Call Me Back - with Dan Senor Purim and Destiny - with Rachel Goldberg Polin
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Feb 26, 2026 Rachel Goldberg Polin, a teacher and commentator on Jewish tradition, offers a lively take on Purim as a meditation on hiddenness, courage, and moral choice. She walks through the Book of Esther, the Persian setting, irony and reversals, the absence of God in the story, masks and mitzvot, and how to recognize and act on your own “For such a time as this” moments.
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Purim's Deeper Philosophy
- Purim's surface fun masks a deeper philosophical message about hiddenness, courage, and purpose.
- Rachel Goldberg-Polin argues Purim teaches that apparent randomness conceals meaning and invites us to seek our role in larger plans.
Mordechai Overhears The Assassination Plot
- Esther becomes queen after a Persian beauty-selection while Mordechai overhears an assassination plot and alerts her.
- That rescue is recorded in the king's annals years later and later redeems Mordechai when Ahasuerus has insomnia and reads it.
Haman's Antisemitism As Archetype
- Haman, descended from Amalek, weaponizes identity by claiming Jews are 'in our midst but not like us' to justify annihilation.
- Rachel links that rhetoric to the perennial logic of antisemitism across history.