I don’t know about you, but over the past week my social media feeds have been overflowing with Purim costumes. Friends, grandchildren, neighbors — all smiling, posing, proudly showing off superheroes, queens, clowns, and every imaginable creative invention.

I must confess something: I’ve never really been a costume person.

Even when our children were young, dressing up just wasn’t their thing. Both were absolutely terrified of clowns. I’m almost certain they may have been the only children in the history of Disneyland who made a deliberate effort to avoid Mickey and the entire cast of costumed characters. So Purim in our house was meaningful and festive — but not especially theatrical.

Still, watching everyone else embrace the fun has made me curious. What is it about costumes that people love so much? And how did dressing up become such a central feature of Purim in the first place?

Here’s something that might be surprising to some: costumes are actually a relatively late addition to the Purim story. They don’t appear in the Book of Esther, the Mishnah, or the Talmud. The practice seems to have emerged in medieval Ashkenaz — Germany and northern France — and only gradually became widespread.

By the 15th century, Rabbi Judah Mintz was already discussing whether men and women could wear each........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)