Adar

Adar names three different things in Scripture, grouped under one heading: the twelfth month of the Jewish calendar, a son of Bela in the tribe of Benjamin, and a place on the southern boundary of Canaan. The month is by far the dominant referent. Adar carries the rebuilt temple's completion under Darius and, a few generations later, the deliverance of the Jews under Ahasuerus that became Purim — the same calendar slot that, in 1 Maccabees, marks the defeat of Nicanor. The personal name and the place name share the Hebrew spelling but appear in UPDV as "Addar."

The Twelfth Month

Adar is the last month of the religious year, the counterpart to the first month Nisan. The book of Esther fixes the contrast in a single verse: "In the first month, which is the month Nisan, in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they cast Pur, that is, the lot, before Haman from day to day, and from month to month, [to] the twelfth [month], which is the month Adar" (Es 3:7). The lot points the threat eleven months out, so the deliverance year runs from Nisan to Adar across the whole calendar.

Esther's intermediate decree is dated to the third month: "Then the king's scribes were called at that time, in the third month Sivan, on the three and twentieth [day] of it" (Es 8:9). The reversal letters travel out from Sivan and aim at the same fixed day in Adar that Haman's first edict had named.

The Temple Finished in Adar

For the post-exilic community, Adar is also the month the second temple came to completion: "And this house was finished on the twenty-third day of the month Adar, which was in the sixth year of the reign of Darius the king" (Ezr 6:15). The same month that, in Esther, sits at the far end of Haman's lot becomes, in Ezra, the date a finished house of Yahweh stands in Jerusalem.

Pur, the Decree, and the Reversal

The threat against the Jews is bound to Adar from the start. The royal edict Haman drafts names the day: "And letters were sent by posts into all the king's provinces, to destroy, to slay, and to cause to perish, all Jews, both young and old, little children and women, in one day, even on the thirteenth [day] of the twelfth month, which is the month Adar, and to take the spoil of them for a prey" (Es 3:13). Mordecai's counter-instructions reach the same calendar mark: the king's letter is to be in force "on one day in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, [namely], on the thirteenth [day] of the twelfth month, which is the month Adar" (Es 8:12).

Esther's posture before the king is what makes the reversal possible. To Mordecai she answers, "Go, gather together all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast⁺ for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day: I also and my maidens will fast in like manner; and so I will go in to the king, which is not according to the law: and if I perish, I perish" (Es 4:16). And before that, Mordecai's challenge holds the date in view: "who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" (Es 4:14).

When Adar 13 finally arrives, the day is described as inverted: "Now in the twelfth month, which is the month Adar, on the thirteenth day of the same, when the king's commandment and his decree drew near to be put in execution, on the day that the enemies of the Jews hoped to have rule over them (whereas it was turned to the contrary, that the Jews had rule over those who hated them)" (Es 9:1).

Purim — Adar 14

The day of fighting becomes the eve of a feast: "[This was done] on the thirteenth day of the month Adar; and on the fourteenth day of the same they rested, and made it a day of feasting and gladness" (Es 9:17). Mordecai's circular letter to the provinces fixes the institution: "as the days in which the Jews had rest from their enemies, and the month which was turned to them from sorrow to gladness, and from mourning into a good day; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, and of sending portions one to another, and gifts to the poor" (Es 9:22). The naming follows the lot Haman cast: "Therefore they called these days Purim, after the name of Pur" (Es 9:26).

Adar 13 in 1 Maccabees — The Day of Nicanor

The same date carries a second deliverance in 1 Maccabees. After the defeat of Nicanor, the day is decreed a yearly remembrance: "And the armies joined battle on the thirteenth day of the month Adar: and the army of Nicanor was defeated, and he himself was first slain in the battle" (1Ma 7:43). The instituting word follows: "And he ordained that this day should be kept every year, being the thirteenth of the month of Adar" (1Ma 7:49). Adar 13 thus stands in the canon of memorial days twice — once as the eve of Purim, once as the Day of Nicanor.

Addar, Son of Bela

The Benjaminite genealogy lists "Addar" under the heading ADAR: "And Bela had sons: Addar, and Gera, and Abihud" (1Ch 8:3). UPDV preserves the doubled-d spelling for the personal name, distinguishing him in English orthography from the month.

Addar, on the Southern Boundary

The third sense of ADAR is a boundary point on the southern edge of Canaan, also called Hazar-addar. Numbers traces the line eastward: "and your⁺ border will turn about southward of the ascent of Akrabbim, and pass along to Zin; and the goings out of it will be southward of Kadesh-barnea; and it will go forth to Hazar-addar, and pass along to Azmon" (Nu 34:4). Joshua's allotment to Judah names the same point in shortened form: "and it went out southward of the ascent of Akrabbim, and passed along to Zin, and went up by the south of Kadesh-barnea, and passed along by Hezron, and went up to Addar, and turned about to Karka" (Jos 15:3). The two verses fix Addar somewhere between Kadesh-barnea and Azmon on the line that separated Canaan, and later Judah's tribal allotment, from the wilderness to the south.