8:5 She said, “If the king is so inclined and if I have met with his approval and if the matter is agreeable to the king and if I am attractive to him, let an edict be written rescinding those recorded intentions of Haman the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, 1 which he wrote in order to destroy the Jews who are throughout all the king’s provinces.
8:9 The king’s scribes were quickly 2 summoned – in the third month (that is, the month of Sivan), on the twenty-third day. 3 They wrote out 4 everything that Mordecai instructed to the Jews and to the satraps and the governors and the officials of the provinces all the way from India to Ethiopia 5 – a hundred and twenty-seven provinces in all – to each province in its own script and to each people in their own language, and to the Jews according to their own script and their own language.
1 tc The LXX does not include the expression “the Agagite.”
2 tn Heb “in that time”; NIV “At once.”
3 sn Cf. 3:12. Two months and ten days have passed since Haman’s edict to wipe out the Jews.
4 tn Heb “it was written”; this passive construction has been converted to an active one in the translation for clarity and for stylistic reasons.
5 tn Heb “Cush” (so NIV), referring to the region of the upper Nile in Africa. Cf. KJV and most other English versions “Ethiopia.”