Now it came to pass in the days of Ahasuerus, (this is Ahasuerus who reigned from India even to Cush, over a hundred and seven and twenty provinces:)

For this deed of the queen will come abroad to all women, so that they will despise their husbands in their eyes, when it shall be reported, The king Ahasuerus commanded Vashti the queen to be brought in before him, but she came not.

Likewise will the ladies of Persia and Media say this day to all the king's princes, who have heard of the deed of the queen. Thus will there arise too much contempt and wrath.

For if thou shalt altogether hold thy peace at this time, then will there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place; but thou and thy father's house will be destroyed: and who knoweth, whether thou hast come to the kingdom for such a time as this?

Then Esther bade them return Mordecai this answer,

And Esther answered, If it shall seem good to the king, let the king and Haman come this day to the banquet that I have prepared for him.

Yet all this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate.

And the king said, What honor and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this? Then said the king's servants that ministered to him, There is nothing done for him.

And let this apparel and horse be delivered to the hand of one of the king's most noble princes, that they may array the man whom the king delighteth to honor, and bring him on horseback through the street of the city, and proclaim before him, Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delighteth to honor.

And Esther said, The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman. Then Haman was afraid before the king and the queen.

For Mordecai was great in the king's house, and his fame went out throughout all the provinces: for this man Mordecai became greater and greater.

Then said Esther, If it shall please the king, let it be granted to the Jews who are in Shushan to do to-morrow also according to this day's decree, and let Haman's ten sons be hanged upon the gallows.

To establish this among them, that they should keep the fourteenth day of the month Adar, and the fifteenth day of the same, yearly,

Wherefore they called these days Purim after the name of Pur. Therefore for all the words of this letter, and of that which they had seen concerning this matter, and which had come to them,

Then Esther the queen, the daughter of Abihail, and Mordecai the Jew, wrote with all authority, to confirm this second letter of Purim.