Esther 9
1 The first law that the king had commanded was to be made effective on March 7th. On that day the enemies of the Jews hoped to get rid of them. But instead, on that same day the Jews defeated their enemies.
Now in the twelfth month (that is the month of Adar), on the thirteenth day, when the king’s command and his decree was about to put into execution, on the day that the enemies of the Jews hoped to gain the mastery over them, then the tables were turned so that the Jews had the mastery over those who hated them.
2 Throughout the empire, the Jews gathered together in their cities to attack those who wanted to get rid of them. No one could fight against the Jews, because all the other people in the areas where the Jews lived were afraid of them, [so they did not want to help anyone who attacked the Jews].
The Jews gathered together in the cities throughout all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, to attack anyone who tried to harm them. No one could withstand them, for the fear of them had fallen on all the peoples.
3 All the governors and [other] officials and important people in all the provinces helped the Jews, because they were afraid of Mordecai.
All the princes of the provinces and the satraps and the governors and they who attended to the king’s business, helped the Jews, because the fear of Mordecai had fallen on them.
4 They were afraid of him because in all the provinces [they knew that] Mordecai was now the king’s most important official, [with the authority that Haman previously had]. Mordecai was becoming more famous because [the king was giving him] more and more power.
For Mordecai was great in the king’s palace, and as his power increased his fame spread throughout all the provinces.
5 [On March 7th, ] the Jews attacked and killed with their swords all of their enemies. They did whatever they wanted to do, to the people who hated them.
The Jews put all their enemies to the sword and, with slaughter and destruction, they did what they wanted to those who hated them.
6 [Just] in Susa alone, the capital city, they killed 500 people.
In Susa the capital the Jews killed five hundred people.
7 Among those whom they killed were the ten sons of Haman. [Their names were] Parshandatha, Dalphon, Aspatha,
They killed Parshandatha, Dalphon, Aspatha,
8 Poratha, Adalia, Aridatha,
Poratha, Adalia, Aridatha,
9 Parmashta, Arisai, Aridai, and Vaizatha.
Parmashta, Arisia, Aridai, and Vaizatha,
10 Those were grandsons of Hammedatha and sons of Haman, the enemy of the Jews. The Jews killed them, but they did not take the things that belonged to the people whom they killed.
the ten sons of Haman the son of Hammedatha, the Jews’ enemy; but they did not take any plunder.
11 [At the end of] that day someone reported to the king the number of people whom the Jews killed in Susa.
On that day the number of those who were slain in Susa was brought before the king,
12 Then the king said to Queen Esther, “The Jews have killed 500 people here in Susa, including the ten sons of Haman! [So I think that] they must have killed many more people in the rest of my empire [RHQ]! [But okay], now what else do you want me to do for you. You tell me, and I will do it.”
and the king said to Queen Esther, ‘The Jews have slain five hundred people in Susa, and the ten sons of Haman. What then have they done in the rest of the king’s provinces! Now what is your petition? It will be granted to you. What is your request? It will be done.’
13 Esther replied, “If it pleases you, allow the Jews here in Susa to do again tomorrow what [you] commanded [them] to do today. And command that the bodies of Haman’s ten sons be hanged on the gallows/poles.”
‘If it please the king,’ Esther said, ‘let it be granted to the Jews who are in Susa to do tomorrow also according to this day’s decree. Let the bodies of Haman’s ten sons be hanged on the gallows.’
14 So the king commanded that the Jews be permitted to kill more of their enemies the next day. After he issued [another] order in Susa, the bodies of Haman’s ten sons were hanged.
And the king commanded it to be done. A decree was given out in Susa and they hung the bodies of Haman’s ten sons on the gallows.
15 On the next day, the Jews in Susa gathered together and killed 300 more people. But [again, ] they did not take the things that belonged to the people whom they killed.
The Jews who were in Susa gathered themselves together again on the fourteenth day of the month of Adar. They killed three hundred people in Susa. But they did not take any plunder.
16 That happened on March 8th. On the following day, the Jews [in Susa] rested and celebrated. In all the other provinces, the Jewish people gathered together to defend themselves, and they killed 75,000 people who hated them, but [again] they did not take the things that belonged to the people whom they killed.
And the other Jews who were in the king’s provinces gathered themselves together and fought for their lives and overcame their enemies. They killed seventy-five thousand who hated them. But they did not take any plunder.
17 That occurred on March 7th, and on the following day they rested and celebrated.
This was on the thirteenth day of Adar. On the fourteenth day of the month Adar the Jews rested and made it a day of feasting and rejoicing.
18 After the Jews in Susa gathered together [and killed their enemies] on March 7th and 8th, they rested and celebrated on March 9th.
(But the Jews in Susa gathered on both the thirteenth and fourteenth day – and rested on the fifteenth day of the same month and made it a day of feasting and rejoicing.)
19 That is why [every year], on March 8th, the Jews who live in villages now celebrate [defeating their enemies]. They have feasts and give gifts [of food] to each other.
This is why the Jews who live in the country villages keep the fourteenth day of the month of Adar as a day of rejoicing and feasting and a holiday, and a day in which they send gifts of food to each other.
20 Mordecai wrote down all the things that had happened. Then he sent letters to the Jews who lived throughout the empire of King Xerxes.
Mordecai had these things recorded. He sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the provinces of the King Ahasuerus, both near and far.
21 He told them that every year they should celebrate on the 8th and 9th of March,
He told them to keep the fourteenth day of the month of Adar and also the fifteenth day every year,
22 because those were the days when the Jews got rid of their enemies. He also told them that they should celebrate on those days by feasting and giving gifts [of food] to each other and to poor people. They would remember it as the month in which they changed from being very sorrowful to being very joyful, from crying to celebrating.
as the days on which the Jews had rest from their enemies, and the month which was turned from sorrow to gladness and from mourning into a feast day. They should make them days of feasting and gladness and of sending gifts of food to each other and of gifts to the poor.
23 So the Jews agreed to do what Mordecai wrote. They agreed to celebrate on those days [every year].
So what the Jews had begun to do they adopted as a custom, just as Mordecai had written to them.
24 They would remember how Haman, son of Hammedatha, a descendant of [King] Agag, became an enemy of all the Jews. [They would remember] how he had made an evil plan to kill the Jews, and that he had (cast lots/thrown small marked stones) to choose the day to kill [DOU] them.
For Haman the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted to destroy them. He had cast “Pur”, that is the lot, intending to consume them and to destroy them.
25 [They would remember] that when Esther told the king about Haman’s plan, the king arranged that the evil plan that Haman had made to kill the Jews would fail, and that he [would be killed] instead of the Jews, and that Haman and that his sons were hanged.
But when the matter came before the king, he gave written orders that his wicked plot, which he had planned against the Jews, should come upon his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows.
26 [Because the (lot/small marked stone) that Haman threw was called] Pur, the Jews called these days Purim. And, because of everything that ([Mordecai] wrote/was written) in that letter, and because of all that happened to them,
This is why these days are called Purim, after the word Pur. Therefore because of all the words of this letter, as well as all they had seen, and all they had experienced,
27 the Jews [throughout the empire] agreed to celebrate in that manner on those two days every year. They said that they would tell their descendants and those people who became Jews to be certain to celebrate this festival every year. They should celebrate just as [Mordecai] told them to do [in the letter] that he wrote.
the Jews established and made it a custom for them, for their descendants, and for all who should join them, so that it might not be repealed, that they should continue to observe these two days as feasts each year,
28 They said that they would remember and celebrate on those two days every year, in each family, in every city, and in every province. They solemnly declared that they and their descendants would never stop remembering and celebrating those days called Purim.
and that these days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation, every family, every province, and every city. And these days of Purim should not pass away from among the Jews nor the remembrance of them disappear among their descendants.
29 Then Mordecai and Queen Esther, who was the daughter of Abihail, wrote a second letter about the Purim feast. Esther used the authority that she had because of being the queen to confirm that what Mordecai had written in the first letter was true.
Queen Esther, the daughter of Abihail, gave Mordecai the Jew all authority in writing to confirm this second letter of Purim.
30 What they wrote [in the second letter] was, “We wish that all of you will be living peacefully and safely/righteously. We want you and your descendants to celebrate Purim each year on the days that we two established, and to do the things that we two told you to do.” In that letter, Queen Esther and Mordecai also gave them instructions about (fasting/abstaining from eating food) and being sorrowful. Then copies of that letter were sent to all the Jews who were living in the 127 provinces of the empire.
He sent letters to all the Jews, to the hundred and twenty-seven provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus, wishing them peace and security,
to confirm these days of Purim in their proper times, to be observed as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had directed and as the Jews had proscribed for themselves and their descendants, in the matter of the fastings and their cry of lamentation.
32 The letter that Esther wrote about the manner in which they should celebrate the Purim feast was also written in an official record.
And the commands of Esther confirmed these matters of Purim; and it was written in the records.
