Esther
3
- After these events, King Xerxes honored
Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, elevating him and giving him a seat
of honor higher than that of all the other nobles.
- All the royal officials at the king's gate
knelt down and paid honor to Haman, for the king had commanded this concerning
him. But Mordecai would not kneel down or pay him honor.
- Then the royal officials at the king's gate
asked Mordecai, "Why do you disobey the king's command ?"
- Day after day they spoke to him but he refused
to comply. Therefore they told Haman about it to see whether Mordecai's behavior
would be tolerated, for he had told them he was a Jew.
- When Haman saw that Mordecai would not kneel
down or pay him honor, he was enraged.
- Yet having learned who Mordecai's people
were, he scorned the idea of killing only Mordecai. Instead Haman looked for
a way to destroy all Mordecai's people, the Jews, throughout the whole kingdom
of Xerxes.
- In the twelfth year of King Xerxes, in the
first month, the month of Nisan, they cast the pur (that is, the lot) in the
presence of Haman to select a day and month. And the lot fell on the twelfth
month, the month of Adar.
- Then Haman said to King Xerxes, "There
is a certain people dispersed and scattered among the peoples in all the provinces
of your kingdom whose customs are different from those of all other people
and who do not obey the king's laws; it is not in the king's best interest
to tolerate them.
- If it pleases the king, let a decree be
issued to destroy them, and I will put ten thousand talents of silver into
the royal treasury for the men who carry out this business."
- So the king took his signet ring from his
finger and gave it to Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of the
Jews.
- "Keep the money," the king said
to Haman, "and do with the people as you please."
- Then on the thirteenth day of the first
month the royal secretaries were summoned. They wrote out in the script of
each province and in the language of each people all Haman's orders to the
king's satraps, the governors of the various provinces and the nobles of the
various peoples. These were written in the name of King Xerxes himself and
sealed with his own ring.
- Dispatches were sent by couriers to all
the king's provinces with the order to destroy, kill and annihilate all the
Jews -- young and old, women and little children -- on a single day, the thirteenth
day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods.
- A copy of the text of the edict was to be
issued as law in every province and made known to the people of every nationality
so they would be ready for that day.
- Spurred on by the king's command, the couriers
went out, and the edict was issued in the citadel of Susa. The king and Haman
sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was bewildered.
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