Readers and scholars often question the inclusion of the ""Book of Esther"" in the canon. Where, they wonder, do the book's flagrant displays of hatred, deceit, violence, and the antidotal grotesqueries of Purim figure in the biblical tradition? Such confusion, this book tells us, arises from a wrong appraisal of Esther's literary genre.

André LaCocque is emeritus professor of Hebrew Scriptures at the Chicago Theological Seminary and emeritus director of its doctoral Center for Jewish-Christian Studies. He is the author, with Paul Ricoeur, of Thinking Biblically.