Revised Standard Version and many other versions present this verse as part of a sentence that continues from verse 11. The translator may find it preferable to restructure into a single and separate sentence as Today’s English Version has done.

On the thirteenth day of the twelfth month was the day that had been set for the destruction of the Jews (see 3.13). Today’s English Version makes the significance explicit by adding “on the day set for the slaughter of the Jews.” This decree is a complete reversal of the situation originally intended by Haman. It may be helpful in other languages to add the words “on the day set for the killing of the Jews,” as Today’s English Version has done (also Nova Tradução na Linguagem de Hoje), since that date was last mentioned in chapter 3.

On Adar see 3.7.

Septuagint 8.12

According to the Greek text of 3.7, the Jews were to be destroyed on the fourteenth day of Adar. The thirteenth of Adar is therefore the day before they are to be destroyed, according to the Greek (see comments on LXX 3.7). But it makes little sense to say that the Jews were to defend themselves the day before they were to be attacked, so it seems better to see a contradiction between the Greek text of 3.7 and 8.11-12. Translators may be tempted to harmonize the date in this verse with that in Septuagint 3.7, but the Greek text should be translated as it stands.

In the Septuagint an addition claiming to be the complete text of the decree follows verse 12 (see Addition E).

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Noss, Philip A. A Handbook on the Book of Esther — Deuterocanon: The Greek Text. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .