When Klal Yisroel were victorious over Haman, they established the fourteenth of Adar as a day of festivity. Two pasukim in the Megillah relate how Purim was established as a day of celebration.
“Therefore, Jewish villagers who live in unwalled towns celebrate the fourteenth of the month of Adar, making it a day of gladness, feasting, and festival, and for sending delicacies to one another” (Esther 9:19).
“Charging them to observe annually the fourteenth day of the month of Adar and the fifteenth day. As the days on which the Jews gained relief from their enemies, and the month that had been turned about for them from one of sorrow to gladness and from mourning to festival; to observe them as days of feasting and gladness, and sending delicacies to one another, and gifts to the poor” (Esther 10:21-22).
There is a discrepancy in the way the Megillah describes the celebration in these pasukim. In pasuk 19, we read that they made Purim a day of שמחה ומשתה ויום טוב, a day of gladness, feasting meals and festival. However, in pasuk 21, the pasuk mentions only that Purim is celebrated as ימי משתה ושמחה, the fact that it is a Yom Tov is conspicuously absent?
The Gemara in Megillah (5b) addresses the inconsistency between the pasukim, and explains the practical ramifications of each description of the celebration. Purim as a day of simcha implies that one is not permitted to offer a eulogy then. As a day of mishteh, one would be required to partake of a festive meal, and fasting would be prohibited. Establishing Purim as a Yom Tov would prohibit the performance of melachah on that day.
The Gemara teaches that the first pasuk, which uses the phrase “Yom Tov,” is telling us that Mordechai’s place was to create a day of festivity on which not only would one not be allowed to eulogize and fast, but melachah would be forbidden as well. In actuality, when the festival was formally legislated and established as a day of celebration, the Jewish people were not willing to accept it as a Yom Tov. Mordechai was compelled to revise his plans, and the prohibition for melachah, establishing Purim’s status as Yom Tov, was not enacted.
This is quite surprising. Why wouldn’t the Jewish people want another Yom Tov on the calendar? Why didn’t they accept Mordechai’s attempt to establish Purim as a day on which melachah is forbidden?
Rav Yitzchok Hutner offers an incredible explanation as to why the Jews were reluctant to accept Purim as a Yom Tov. Had Klal Yisroel accepted Purim as a Yom Tov, as mentioned, it would have been forbidden to do melachah, as on all Yomim Tovim. Then, at the conclusion of Purim, we would have been required to make havdolah in order to permit the performance of melachah.
Klal Yisroel could not accept having to bring themselves to make havdolah after Purim. Formally ending Purim with havdolah, separating from Purim, was so objectionable that they could not accept Purim as a Yom Tov. The Jews felt such a close connection to Purim that they were unwilling to embrace Purim as a day of prohibited melachah from which they would have to take leave.
