Esther 9:17–22

¹⁷This was ^gon the thirteenth day of the month of Adar, and on the fourteenth day they rested and made that a day of feasting and gladness. ¹⁸But the Jews who were in Susa gathered ^gon the thirteenth day and on the fourteenth, and rested ^hon the fifteenth day, making that a day of feasting and gladness. ¹⁹Therefore the Jews of the villages, who live in ⁱthe rural towns, hold the fourteenth day of the month of Adar as a day for gladness and feasting, as ^ja holiday, and ^kas a day on which they send gifts of food to one another.

The Feast of Purim Inaugurated

²⁰And Mordecai recorded these things and sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, both near and far, ²¹obliging them to keep the fourteenth day of the month Adar and also the fifteenth day of the same, year by year, ²²as the days on which the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month that had been turned for them from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into ^ja holiday; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, days for sending gifts of food to one another and gifts to the poor.