 In the land we call Iran in the 5th century BCE, King Ahasuerus held a contest to choose a queen. The winner was Esther, a commoner, an orphan, and secretly a Jew raised by her cousin Mordecai. But the king's advisor Haman hated Mordecai and his faith and plotted to slaughter all the Jews in Persia in revenge. Esther, terrified but urged on by her cousin, revealed to her new husband that Haman's plot would kill her too. The king was outraged and ordered Haman hanged and the Jewish people in Persia were saved.