- So the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther,
- and as they were drinking wine on that second day, the king again asked, "Queen Esther, what is your petition? It will be given you. What is your request? Even up to half the kingdom, it will be granted."
- Then Queen Esther answered, "If I have found favor with you, O king, and if it pleases your majesty, grant me my life--this is my petition. And spare my people--this is my request.
- For I and my people have been sold for destruction and slaughter and annihilation. If we had merely been sold as male and female slaves, I would have kept quiet, because no such distress would justify disturbing the king. "
- King Xerxes asked Queen Esther, "Who is he? Where is the man who has dared to do such a thing?"
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- Now the king and Haman came to drink wine with Esther the queen.
- And the king said to Esther on the second day also as they drank their wine at the banquet, "What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you And what is your request? Even to half of the kingdom it shall be done."
- Then Queen Esther replied, "If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me as my petition, and my people as my request;
- for we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be killed and to be annihilated. Now if we had only been sold as slaves, men and women, I would have remained silent, for the trouble would not be commensurate with the annoyance to the king."
- Then King Ahasuerus asked Queen Esther, "Who is he, and where is he, who would presume to do thus?"
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