Esther 5:3

5:3 The king said to her, “What is on your mind, ¹  Queen Esther? What is your request? Even as much as half the kingdom will be given to you!”

Esther 5:6

5:6 While at the banquet of wine, the king said to Esther, “What is your request? It shall be given to you. What is your petition? Ask for as much as half the kingdom, ²  and it shall be done!”

Esther 7:2

7:2 On the second day of the banquet of wine the king asked Esther, “What is your request, Queen Esther? It shall be granted to you. And what is your petition? Ask up to half the kingdom, and it shall be done!”

Proverbs 6:2

6:2 if ³  you have been ensnared ⁴  by the words you have uttered, ⁵ 

and have been caught by the words you have spoken,

Matthew 4:9

4:9 And he said to him, “I will give you all these things if you throw yourself to the ground and worship ⁶  me.”

¹ tn Heb “What to you?”; NAB, NIV NRSV “What is it, Queen Esther?”

² sn As much as half the kingdom. Such a statement would no doubt have been understood for the exaggeration that it clearly was. Cf. the similar NT scene recorded in Mark 6:23, where Herod makes a similar promise to the daughter of Herodias. In that case the request was for the head of John the Baptist, which is a lot less than half the kingdom.

³ tn The term “if” does not appear in this line but is implied by the parallelism. It is supplied in the translation for the sake of clarity.

⁴ tn The verb יָקַשׁ (yaqash) means “to lay a bait; to lure; to lay snares.” In the Niphal it means “to be caught by bait; to be ensnared” – here in a business entanglement.

⁵ tn Heb “by the words of your mouth.” The same expression occurs at the end of the following line (cf. KJV, ASV, NASB). Many English versions vary the wording slightly, presumably for stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy (e.g., NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

⁶ tn Grk “if, falling down, you will worship.” BDAG 815 s.v. πίπτω 1.b.α.ב has “fall down, throw oneself to the ground as a sign of devotion, before high-ranking persons or divine beings.”