Esther 3:13

and the decree was despatched by posts throughout the whole kingdom of Artaxerxes, to destroy the race of the Jews on a certain day of the twelfth month which is Adar, and to make spoil of their goods. And the copy of the letter follows: The great king Artaxerxes writeth these things to the princes and governors under his rule from India unto Ethiopia, in a hundred and twenty-seven satrapies. After I had become lord over many nations, and had dominion ouer the whole world, not inflated with overconfidence of power, but conducting myself ever with justness and mercy, I planned to settle on my subjects a continually peaceful life, and, maintaining the kingdom in order, and passable to its utmost boundaries, to renew the peace desired by all men. Yet when I asked my counsellors how this might be brought about, Haman,—who excels in wisdom among us, and who has been manifestly of constant good will and unswerving fidelity, and has risen to second in rank in the kingdom,—informed us that among all nations throughout the world there was dispersed a certain invidious people that had laws contrary to all [other] nations, and who continually ignored the commands of kings, so that the uniting of our kingdoms, in unexceptionable good faith planned by us, cannot proceed. Realizing, hence, that this people alone is continually opposing all men, innovating an alien code of laws, and attempting to work all the mischief they can against us and the firm establishment of the kingdom:— Therefore we have decreed that all those who are signified in writing to you by Haman, who is in charge ouer the affairs [ofthe kingdom] next to us, shall all—wives and children alike—without mercy be utterly destroyed by the sword of their enemies, sparing none, on the fourteenth day of the twelfth month Adar of this present year; in order that these people, hitherto and also now hostile, may on one day be violently slain, thus ever henceforth obtaining for us a well-ordered and untroubled state.

And the message was sent by posts throughout the kingdom of Artaxerxes, to destroy utterly the race of the Jews on the first day of the twelfth month, which is Adar, and to plunder their goods.