Open Bible Data Home About News OET Key
OET OET-RV ULT UST BSB OEB WEB NET TCNT T4T LEB RV KJB-1769 Related Parallel Interlinear Reference Dictionary Search
OET By Document By Section By Chapter Details
OET GEN EXO LEV NUM DEU JOS JDG RUTH 1SA 2SA 1KI 2KI 1CH 2CH EZRA NEH EST JOB PSA PRO ECC SNG ISA JER LAM EZE DAN HOS JOEL AMOS OBA YNA MIC NAH HAB ZEP HAG ZEC MAL YHN MARK MAT LUKE ACTs ROM 1COR 2COR GAL EPH PHP COL 1TH 2TH 1TIM 2TIM TIT PHM HEB YAC 1PET 2PET 1YHN 2YHN 3YHN YUD REV
EST Intro C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9 C10
This is still a very early look into the unfinished text of the Open English Translation of the Bible. Please double-check the text in advance before using in public.
9:20 The celebration named ‘Purim’
20 Now Mordekai recorded everything that had happened and sent letters to all the Jews throughout the empire, in both the near provinces and the far away ones. 21 That decree established an annual holiday on the 14th and 15th of March every year,[fn] 22 because those were the days when the Jews no longer had to oppose their enemies and that was the month when their sorrow and mourning had changed into a good day. Now they were instructed to make them days of feasting and happiness, and sending of gifts—to each other but also to the needy. 23 The Jews had already celebrated those days that way, so they readily agreed to do what Mordekai had written.
24 Yes, Haman (the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite), the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted to annihilate them, and he had thrown a ‘Pur’ (which is ‘lot’ or perhaps ‘dice’) choose the date to crush them and to destroy them. 25 But instead they would remember how Queen Esther stood in front of the king, and how he had said in the letter, “Let his evil plot that he plotted concerning the Jews return on his head, and let them execute him and his sons on the pole.” 26 Therefore they called this celebration ‘Purim’[fn] because of what they had experienced and because of the contents of Mordekai’s letter. 27 The Jews agreed to establish those two days as holidays and to observe them on those specific days as they’d been instructed. They agreed that they and their descendants and everyone who became part of the Jewish people would celebrate it every year. 28 So that’s why every Jewish family in every generation since has celebrated these days as holidays, wherever they live. The Jewish community and its descendants will always faithfully observe this festival of ‘Purim’.
29 Then Queen Esther (the daughter of Abihail), with help from Mordekai the Jew, wrote a second letter about ‘Purim’. 30 He sent this second letter to all the Jews throughout the empire of King Ahasuerus, with words of peace and truth 31 to set up the ‘Purim’ celebration on the given dates according to what Mordekai the Jew and Queen Esther had determined for them. They also confirmed that the Jews should continue the times of fasting and mourning that they had established for themselves and their future descendants. 32 So Esther’s decree confirmed these regulations about ‘Purim’ and they were written into the official record.
9:21 The OET-RV gives an approximate time of the year in our calendars, but the Jewish calendar is largely a lunar calendar so the dates of the feast in our calendars moves around a little. In 2024 for example, ‘Purim’ begins on the evening of March 23 in Israel and concludes at sundown on March 24.
9:26 Plural of Hebrew ‘Pur’ meaning ‘lot/dice’.