with 1,200 chariots and 60,000 horsemen. And the people who came with him from Egypt were without number: the Lubim, the Sukkiim and the Ethiopians.

Then Zerah the Ethiopian went out against them with a military force of one million men and 300 chariots, and he came to Mareshah.

So Yahweh smote the Ethiopians before Asa and before Judah, and the Ethiopians fled.

And Asa and the people who were with him pursued them as far as Gerar; and so many Ethiopians fell that they could not recover, for they were shattered before Yahweh and before His army. And they carried away very much spoil.

Were not the Ethiopians and the Lubim a vast military force with an exceedingly vast number of chariots and horsemen? Yet because you leaned on Yahweh, He gave them into your hand.

Then Yahweh stirred up against Jehoram the spirit of the Philistines and the Arabs who bordered the Ethiopians;

Queen Vashti’s Refusal

On the seventh day, when the heart of the king was merry with wine, he said for Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar, and Carkas, the seven eunuchs who attended to the presence of King Ahasuerus,

But Queen Vashti refused to come at the word of the king which was delivered by the hand of the eunuchs. Then the king became exceedingly furious, and his wrath burned within him.

“According to law, what is to be done with Queen Vashti, because she did not do the declaration of King Ahasuerus delivered by the hand of the eunuchs?”

And let the king appoint overseers in all the provinces of his kingdom that they may gather every young virgin, beautiful in appearance, to the citadel of Susa, to the harem, into the hand of Hegai, the king’s eunuch, who keeps charge of the women; and let their cosmetics be given to them.

In the evening she would go in, and in the morning she would return to the second harem, to the hand of Shaashgaz, the king’s eunuch who kept charge of the concubines. She would not again go in to the king unless the king delighted in her and she was summoned by name.

Now when it reached the turn of Esther, the daughter of Abihail the uncle of Mordecai who had taken her as his daughter, to go in to the king, she did not seek anything except what Hegai, the king’s eunuch who kept charge of the women, said. And Esther advanced in favor in the eyes of all who saw her.

Two of the King’s Eunuchs Are Hanged

In those days, while Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king’s eunuchs from those who were doorkeepers, became furious and sought to send forth their hand against King Ahasuerus.

Then Esther’s young women and her eunuchs came and told her, and the queen writhed in great anguish. And she sent garments to clothe Mordecai and to remove his sackcloth from upon him, but he did not accept them.

Then Esther summoned Hathach from the king’s eunuchs, whom the king had appointed to attend her, and commanded him to go to Mordecai to know what this was and why it was.

And it was found written what Mordecai had told concerning Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king’s eunuchs from those who were doorkeepers, that they had sought to send forth their hand against King Ahasuerus.

While they were still speaking with him, the king’s eunuchs reached Haman’s home and hastily brought Haman to the feast which Esther had prepared.

Then Harbonah, one of the eunuchs who were before the king, said, “Behold indeed, the gallows—which Haman made for Mordecai who spoke good on behalf of the king—are standing at Haman’s house fifty cubits high!” And the king said, “Hang him on it.”

Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to Yahweh say, “Yahweh will surely separate me from His people.” Nor let the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree.”

For thus says Yahweh, “To the eunuchs who keep My sabbaths, And choose what pleases Me, And hold fast My covenant,

Can the Ethiopian change his skin Or the leopard his spots? Then you also can do good Who are accustomed to doing evil.

But Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, a eunuch, while he was in the king’s palace, heard that they had put Jeremiah into the cistern. Now the king was sitting in the Gate of Benjamin;

Then the king commanded Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, saying, “Take in your hand thirty men from here and bring up Jeremiah the prophet from the cistern before he dies.”

Then Ebed-melech the Ethiopian said to Jeremiah, “Now put these worn-out clothes and rags under your armpits under the ropes”; and Jeremiah did so.

“Go and speak to Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, saying, ‘Thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel, “Behold, I am about to bring My words on this city for calamity and not for prosperity; and they will take place before you on that day.