Esther 3–5

Haman Plots to Destroy the Jews

3Some time later King Xerxes promoted a man named Haman to the position of prime minister. Haman was the son of Hammedatha, a descendant of Agag.^{e 2}The king ordered all the officials in his service to show their respect for Haman by kneeling and bowing to him. They all did so, except for Mordecai, who refused to do it. ³The other officials in the royal service asked him why he was disobeying the king’s command; ⁴day after day they urged him to give in, but he would not listen to them. “I am a Jew,” he explained, “and I cannot bow to Haman.” So they told Haman about this, wondering if he would tolerate Mordecai’s conduct. ⁵Haman was furious when he realized that Mordecai was not going to kneel and bow to him, ⁶and when he learnt that Mordecai was a Jew, he decided to do more than punish Mordecai alone. He made plans to kill every Jew in the whole Persian Empire.

⁷In the twelfth year of King Xerxes’ rule, in the first month, the month of Nisan, Haman ordered the lots to be cast (”purim”, they were called) to find out the right day and month to carry out his plot. The thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, was decided on.

⁸So Haman told the king, “There is a certain race of people scattered all over your empire and found in every province. They observe customs that are not like those of any other people. Moreover, they do not obey the laws of the empire, so it is not in your best interests to tolerate them. ⁹If it please Your Majesty, issue a decree that they are to be put to death. If you do, I guarantee that I will be able to put more than 340,000 kilogrammes of silver into the royal treasury for the administration of the empire.”

¹⁰The king took off his ring, which was used to stamp proclamations and make them official, and gave it to the enemy of the Jewish people, Haman son of Hammedatha, the descendant of Agag. ¹¹The king told him, “The people and their money are yours; do as you like with them.”

¹²So on the thirteenth day of the first month Haman called the king’s secretaries and dictated a proclamation to be translated into every language and system of writing used in the empire and to be sent to all the rulers, governors, and officials. It was issued in the name of King Xerxes and stamped with his ring. ¹³Runners took this proclamation to every province of the empire. It contained the instructions that on a single day, the thirteenth day of Adar, all Jews—young and old, women and children—were to be killed. They were to be slaughtered without mercy and their belongings were to be taken. ¹⁴The contents of the proclamation were to be made public in every province, so that everyone would be prepared when that day came.

¹⁵At the king’s command the decree was made public in the capital city of Susa, and runners carried the news to the provinces. The king and Haman sat down and had a drink while the city of Susa was being thrown into confusion.

Mordecai Asks for Esther’s Help

4When Mordecai learnt of all that had been done, he tore his clothes in anguish. Then he dressed in sackcloth, covered his head with ashes, and walked through the city, wailing loudly and bitterly, ²until he came to the entrance of the palace. He did not go in because no one wearing sackcloth was allowed inside. ³Throughout all the provinces, wherever the king’s proclamation was made known, there was loud mourning among the Jews. They fasted, wept and wailed, and most of them put on sackcloth and lay in ashes. ⁴When Esther’s young women and eunuchs told her what Mordecai was doing, she was deeply disturbed. She sent Mordecai some clothes to put on instead of the sackcloth, but he would not accept them. ⁵Then she called Hathach, one of the palace eunuchs appointed as her servant by the king, and told him to go to Mordecai and find out what was happening and why. ⁶Hathach went to Mordecai in the city square at the entrance of the palace. ⁷Mordecai told him everything that had happened to him and just how much money Haman had promised to put into the royal treasury if all the Jews were killed. ⁸He gave Hathach a copy of the proclamation that had been issued in Susa, ordering the destruction of the Jews. Mordecai asked him to take it to Esther, explain the situation to her, and ask her to go and plead with the king and beg him to have mercy on her people. ⁹Hathach did this, ¹⁰and Esther gave him this message to take back to Mordecai: ¹¹“If anyone, man or woman, goes to the inner courtyard and sees the king without being summoned, that person must die. That is the law; everyone, from the king’s advisers to the people in the provinces, knows that. There is only one way to get round this law: if the king holds out his gold sceptre to someone, then that person’s life is spared. But it has been a month since the king sent for me.”

¹²When Mordecai received Esther’s message, ¹³he sent her this warning: “Don’t imagine that you are safer than any other Jew just because you are in the royal palace. ¹⁴If you keep quiet at a time like this, help will come from heaven to the Jews, and they will be saved, but you will die and your father’s family will come to an end. Yet who knows—maybe it was for a time like this that you were made queen!”

¹⁵Esther sent Mordecai this reply: ¹⁶“Go and gather all the Jews in Susa together; hold a fast and pray for me. Don’t eat or drink anything for three days and nights. My young women and I will be doing the same. After that, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. If I must die for doing it, I will die.”

¹⁷Mordecai then left and did everything that Esther had told him to do.

Esther Invites the King and Haman to a Banquet

5On the third day of her fast Esther put on her royal robes and went and stood in the inner courtyard of the palace, facing the throne room. The king was inside, seated on the royal throne, facing the entrance. ²When the king saw Queen Esther standing outside, she won his favour, and he held out to her the gold sceptre. She then came up and touched the tip of it. ³“What is it, Queen Esther?” the king asked. “Tell me what you want, and you shall have it—even if it is half my empire.”

⁴Esther replied, “If it please Your Majesty, I would like you and Haman to be my guests tonight at a banquet I am preparing for you.” ⁵The king then ordered Haman to come quickly, so that they could be Esther’s guests. So the king and Haman went to Esther’s banquet. ⁶Over the wine the king asked her, “Tell me what you want, and you shall have it. I will grant your request, even if you ask for half my empire.”

⁷Esther replied, ⁸“If Your Majesty is kind enough to grant my request, I would like you and Haman to be my guests tomorrow at another banquet that I will prepare for you. At that time I will tell you what I want.”

Haman Plots to Kill Mordecai

⁹When Haman left the banquet he was happy and in a good mood. But then he saw Mordecai at the entrance of the palace, and when Mordecai did not rise or show any sign of respect as he passed, Haman was furious with him. ¹⁰But he controlled himself and went home. Then he invited his friends to his house and asked his wife Zeresh to join them. ¹¹He boasted to them how rich he was, how many sons he had, how the king had promoted him to high office, and how much more important he was than any of the king’s other officials. ¹²“What is more,” Haman went on, “Queen Esther gave a banquet for no one but the king and me, and we are invited back tomorrow. ¹³But none of this means a thing to me as long as I see that Jew Mordecai sitting at the entrance of the palace.”

¹⁴So his wife and all his friends suggested, “Why don’t you have a gallows built, twenty-two metres tall? Tomorrow morning you can ask the king to have Mordecai hanged on it, and then you can go to the banquet happy.” Haman thought this was a good idea, so he had the gallows built.