Esther Chapter 8    

¹On that day, King Ahasuerus gave the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews, to Esther the queen. And Mordecai came into the presence of the king, for Esther had told what he was to her.
  ²The king took off his signet ring, which he had taken back from Haman, and gave it to Mordecai. And Esther set Mordecai over the house of Haman.
 

³Then Esther spoke again before the king and fell down at his feet and wept and begged him to put a stop to the evil plan of Haman the Agagite and his plot that he had plotted against the Jews.
  ⁴Then the king held out to Esther the golden scepter. So Esther arose and stood before the king.
 

⁵Then she said, “If it pleases the king and if I have found favor in his eyes, and the thing seem right to the king, and I am pleasing in his eyes, let it be written to reverse the letters devised by Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, which he wrote to destroy the Jews who are in all the king’s provinces.
  ⁶For how can I bear to see the evil that would come to my people? How can I endure to see the destruction of my kindred?”
 

⁷Then King Ahasuerus said to Esther the queen and to Mordecai the Jew, “See, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and him they have impaled him on the stake because he had stretched out his hands against the Jews.
  ⁸So you write in the king’s name to the Jews whatever is good in your eyes, and seal it with the king’s ring; for a writing that is written in the king’s name and sealed with the king’s ring cannot be revoked.”
 

⁹Then the king’s scribes were called at that time, in the third month (that is the month Sivan), on the twenty-third day of the month; and it was written according to all that Mordecai commanded to the Jews, and to the satraps and the governors and officials of the provinces from India to Ethiopia, 127 provinces, to every province in its own script and to every people in their own language, and to the Jews in their script and in their language.
 

¹⁰And he wrote in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed it with the king’s signet ring, and he sent letters by courier on horseback, riding on royal horses that were bred from swift steeds.
 

¹¹In those letters, the king granted the Jews who were in every city the right to gather themselves together and to defend their lives, to destroy, to kill, and to wipe out every armed force of any people and province who would assault them, even their little ones and women, and to plunder their possessions
  ¹²on a single day in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month Adar.
 

¹³A copy of what was written was to be issued as law in every province, and was proclaimed to all the peoples, and the Jews were to be ready on that day to avenge themselves on their enemies.
  ¹⁴So the couriers who rode on swift horses went out, hastened and pressed on by the king’s commandment. The decree was given out in the palace-fortress of Susa.
 

¹⁵And Mordecai went out from the king’s presence in royal clothing of blue and white, and with a great crown of gold and with a robe of fine linen and purple; and the city of Susa shouted and was glad.
  ¹⁶For the Jews there was light, and gladness, and joy, and honor.
  ¹⁷And in each and every province and in each and every city, wherever the king’s commandment and his decree came, there was gladness and joy for the Jews, a feast and a good day. And many from among the peoples of the land became Jews, for the fear of the Jews had fallen on them.