Esther 9

On the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, the king's edict was due to be carried out. On that day the enemies of the Jews had hoped to overpower them, but now the opposite happened: the Jews got the upper hand over those who hated them.

The Jews gathered in their cities in all the provinces of King Xerxes to attack those who wanted to destroy them. Nobody could stand against them, because the peoples of all the other nationalities were afraid of them.

And all the nobles of the provinces, the satraps, the governors and the king's officials helped the Jews, because fear of Mordecai had taken hold of them.

Mordecai was powerful in the palace. His reputation spread throughout the provinces, and he became more and more powerful.

The Jews struck down all their enemies with the sword, killing and destroying them, and they did what they pleased to those who hated them.

In the fortress of Susa the Jews killed and destroyed five hundred men.

They also killed Parshandatha, Dalphon, Aspatha,

Poratha, Adalia, Aridatha,

Parmashta, Arisai, Aridai and Vaizatha,

the ten sons of Haman son of Hammedatha, the enemy of the Jews. But they didn't lay their hands on the plunder.

The number killed in the fortress of Susa was reported to the king that same day.

And the king said to Queen Esther, “The Jews have killed and destroyed five hundred men and the ten sons of Haman in the fortress of Susa. What have they done in the rest of the king's provinces? Now what's your petition? It'll be given you. What's your request? It'll be granted.”

“If it please the king,” Esther answered, “let the Jews in Susa be allowed to carry out today's edict tomorrow as well, and let Haman's ten sons be hanged on poles.”

So the king ordered this to be done. An edict was issued in Susa, and they hanged the ten sons of Haman.

The Jews in Susa came together on the fourteenth day of the month of Adar and killed three hundred men in Susa, but they didn't lay their hands on the plunder.

Meanwhile the rest of the Jews in the king's provinces also came together to defend themselves and get relief from their enemies. They killed seventy-five thousand of them, but they didn't lay their hands on the plunder.

This happened on the thirteenth day of the month of Adar, and on the fourteenth they rested and made it a day of feasting and celebration.

But the Jews in Susa had come together on the thirteenth and fourteenth, and then on the fifteenth they rested and made it a day of feasting and celebration.

That's why country Jews, those living in the villages, observe the fourteenth of the month of Adar as a day of celebration and feasting, a holiday for giving presents of food to one another.

Mordecai wrote all this down and sent letters to all the Jews throughout the provinces of King Xerxes, near and far,

to have them celebrate every year the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the month of Adar

as the time when the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month when their sorrow was turned into joy and their mourning into a holiday. He wrote them to observe the days as days of feasting and celebration, giving presents of food to one another and gifts to the poor.

So the Jews agreed to continue what they'd already begun doing, and to do what Mordecai had written to them.

Because Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews to destroy them, and had cast the pur — that is, the lot — for their ruin and destruction.

But when the plot came to the king's attention, he issued written orders that the evil scheme Haman had devised against the Jews should come back onto his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on poles.

That's why these days were called Purim, from the word pur. Because of everything written in this letter, and because of what they'd seen and what had happened to them,

the Jews took it on themselves to establish the custom that they and their descendants and all who joined them should without fail observe these two days every year, in the way prescribed and at the time appointed.

These days should be remembered and observed in every generation, by every family, and in every province and every city. And these days of Purim should never fail to be celebrated by the Jews, and the memory of them should never die out among their descendants.

So Queen Esther, daughter of Abihail, along with Mordecai the Jew, wrote with full authority to confirm this second letter about Purim.

And Mordecai sent letters to all the Jews in the hundred and twenty-seven provinces of the kingdom of Xerxes — words of goodwill and assurance —

to establish these days of Purim at their appointed times, as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had decreed for them, and as they had established for themselves and their descendants in regard to their times of fasting and lamentation.

Esther's decree confirmed these regulations about Purim, and it was written down in the records.