He sent letters to all the Jews, to the one hundred twenty-seven provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus, with words of peace and truth,
For Mordecai the Jew was next to King Ahasuerus, and great among the Jews, and accepted by the multitude of his brothers, seeking the good of his people and speaking peace to all his descendants.
And the nations were those which were assembled to destroy the name of the Jews;
But he scorned the thought of laying hands on Mordecai alone, for they had made known to him Mordecai's people. Therefore Haman sought to destroy all the Jews who were throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus, even Mordecai's people.
The king took his ring from his hand, and gave it to Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the Jews' enemy.
Letters were sent by couriers into all the king's provinces, to destroy, to kill, and to cause to perish, all Jews, both young and old, little children and women, in one day, even on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month Adar, and to plunder their possessions.
In every province, wherever the king's commandment and his decree came, there was great mourning among the Jews, and fasting, and weeping, and wailing; and many lay in sackcloth and ashes.
Mordecai told him of all that had happened to him, and the exact sum of the money that Haman had promised to pay to the king's treasuries for the destruction of the Jews.
Then Mordecai asked them return answer to Esther, "Don't think to yourself that you will escape in the king's house any more than all the Jews.
For if you remain silent now, then relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another place, but you and your father's house will perish. Who knows if you haven't come to the kingdom for such a time as this?"
"Go, gather together all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day. I and my maidens will also fast the same way. Then I will go in to the king, which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish."
On that day, King Ahasuerus gave the house of Haman, the Jews' enemy, to Esther the queen. Mordecai came before the king; for Esther had told what he was to her.
Esther spoke yet again before the king, and fell down at his feet, and begged him with tears to put away the mischief of Haman the Agagite, and his device that he had devised against the Jews.
She said, "If it pleases the king, and if I have found favor in his sight, and the thing seem right to the king, and I am pleasing in his eyes, let it be written to reverse the letters devised by Haman, the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, which he wrote to destroy the Jews who are in all the king's provinces.
Then King Ahasuerus said to Esther the queen and to Mordecai the Jew, "See, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and him they have hanged on the gallows, because he laid his hand on the Jews.
Write also to the Jews, as it pleases you, in the king's name, and seal it with the king's ring; for the writing which is written in the king's name, and sealed with the king's ring, may not be reversed by any man."
Then the king's scribes were called at that time, in the third month Sivan, on the twenty-third day of the month; and it was written according to all that Mordecai commanded to the Jews, and to the satraps, and the governors and princes of the provinces which are from India to Ethiopia, one hundred twenty-seven provinces, to every province according to its writing, and to every people in their language, and to the Jews in their writing, and in their language.
In those letters, the king granted the Jews who were in every city to gather themselves together, and to defend their life, to destroy, to kill, and to cause to perish, all the power of the people and province that would assault them, their little ones and women, and to plunder their possessions,
A copy of the letter, that the decree should be given out in every province, was published to all the peoples, that the Jews should be ready for that day to avenge themselves on their enemies.
The Jews had light, gladness, joy, and honor.
In every province, and in every city, wherever the king's commandment and his decree came, the Jews had gladness, joy, a feast, and a good day. Many from among the peoples of the land became Jews; for the fear of the Jews was fallen on them.
Now in the twelfth month, which is the month Adar, on the thirteenth day of the month, when the king's commandment and his decree drew near to be put in execution, on the day that the enemies of the Jews hoped to conquer them, (but it was turned out the opposite happened, that the Jews conquered those who hated them),
the Jews gathered themselves together in their cities throughout all the provinces of the King Ahasuerus, 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 satraps, the governors, and those who did the king's business helped the Jews, because the fear of Mordecai had fallen on them.
The Jews struck all their enemies with the stroke of the sword, and with slaughter and destruction, and did what they wanted to those who hated them.
In the citadel of Susa, the Jews killed and destroyed five hundred men.
The king said to Esther the queen, "The Jews have slain and destroyed five hundred men in the citadel of Susa, including the ten sons of Haman; 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 Esther said, "If it pleases the king, let it be granted to the Jews who are in Shushan to do tomorrow also according to this day's decree, and let Haman's ten sons be hanged on the gallows."
The Jews who were in Shushan gathered themselves together on the fourteenth day also of the month Adar, and killed three hundred men in Shushan; but they didn't lay their hand on the spoil.
The other Jews who were in the king's provinces gathered themselves together, defended their lives, had rest from their enemies, and killed seventy-five thousand of those who hated them; but they didn't lay their hand on the plunder.
But the Jews who were in Shushan 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 Jews of the villages, who live in the unwalled towns, make the fourteenth day of the month Adar a day of gladness and feasting, a good day, and a day of sending presents of food to one another.
Mordecai wrote these things, and sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the provinces of the king Ahasuerus, both near and far,
as the days in which the Jews had rest from their enemies, and the month which was turned to them from sorrow to gladness, and from mourning into a good day; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, and of sending presents of food to one another, and gifts to the needy.
The Jews accepted the custom that they had begun, as Mordecai had written to them;
because Haman the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews 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 wicked device, which he had devised against the Jews, should return on his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows.
the Jews established, and imposed on themselves, and on their descendants, 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 appointed time, 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 Purim should not fail from among the Jews, nor the memory of them perish from their seed.
He sent letters to all the Jews, to the hundred twenty-seven provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus, with words of peace and truth,
For Mordecai the Jew was next to King Ahasuerus, and great among the Jews, and accepted by the multitude of his brothers, seeking the good of his people, and speaking peace to all his descendants.
Be it known to the king, that the Jews who came up from you are come to us to Jerusalem; they are building the rebellious and the bad city, and have finished the walls, and repaired the foundations.
Then when the copy of king Artaxerxes' letter was read before Rehum, and Shimshai the scribe, and their companions, they went in haste to Jerusalem to the Jews, and made them to cease by force and power.
Now the prophets, Haggai the prophet, and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem; in the name of the God of Israel [prophesied they] to them.
But the eye of their God was on the elders of the Jews, and they did not make them cease, until the matter should come to Darius, and then answer should be returned by letter concerning it.
Leave the work of this house of God alone; let the governor of the Jews and the elders of the Jews build this house of God in its place.
Moreover I make a decree what you shall do to these elders of the Jews for the building of this house of God: that of the king's goods, even of the tribute beyond the River, expenses be given with all diligence to these men, that they be not hindered.
The elders of the Jews built and prospered, through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. They built and finished it, according to the commandment of the God of Israel, and according to the decree of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia.
For you have heard of my way of living in time past in the Jews' religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the assembly of God, and ravaged it.
I advanced in the Jews' religion beyond many of my own age among my countrymen, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers.
And the rest of the Jews joined him in his hypocrisy; so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy.
But when I saw that they didn't walk uprightly according to the truth of the Good News, I said to Peter before them all, "If you, being a Jew, live as the Gentiles do, and not as the Jews do, why do you compel the Gentiles to live as the Jews do?
"We, being Jews by nature, and not Gentile sinners,
Then Eliakim, Shebna and Joah said to Rabshakeh, "Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; and don't speak to us in the Jews' language in the hearing of the people who are on the wall."
Then Rabshakeh stood, and called out with a loud voice in the Jews' language, and said, "Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria!
and I delivered the deed of the purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, in the presence of Hanamel my uncle's son, and in the presence of the witnesses who subscribed the deed of the purchase, before all the Jews who sat in the court of the guard.
Zedekiah the king said to Jeremiah, I am afraid of the Jews who are fallen away to the Chaldeans, lest they deliver me into their hand, and they mock me.
Likewise when all the Jews who were in Moab, and among the children of Ammon, and in Edom, and who were in all the countries, heard that the king of Babylon had left a remnant of Judah, and that he had set over them Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan;
then all the Jews returned out of all places where they were driven, and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah, to Mizpah, and gathered wine and summer fruits very much.
Then Johanan the son of Kareah spoke to Gedaliah in Mizpah secretly, saying, Please let me go, and I will kill Ishmael the son of Nethaniah, and no man shall know it: why should he take your life, that all the Jews who are gathered to you should be scattered, and the remnant of Judah perish?
Ishmael also killed all the Jews who were with him, [to wit], with Gedaliah, at Mizpah, and the Chaldeans who were found there, the men of war.
The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the Jews who lived in the land of Egypt, who lived at Migdol, and at Tahpanhes, and at Memphis, and in the country of Pathros, saying,
This is the people whom Nebuchadnezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year three thousand twenty-three Jews;
in the three and twentieth year of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive of the Jews seven hundred forty-five persons: all the persons were four thousand and six hundred.
This is John's testimony, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, "Who are you?"
Now there were six water pots of stone set there after the Jews' way of purifying, containing two or three metretes apiece.
The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
The Jews therefore answered him, "What sign do you show us, seeing that you do these things?"
The Jews therefore said, "It took forty-six years to build this temple! Will you raise it up in three days?"
Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.
There arose therefore a questioning on the part of John's disciples with some Jews about purification.
The Samaritan woman therefore said to him, "How is it that you, being a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?" (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)
Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship."
You worship that which you don't know. We worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews.
After these things, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
So the Jews said to him who was cured, "It is the Sabbath. It is not lawful for you to carry the mat."
The man went away, and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
For this cause the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill him, because he did these things on the Sabbath.
For this cause therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also called God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.
The Jews therefore murmured concerning him, because he said, "I am the bread which came down out of heaven."
The Jews therefore contended with one another, saying, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"
After these things, Jesus was walking in Galilee, for he wouldn't walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill him.
Now the feast of the Jews, the Feast of Booths, was at hand.
The Jews therefore sought him at the feast, and said, "Where is he?"
Yet no one spoke openly of him for fear of the Jews.
The Jews therefore marveled, saying, "How does this man know letters, having never been educated?"
The Jews therefore said among themselves, "Where will this man go that we won't find him? Will he go to the Dispersion among the Greeks, and teach the Greeks?
The Jews therefore said, "Will he kill himself, that he says, 'Where I am going, you can't come?'"
Jesus therefore said to those Jews who had believed him, "If you remain in my word, then you are truly my disciples.
Then the Jews answered him, "Don't we say well that you are a Samaritan, and have a demon?"
Then the Jews said to him, "Now we know that you have a demon. Abraham died, and the prophets; and you say, 'If a man keeps my word, he will never taste of death.'
The Jews therefore said to him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?"
The Jews therefore did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind, and had received his sight, until they called the parents of him who had received his sight,
His parents said these things because they feared the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that if any man would confess him as Christ, he would be put out of the synagogue.
Therefore a division arose again among the Jews because of these words.
The Jews therefore came around him and said to him, "How long will you hold us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly."
Therefore Jews took up stones again to stone him.
The Jews answered him, "We don't stone you for a good work, but for blasphemy: because you, being a man, make yourself God."
The disciples told him, "Rabbi, the Jews were just trying to stone you, and are you going there again?"
Many of the Jews had joined the women around Martha and Mary, to console them concerning their brother.
Then the Jews who were with her in the house, and were consoling her, when they saw Mary, that she rose up quickly and went out, followed her, saying, "She is going to the tomb to weep there."
When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews weeping who came with her, he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled,
The Jews therefore said, "See how much affection he had for him!"
Therefore many of the Jews, who came to Mary and saw what Jesus did, believed in him.
Jesus therefore walked no more openly among the Jews, but departed from there into the country near the wilderness, to a city called Ephraim. He stayed there with his disciples.
Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand. Many went up from the country to Jerusalem before the Passover, to purify themselves.
A large crowd therefore of the Jews learned that he was there, and they came, not for Jesus' sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead.
because on account of him many of the Jews went away and believed in Jesus.
Little children, I will be with you a little while longer. You will seek me, and as I said to the Jews, 'Where I am going, you can't come,' so now I tell you.
So the detachment, the commanding officer, and the officers of the Jews, seized Jesus and bound him,
Now it was Caiaphas who advised the Jews that it was expedient that one man should perish for the people.
Jesus answered him, "I spoke openly to the world. I always taught in synagogues, and in the temple, where the Jews always meet. I said nothing in secret.
Pilate therefore said to them, "Take him yourselves, and judge him according to your law." Therefore the Jews said to him, "It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death,"
Pilate therefore entered again into the Praetorium, called Jesus, and said to him, "Are you the King of the Jews?"
Jesus answered, "My Kingdom is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this world, then my servants would fight, that I wouldn't be delivered to the Jews. But now my Kingdom is not from here."
Pilate said to him, "What is truth?" When he had said this, he went out again to the Jews, and said to them, "I find no basis for a charge against him.
But you have a custom, that I should release someone to you at the Passover. Therefore do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?"
They kept saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!" and they kept slapping him.
The Jews answered him, "We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God."
At this, Pilate was seeking to release him, but the Jews cried out, saying, "If you release this man, you aren't Caesar's friend! Everyone who makes himself a king speaks against Caesar!"
Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, at about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, "Behold, your King!"
Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. There was written, "JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS."
Therefore many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.
Most of the teaching of Jesus are recorded in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The Complete Sayings of Jesus presents every word spoken by Jesus in one place and provides an index to assist in finding specific ocassions, places and/or events. It is a must read aid for serious Bible study.
He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, saith the Lord. These are the words of Christ; and they direct us to imitate his life and character. The Imitation of Christ is guide to following the example of Jesus Christ. Let it be our most earnest study to dwell upon the life and example of Jesus.
The Apocrypha books are 14 books that were included between the old and new testaments in the original King James Version of the bible and many others. Church leaders agreed that these books were valuable for instruction in life and manners, but did not all agree that they should be considered cannon.
The Childrens Bible provides bible lessons from the Old and New testaments. There are 216 stories written in plain english. The stories are easy to read and understand but they are not just for childern. It is a pleasure to read and enjoy these important stories.
Let us love one another, for love comes from God and every one who loves is a child of God and knows God. He who loves not man does not know God, for God is love. God showed his love for us, for he sent his only Son into the world that through him we might have life. Love the stranger.
In Mark 12:30 Jesus said;
And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this [is] the first commandment.
And the second Mark 12:31 [is] like, [namely] this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.
The Gospel of The Birth of Mary was attributed to St. Matthew and was received as genuine and authentic by early Christians. It is to be found in the works of Jerome, a Father of the Church in the 4th century and is translated from his collection.
The Book of Enoch is ascribed to the great-grandfather of Noah and is included in the cannon of some churches. It describes the fall of the angels (watchers), visions of heaven and hell and the birth of Noah. Quotes from the book of Enoch are found in the New Testament.
The First Book of Adam and Eve. Books 1 begins immediately after the expulsion from the Garden of Eden. We learn about the fall but also of the promise to save Adam and his decendents. The story depicts mans struggle against evil, the devil and sin.
The Second Book of Adam and Eve. Discusses Adam's sorrow and death. The history of the patriarchs who lived before the Flood until the birth of Noah; the children of Seth on Mount Hermon and Cain's death. It ends with the testament and translation of Enoch.
The Infancy of Jesus Christ (Infancy Gospel of Thomas) relates the life of Jesus from the ages of five to twelve. It is believed that the document was transcribed from oral traditions some time prior to the second century. The ancient writing is possibly Gnostic and many early church leaders considered it heretical.
Daily Bible study is essential. The Bible Verse of the Day provides a collection of enlightening and inspiration bible verses. Improve your knowledge and understanding of the Bible and your life by studying the words of the holy scripture. Explore the King James Bible (kjv) and discover new insights.
The World English Bible was produced to provide speakers of modern English with a version of the Bible that is easily understood. The Bible is in the public domain and available world-wide. It is an accurate modern translation of the original King James Bible, including the Apocryphal books.
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The favorite verses page is a list of popular bible verses. Each verse includes a link to the chapter and verse of the book where it is found in the bible. Click on any link for a bible verse and it will take you to that location in the bible.
The bible contains great stories. Visit the bible stories page for links to some of the best known and most significant stories and passages in the bible.