Esther 9:24-32 - The Reason For The Festival Of Purim

²⁴ Because Haman, the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the hater of all the Jews, conspired for their destruction, attempting to get a decision by Pur that is, chance with a view to putting an end to them and cutting them off. ²⁵ But when the business was put before the king, he gave orders by letters that the evil design that he had made against the Jews was to be turned against him. That he and his sons were to be put to death by hanging. ²⁶ So these days were named Purim, after the name of Pur. And so, because of the words of this letter, and of what they had seen in connection with this business, and what had come to them, ²⁷ The Jews made a rule and established a custom that all their descendents should observe two days every year as ordered in the letter, at the fixed time every year. ²⁸ Those days were to be kept in memory through every generation and every family, in every division of the kingdom and every town, that there might never be a time when these days of Purim would not be kept among the Jews, or when the memory of them would go from the minds of their descendents.

²⁹ Esther the queen, daughter of Abihail, and Mordecai the Jew, sent a second letter giving the force of their authority to the order about the Purim. ³⁰ He sent letters to all the Jews in the hundred and twenty-seven divisions of the kingdom of Ahasuerus, with true words of peace, ³¹ Giving the force of law to these days of Purim at their fixed times, as they had been ordered by Mordecai the Jew and Esther the queen. This was in keeping with the rules they had made for themselves and their descendents, in connection with their time of going without food and their cry for help. ³² The order given by Esther gave the force of law to the rules about the Purim. It was recorded in the book.