³ Then Queen Esther answered, “If I have found favor^(A) with you, Your Majesty, and if it pleases you, grant me my life—this is my petition. And spare my people—this is my request.

¹³ “If it pleases the king,” Esther answered, “give the Jews in Susa permission to carry out this day’s edict tomorrow also, and let Haman’s ten sons^(A) be impaled^(B) on poles.”

²⁹ So Queen Esther, daughter of Abihail,^(A) along with Mordecai the Jew, wrote with full authority to confirm this second letter concerning Purim. ³⁰ And Mordecai sent letters to all the Jews in the 127 provinces^(B) of Xerxes’ kingdom—words of goodwill and assurance— ³¹ to establish these days of Purim at their designated times, as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had decreed for them, and as they had established for themselves and their descendants in regard to their times of fasting^(C) and lamentation.^{(D) 32} Esther’s decree confirmed these regulations about Purim, and it was written down in the records.