The story takes its sharpest turn on a sleepless night. King Artaxerxes could not sleep, so he ordered his servants to read the royal chronicles aloud. They happened upon the entry about Mordecai uncovering the assassination plot. "What honor has been given to this man?" the king asked. "Nothing," came the answer.
At that exact moment, Haman arrived at court—planning to ask the king's permission to hang Mordecai. Before he could speak, the king asked him: "What should be done for the man whom the king wishes to honor?" Haman, certain the king meant him, described the most lavish honor he could imagine: dress the man in the king's robes, set him on the king's horse, and have a nobleman lead him through the streets proclaiming his glory.
"Excellent," said the king. "Do all of this for Mordecai the Jew."
Josephus records that Haman was stunned. He had no choice but to lead his mortal enemy through the streets of Shushan on the king's horse, shouting his praises. When it was over, Haman went home in humiliation and told his wife everything. She replied that since Mordecai was of the Jewish nation, Haman's downfall had already begun.
At Esther's banquet that evening, the queen finally revealed her secret: she was Jewish, and Haman's decree would kill her along with her people. The king was furious. He stormed into the garden; Haman threw himself on Esther's couch to beg for mercy, which the king mistook for an assault on the queen. Haman was hanged on the very gallows he had built for Mordecai—fifty cubits high. The Jews were granted permission to defend themselves, and on the day appointed for their destruction, they struck down seventy-five thousand of their enemies. This is why the festival of Purim is celebrated to this day.
Bagoses Offered Many Injuries To The Jews; And What Sanballat Did.
1. When Eliashib the high priest was dead, his son Judas succeeded in the high priesthood; and when he was dead, his son John took that dignity; on whose account it was also that Bagoses, the general of another Artaxerxes's army, 22 polluted the temple, and imposed tributes on the Jews, that out of the public stock, before they offered the daily sacrifices, they should pay for every lamb fifty shekels. Now Jesus was the brother of John, and was a friend of Bagoses, who had promised to procure him the high priesthood. In confidence of whose support, Jesus quarreled with John in the temple, and so provoked his brother, that in his anger his brother slew him. Now it was a horrible thing for John, when he was high priest, to perpetrate so great a crime, and so much the more horrible, that there never was so cruel and impious a thing done, neither by the Greeks nor Barbarians. However, God did not neglect its punishment, but the people were on that very account enslaved, and the temple was polluted by the Persians. Now when Bagoses, the general of
Artaxerxes's army, knew that John, the high priest of the Jews, had slain his own brother Jesus in the temple, he came upon the Jews immediately, and began in anger to say to them, "Have you had the impudence to perpetrate a murder in your temple?" And as he was aiming to go into the temple, they forbade him so to do; but he said to them,
"Am not I purer than he that was slain in the temple?" And when he had said these words, he went into the temple. Accordingly, Bagoses made use of this pretense, and punished the Jews seven years for the murder of
Jesus.
2. Now when John had departed this life, his son Jaddua succeeded in the high priesthood. He had a brother, whose name was Manasseh. Now there was one Sanballat, who was sent by Darius, the last king [of Persia], into Samaria. He was a Cutheam by birth; of which stock were the
Samaritans also. This man knew that the city Jerusalem was a famous city, and that their kings had given a great deal of trouble to the
Assyrians, and the people of Celesyria; so that he willingly gave his daughter, whose name was Nicaso, in marriage to Manasseh, as thinking this alliance by marriage would be a pledge and security that the nation of the Jews should continue their good-will to him.
