everyone who has determined to follow God, the Lord God of his ancestors, even if he is not ceremonially clean according to the standards of the temple.”

Prepare yourselves by your families according to your divisions, as instructed by King David of Israel and his son Solomon.

Slaughter the Passover lambs, consecrate yourselves, and make preparations for your countrymen to do what the Lord commanded through Moses.”

Preparations were made, and the priests stood at their posts and the Levites in their divisions as prescribed by the king.

So they hanged Haman on the very gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. The king’s rage then abated.

he wanders about – food for vultures; he knows that the day of darkness is at hand.

Who prepares prey for the raven, when its young cry out to God and wander about for lack of food?

For they do not speak the truth; their stomachs are like the place of destruction, their throats like an open grave, their tongues like a steep slope leading into it.

May the evil deeds of the wicked come to an end! But make the innocent secure, O righteous God, you who examine inner thoughts and motives!

If a person does not repent, God sharpens his sword and prepares to shoot his bow.

When I look up at the heavens, which your fingers made, and see the moon and the stars, which you set in place,

He lifted me out of the watery pit, out of the slimy mud. He placed my feet on a rock and gave me secure footing.

Create for me a pure heart, O God! Renew a resolute spirit within me!

They have prepared a net to trap me; I am discouraged. They have dug a pit for me. They will fall into it! (Selah)

O God, you cause abundant showers to fall on your chosen people. When they are tired, you sustain them,

You established the cycle of day and night; you put the moon and sun in place.

But it is said of Zion’s residents, “Each one of these was born in her, and the sovereign One makes her secure.”

For I say, “Loyal love is permanently established; in the skies you set up your faithfulness.”

‘I will give you an eternal dynasty and establish your throne throughout future generations.’” (Selah)

Say among the nations, “The Lord reigns! The world is established, it cannot be moved. He judges the nations fairly.”