Ester 3

Haman seeks to annihilate the Jews

¹Some time later King Ahasuerus promoted Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite. He raised him high and gave him a seat above all the officials who served with him.^{a 2}All the king’s officials at the king’s gate used to kneel and bow down to Haman, because the king had ordered it for him. But Mordecai would not kneel or bow down.^{b 3}Then the king’s officials at the king’s gate said to Mordecai, “Why do you disobey the king’s command?” ⁴Day after day they spoke to him, but he would not listen to them. So they told Haman, to see whether Mordecai’s reason would be accepted, since he had told them that he was a Jew. ⁵When Haman saw that Mordecai did not kneel or bow down to him, he was filled with rage. ⁶But he thought it beneath him to lay hands on Mordecai alone, since they had told him who Mordecai’s people were. So Haman looked for a way to wipe out all the Jews throughout the kingdom of Ahasuerus, Mordecai’s people. ⁷In the first month, which is the month Nisan, in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they cast Pur, that is, the lot, in front of Haman, day by day and month by month, and it fell on the twelfth month, which is the month Adar.^cd

⁸Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus, “There is a certain people scattered and kept apart among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. Their laws are different from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king’s laws. It does the king no good to tolerate them. ⁹If it pleases the king, let a decree be written to destroy them, and I will pay about 375 tons of silver into the hands of the officials in charge of the king’s business, to be put into the royal treasuries.” ¹⁰So the king took his signet ring off his hand and gave it to Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the enemy of the Jews. ¹¹The king said to Haman, “The silver is yours, and the people too. Do with them as you see fit.”^{e 12}The king’s scribes were summoned on the thirteenth day of the first month, and a decree was written just as Haman commanded. It went to the king’s satraps, to the governors over each province, and to the officials of each people, to every province in its own script and every people in its own language. It was written in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed with the king’s signet ring. ¹³Letters were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces, ordering that all the Jews be wiped out, killed and destroyed, young and old, children and women, on a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month Adar, and that their goods be taken as plunder. ¹⁴A copy of the text was to be issued as law in every province and published to all the peoples, so that they would be ready for that day. ¹⁵At the king’s command the couriers went out in haste, and the law was issued in the citadel of Susa. The king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was thrown into confusion.