Ahasuerus' Court: Esther 1:10, 14 according to the First Targum to Esther

The fixing of the literary form of the Bible did not put an end to its development. In the Targumim to the Book of Esther, the frame of the literal translation is embellished by additions of considerable length, some related to rabbinic midrashim and the Talmud, but with no apparent basis in the Hebrew original. This article examines two verses in the First Targum to Esther that are considerably expanded vis-à-vis the Hebrew original and also diverge in content, and tries to explain the working of the midrashic mind behind the Targum, and the rabbinic sources it employed.