Esther 6:1 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

The book of records of the chronicles— In these diaries, which we now call journals, wherein was set down what passed every day, the manner of the Persians was, to record the names of those who had done the king any signal services. Accordingly, Josephus informs us, that, upon the secretary's reading these journals, he took notice of such a person who had great honours and possessions given him as a reward for a glorious and remarkable action, and of such another who made his fortune by the bounties of his prince for his fidelity; but that, when he came to the particular history of the conspiracy of the two eunuchs against the person of the king, and of the discovery of this treason by Mordecai, the secretary read it over, and was passing forward to the next; when the king stopped him, and asked whether that person had any reward given him for his service: which shews, indeed, a singular providence of God, that the secretary should read in that very part of the book wherein the service of Mor-decai was recorded. Why Mordecai was not rewarded before, it is in vain to enquire. We see daily, even among us, that great men are frequently unmindful of the highest services which are done them, and take no care to reward them, especially if the person be in himself obscure, and not supported by a proper recommendation; and therefore we are not to wonder, if a prince who buried himself in indolence, and made it a part of his grandeur to live unacquainted and unconcerned with what passed in his dominions, (which was the custom of most eastern kings,) should overlook the service that Mordecai had done him; or, that if he ordered him a reward, yet by the artifice of those at court, who were no well-wishers to the Jews, Mordecai might be disappointed of it. There seems, however, to have been a particular direction of Providence in having his reward delayed till this time, when he and all his nation were appointed to destruction, when the remembrance of his services might be a means to recommend them to the king's mercy, and the honours conferred on him be a poignant mortification to his proud adversary.