Mordecai probably refused the required prostration, usual though it was, on religious grounds. Therefore, his opposition led to his confession that…

Bowed not. —Perhaps, rather, did not prostrate himself, for this was the ordinary Eastern practice (see Herodotus iii. 86…

And the king's servants that were in the king's gate
Or court, all his courtiers; for it cannot be thought they were…

Mordecai refused to reverence Haman. The religion of a Jew forbade him to give honors to any mortal man that smacked of idolatry, especially to suc…