Puppets Enhance the Story of Purim

The story of Queen Esther, the Jewish holiday of Purim, is a favorite Bible story of both Jewish and Christian little girls who see the beauty queen turned heroine as an exciting role model.

Adding to the story is a set of five biblical Purim puppets--handmade action figures—that capture the fanciful spirit of Purim, which begins this year on Thursday, March 8. The five hand puppets, created by Lesley Frost of Morris Township, represent each of the five characters in the Purim story--Queen Esther, Mordechai, Queen Vashti, King Ahasuerus, and the evil royal advisor, Haman. Frost's Purim puppets are featured in the new book "Jewish Threads: A Hands-On Guide to Stitching Spiritual Intention into Jewish Fabric Crafts" (Jewish Lights Publishing, 288 pp.), compiled and written by Diana Drew with Robert Grayson.

Purim commemorates the story of Queen Esther, who saved the Jewish people from the evil Haman in Persia around the fifth century BCE. Persian King Ahasuerus issued a decree that all the Jewish people in Persia be killed. But it was actually his close adviser, Haman, who wanted the Jewish people annihilated. When the beautiful Queen Esther, who was Jewish, got word of the decree, she convinced the king to rescind the order. The king went a step further and ordered Haman killed.

When her children were young, Frost created the Purim hand puppets as a mitzvah project for her synagogue's Hebrew school. "My idea was to create fabric hand puppets that a mother and child could make together and then play with to reenact biblical events and stories," she notes. A native of the UK and a teacher, the fabric artist believed that children learn by doing. So she designed these puppets as a hands-on way to teach her son and daughter about the action-filled Purim story.

"Jewish Threads" spotlights 30 handmade crafts by artisans from throughout the United States and Israel. The varied projects included in the book--most fairly simple to make--were chosen because they reflected deep-rooted connections to Jewish heritage and contemporary Jewish life. Each project had to have a compelling story behind its creation, and fit in with the overall concept of the book as both a volume of stories about artisans' spiritual intention in making these crafts and a how-to book for novices as well as more experienced needlecrafters.

Speaking about the book, in which Frost's Purim puppets are spotlighted, author Diana Drew says, " 'Jewish Threads' brings together the disparate threads of my own life--Judaism and Jewish observance, sewing and knitting, writing and editing--while stitching together the inspiring stories of fabric artists from throughout the United States and Israel. Collectively, these personal stories, and the projects that spring from them, form a patchwork of modern-day Jewish life. The part introductions, written by Robert Grayson, place these crafts in historical perspective, with tales from the Jewish tradition that give these fabric crafts added resonance today."

"Jewish Threads" is available at major bookstores and online.