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Journey of a Passage

Esther 2:5–6

Who was carried away with Jeconiah?

"Mordecai, son of Jair, son of Shimei, son of Kish, a Benjamite, who had been carried away from Jerusalem with… Jeconiah." If "who" refers to Mordecai, he was exiled in 597 BC and would be over 110 by Xerxes' seventh year. If it refers to Kish, the chronology works. All texts agree on the words.

Same letters, different readings: the consonants agree, but ancient readers vocalized or interpreted them differently

The family tree

Each row is a language or text tradition. Witnesses in the same row may share ancestry, revise one another, or have an uncertain relationship; the line under each box says which. A solid arrow appears only where direct copying or a documented revised edition is established. Order by date never implies copying. Scroll sideways on a phone.

✓ contains it · ✕ does not · ❝ quotes part of it · ⓘ reports on manuscripts · ▢ pages lost · – no copy survives

  • Same line, through lost copies
  • Translation
Hebrew
  1. Original EstherComposed c. 400–150 BC (debated)
  2. Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)AD 1008Descends, through lost copies, from Original Esther
Greek
  1. Old Greek Esther (library text: Giguet's French)Translated c. 2nd–1st century BCTranslated from a Hebrew text of Esther, freely, with additions
Latin
    English
    1. King James Bible1611Translated from printed Masoretic Hebrew

    Every witness, in order

    1. Composed c. 400–150 BC (debated)

      Original Esther

      – No copy survives

      No original survives. No copy of Esther has been identified among the Dead Sea Scrolls.

    2. Translated c. 2nd–1st century BC

      Old Greek Esther (library text: Giguet's French)

      ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from a Hebrew text of Esther, freely, with additions

      How the site knows this: Known here only through a translation.

      Mardochée, fils de Jaïr, fils de Sémeï, fils de Cisée… qui avait été fait captif à Jérusalem, parmi ceux qu'avait emmenés Nabuchodonosor

      Old Greek via Giguet's French (its own verse numbers); not checked against Hanhart's Göttingen edition.

    3. AD 1008

      Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)

      ✓ Contains this passageDescends, through lost copies, from Original Esther

      How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Westminster Leningrad Codex, a digital transcription of the Leningrad Codex.

      מָרְדֳּכַי בֶּן יָאִיר בֶּן־שִׁמְעִי בֶּן־קִישׁ אִישׁ יְמִינִי אֲשֶׁר הָגְלָה מִירוּשָׁלַיִם

      Mordecai son of Jair son of Shimei son of Kish, a Benjaminite, who was exiled from Jerusalem

    4. 1611

      King James Bible

      ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from printed Masoretic Hebrew

      How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: King James Version (1769 text).

      the son of Kish, a Benjamite; Who had been carried away from Jerusalem with the captivity… with Jeconiah king of Judah

    What changed, and why

    Hebrew genealogies often skip generations; Kish may be a distant ancestor (Saul's father was also Kish, 1 Samuel 9:1). Reading "who" as Kish fits the dates; reading it as Mordecai makes him impossibly old, and some see the book's chronology as literary rather than exact. The site does not fix a date for Mordecai's ancestors.

    What the evidence shows

    • DisputedMordecai himself was exiled in 597 BC.

    Sources

      Related lessons

      • Esther Enters the Court; Mordecai Saves the King →Young women from every province are gathered into the house of the women at Susa under Hegai. Among them is Hadassah, Esther, an orphan raised by her cousin Mordecai, a Benjaminite whose ancestor was exiled with Jeconiah. On Mordecai's instruction she hides her people. After twelve months of preparation, she is taken to the king in his seventh year, in Tebeth, and he makes her queen. Mordecai, sitting in the king's gate, uncovers a plot by two eunuchs, Bigthan and Teresh; it is recorded in the chronicles.