Esther 9:20–28, King James Version
Italic words were supplied in the English translation for clarity.
Esther 9:20–28
Mordecai establishes Purim as durable memory
Mordecai writes a yearly memory of reversal, not a revenge charter
And Mordecai wrote these things, and sent letters unto all the Jews that were in all the provinces of the king Ahasuerus, both nigh and far, to stablish this among them, that they should keep the fourteenth day of the month Adar, and the fifteenth day of the same, yearly, as the days wherein the Jews rested from their enemies, and the month which was turned unto them from sorrow to joy, and from mourning into a good day: that they should make them days of feasting and joy, and of sending portions one to another, and gifts to the poor.
The lot that scheduled death becomes the name Purim
And the Jews undertook to do as they had begun, and as Mordecai had written unto them; because Haman the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had devised against the Jews to destroy them, and had cast Pur, that is, the lot, to consume them, and to destroy them; but when Esther came before the king, he commanded by letters that his wicked device, which he devised against the Jews, should return upon his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows. 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 unto them, the Jews ordained, and took upon them, and upon their seed, and upon all such as joined themselves unto them, so as it should not fail, that they would keep these two days according to their writing, and according to their 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 memorial of them perish from their seed.
Purim is durable Jewish memory: rest, food, mutual portions, gifts to the poor, and a story of a lot turned. It is not inherited revenge, not a yearly license to harm, and not a code that maps Haman onto modern Persians, Iranians, or any other people. God is still not named in the founding letter.
How this should shape us
Keep survival memory with feasting, shared portions, and gifts to the poor. Do not convert an anniversary of deliverance into inherited revenge or into a hunt for new Hamans.
Teach it back
Explain Esther 9:20–28 in your own words. Include the movement, one source-supported detail, one material uncertainty, and one misuse the context rules out.
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Go deeper
The explanation above is meant to stand on its own. Open these notes only if you want language, history, disagreements, or source locations.
Where careful interpreters disagreeThe strongest options and their difficulties
Where do careful interpreters disagree?
Best judgment: Scholars debate composition layers, festival origins, and whether verses 20-32 are later additions. The canonical Hebrew form presents Mordecai and Esther as establishing and confirming Purim; precise prehistory remains uncertain.
How certain? probableResearch trail and exact locationsThe source record behind this section
Supports: Exact reader-facing KJV wording and complete verse coverage for this thought unit.
Esther 9:20–28, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM corpus
Supports: Hebrew wording, morphology, repeated roots, Persian terms, clause relationships, names, and translation controls.
Open Scriptures MorphHB v.2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Esth.xml, Masoretic words and morphology for 9:20–28
Supports: Material lexical, grammatical, textual, Persian-setting, literary, and translation notes within the unit.
NET Bible Esther PDF, printed pp. 792–793, translation and translator notes on 9:20–28
Supports: Directly inspected close literary analysis of characterization, feasts, ambiguity, pacing, irony, and reversal.
Sasson, 'Esther,' The Literary Guide to the Bible, printed pp. 335–342
Supports: Ahasuerus-Xerxes identification, Achaemenid color, name and loanword proposals, historical limits, and disputed dates and Purim origins.
Shaked, Encyclopaedia Iranica, 'Esther, Book of,' Vol. VIII, Fasc. 6, pp. 655–657, web paragraphs 1–18
Supports: Only the inspected discussion of diaspora survival, Persian setting, date proposals, literary unity, and Hebrew and Greek forms.
Kalimi, The Book of Esther between Judaism and Christianity, preview pp. 15–20
Supports: A sustained high-risk analysis of annihilation rhetoric, counter-decree, mass killing, spoil, power, and major ethical alternatives across ancient Esther forms.
Bezold, 'Esther's Power Play,' sections 2–5, especially Hebrew Esther 3 and 8–10
Supports: Trauma-, empire-, gender-, and diaspora-aware analysis of Vashti, the gathered women, ethnic concealment, antisemitism, Jewish survival, and imperial peace claims.
De-Whyte, 'Surviving Persia,' sections 1–3
Supports: Only the abstract's exposed distinction between the Hebrew form, Greek additions, and risks of obscuring each form by interleaving.
Rasmussen, JTS 70.1 (2019), official abstract for pp. 1–20
Sources for This Section
These records identify the source, the claim it supports, and the exact location used. A source remains evidence to evaluate; it does not replace the biblical text.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact reader-facing KJV wording and complete verse coverage for this thought unit.
Exact location: Esther 9:20–28, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM corpus
Open source ↗hebrew text and morphology
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible: Esther
Open Scriptures
Open Scriptures, release 2.2
Supports: Hebrew wording, morphology, repeated roots, Persian terms, clause relationships, names, and translation controls.
Exact location: Open Scriptures MorphHB v.2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Esth.xml, Masoretic words and morphology for 9:20–28
Open source ↗translation and translator notes
NET Bible: Esther with translators' notes
Biblical Studies Press
Biblical Studies Press, 2006
Supports: Material lexical, grammatical, textual, Persian-setting, literary, and translation notes within the unit.
Exact location: NET Bible Esther PDF, printed pp. 792–793, translation and translator notes on 9:20–28
Open source ↗scholarly literary guide chapter
Esther
Jack M. Sasson
Harvard University Press, The Literary Guide to the Bible, 1990
Supports: Directly inspected close literary analysis of characterization, feasts, ambiguity, pacing, irony, and reversal.
Exact location: Sasson, 'Esther,' The Literary Guide to the Bible, printed pp. 335–342
Open source ↗specialist encyclopedia article
Esther, Book of
Shaul Shaked
Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. VIII, Fasc. 6, 1998; updated 2017
Supports: Ahasuerus-Xerxes identification, Achaemenid color, name and loanword proposals, historical limits, and disputed dates and Purim origins.
Exact location: Shaked, Encyclopaedia Iranica, 'Esther, Book of,' Vol. VIII, Fasc. 6, pp. 655–657, web paragraphs 1–18
Open source ↗scholarly monograph preview
The Book of Esther between Judaism and Christianity: preview of Esther's Story
Isaac Kalimi
Cambridge University Press, 2023
Supports: Only the inspected discussion of diaspora survival, Persian setting, date proposals, literary unity, and Hebrew and Greek forms.
Exact location: Kalimi, The Book of Esther between Judaism and Christianity, preview pp. 15–20
Open source ↗peer reviewed open access article
Esther's Power Play: Negotiating Power and Violence in Ancient Esther Traditions
Helge Bezold
Judaica: Neue digitale Folge 5.1, 2024
Supports: A sustained high-risk analysis of annihilation rhetoric, counter-decree, mass killing, spoil, power, and major ethical alternatives across ancient Esther forms.
Exact location: Bezold, 'Esther's Power Play,' sections 2–5, especially Hebrew Esther 3 and 8–10
Open source ↗peer reviewed open access article
Surviving Persia: Esther's Scroll, Anti-Black Racism and the Propaganda of Peace and Progress
Janice P. De-Whyte
Religions 13.9, article 829, 2022
Supports: Trauma-, empire-, gender-, and diaspora-aware analysis of Vashti, the gathered women, ethnic concealment, antisemitism, Jewish survival, and imperial peace claims.
Exact location: De-Whyte, 'Surviving Persia,' sections 1–3
Open source ↗peer reviewed article abstract
The Presentation of the Catholic Canonical Form of Esther in Modern Bible Translations: A Proposal
Angela Parchen Rasmussen
The Journal of Theological Studies 70.1, 2019
Supports: Only the abstract's exposed distinction between the Hebrew form, Greek additions, and risks of obscuring each form by interleaving.
Exact location: Rasmussen, JTS 70.1 (2019), official abstract for pp. 1–20
Open source ↗