Bible: Esther 1:10-12; 2:1-17

Queen Vashti is Removed from Her Royal Position

1:10 On the seventh day, as King Ahasuerus was feeling the effects of the wine, 1  he ordered Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar, and Carcas, the seven eunuchs who attended him, 2  1:11 to bring Queen Vashti into the king’s presence wearing her royal high turban. He wanted to show the people and the officials her beauty, for she was very attractive. 3  1:12 But Queen Vashti refused 4  to come at the king’s bidding 5  conveyed through the eunuchs. Then the king became extremely angry, and his rage consumed 6  him.

2:1 The heavens and the earth 1  were completed with everything that was in them. 2  2:2 By 3  the seventh day God finished the work that he had been doing, 4  and he ceased 5  on the seventh day all the work that he had been doing. 2:3 God blessed the seventh day and made it holy 6  because on it he ceased all the work that he 7  had been doing in creation. 8 

The Creation of Man and Woman

2:4 This is the account 9  of the heavens and the earth 10  when they were created – when the Lord God 11  made the earth and heavens. 12 

2:5 Now 13  no shrub of the field had yet grown on the earth, and no plant of the field 14  had yet sprouted, for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to cultivate the ground. 15  2:6 Springs 16  would well up 17  from the earth and water 18  the whole surface of the ground. 19  2:7 The Lord God formed 20  the man from the soil of the ground 21  and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, 22  and the man became a living being. 23 

2:8 The Lord God planted an orchard 24  in the east, 25  in Eden; 26  and there he placed the man he had formed. 27  2:9 The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow from the soil, 28  every tree that was pleasing to look at 29  and good for food. (Now 30  the tree of life 31  and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil 32  were in the middle of the orchard.)

2:10 Now 33  a river flows 34  from Eden 35  to water the orchard, and from there it divides 36  into four headstreams. 37  2:11 The name of the first is Pishon; it runs through 38  the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. 2:12 (The gold of that land is pure; 39  pearls 40  and lapis lazuli 41  are also there). 2:13 The name of the second river is Gihon; it runs through 42  the entire land of Cush. 43  2:14 The name of the third river is Tigris; it runs along the east side of Assyria. 44  The fourth river is the Euphrates.

2:15 The Lord God took the man and placed 45  him in the orchard in 46  Eden to care for it and to maintain it. 47  2:16 Then the Lord God commanded 48  the man, “You may freely eat 49  fruit 50  from every tree of the orchard, 2:17 but 51  you must not eat 52  from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when 53  you eat from it you will surely die.” 54 

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