¹¹ Then the king said to Haman, “The money and the people are yours. Do with them as you please.”

¹² On the thirteenth day of the first month, the royal secretaries were called. They wrote out all of Haman’s orders. They wrote to the king’s governors and to the captains of the soldiers in each area. And they wrote to the important men of each group of people. The orders were written to each area in its own form of writing. And they were written to each group of people in their own language. They were written in the name of King Xerxes and sealed with his signet ring. ¹³ Letters were sent by messengers to all the king’s empire. They stated the king’s order to destroy, kill and completely wipe out all the Jews. That meant young and old, women and little children, too. The order said to kill all the Jews on a single day. That was to be the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which was Adar. And it said to take all the things that belonged to the Jews.