1 So the king and Haman went to dine with Esther the queen, 2 and as they drank their wine on that second day, the king asked once more, “Queen Esther, what is your petition? It will be given to you. What is your request? Even up to half the kingdom, it will be fulfilled.”

3 Queen Esther replied, “If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, grant me my life as my petition, and the lives of my people as my request. 4 For my people and I have been sold out to destruction, death, and annihilation. If we had merely been sold as menservants and maidservants, I would have remained silent, because no such distress would justify burdening the king.”

5 Then King Xerxes spoke up and asked Queen Esther, “Who is this, and where is the one who would devise such a scheme?”

6 Esther replied, “The adversary and enemy is this wicked man—Haman!”

And Haman stood in terror before the king and queen.

7 In his fury, the king arose from drinking his wine and went to the palace garden, while Haman stayed behind to beg Queen Esther for his life, for he realized that the king was planning a terrible fate for him.

8 Just as the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was reclining. The king exclaimed, “Would he actually assault the queen while I am in the palace?”

As soon as the words had left the king’s mouth, they covered Haman’s face.

9 Then Harbonah, one of the eunuchs attending the king, said: “There is a gallows fifty cubits high[B] at Haman’s house. He had it built for Mordecai, who gave the report that saved the king.”

“Hang him on it!” declared the king.

10 So they hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the fury of the king subsided.

REFLECTIONS

Written by Susan Duc

In today’s passage, the evildoer Haman, who was already unsettled by recent events in the king’s court, is hurried off to Esther’s banquet. And there, for a third time, the king offers to grant Esther anything she asks for.

Esther isn’t aware that the tables had already been turning against Haman and, at risk to her life, bravely presents her petition. She chooses her words wisely – framing her request as a ‘distress call’ only the king could answer and riling him up in favour of her and her people. At that point, she points the finger at Haman, whose life is now at stake.

And so, Haman begs Esther to save him. But in a darkly comic scene, as the king returns from the garden, Haman falls on Esther and condemns himself. One of the attendants tells the king that Haman was planning to kill Mordecai, and so the gallows Haman had intended for Mordecai was used to hang him.

Today’s passage is a welcome reminder of God’s justice, particularly as we grieve the persecution of believers around the world – the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of justice (2 Peter 2:9).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Susan is our Women and children’s minister.