Persian Satrap Hits Reply-All On Haman’s Proclamation To 127 Provinces

The use of so many couriers strained the supply for other important communications.

Susa, September 1 – Continued chaos enveloped royal correspondence with all parts of the Achaemenid Empire this week when the governor of one far-flung territory, in a moment of carelessness, selected the option to include every other recipient of the original letter in his inquiry for clarification of details in the royal decree, palace sources disclosed today.

King Ahashverosh’s seal adorned official missives to the one hundred twenty-seven provinces of the kingdom, apprising the administrators of each province, and the cities and towns therein, to prepare for a special day of reckoning regarding the Jews among them, to take place as this coming winter transitions into spring, the thirteenth day of the month of Adar. The 127 couriers carrying 127 copies, plus several spare scrolls, made their way to each provincial capital. Then the governor of the territory of Sarmatia decided to request more information, but accidentally selected Reply All and soon he, too, had sent 127 couriers with 127 copies of his letter not just to the king, as intended, but to all of the governors, satraps, and other high officials of the empire.

The resulting confusion snarled communications throughout the realm for weeks. Witnesses reported that the use of so many couriers strained the supply for other important communications, on top of which at least two dozen irate governors of other provinces saw fit to reply-all in kind to berate the Sarmatian prince, compounding the problem further.

Exhausted couriers recalled hauling satchels full of scrolls containing invective and ridicule that could make a Greek blush. They did not desire to deliver any such epistles, but performed that duty nevertheless.

“I’m pretty sure the admonition not to kill the messenger hasn’t been widely adopted yet,” observed a nervous rider of the swift camels. “I hope this hubbub dies down before I do.”

The impetus for the decree remains unclear. Rumors point to Royal Vizier Haman’s resentment that a prominent Jew named Mordechai refused to bow to him, and that personal insult drove Haman to find some pretext to get rid of Mordechai and the metaphorical horse he rode in on, i.e. Jews and Jewish culture. Haman then presented his case to the king as a pressing concern for the unity and stability of the empire, rather than as a petty, self-absorbed scheme to seek disproportionate vengeance against the only person in the kingdom not to bow to him, which he could have shrugged off and dismissed as unimportant in light of all the other honor and power he enjoys, but no, he let it consume him, like the fruit of the one forbidden tree in a vast, sumptuous garden of delights.

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