Esther

each province in its language and to each people in its tongue, written in the 13 name of King Ahasuerus and sealed with the king’s ring. Scrolls were sent | out with the runners, to all the provinces of the king - ruling that they wipe out, kill and destroy all the Jews, young and old, children and women alike, | allin one day: the thirteenth [day] of the twelfth month, which is the month = 14 of Adar - leaving their wealth for plunder. The text of that letter was to lay down law in each and every province, displayed for every people to see, that 1s they should make themselves ready for that day. The runners bolted out at the king’s word, and the law was laid down in the imperial city, Shushan; and the king and Haman sat down to drink - and the town of Shushan stood aghast in horror. 41 Mordekhai understood all that had happened, and he tore his clothes, and dressed himself in sackcloth and ash; and he walked out across the town, 2 crying out, a great and bitter cry. He came as far as the entrance to the 3 King’s Gate - for no one enters the King’s Gate dressed in sackcloth. And in every single province, wherever the king’s word and law extended, deep mourning prevailed among the Jews, and fasting and weeping and grief, the multitudes lying down upon sackcloth and ash. 4 Esther’s young maids and her eunuchs came and told her of this — and the queen's whole body shook. And she sent clothes for Mordekhai to put on, Sto lay aside the sackcloth he was wearing - but he would not accept them. So Esther called Hatakh, the king’s eunuch employed for her service; and she bid him go and speak to Mordekhai, to find out what all this was, and why. 6 Hatakh went out to Mordekhai, to the town square just before the King’s 7 Gate; and Mordekhai told him all that had happened to him, and all about the money that Haman had promised to have weighed out to the king’s 8 treasury in return for the Jews, to destroy them. And he gave him the text of the decree that had been issued in Shushan to have them wiped out, telling him to show it to Esther and to speak to her, bidding her strictly to go to the king and plead with him, to entreat with him on her people’s 12 behalf. Hatakh came and told Esther what Mordekhai had said. Esther 11 told Hatakh, bidding him repeat it to Mordekhai, “All the king’s courtiers, and all the people of his provinces know, that there is only one law for any man or woman who comes before the king, into the inner courtyard, without being called: to be killed. Unless, that is, the king extends the golden scepter towards him, that he live on. And as for me — I have not