Chapter 4

¹Now when Mordecai knew all that was done, Mordecai tore his clothes, and put on sackcloth with ashes, and went out into the midst of the city, and cried with a loud and a bitter cry; ²and he came even before the king’s gate: for none might enter within the king’s gate clothed with sackcloth. ³In every province, wherever the king’s commandment and his decree came, there was great mourning among the Jews, and fasting, and weeping, and wailing; and many lay in sackcloth and ashes. ⁴Esther’s maidens and her chamberlains came and told it her; and the queen was exceedingly grieved: and she sent clothing to clothe Mordecai, and to take his sackcloth from off him; but he didn’t receive it. ⁵Then called Esther for Hathach, one of the king’s chamberlains, whom he had appointed to attend on her, and charged him to go to Mordecai, to know what this was, and why it was. ⁶So Hathach went forth to Mordecai to the broad place of the city, which was before the king’s gate. ⁷Mordecai told him of all that had happened to him, and the exact sum of the money that Haman had promised to pay to the king’s treasuries for the Jews, to destroy them. ⁸Also he gave him the copy of the writing of the decree that was given out in Shushan to destroy them, to show it to Esther, and to declare it to her, and to charge her that she should go in to the king, to make supplication to him, and to make request before him, for her people. ⁹Hathach came and told Esther the words of Mordecai. ¹⁰Then Esther spoke to Hathach, and gave him a message to Mordecai saying: ¹¹All the king’s servants, and the people of the king’s provinces, do know, that whoever, whether man or woman, shall come to the king into the inner court, who is not called, there is one law for him, that he be put to death, except those to whom the king shall hold out the golden scepter, that he may live: but I have not been called to come in to the king these thirty days. ¹²They told to Mordecai Esther’s words. ¹³Then Mordecai bade them return answer to Esther, Don’t think to yourself that you shall escape in the king’s house, more than all the Jews. ¹⁴For if you altogether hold your peace at this time, then will relief and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish: and who knows whether you haven’t come to the kingdom for such a time as this? ¹⁵Then Esther bade them return answer to Mordecai, ¹⁶Go, gather together all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast you for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day: I also and my maidens will fast in like manner; and so will I go in to the king, which is not according to the law: and if I perish, I perish. ¹⁷So Mordecai went his way, and did according to all that Esther had commanded him.