For Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the oppressor of all the Jews, had devised against the Jews to destroy them, and had cast Pur, that is, the lot, to consume them and to destroy them;
Esther 9:24 gives the official reason for a new yearly feast. In one sentence the Jews recorded where their enemy came from, how far his hatred went, and how he chose the date.
The verse does not call Haman a Persian official. It ties him to Agag, and commentators read that as a family line, not a job title. This also explains a refusal earlier in the book that looks, at first glance, like simple rudeness:
Haman was the son of Hammedatha the Agagite (Esther 3:1-10; Esther 8:3, 5; Esther 9:24). Fürst says that Josephus explains Haman's Gentile name as meaning "Amalekite by race," and Jewish tradition says the same. That is, Haman was an Amalekite. This explains why Mordecai refused to bow down before Haman. He belonged to the race the LORD had sworn to fight for ever, and the race Saul had orders to destroy completely.
Amalek was Israel's sworn enemy, under a standing verdict from God. Mordecai's refusal rested on that, not on personal pride.
The verse calls him "the enemy of all the Jews," and the plot matches the title. One man's slight was not enough for him:
He must have the blood of all the Jews; his heart will not be satisfied by the life of the one who had refused to honour him. He must have the lives of the whole nation. He breathes the spirit of the enemy of Israel. That enemy later says, "Come, let us wipe them out as a nation; let the name of Israel be remembered no more!" (Ps. 83).
The verse stops to translate the foreign word: Pur means "the lot." Haman did not work out a date. He gambled for one. Writers point out what that shows about him:
The Antichrist will rage against those who do not acknowledge his power and authority, and who refuse to bear his mark on their forehead and hands. Haman's fury is like it. It burns against a man who despises his person and refuses his yoke, and it knows no limits. But he would have scorned to put Mordecai alone to death. He must strike him down together with all his people. Haman cast Pur (that is, the lot) to learn when this extermination should take place. He believes in this superstitious practice. Later the Antichrist will do the same and consult the "god of fortresses" (Dan. 11:38). Even the most unbelieving man must have some religion: a fact we may observe every day.
The lot he consulted named the last month of the year. That left the threatened people a long window in which to escape:
The lot points to the twelfth month for the massacre of the Jews. Why not the third or the fourth month, to take away any chance of escape from the oppressed people? Is it not once again hidden Providence which directs everything as always? What can "the enemy of the Jews" (Esther 9:10, 24) do against the secret counsels of Providence? He must obey the lot he has consulted, and from that point his swift road to death and judgment begins.
The Jews could have named the holiday after Esther, or Mordecai, or the battle. They named it after Haman's dice. They knew whose hand had thrown them:
The two-day feast the Jews set up at this time was called Purim, after Pur, the lot Haman cast with the aim of destroying the Jews. Very likely the Jews knew Solomon's proverb, "The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD" (Proverbs 16:33). Haman had expected demon power to back him up. But no doubt the Jews recognised that the Lord had stepped in with His own clear decision. The Jews did recognise the Lord's hand in this. Yet God still did not allow His name to be mentioned in public.
Some writers read Haman as a preview of an enemy still to come:
Amalek is always the bitter enemy of Israel. His final overthrow will come with the second coming of Christ... This Haman, the Amalekite, is later called "the Jews' enemy" (verse 10). He foreshadows that final enemy. That enemy rises to trouble Israel and tries to wipe them out before the King of Israel appears.
- Ancestry. "The Agagite" ties Haman to Amalek, Israel's sworn enemy — he inherited his hatred, he did not invent it.
- Ambition. He wanted a nation, not a man; Mordecai's refusal was the excuse, extermination was the aim.
- Lot. Pur means "the lot." He trusted chance and dark powers to name the day — even the most unbelieving man keeps some religion.
- Overruled. The lot he obeyed gave him the twelfth month, and that delay opened his own road to death and judgment.
- Memorial. The Jews named the feast Purim after the enemy's dice — they turned his weapon into their calendar.
and when [Esther] came before the king, he commanded by letters that his wicked device, which he had devised against the Jews, should return upon his own head; and they hanged him and his sons on the gallows.
Esther 9:25 is the short official summary of the whole story: Haman's plot, Esther's appeal, and the reversal that hanged the schemer on his own gallows. It raises the question the book never answers by name — who turned the plot around?
The verse looks back to the "Pur," the lot Haman threw to pick the day for the massacre. That day fell almost a year later. Commentators see God's hand behind the long delay.
The Amalekite and his company cast the lot, the Pur, only to fix the day for this act of extermination. But as we know, the lot may be "cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD" (Prov. 16:33). And so it was here. Eleven long months stand between the two dates. The lot was cast on the thirteenth day of the first month, and it fixed the slaughter of the nation for the thirteenth day of the twelfth month. That time was given so that God would ripen His purposes toward both His people and their enemies.
The verse turns on a single moment: the matter came before the king. That hearing is where a private scheme became public knowledge.
Verses 24-25 briefly retell the history of the plot of Haman the Agagite to wipe out the Jews. He cast Pur, that is, the lot, which in Haman's case meant consulting evil spirits. At first his scheme seemed to be working. Then Esther stepped in — the king not only respected her, he loved her — and the whole plot came out into the open. So Haman's wickedness recoiled on his own head, and he and his sons were hanged on the gallows he had put up for Mordecai.
"His evil plan... should return on his own head" is not only poetic justice. Writers point out that God's purpose and Haman's own choices are both fully real here.
God does not only use circumstances or events to carry out His purposes. He also uses people — whether godly people like Mordecai and Esther, or ungodly and wicked people like Haman... God's dealings with people never contradict or remove man's responsibility. Man is not a puppet in His hand... In the book of Esther this is seen in connection with the great enemy and hater of the Jews called "this wicked Haman" (7:6). In the end, his wickedness resulted in his own destruction and their salvation. People may call this irony, but it is nothing of the kind. It was God's hand and purpose. It was also the outcome of Haman's own free decision, and he was fully responsible for all his decisions and actions.
Commentators see a settled rule of Scripture here, not a one-off.
So the evil Haman planned came back violently on his own head, as Ecclesiastes 10:8 warns, "He who digs a pit will fall into it."
Some writers find more than irony in the gallows Haman built.
It is beautifully significant that Haman hangs on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. At the cross, Satan was defeated. Through death, the one who had the power of death was destroyed (Heb. 2:14). What looked like a great defeat turned out to be the greatest victory of all time — and the end of the adversary.
The feast takes its name from Haman's lot. Yet God is still not named, even in the letters that set up the feast. Commentators contrast what God's book leaves out with what man's own writings later put in.
Here again, notice, the book holds to its character all the way through. Even here it does not name Him whom it would normally be the highest duty to proclaim. Yet the complete contrast shows up in man's own word. The Talmud lays down that at the feast of Purim a man should drink until he cannot tell the difference between "Blessed be Mordecai" and "Cursed be Haman."
Others read the feast as pointing forward rather than backward.
Only one feast, the feast of Purim, is mentioned in this book: a new feast that will last forever in memory of the deliverance of God's earthly people... So ends this account. It brings us to the dawn of the glorious time that follows deliverance, and points us prophetically to the threshold of the millennial reign of Christ.
- Plot. Haman schemed to destroy a whole people, and the plan looked unstoppable.
- Lot. The "Pur" he cast set the date eleven months away — time in which God ripened His purposes.
- Return. The evil he devised came back on his own head; God's purpose and Haman's own responsibility both stand.
- Gallows. He died on the structure he built, a reversal some read as a picture of the adversary's defeat at the cross.
- Memorial. Purim keeps his lot in its name, so the deliverance would never be forgotten — yet God's name stays unspoken to the last.