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Journey of a Passage

Esther 9:16

75,000, 15,000 or 70,100?

The Jews in the provinces killed 75,000 of their enemies (Hebrew, Vulgate, KJV). The library's Greek (Giguet, its 9:15) says 15,000; the Alpha Text is reported to read 70,100.

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
  • Uncertain connection
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
  2. Greek Alpha TextMedieval manuscripts (19, 93, 108, 319); origin debatedUncertain relationship to a Hebrew text of Esther (perhaps different from the Masoretic)
Latin
  1. Jerome's Vulgatec. AD 400Translated from Hebrew texts of Jerome's day (additions from Greek, appended)
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.

    car ils en tuèrent quinze mille, le treize d'adar, et ils ne prirent rien

    Its 9:15. Old Greek via Giguet's French (its own verse numbers); not checked against Hanhart's Göttingen edition.

  3. c. AD 400

    Jerome's Vulgate

    ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from Hebrew texts of Jerome's day (additions from Greek, appended)

    How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Clementine Vulgate (1592 edition).

    in tantum ut septuaginta quinque millia occisorum implerentur

  4. Medieval manuscripts (19, 93, 108, 319); origin debated

    Greek Alpha Text

    ⓘ Reports what manuscripts containedUncertain relationship to a Hebrew text of Esther (perhaps different from the Masoretic)

    How the site knows this: Reported in scholarship; not checked by the site.

    Reported to read 70,100.

    Source: NETS, Esther (Old Greek and Alpha Text, tr. K. H. Jobes, after Hanhart's Göttingen edition 1966/1983) ↗

  5. 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.

    וְהָרֹג בְּשֹׂנְאֵיהֶם חֲמִשָּׁה וְשִׁבְעִים אָלֶף

    and killed among those who hated them seventy-five thousand

  6. 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).

    and slew of their foes seventy and five thousand

What changed, and why

The numbers differ widely between traditions. They may be literary rather than counts; no independent record of such fighting exists. The site gives each text's figure and does not choose one.

What the evidence shows

  • Independently documentedThe Hebrew reads 75,000; the library's Greek 15,000. Greek via Giguet.
  • Not independently verifiedThe Alpha Text reads 70,100. Reported; not in the library.

Sources

Related lessons

  • Violence, Numbers and Purim →On 13 Adar the day is reversed: the Jews gather against those who sought their hurt, and officials help them for fear of Mordecai. In Susa they kill 500 men and Haman's ten sons, but lay no hand on the plunder. At Esther's request a second day is granted in Susa: 300 more men; the ten sons are hanged. Elsewhere the Jews kill 75,000 (in the library's Greek, 15,000), and take no plunder. They rest and feast on the 14th, in Susa on the 15th. Mordecai and Esther write letters establishing Purim: feasting, gifts to one another and gifts to the poor, every year.
  • Esther's Three Texts →Esther exists in three main forms: the Hebrew (Masoretic) text; the Old Greek (Septuagint), a fairly free translation with six additions; and the Alpha Text, a shorter Greek version with the additions but a different, briefer ending. They are not copies of one another. Scholars debate whether the Alpha Text translates a different Hebrew original.
  • 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.