Esther 8:13

The copy of the writing for a commandment to be given in every province [was] published unto all people, and that the Jews should be ready against that day to avenge themselves on their enemies.

Ver. 13. The copy of the writing] Transcripts of the original were everywhere published and proclaimed, as the contrary edict had been before, Esther 3:14. This must needs amuse and amaze the people, but who durst say to their monarch, What doest thou? Is it safe to take a lion by the beard, or a bear by the tooth?

That the Jews should be ready against that day] God sometimes taketh notice (in his vindictive justice), as of the offending member, Jdg 1:6-7 Luke 16:24, so of the place where, 1 Kings 21:19 (Henry III of France was stabbed to death in that very chamber where he had contrived the Massacre of Paris), and of the time when, mischief should have been acted, to prevent and punish it, as Exodus 15:9,10. Ladislaus, king of Bohemia and Hungary, having conspired with other Popish princes to root out the true Christians in Bohemia, on such a day, on his marriage day, was immediately before, in the midst of his great, preparations, visited with a pestilent sore in his groin, whereof within thirty-six hours he died (Mr Clark's Examples). Henry II, king of France, the selfsame day that he had purposed to persecute the Church, and burn certain of his guard whom he had in prison for religion (at whose execution be had promised to have been himself in person), in the midst of his triumph, at a tourney, was wounded so sore in the head with a spear, by one of his own subjects, that ere long he died (Acts & Mon. 1784). The duke of Guise threatened to destroy utterly the town of Orleans, but was himself slain that very evening. The constable of France made a vow, that as soon as he had taken St Quintons he would set upon Geneva; but sped as ill as Julian the apostate did, when going against the Persians, he swore that upon his return he would offer the blood of Christians. But the Galilean (as he called Christ in scorn) took an order with him ere that day came; the carpenter's son had made ready his coffin; as was foretold him by a Christian, in answer to that bitter jeer.

To avenge themselves on their enemies] This was no private revenge, but licensed by the chief magistrates, intrusted by God with the administration of his kingdom upon earth, by the exercise of vindictive and remunerative justice, Romans 13:4. And here, Bonis nocet qui malis parcit. He wrongeth the good that punisheth not the bad. True it is, that private revenge is utterly unlawful unless it be in a man's own necessary defence, where the case is so sudden that a man cannot call in the help of the magistrate, but must either kill or be killed. Otherwise that of Lactantius holdeth true, Non minus mali est iniuriam referre quam inferre. It is no lesser evil to pay back a wrong than to inflict it. And that of Seneca, immune verbum est ultio, revenge is a cruel word, manhood some call it, but it is rather doghood. The manlier any man is the milder and more merciful, as David, 2 Samuel 1:12, and Julius Caesar, who when he had Pompey's head presented to him, wept and said, Non mihi placet vindicta sed victoria, I seek not revenge, but victory. The Jews here sought not revenge, but safety. If they had been sold for bondmen, they had borne it in silence and sufferance, the language of the lamb, dumb before the shearer, Esther 7:4 .