(RNS) — As luck would have it, the outbreak of war between the United States, Israel and Iran took place shortly before the Jewish holiday of Purim. One consequence is, in Israel at least, what is usually a festive day of revelry and foolishness will instead be spent in bomb shelters.

But the coincidence is also a generative one, as the themes of Purim, which this year begins at sundown Monday (March 2), resonate all too well with this latest chapter in the second Trump administration — and even offer a kind of comfort.

At least on its surface, Purim is a cynical satire on political folly. The impulsive King Ahasuerus (perhaps based on the historical Persian monarch Xerxes) throws multi-day banquets where he is flattered by those in search of power. He has a harem of beautiful young women and demands that they obey his every command. And he has a sinister adviser, Haman the Agagite, who seeks to incite mass violence against the Jews of Persia because one Jew, Mordechai, offended him.

Ultimately, Haman’s plot is foiled when the young Queen Esther, who had hidden her Jewishness, confronts him in front of the king. There is a quick reversal of fortune: Haman and his sons are hanged, and the Jews slaughter their enemies instead of the other way around. Hooray!

It’s no coincidence the holiday is called Purim, which literally means “lottery.” In the narrow sense, that refers to the casting of lots to decide the day on which the massacre of the Jews was to take place. But more broadly, it refers to the (seemingly) random twists and turns that shape history.

This is not a story of destiny, or the triumph of good over evil. It is a story of luck. God’s name does not appear in it. While there are mystical readings of Purim that perceive the hand of God operating invisibly behind the scenes, on the surface at least, God is absent, and everything is a matter of chance.

The parallels to our own political moment are inescapable. The U.S. is ruled by an impulsive, narcissistic leader who seeks, and sometimes wields, absolute power — in this case by attacking the territory formerly known as Persia without legal authority or much of a factual pretext. Like Ahasuerus, he is surrounded by sycophants, opportunists and political connivers with their own agendas and interests. He is, it seems, easily flattered and freely uses his public office to enrich himself and his family. And, like Ahasuerus, he has made no secret of his love of women “on the younger side,” though his viziers at the Department of Justice have reportedly withheld from the public Epstein files that describe specific allegations against him.

How can any of this be comforting?

One of the most challenging aspects of Donald Trump’s presidency, for liberals and conservatives alike, is how unprecedented it seems to be. The word “unprecedented” itself feels like a cliché, drained of meaning by its overuse. Our president is a convicted felon (for fraud, appropriately) who defies court orders, lies wildly about election results and is now seeking to prevent the 2026 midterm elections from proceeding fairly. There is no precedent for the level of corruption of Trump’s family — no previous administration even comes close. And his agents have brazenly flouted constitutional norms, murdered Americans on the street, slashed programs that Congress has demanded to fund and hung giant, fascist-like banners of the president on government buildings. 

Yet, the story of Purim reminds us that however unprecedented all of this is, it is also quite familiar. A story set in the sixth-century B.C. features characters who seem ripped from last week’s headlines — the adviser who whips up xenophobia, the impulsive and omnipotent king, the fawning subordinates. And I haven’t even gotten to the part where another of the king’s wives is put to death because she refuses to dance naked at one of the king’s lavish parties.

I think this is a profound point. Often, the Bible is read as a pious chronicle of righteous men who speak in thees and thous. But in reality, the Bible is keenly aware of the march of human folly. The righteous often suffer. The stupid often prevail. Ahasuerus is hardly the only monarch depicted by the Bible as boorish, foolish and corrupt. So are many of the Kings of Israel and Judea, not to mention Pharaoh and, in the New Testament, Herod. Even King David sent Uriah to die in war so that he could marry his wife, Batsheva. Rulers with impeccable ethics are the exception, not the rule. Power corrupts.

Yet, amid all the nihilism of Ahasuerus’ court, Esther demonstrates heroism, not cynicism. Surrounded by amoral leaders, she acts with morality. While others fight for their own advancement, she risks everything to save innocent lives. Her heroism is defined by her context, and like Esther, we are called to act ethically in a world often governed by the least ethical among us.

It is not new to be ruled over by demagogues who incite hatred or tyrants who are swayed by them. On the contrary, human civilization has been here many times before, and power is almost always like this. Despairing over the “unprecedented” nature of our current political moment? Turn to the scroll of Esther and read — and take inspiration from her example.

(Rabbi Jay Michaelson is a visiting researcher at Harvard Law School who writes the weekly Substack newsletter “Both/And with Jay Michaelson.” The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.)