Le retourKingPersian kingHusband of EstherIssuer of royal decreesc. 519–465 BC
Ahasuerus is the Hebrew form of the Persian great king Xerxes I, who ruled over the Achaemenid world empire with its 127 provinces from India to Ethiopia. In the book of Esther, he appears as a powerful but easily influenced ruler who allows himself to be guided by his advisors—first when he deposes Queen Vashti after her disobedience, and then when the nobleman Haman is given authority to issue a decree for the destruction of all Jews in the empire. It is through Queen Esther's life-risking approach to the king that God's hidden providence becomes evident: the Jewish people are saved from ruin, Haman is executed on his own gallows, and Mordecai is elevated to the second most powerful position in the empire. Remarkably, God's name is never mentioned directly in the book of Esther, yet the entire story testifies to His sovereign rule behind the scenes of history. These events laid the foundation for the festival of Purim, which is still celebrated in Jewish tradition as a commemoration of God's liberating intervention. Ahasuerus is also mentioned in Ezra 4:6, where opponents of the rebuilding in Jerusalem sent written accusations against him early in his reign, shedding further light on his role in the history of the Jewish diaspora.
3in the third year of his reign he gave a banquet for all his officials and servants—the army of Persia and Media, the nobles, and the governors of the provinces were there before him—
10On the seventh day, when the king's heart was merry with wine, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar, and Carkas—the seven eunuchs who served in the presence of King Ahasuerus—
11to bring Queen Vashti before him wearing her royal crown, so that he might display her beauty to the peoples and the officials; for she was lovely to look at.
19So if it pleases the king, let a royal decree go out from him and be written into the laws of Persia and Media, never to be revoked, that Vashti shall never again come before King Ahasuerus, and that the king give her royal position to another woman who is better than she.
After an extensive search for a new queen, Esther, a Jewish woman and Mordecai's adopted daughter, was chosen because she won the king's favor above all other women.
15When the turn came for Esther, the daughter of Abihail, the uncle of Mordecai who had taken her as his own daughter, to go in to the king, she asked for nothing except what Hegai, the king's eunuch who kept the women, advised. And Esther won the admiration of everyone who saw her.
17The king loved Esther more than all the other women, and she won his favor and devotion more than all the other virgins. So he set the royal crown on her head and made her queen in place of Vashti.
Mordecai discovered a conspiracy by two of the king's officials, Bigthan and Teresh, who planned to lay hands on King Ahasuerus. Mordecai told Esther, who reported it to the king. The matter was investigated and confirmed, and the two were executed. The event was recorded in the king's chronicles.
21In those days, while Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs who guarded the threshold, grew angry and plotted to lay hands on King Ahasuerus.
23The matter was investigated and confirmed, and the two men were hanged on a pole.[^1]
[^1]: Or "impaled on a stake"; the Hebrew word means "tree" or "wood."
Ahasuerus gave Haman authority to issue a decree to destroy all the Jews in the kingdom, after Haman was offended that Mordecai refused to bow down before him.
8Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus, "There is a certain people scattered and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. Their laws differ from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king's laws, so it is not in the king's interest to tolerate them.
9If it pleases the king, let an order be written that they be destroyed, and I will weigh out ten thousand talents of silver into the hands of those who administer the king's affairs, to be brought into the royal treasury."
12On the thirteenth day of the first month the king's scribes were summoned, and everything Haman commanded was written to the king's satraps, to the governors over each province, and to the officials of each people—to every province in its own script and to every people in its own language. It was written in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed with the king's signet ring.
13Letters were sent by couriers to all the king's provinces, ordering that all the Jews—young and old, women and children—be destroyed, killed, and annihilated in a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and their possessions plundered.
Esther risked her life by going uninvited into the king's presence, but Ahasuerus extended his golden scepter toward her and showed her favor. She invited the king and Haman to a banquet, where she revealed Haman's evil plan against her people.
1On the third day Esther put on her royal robes and stood in the inner court of the palace, facing the king's hall. The king was seated on his royal throne in the hall, facing the entrance.
2When the king saw Queen Esther standing in the court, she found favor in his eyes, and he held out to her the golden scepter in his hand. Esther approached and touched the tip of the scepter.
2And again on this second day, as they drank their wine, the king said to Esther, "What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. What is your request? Up to half the kingdom, and it shall be done."
3Queen Esther answered, "If I have found favor in your eyes, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be granted me as my petition, and my people as my request.
4For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, killed, and annihilated. If we had merely been sold as slaves and servant girls, I would have kept silent, for such trouble would not be worth disturbing the king."
Ahasuerus could not sleep and had the chronicles read to him, discovering that Mordecai had never been rewarded for exposing the conspiracy against the king. This became a turning point in the story.
2There it was found written how Mordecai had reported that Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs who guarded the threshold, had plotted to lay hands on King Ahasuerus.
3The king asked, "What honor or distinction has been given to Mordecai for this?" The king's attendants who served him answered, "Nothing has been done for him."
When Ahasuerus heard about Haman's plot, he was furious and ordered that Haman be hanged on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. The king issued a new decree allowing the Jews to defend themselves, and Mordecai was elevated to a prominent position in the kingdom.
9Then Harbona, one of the eunuchs attending the king, said, "Look, the gallows Haman made for Mordecai, who spoke up for the king's good, is standing at Haman's house, fifty cubits high."[fn] The king said, "Hang him on it."
1That same day King Ahasuerus gave Queen Esther the estate of Haman, the enemy of the Jews. And Mordecai came before the king, for Esther had told him how he was related to her.
7King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther and to Mordecai the Jew, "See, I have given Haman's estate to Esther, and he himself has been hanged on the gallows because he raised his hand against the Jews.
8Now you write concerning the Jews whatever seems best to you, in the king's name, and seal it with the king's signet ring; for no document written in the king's name and sealed with the king's ring can be revoked."
11By these letters the king granted the Jews in every city the right to assemble and defend their lives—to destroy, kill, and annihilate any armed force of any people or province that might attack them, together with the women and children of those attackers, and to plunder their goods—
2And all his acts of power and might, together with the full account of how the king had raised Mordecai to greatness—are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Media and Persia?
3For Mordecai the Jew was second to King Ahasuerus, great among the Jews and esteemed by the multitude of his brothers, for he sought the good of his people and spoke peace to all his people's descendants.