“So on the seventh day when the king was very festive, and after he had drunk too much and grown heated from the wine, he ordered Mehuman, and Biztha, and Harbona, and Bigtha, and Abigtha, and Zethar, and Carcas, the seven eunuchs who ministered in his presence, to bring in Queen Vashti before the king once the diadem had been placed upon her head, so that he could show off her beauty to all the peoples and officials; for she was very beautiful. But she refused, and disdained to come at the king’s command.” The seventh day of the feast symbolizes the beauty of the time when the Lord incarnate clarified in his abundant grace all the mysteries of the Law and the prophets upon which the pious minds of devout men had been feeding till then. It is about this completion that Paul writes to the Galatians when he says: “And when the time was completed, God sent his own son made from a woman so that he might redeem those who were under the Law, so that we might receive the adoption given to children. Because you are the children of God, God has sent the spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying: ‘Abba! Father (Galatians 4)!’” And it is well said that after drinking too much he had grown heated from the wine, because he poured into his disciples, through the arrival of the Paraclete, abundant grace through the gift of the Holy Spirit. We read about this wine in the Acts of the Apostles that when, in the Cenacle of Zion, the Holy Spirit settled upon one hundred and twenty believers and the Jews thought that they were full of new wine, Peter answered them with: “Brothers, despite what you think these men are sober, since it is the third hour of the day. But this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ‘And it will be in the last days, says the Lord, that I will pour out from my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters will prophesy; and your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams. And I will indeed pour out from my spirit in those days upon my servants and my maids, and they will prophesy; and I will show marvels in the heavens above, and signs on the earth below (Acts 2).’” When, during the allegorical wedding in the Gospel, the chief steward tastes the sweetness of the wine, he says to the groom: “Every man serves the good wine first, and once they have become drunk he serves the inferior stuff. But you have saved the good wine till now.” So the king in his happiness ordered the seven eunuchs who ministered in his presence to bring in Queen Vashti before the king once the diadem had been placed upon her head, so that he could show off her beauty to all the peoples. And in the same way, our Redeemer Christ (i.e. the Lord) directed the order of the aforementioned saints, which was full of the grace of the sevenfold Holy Spirit, to assemble the Jewish people at a spiritual feast, so that its beauty and nobility— which it had as a privilege of its ancestors, and because of its knowledge of the Law and the prophets and its cultivation of righteousness (for which it was better known than the other nations before the coming of the Lord)—would be known to the peoples of the entire world. But she disdained to come, not only showing her contempt for the emissaries but even rejecting the authority of the supreme king. Of course, the Lord himself referred to this in the Gospel parables, when he explained that it was the mercy of the righteous father toward his wasteful but penitent son, whom he took into his home, that led him to sacrifice a calf and hold a feast which his older son refused to attend even though his father had summoned him from town. And elsewhere we read about the men who—occupied with their pursuit of other things—did not want to come to the wedding which the king had prepared for his son, or to the great meal which, it is written, a certain man had prepared and to which he had invited many people. It was, we are told, because of this that the head of the household—who had every right to feel indignant—turned away even men of the highest rank and substituted others in their place. Hence the older son, and the ancient people of the Synagogue who are represented in the person of Queen Vashti, refused to leave their dwelling, i.e. to be parted from the letter of the Law, but were rather content to live by their own judgment which they would exercise for the satisfaction of their earthly desires. They were exiled far from the homeland of the Holy Spirit and the counsel of the Father, forever brittle and hard, full of rancor and indignation; they are the one who says: “I have bought a field, and I need to go out and see it; I ask you to excuse me” (Luke 14). The one who purchases five yoke of oxen is weighed down by the burden of the Law while enjoying the pleasures of our earthly senses; the one who has gotten married and cannot come to the wedding, and having been made flesh can never be one with the spirit—the character of this man is much like that of the workers in the parable in which they are sent to the vineyard at the first, the third, the sixth, and the ninth hour, i.e. they were hired at different times. So they are indignant that the workers hired at the eleventh hour are being paid the same amount as they are.
The seventh day of the banquet signifies the beauty of the time in which the incarnate Lord manifested with more abundant grace all the mysteries of the law and the prophets on which the pious minds of the faithful had until then pastured. And writing about that fullness to the Galatians, the apostle Paul says, “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba Father.’ ”
[AD 856] Rabanus Maurus on Esther 1:10-12