When it is said
Pray it when you face something hard and have no one to stand with you.
Its opening plea, “Help me, who am alone and have no helper but You,” is short enough to pray on its own.
Where it comes from
Author by tradition
Why Esther prayed
Queen Esther was a Jew, raised by Mordecai. The king’s chief minister Haman had won an order to destroy the Jews, and Mordecai begged her to plead with the king. Yet anyone who went in to the king uncalled was put to death, unless he held out his golden sceptre. Esther asked the Jews to fast for her three days. Then she would go in, even if it cost her life (Esther 4:7-16).
The King James Version, Esther 4; Brenton’s translation of the Septuagint, Esther 4
What happened next
Esther ended her prayer on the third day and went in. The king’s fierce look made her faint. In the Greek telling, God turned his spirit to gentleness, and he laid his golden sceptre on her neck. At a banquet she later named Haman as her people’s enemy. He was hanged on the gallows he had built for Mordecai, and a new order let the Jews defend their lives (Esther 7:1-10; 8:7-11).
The King James Version, the Rest of Esther; The King James Version, Esther 7 and 8
Where the prayer is found
The prayer is one of six passages found only in the Greek Book of Esther. A note at the book’s end dates the translation to the fourth year of a King Ptolemy and Cleopatra. That would be 114, 78 or 48 BC, if the note is right. Jerome moved the six passages to the end of his Latin Bible, and the King James Version sets them apart among the Apocrypha. The Orthodox count them as Scripture.
Karen H. Jobes, introduction to Esther, A New English Translation of the Septuagint (2007); Orthodox Church in America, “Canon of Scripture”
What the words mean
Alone, twice
In the Greek, Esther uses one word twice in her first lines. God “alone” is King, and she is “alone”, with no helper but Him. Brenton’s translation of the Greek gives the second as “destitute”, and the King James has “desolate woman”. The plain English keeps “alone” both times, as the Greek does.
The Greek Septuagint, on eBible.org; Brenton’s translation of the Septuagint, Esther 4
Part of a longer prayer
Esther’s whole prayer is longer. This page gives the five parts anyone alone can pray, where she cries for help, for courage and for freedom from fear. It leaves out the rest, where she tells of her people’s past and sins, asks God to turn their enemies’ plot back on them, asks for the right words before the king, and says how she hates the crown she must wear.
The Scripture in it
Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai: “Go and assemble all the Jews who can be found in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day, and I and my maidens will fast as you do. After that, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish!”
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Greek
Κύριέ μου βασιλεὺς ἡμῶν σὺ εἶ μόνος,
βοήθησόν μοι τῇ μόνῃ, καὶ μὴ ἐχούσῃ βοηθὸν εἰ μὴ σὲ,
ὅτι κίνδυνός μου ἐν χειρί μου.
Μνήσθητι Κύριε, γνώσθητι ἐν καιρῷ θλίψεως ἡμῶν,
καὶ ἐμὲ θάρσυνον, βασιλεῦ τῶν θεῶν, καὶ πάσης ἀρχῆς ἐπικρατῶν.
Ἡμᾶς δὲ ῥύσαι ἐν χειρί σου,
καὶ βοήθησόν μοι τῇ μόνῃ, καὶ μὴ ἐχούσῃ εἰ μὴ σέ Κύριε·
Καὶ οὐκ ηὐφράνθη ἡ δούλη σου ἀφʼ ἡμέρας μεταβολῆς μου μέχρι νῦν,
πλὴν ἐπὶ σοὶ, Κύριε ὁ Θεὸς Ἁβραάμ.
Ὁ Θεὸς ὁ ἰσχύων ἐπὶ πάντας,
εἰσάκουσον φωνὴν ἀπηλπισμένων,
καὶ ῥύσαι ἡμᾶς ἐκ χειρὸς τῶν πονηρευομένων,
καὶ ῥῦσαί με ἐκ τοῦ φόβου μου.
From the Greek Septuagint, as eBible.org prints it beside Brenton’s translation.