The Jews kill their enemies that would have killed them. The days of
Phurim are appointed to be kept holy.
9:1. So on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which as we have
said above is called Adar, when all the Jews were designed to be
massacred, and their enemies were greedy after their blood, the case
being altered, the Jews began to have the upper hand, and to revenge
themselves of their adversaries.
To revenge, etc.... The Jews on this occasion, by authority from the
king, were made executioners of the public justice, for punishing by
death a crime worthy of death, viz., a malicious conspiracy for
extirpating their whole nation.
9:2. And they gathered themselves together in every city, and town, and
place, to lay their hands on their enemies, and their persecutors. And
no one durst withstand them, for the fear of their power had gone
through every people.
9:3. And the judges of the provinces, and the governors, and
lieutenants, and every one in dignity, that presided over every place
and work, extolled the Jews for fear of Mardochai:
9:4. For they knew him to be prince of the palace, and to have great
power: and the fame of his name increased daily, and was spread abroad
through all men’s mouths.
9:5. So the Jews made a great slaughter of their enemies, and killed
them, repaying according to what they had prepared to do to them:
9:6. Insomuch that even in Susan they killed five hundred men, besides
the ten sons of Aman the Agagite, the enemy of the Jews: whose names
are these: