Esther 8:11
"Both little ones and women"
The counter-decree lets the Jews "destroy, slay and cause to perish" any armed force that attacks them, "little ones and women," and take the spoil. The Hebrew, Vulgate and KJV include the clause; the library's Greek (Giguet) does not, permitting the Jews "to live according to their law" and to deal with their enemies.
Manuscript variant: witnesses differ in wording
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
Every witness, in order
Composed c. 400–150 BC (debated)
Original Esther
No original survives. No copy of Esther has been identified among the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Translated c. 2nd–1st century BC
Old Greek Esther (library text: Giguet's French)
How the site knows this: Known here only through a translation.
permettre aux Juifs, en chaque ville, de vivre selon leur loi, de leur porter secours, et de mettre à leur merci leurs ennemis
to allow the Jews in each city to live by their law, to help them, and to put their enemies at their mercy
No women and children. Old Greek via Giguet's French (its own verse numbers); not checked against Hanhart's Göttingen edition.
c. AD 400
Jerome's Vulgate
How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Clementine Vulgate (1592 edition).
omnes inimicos suos cum conjugibus ac liberis et universis domibus, interficerent
to kill all their enemies with their wives and children and whole households
AD 1008
Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)
How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Westminster Leningrad Codex, a digital transcription of the Leningrad Codex.
לְהַשְׁמִיד וְלַהֲרֹג וּלְאַבֵּד אֶת־כָּל־חֵיל עַם וּמְדִינָה הַצָּרִים אֹתָם טַף וְנָשִׁים וּשְׁלָלָם לָבוֹז
to destroy, kill and annihilate every force of any people or province attacking them, little ones and women, and to plunder their goods
Mirrors 3:13 word for word.
1611
King James Bible
How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: King James Version (1769 text).
all the power of the people and province that would assault them, both little ones and women, and to take the spoil of them for a prey
What changed, and why
Most translations read "little ones and women" as the attackers' families. A minority reading takes them as the Jews' own families, whom the attackers would strike. The report in chapter 9 mentions men killed and no plunder. The site gives the Hebrew in full, both readings, and the Greek's very different wording.
What the evidence shows
- The Hebrew counter-decree mirrors Haman's decree.
- The library's Greek lacks the women-and-children clause. Via Giguet.
Sources
Related lessons
- Counter-Edict, Self-Defense and Power →The king gives Haman's house to Esther and his ring to Mordecai. Esther falls at the king's feet weeping and begs him to reverse Haman's letters. He says a decree sealed with the king's ring cannot be revoked, but they may write another. On 23 Sivan the scribes write in every script and language: the Jews may gather and defend themselves on 13 Adar, "to destroy, to slay, and to cause to perish" any armed force that attacks them, "both little ones and women," and take their spoil. Mordecai goes out in royal robes; the Jews have light and joy; many of the peoples of the land "became Jews."
- Esther, Power and Violence →Esther raises hard questions: a queen deposed for refusing to be displayed; young women gathered for the king; a decree of genocide; a counter-decree permitting the killing of attackers' families; 75,000 dead. This lesson gathers what the text says, how different communities have read it, and why it mattered so much to people facing persecution.