Nathaniel Hawthorne's romantic novel, The Scarlet Letter, is riddled with biblical references and connections. But most of these have been analyzed and discussed until they are beaten into the dust. One correlation, however, does not enter the limelight as often as these others do, as stated by Matthew Gartner in his critical essay, “The Scarlet Letter and the Book of Esther: Scriptural Letter and Narrative Life.” Gartner maintains that the Book of Esther “serves as a sort of sunken groundwork or hidden scaffolding for Hawthorne's tale…. Major parallels include a central plot episode…, analogies between the principal characters, and thematic congruencies” (Gartner).
The central plot episode occurs when Hester visits Governor Bellingham's mansion to plead for the right to retain custody of her daughter, Pearl. She is a young woman entering the lavish residence of a powerful man, and she does not know whether her sojourn will be for good or ill. In the same way, Esther enters the palace of King Ahasuerus uncertain if her visit will bring tragedy or fortune. Her visit brings fortune; she is named queen, and, later in the story, she pleads with the king for the safety of her people, the Jews, just as Hester pleads for Pearl. “Esther receives the clemency of the king, who promises to grant any request she makes…Hester, appealing to Bellingham as to a king…also has her request granted” (Gartner). Adding imagery to the plotline, Bellingham's mansion is described as “Aladdin's palace” (Hawthorne), and lends a Middle Eastern semblance to the vision of the mansion; in the imagination it resembles the palace of a Middle Eastern ruler such as King Ahasuerus who ruled “from India to Ethiopia” (Esther 1:1). This scene of Hester visiting the governor's mansion demonstrates one of the connections between the two books.
Striking similarities between Esther and Hester also serve to link The Scarlet Letter and the Book of Esther. Perhaps the most obvious connection is the similarity in name. Hester is Esther with the “H” relocated to the beginning of the appellation. Gartner also emphasizes the similarities between the marital relationships of both women. Hester is married to Chillingworth, whom she does not love. In the prison, Chillingworth says to Hester, “I betrayed thy budding youth into a false and unnatural relation with my decay” (Hawthorne). In this passage, Chillingworth indicates that he is a great deal older than Hester. “Esther too has been brought into a "false and unnatural relation" with the much older Ahasuerus; she is first brought into his harem and then made his wife” (Gartner). While Hester clearly shows the greatest resemblance to Queen Esther, her public disgrace at the beginning of The Scarlet Letter reveals a parallelism to Esther's predecessor, Queen Vashti:
[L]et an irrevocable decree be issued by [King Ahasuerus] and inscribed among the laws of the Persians and Medes, forbidding Vashti to come into the presence of King Ahasuerus and authorizing the king to give her royal dignity to one more worthy than she….[T]he decree which the king will issue [will be] published throughout the land. (Esther 1:19-20).
In this way, Vashti is publicly humiliated and deposed; all peoples in the land learn of her disgrace. Hester stands on the scaffold for three hours and endures the malevolent gaze of the townspeople as a collective whole; everyone knows her disgrace as well.
Mordecai is Esther's cousin; he is reincarnated as Mr. Dimmesdale in The Scarlet Letter. Gartner depicts Mordecai as “the timid man of God.” Dimmesdale, as a minister, is also a “man of God”; he is also frail and weak, traits Hawthorne ascribes to Dimmesdale in several places: “[T]he health of Mr. Dimmesdale had evidently begun to fail…with every successive Sabbath, his cheek was paler and thinner, and his voice more tremulous than before…thus suffering under bodily disease and tortured by some black trouble of the soul….” Insofar as Mordecai is represented by Dimmesdale, “Hawthorne seems to imagine Mordecai as a weak figure who looks helplessly on as the woman he cares for is made to endure a long ordeal of shame, solitude, and isolation” (Gartner). Mordecai observes Esther in Ahasuelus's harem, but is unable to intervene on her behalf. In contrast, Dimmesdale has the ability to join Hester and alleviate some of her suffering by offering companionship, but out of cowardice is unable to do so for seven years. Gartner's comparison of Mordecai and Dimmesdale is solid except for one discrepancy: Gartner maintains that Esther and Mordecai are lovers. This would match the relationship between Hester and Dimmesdale; however, the Bible states that Mordecai takes Esther as his daughter and has no sexual relationship with her. Considering the Bible as an historical text, it is safe to say that Gartner is wrong in this area.
