Esther 3:8-15

8Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus, “There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. aTheir laws are different from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king’s laws, so that it is not to the king’s profit to tolerate them. 9If it please the king, let it be decreed that they be destroyed, and I will pay 10,000 talents
A  talent was about 75 pounds or 34 kilograms
of silver into the hands of those who have charge of the king’s business, that they may put it into the king’s treasuries.”
10 cSo the king took his signet ring from his hand and gave it to Haman dthe Agagite, the son of Hammedatha, ethe enemy of the Jews. 11And the king said to Haman, “The money is given to you, the people also, to do with them as it seems good to you.”

12 fThen the king’s scribes were summoned on the thirteenth day of the first month, and an edict, according to all that Haman commanded, was written to the king’s gsatraps and to the governors over all the provinces and to the officials of all the peoples, hto every province in its own script and every people in its own language. It was written iin the name of King Ahasuerus jand sealed with the king’s signet ring. 13Letters were sent kby couriers to all the king’s provinces with instruction lto destroy, to kill, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, min one day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, nand to plunder their goods. 14 oA copy of the document was to be issued as a decree in every province by proclamation to all the peoples to be ready for that day. 15 pThe couriers went out hurriedly by order of the king, and the decree was issued in Susa the citadel. And the king and Haman sat down to drink, qbut the city of Susa was thrown into confusion.

Esther 7:4

4 rFor we have been sold, I and my people, sto be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. If we had been sold merely as slaves, men and women, I would have been silent, for our affliction is not to be compared with the loss to the king.”
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