Musar על מגילה 37:13

Perhaps the four expressions of joy mentioned in our verse have a bearing on the disagreement between four scholars as to from where one starts reading the מגילה in order to have fulfilled one's duty. The opinions range from the requirement to start at the beginning, in order to demonstrate the full extent of Ahasverus's power, and an opinion that we must only read from the paragraph describing the night the king could not sleep and had the book of Chronicles read before him, i.e. the description of Mordechai saving his life. It is quite unlikely that the reason a scholar demands that the מגילה be read from start to finish is to enhance the reputation of Ahasverus. The exact wording in the Talmud is תוקפו של אחשורש. I do not think we err if we understand this to mean that the whole era of Ahasverus was one during which Jews accepted the Torah voluntarily. Since the Talmud indulges in a variety of attempts to prove that all that happened was alluded to in various hints in the Torah thousands of years previously, such exegesis is not far fetched. I have listed some of these allusions in my treatise on פרשת שקלים.

In Megillah 19 we find an argument as to how much of the Megillah has to be read. Four views are mentioned as we have already stated earlier. The views are based on whether תקפו של אחשורוש, or תקפו של מרדכי, or תקפו של המן, or תקפו של נס i.e. the power of Ahasverus, Haman, Mordechai or the extent of the miracle, determines from which point the story has to be read in order to fulfil the commandment. The view mentioned last, that of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, states that the extent of the miracle is what determines from which part of the Megillah one has to start reading. Why would his colleagues of the Mishnah disagree with such a viewpoint?