“It’s almost like she’s just ever present in the 17th century Netherlands,” said Abigail Rapoport, the curator of Judaica at the Jewish Museum in Manhattan. Esther, whose name shares a ...

Queen Esther was a figure of inspiration to Jews who had fled from oppressive regimes. In the Netherlands, she became a ...

imagining the heroic Queen Esther as their own, as a young woman who gave voice to the voiceless at the risk of her safety,” ...

curated by Abigail Rapoport. Rembrandt’s “Jewish Heroine from the Hebrew Bible,” the central painting, was completed when the artist was 27. While the identification with Esther is not entirely ...