12 When this was done, the king heard that their fellow Jews were frequently going forth from the city in secret to express sympathy for the shameful misery of their kindred.
13 He became very angry and gave an order to deal with these people in exactly the same thorough fashion as the others, not leaving out any part of their punishment.
14 The entire tribe was to be registered by name—no longer for the service of hard labor described earlier, but to be tortured with the prescribed punishments and, in the end, to be killed within a single day.
15 So the process of drawing up a list of these people was carried out with cruel eagerness and intense diligence from the rising of the sun until its setting, coming to an end, though still incomplete, after forty days.
16 Filled with constant joy, the king organized banquets at the sites of all his idols. With a mind that had strayed far from the truth and with a polluted mouth, he praised objects that were deaf and unable to speak or give aid, but he spoke improper words against the supreme God.
17 At the end of the forty days, the clerks reported to the king that they were no longer able to complete the task of drawing up a list of all the Jews because of their countless number.
18 Though the majority were still in the country, some still in their homes, and some even on-site, the job had become impossible for all the generals in Egypt.