World English Bible · The Persian return
Esther 9
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Now in the twelfth month, which is the month , on the thirteenth day of the month, when the king's and his came near to be put in execution, on the day that the of the to conquer them, (but it turned out that the opposite happened, that the conquered those who hated them), the gathered themselves together in their cities throughout all the provinces of the King , to lay hands on those who wanted to harm them. No one could withstand them, because the fear of them had fallen on all the people. All the princes of the provinces, the local governors, the governors, and those who did the king's business helped the , because the fear of had fallen on them. For was great in the king's house, and his fame went out throughout all the provinces, for the man grew greater and greater. The struck all their with the stroke of , and with slaughter and , and did what they wanted to those who hated them. In the citadel of , the killed and destroyed five hundred men. 7They killed Parshandatha, Dalphon, Aspatha, 8Poratha, Adalia, Aridatha, 9Parmashta, Arisai, Aridai, and Vaizatha, the ten sons of the son of Hammedatha, the ' enemy, but they didn't lay their hand on the plunder. 11On that day, the number of those who were slain in the citadel of was brought before the king. The king said to the queen, "The have slain and destroyed five hundred men in the citadel of , including the ten sons of ; what then have they done in the rest of the king's provinces! Now what is your petition? It shall be granted you. What is your further request? It shall be done." Then said, "If it pleases the king, let it be granted to the who are in to do tomorrow also according to today's , and let ten sons be hanged on the gallows." 14The king commanded this to be done. A was given out in ; and they hanged ten sons. The who were in gathered themselves together on the fourteenth day also of the month , and killed three hundred men in ; but they didn't lay their hand on the plunder. The other who were in the king's provinces gathered themselves together, defended their lives, had rest from their , and killed seventy-five thousand of those who hated them; but they didn't lay their hand on the plunder. This was done on the thirteenth day of the month ; and on the fourteenth day of that month they rested and made it a day of feasting and gladness. But the who were in assembled together on the thirteenth and on the fourteenth days of the month; and on the fifteenth day of that month, they rested, and made it a day of feasting and gladness. Therefore the of the villages, who live in the unwalled towns, make the fourteenth day of the month a day of gladness and feasting, a holiday, and a day of sending presents of food to one another. wrote these things, and sent letters to all the who were in all the provinces of the King , both near and far, 21to enjoin them that they should keep the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the month yearly, as the days in which the had rest from their , and the month which was turned to them from sorrow to gladness, and from into a holiday; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, and of sending presents of food to one another, and gifts to . 23The accepted the custom that they had begun, as had written to them, because the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, of all the , had plotted against the to destroy them, and had cast "Pur", that is the lot, to consume them and to destroy them; but when this became known to the king, he commanded by letters that his plan, which he had planned against the , should return on his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows. Therefore they called these days "", from the word "Pur." Therefore because of all the words of this letter, and of that which they had seen concerning this matter, and that which had come to them, the established and imposed on themselves, on their , and on all those who joined themselves to them, so that it should not fail that they would keep these two days according to what was written and according to its every year; and that these days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation, every family, every province, and every city; and that these days of should not fail from among the , nor their memory from their . Then the queen, the daughter of , and the wrote with all to confirm this second letter of . He sent letters to all the in the hundred twenty-seven provinces of of with words of peace and truth, to confirm these days of in their , as the and the queen had decreed, and as they had imposed upon themselves and their in the matter of the fastings and their . The of confirmed these matters of ; and it was written in the book.
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The world at this moment · The Persian return, 539 BC to 332 BC ›
Persia takes Babylon and reverses its policy, sending exiled peoples home to rebuild their temples. Judah returns as a small province, rebuilding under imperial permission rather than independence.
- Persia
- The largest empire the world had yet seen, from the Indus to the Aegean, run through provinces, a royal road, and a postal system. Its policy on conquered peoples was to send them home and fund their temples, in exchange for loyalty and prayers for the king. The Cyrus Cylinder states the policy in Cyrus's own words, and Ezra opens with the same policy applied to Judah.
- Judah
- A small, poor province called Yehud, a fraction of the old kingdom, with a rebuilt temple that made the people who remembered the first one weep. No king, and no prospect of one. Leadership passes to priests and scribes, which shapes everything afterward.
- Greece
- Persia and Greece collide at Marathon and Salamis, Persia loses, and Athens spends the following decades on the Parthenon, tragedy, and Socrates. Herodotus writes the first history in order to explain that war. Then Plato and Aristotle, whose vocabulary the church will still be using at Nicaea eight centuries later.
- Further afield
- Rome throws out its kings and becomes a republic. In India and China this is the age of the Buddha's early followers and of Confucian teaching taking hold. More of what the world still thinks with was invented in this era than in almost any other.