Esther 9:20–32

The Feast of Purim

²⁰Mordecai wrote down these things and he sent letters to all the Jews who were in all of the provinces of King Ahasuerus, both near and far, ²¹to impose on them to keep the fourteenth day of the month of Adar, and the fifteenth day, every year,^{m 22}as the day that the Jews found reliefⁿ from their enemies, and the month which changed for them from sorrow to joy, and from a mourning ceremony to a festive day;^o to make them days of feasting and joy, and giving gifts to each other and to the poor. ²³And the Jews adopted what they had begun to do and what Mordecai had written to them.

²⁴For Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews had plotted against the Jews to destroy them, and he had cast pur, that is the lot, to rout them out and destroy them. ²⁵But when it came^p to the attention of^q the king, he gave orders in writing^r that his evil plot that he had devised against the Jews should return on his head, and they hung him and his sons on the gallows. ²⁶Therefore they called these days Purim, because of the name Pur. Thus because of all the words of this letter, and of what they faced concerning this, and of what had happened to them, ²⁷the Jews established and adopted it for themselves and for their offspring, and for all who joined them. They did not neglect to observe^s these two days every year as it was written and appointed to them. ²⁸These days are to be remembered and are to be kept in every generation, and in family, province, and city; and these days of Purim are not to be neglected among the Jews, and their memory shall not come to an end among their offspring.

²⁹So Queen Esther the daughter of Abihail and Mordecai the Jew wrote in full authority to confirm this second letter of Purim. ³⁰He sent letters of words of peace and truth to all the Jews, to the one hundred and twenty-seven provinces^t of Ahasuerus’ kingdom, ³¹to establish these days of Purim at their appointed times, just as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had imposed, and just as they had imposed on themselves and their offspring regulations of the fast and their lament. ³²And the command of Esther established these practices of Purim, and it was written on the scroll.