1 So the king and Haman went in to drink with the queen. 2 And the second day, as they were drinking wine, the king said, "What is it, Queen Esther? What is your petition and what is your request? It shall be granted to you, even to half of my kingdom." 3 She answered and said, "If I have found favor with the king, let my life be granted me at my petition, and my people at my request. 4 For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, plundered, and made slaves--we and our children--male and female slaves. This has come to my knowledge. Our antagonist brings shame on 1 the king's court." 5 Then the king said, "Who is the person that would dare to do this thing?" 6 Esther said, "Our enemy is this evil man Haman!" At this, Haman was terrified in the presence of the king and queen.
7 The king rose from the banquet and went into the garden, and Haman began to beg for his life from the queen, for he saw that he was in serious trouble. 8 When the king returned from the garden, Haman had thrown himself on the couch, pleading with the queen. The king said, "Will he dare even assault my wife in my own house?" Haman, when he heard, turned away his face. 9 Then Bugathan, one of the eunuchs, said to the king, "Look, Haman has even prepared a gallows for Mordecai, who gave information of concern to the king; it is standing at Haman's house, a gallows fifty cubits high." So the king said, "Let Haman be hanged on that." 10 So Haman was hanged on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. With that the anger of the king abated.
1 On that very day King Artaxerxes granted to Esther all the property of the persecutor 2 Haman. Mordecai was summoned by the king, for Esther had told the king 3 that he was related to her. 2 The king took the ring that had been taken from Haman, and gave it to Mordecai; and Esther set Mordecai over everything that had been Haman's.
3 Then she spoke once again to the king and, falling at his feet, she asked him to avert all the evil that Haman had planned against the Jews. 4 The king extended his golden scepter to Esther, and she rose and stood before the king. 5 Esther said, "If it pleases you, and if I have found favor, let an order be sent rescinding the letters that Haman wrote and sent to destroy the Jews in your kingdom. 6 How can I look on the ruin of my people? How can I be safe if my ancestral nation 4 is destroyed?" 7 The king said to Esther, "Now that I 5 have granted all of Haman's property to you and have hanged him on a tree because he acted against the Jews, what else do you request? 8 Write in my name what you think best and seal it with my ring; for whatever is written at the king's command and sealed with my ring cannot be contravened."
9
The secretaries were summoned on the twenty-third day of the first month, that is, Nisan, in the same year; and all that he commanded with respect to the Jews was given in writing to the administrators and governors of the provinces from India to Ethiopia, one hundred twenty-seven provinces, to each province in its own language.
10
The edict was written 6 with the king's authority and sealed with his ring, and sent out by couriers.
11
He ordered the Jews in every city to observe their own laws, to defend themselves, and to act as they wished against their opponents and enemies
12
on a certain day, the thirteenth of the twelfth month, which is Adar, throughout all the kingdom of Artaxerxes.
1 "Let copies of the decree be posted conspicuously in all the kingdom, and let all the Jews be ready on that day to fight against their enemies."
14 So the messengers on horseback set out with all speed to perform what the king had commanded; and the decree was published also in Susa. 15 Mordecai went out dressed in the royal robe and wearing a gold crown and a turban of purple linen. The people in Susa rejoiced on seeing him. 16 And the Jews had light and gladness 17 in every city and province wherever the decree was published; wherever the proclamation was made, the Jews had joy and gladness, a banquet and a holiday. And many of the Gentiles were circumcised and became Jews out of fear of the Jews.