Esther 8:7-9

8:7 King Ahasuerus replied to Queen Esther and to Mordecai the Jew, “Look, I have already given Haman’s estate to Esther, and he has been hanged on the gallows because he took hostile action ¹  against the Jews. 8:8 Now you write in the king’s name whatever in your opinion is appropriate concerning the Jews and seal it with the king’s signet ring. Any decree that is written in the king’s name and sealed with the king’s signet ring cannot be rescinded.

8:9 The king’s scribes were quickly ²  summoned – in the third month (that is, the month of Sivan), on the twenty-third day. ³  They wrote out ⁴  everything that Mordecai instructed to the Jews and to the satraps and the governors and the officials of the provinces all the way from India to Ethiopia ⁵  – a hundred and twenty-seven provinces in all – to each province in its own script and to each people in their own language, and to the Jews according to their own script and their own language.

[8:7]  ¹ tn Heb “sent forth his hand”; NAB, NIV “attacked”; NLT “tried to destroy.” Cf. 9:2.

[8:9]  ² tn Heb “in that time”; NIV “At once.”

[8:9]  ³ sn Cf. 3:12. Two months and ten days have passed since Haman’s edict to wipe out the Jews.

[8:9]  ⁴ tn Heb “it was written”; this passive construction has been converted to an active one in the translation for clarity and for stylistic reasons.

[8:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “Cush” (so NIV), referring to the region of the upper Nile in Africa. Cf. KJV and most other English versions “Ethiopia.”