Charles Ellicott Commentary Esther 9:16

"And the other Jews that were in the king`s provinces gathered themselves together, and stood for their lives, and had rest from their enemies, and slew of them that hated them seventy and five thousand; but on the spoil they laid not their hand." — Esther 9:16 (ASV)

Seventy and five thousand. —The number as given in the Septuagint is fifteen thousand, perhaps a more probable number.

On the whole history, Bishop Wordsworth well remarks, “It shows the recklessness of human life, even of their own subjects, which then prevailed among the sovereigns of the most celebrated nations of the Eastern world; and it displays the ruinous consequences which would have resulted for human civilisation if Ahasuerus (Xerxes) had been victorious at Salamis.

If Greece had not triumphed in that struggle with Asia, Eastern ruthlessness and Eastern polygamy might have become dominant in the West, and greater difficulties would have obstructed the progress of civilisation and Christianity. The Book of Esther reveals to us that the hand of God wrought for the deliverance of mankind at the Straits of Salamis, and on the banks of the Asopus at Platæa, as well as for the preservation of the Jews in the provinces of Persia.”