Esther Preserves the Covenant People

Esther 4:13-17

Then Mordecai told them to reply to Esther: “Do not think that your life will be saved in the palace of the king more than all the Jews. For if indeed you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place, and you and the family of your father will perish. Who knows? Perhaps you have come to a royal position for a time such as this.” Esther replied to Mordecai: “Go, gather all the Jews that are found in Susa and fast for me; do not eat or drink for three days, both night and day. I and my young girls will fast likewise, and then I will go to the king, which is not according to the law; if I perish, I perish. And Mordecai went away and he did everything that Esther commanded him.

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Esther 8:1-17

On that day King Ahasuerus gave Queen Esther the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews; and Mordecai came before the king, for Esther had told what he was to her. And the king removed his signet ring that he had taken away from Haman, and he gave it to Mordecai. So Esther set Mordecai over the house of Haman. And Esther again spoke before the king, and she fell before his feet and wept, pleading for his grace to avert Haman the Agagite’s evil plan and the plot that he devised against the Jews. And the king held out to Esther the scepter of gold, and Esther rose and stood before the king, and she said, “If it is good to the king, and if I have found favor before him, and if the king is pleased with this matter, and I have his approval, let an edict be written to revoke the letters of the plans of Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite, which he wrote to destroy the Jews that are in all the provinces of the king. For how can I bear to look on the disaster that will find my people, and how can I bear to look on the destruction of my family?” And King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther and to Mordecai the Jew, “Look, I have given Haman’s house to Esther, and they have hanged him on the gallows because he plotted against the Jews. Write as you see fit concerning the Jews in the name of the king, and seal it with the king’s signet ring; for a decree that is written in the name of the king and sealed with the king’s signet ring cannot be revoked.” And the secretaries of the king were summoned at that time, in the third month, which is in the month of Sivan on the twenty-third day , and an edict was written according to all that Mordecai commanded, to the Jews and to the governors and satraps and officials of the provinces from India to Cush—one hundred and twenty-seven provinces—each province according to its own script and to every people in their own language, and to the Jews in their own script and language. And he wrote in the name of King Ahasuerus, and he sealed the letters with the king’s signet ring and sent them by couriers on horses, riding on royal horses bred by racing mares. In them the king allowed the Jews who were in every city to assemble and defend their lives, to destroy and kill and annihilate any army of any people or province attacking them, including women and children, and to plunder their spoil, in one day in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar. A copy of the edict was to be given as law in each province to inform all the people, so that the Jews would be ready on that day to avenge themselves from their enemies. The mounted couriers on the royal horses went out without delay, urged by the king’s word. The law was given in the citadel of Susa. Mordecai went out from the presence of the king in royal clothing of blue cloth and white linen, and a great crown of gold and a robe of fine white linen and purple, and the city of Susa was shouting and rejoicing. For the Jews, there was light and gladness, joy and honor. In every province and city, wherever the king’s edict and his law came, there was gladness and joy for the Jews, a banquet and a holiday, and many of the people from the country were posing as Jews because the fear of the Jews had fallen on them.

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