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Then Queen Esther, seized with deadly anxiety, fled to the Lord.
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She took off her splendid apparel and put on the garments of distress and mourning, and instead of costly perfumes she covered her head with ashes and dung, and she utterly humbled her body; every part that she loved to adorn she covered with her tangled hair.
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She prayed to the Lord God of Israel, and said: "O my Lord, you only are our king; help me, who am alone and have no helper but you,
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for my danger is in my hand.
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Ever since I was born I have heard in the tribe of my family that you, O Lord, took Israel out of all the nations, and our ancestors from among all their forebears, for an everlasting inheritance, and that you did for them all that you promised.
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And now we have sinned before you, and you have handed us over to our enemies
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because we glorified their gods. You are righteous, O Lord!
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And now they are not satisfied that we are in bitter slavery, but they have covenanted with their idols
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to abolish what your mouth has ordained, and to destroy your inheritance, to stop the mouths of those who praise you and to quench your altar and the glory of your house,
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to open the mouths of the nations for the praise of vain idols, and to magnify forever a mortal king.
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"O Lord, do not surrender your scepter to what has no being; and do not let them laugh at our downfall; but turn their plan against them, and make an example of him who began this against us.