The Book of Tobias (Tobit)

Tobias is one of the gentlest and most practical books of the Old Testament. In fourteen short chapters it shows a blind old man who would not stop burying the dead, a young woman tormented by a devil, an archangel who walks the roads of Media in the form of a hired guide, and a wedding night spent in prayer. Every chapter is below, with St Jerome's Latin Vulgate beside the Douay-Rheims; this guide introduces the whole.

The Latin Vulgate and the Douay-Rheims Bible call both father and son Tobias; the Greek text calls the father Tobit (Tobeit) and the son Tobias, which is why modern translations title the book "Tobit". It is the same book. "Tobit" is pronounced TOE-bit, "Tobias" toe-BYE-us.

Who wrote the Book of Tobias?

The Church has received the book as the work of the two Tobiases themselves. The angel bids them "publish all his wonderful works" (Tobias 12:20), and in the Greek and Old Latin the command is explicitly to write them in a book; in the Greek, chapters 1:1–3:6 are told in the first person by the elder Tobias. On this view all save the last chapter is their work, and chapter 14, which records the son's death at ninety-nine, was added by another hand.

The Douay-Rheims tells it all in the third person, because St Jerome translated from a "Chaldee" (Aramaic) copy: in his preface he relates that a scholar rendered the Aramaic aloud into Hebrew while he dictated the Latin, finishing in a single day.

Many modern scholars consider it a later work by an unknown author, some an edifying tale rather than history. The Church's tradition has treated it as true history, and the Pontifical Biblical Commission (23 June 1905) taught that books commonly held to be historical are not to be explained otherwise without solid proof.

When was it written?

The events take place in the Assyrian captivity of the northern kingdom. The elder Tobias, of the tribe of Nephthali, "was made captive in the days of Salmanasar king of the Assyrians" (Tobias 1:2) and lived on under Sennacherib, whose flight from Judea and murder by his own sons are told in 4 Kings 19 and recalled in Tobias 1:21–24. He lived to a hundred and two (Tobias 14:2).

Taken as history, the book was written during the captivity itself; the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia places it in the early part of the seventh century before Christ, with the last chapter added after the younger Tobias's death. Modern scholars commonly date it to the third or second century before Christ; Aramaic and Hebrew fragments found at Qumran confirm the Semitic original St Jerome spoke of.

What is the Book of Tobias about? A summary

The just man of Nephthali (chapters 1–3)

Chapters 1–3 introduce the elder Tobias. As a boy he worshipped at Jerusalem while his tribe went after the golden calves of Jeroboam; captive at Ninive, he kept the Law, fed the hungry, clothed the naked, and buried the slain of his people, for which Sennacherib condemned him to death. Returning from hiding, he again leaves his feast-day dinner to bury a murdered Israelite. Exhausted after burying the dead, he falls asleep by a wall and is blinded by the droppings of a swallow (chapter 2). "This trial the Lord therefore permitted to happen to him, that an example might be given to posterity of his patience, as also of holy Job" (2:12). Reproached by his wife Anna, he asks God to take him.

On the same day, far away in Media, Sara the daughter of Raguel is mocked by a servant girl: she has been given to seven husbands, and "a devil named Asmodeus had killed them" on their wedding night (3:8). Chapter 3 closes with the hinge of the book: both prayers are heard "in the sight of the glory of the most high God", and "the holy angel of the Lord, Raphael was sent to heal them both".

The father's counsel and the journey (chapters 4–6)

Expecting death, the elder Tobias gives his son the counsels of chapter 4, among the finest moral teaching in the Old Testament: honour your mother, give alms, flee fornication and pride, pay the labourer at once. He then sends him to Rages of the Medes to recover ten talents lent to Gabelus. In chapter 5 the young man finds a guide "standing girded, and as it were ready to walk", not knowing he is an angel; the guide calls himself Azarias, son of the great Ananias. Challoner notes that the angel took the form of Azarias, and so bore his name.

On the first night, by the Tigris, a great fish leaps up to devour the young Tobias. At the angel's word he draws it ashore and keeps its heart, gall and liver for medicines (chapter 6). Raphael then tells him that he is to marry Sara, his kinswoman, and teaches him why the devil had power over her seven husbands.

The marriage of Tobias and Sara (chapters 7–10)

Raguel receives them with tears and, encouraged by the angel, gives Sara to Tobias: "The God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob be with you, and may he join you together, and fulfil his blessing in you" (Tobias 7:15). On the wedding night, in chapter 8, Tobias burns part of the liver, "the angel Raphael took the devil, and bound him in the desert of upper Egypt", and the couple pray together; at cockcrow Raguel, who has dug a grave, learns they are "safe and sound". Raphael fetches the money from Gabelus (chapter 9), while at home Anna watches the roads (chapter 10).

The healing and the revelation of Raphael (chapters 11–12)

In chapter 11 the dog that had followed the travellers runs ahead "as if he had brought the news", the son anoints his father's eyes with the gall, and the old man sees: "I bless thee, O Lord God of Israel, because thou hast chastised me, and thou hast saved me: and behold I see Tobias my son." When father and son try to give their guide half of all they have, he reveals himself in chapter 12: "I am the angel Raphael, one of the seven, who stand before the Lord", and vanishes from their sight.

The canticle and the last words (chapters 13–14)

Chapter 13 is the elder Tobias's canticle of thanksgiving, which turns into a prophecy of Jerusalem rebuilt, whose gates "shall be built of sapphire, and of emerald", and in whose streets "Alleluia shall be sung". Challoner reads it partly of the city restored after the captivity, partly of the Church and the heavenly Jerusalem of the Apocalypse 21. In chapter 14 the old man dies, foretelling the destruction of Ninive and the return of the Gentiles to the God of Israel; his son leaves Ninive and ends his days in peace.

Themes and the Catholic reading

Almsgiving and the works of mercy. The 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia sees the chief purpose of the book in showing that God is true to those who are true to Him, and almsgiving as its most prominent lesson. "Alms deliver from all sin, and from death, and will not suffer the soul to go into darkness" (Tobias 4:11); "alms delivereth from death, and the same is that which purgeth away sins" (12:9). St Polycarp and St Cyprian both build on these words. The seventh corporal work of mercy, to bury the dead, the Church draws from the example of holy Tobias; we treat it in the works of mercy.

Prayer, fasting and the angels. "Prayer is good with fasting and alms more than to lay up treasures of gold" (12:8). Raphael's words, "When thou didst pray with tears … I offered thy prayer to the Lord" (12:12), are one of the clearest scriptural witnesses that the holy angels present our prayers before God, as the angel with the golden censer does in Apocalypse 8. Tobias is the only book of Scripture that names Raphael, "the medicine of God" in St Gregory the Great's interpretation. On him, see St Raphael the Archangel and the Archangels; on the angel who accompanies each of us, Guardian Angels: the Catholic teaching.

Holy matrimony. Raphael's teaching in chapter 6 is the heart of the book for married Christians: the devil has power over those who "in such manner receive matrimony, as to shut out God from themselves, and from their mind, and to give themselves to their lust, as the horse and mule, which have not understanding" (6:17). He bids Tobias spend the first three nights in continence and prayer, whence the old custom, in Catholic lands, of the "Tobias nights". They pray as "children of saints" who "must not be joined together like heathens" (8:5). The Church teaches the same ends of marriage in Catholic marriage: the Sacrament of Matrimony.

Christ and the Church. St Ambrose calls it a prophetic book. St Bede, in his commentary on the book, reads in it the mysteries of Christ and the Church: the young Tobias, the only son sent far to bring home a bride and give light to his father, figures Christ, and the fish that sought to devour him the ancient enemy.

Famous chapters and verses

Tobias 8:4–10 ("Tobit 8:4b-8"), the wedding prayer. Modern lectionaries cite the marriage reading as "Tobit 8:4b-8"; in the Douay-Rheims the same prayer stands at Tobias 8:4–10: "Thou madest Adam of the slime of the earth, and gavest him Eve for a helper. And now, Lord, thou knowest, that not for fleshly lust do I take my sister to wife, but only for the love of posterity." Sara answers: "Have mercy on us, O Lord, have mercy on us, and let us grow old both together in health." It recalls Genesis 2.

Tobias 4:16, the Golden Rule. "See thou never do to another what thou wouldst hate to have done to thee by another" (Tobias 4), which Our Lord gives in its positive form in Matthew 7:12.

Tobias 12:8–9, prayer, fasting and alms. The three works of penance named together (Tobias 12), long before Our Lord taught alms, prayer and fasting in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6).

Tobias 12:15, one of the seven. Raphael's words are the scriptural ground for the seven angels who stand before God, whom St John sees again in Apocalypse 8: "And I saw seven angels standing in the presence of God" (Apocalypse 8:2).

Tobias in the canon and in the liturgy

Tobias belongs to the Septuagint, the Greek Old Testament used by the Apostles, and is one of the seven books which the Church calls deuterocanonical, together with Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch and the two books of Machabees. The Fathers cited it as Scripture from the second century: St Polycarp, St Clement of Alexandria, Origen, St Cyprian, St Ambrose. It is named in the canon of the Council of Rome under Pope St Damasus (382), of the Councils of Hippo (393) and Carthage (397), in the letter of Pope St Innocent I to Exsuperius (405), in St Augustine's On Christian Doctrine, at the Council of Florence (1442), and finally in the decree of the Council of Trent, Session IV (8 April 1546), which binds all Catholics to receive it as sacred and canonical.

Protestant Bibles omit it because the Reformers followed the shorter Hebrew canon and placed Tobit among the "Apocrypha"; the King James Bible of 1611 still printed it between the Testaments, but later editions generally left it out. We explain the whole question in the deuterocanonical books.

In the 1962 Roman Missal the Introit of the Nuptial Mass is taken from Tobias 7:15 and 8:19: Deus Israël conjungat vos, "May the God of Israel join you together, and may He be with you, who was merciful to two only children", followed by Psalm 127 (128). On the feast of St Raphael the Archangel, 24 October, the Epistle is taken from Tobias 12, and the Gospel from John 5, the pool where "an angel of the Lord descended at certain times". In the Roman Breviary, Tobias is read at Matins in September, among the books of Job, Judith and Esther.

How to read it

Read it in one sitting first; it takes well under an hour. Then return to the prayers, the soul of the book: those of Tobias and Sara in chapter 3, the wedding prayer in chapter 8, the canticle of chapter 13. Engaged and married couples will profit from reading chapters 6–8 together. Keep the Latin beside the English: the Douay-Rheims follows the Latin Vulgate, whose text of Tobias differs in places from the Greek behind most modern versions. Those who wish to pray with the archangel can make the novena to St Raphael, drawn from this book.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Book of Tobit about?

The Book of Tobit (Tobias) tells of a devout Israelite captive in Ninive who is struck blind after years of almsgiving and burying the dead. God sends the Archangel Raphael, disguised as a man named Azarias, to guide his son Tobias to Media, where he marries Sara and frees her from the devil Asmodeus. On their return the father's sight is restored, and Raphael reveals who he is.

Who wrote the Book of Tobit?

The Church traditionally attributes the book to the two Tobiases, father and son, who were commanded by the angel to make known all God's works (Tobias 12:20). The opening chapters in the Greek are told in the first person by the elder Tobias, and all but the last chapter is held to be their work. Many modern scholars ascribe it to an unknown later author.

When was the Book of Tobit written?

Taken as history, as the Church's tradition received it, the book was written during the Assyrian captivity, in the early part of the seventh century before Christ, by those who had lived under kings Salmanasar and Sennacherib. Many modern scholars date it to the third or second century before Christ.

Is the Book of Tobit in the Catholic Bible?

Yes. Tobit (Tobias) is a canonical book of the Catholic Old Testament, placed after 2 Esdras (Nehemias) and before Judith. It was listed in the canon by the Councils of Rome (382), Hippo (393) and Carthage (397), by the Council of Florence, and was solemnly defined as Scripture by the Council of Trent in 1546. It is also in the Orthodox and Ethiopian Bibles.

Why is the Book of Tobit not in the Protestant Bible?

The Protestant Reformers followed the shorter canon of the Hebrew Bible, from which the Jews excluded Tobias, as St Jerome already noted. They classed it among the "Apocrypha"; the 1611 King James Bible printed it between the Testaments, but most later Protestant editions omit it. The Church received it from the Septuagint and the Apostolic tradition and defined it as inspired.

How many chapters are in the Book of Tobit?

The Book of Tobit has 14 chapters, both in the Latin Vulgate and Douay-Rheims and in modern translations made from the Greek.

Is the Book of Tobit true or fiction?

The Church's tradition and the Fathers treat Tobias as a true history, and the Pontifical Biblical Commission (1905) taught that books held to be historical are not to be explained as fiction without solid proof. Some modern scholars read it as an edifying story because of difficulties of chronology and geography.

What is Tobit 8:4b-8?

Tobit 8:4b-8 is the modern lectionary reference for the prayer of Tobias and Sara on their wedding night, one of the most popular readings at Catholic weddings. In the Douay-Rheims, which follows the Vulgate, the same prayer is found at Tobias 8:4–10: "not for fleshly lust do I take my sister to wife, but only for the love of posterity".

Who is Asmodeus in the Book of Tobit?

Asmodeus is the devil who killed the seven husbands of Sara on their wedding nights (Tobias 3:8). Tobias drives him away by prayer and by burning the fish's liver, and Raphael binds him "in the desert of upper Egypt" (Tobias 8:3).

Where can I read the Book of Tobit?

On this page, chapter by chapter, in the Douay-Rheims beside St Jerome's Latin Vulgate, starting with Tobias 1; every other book is in our online Bible.

Read the Book of Tobias verse by verse, in Latin and English, in the Iter Fidei Catholic Bible app.

Sources. The Book of Tobias, Douay-Rheims Bible (Challoner revision), with Challoner's notes; Biblia Sacra Vulgata; St Jerome, Preface to the Book of Tobias; St Polycarp, Letter to the Philippians 10; St Cyprian, De opere et eleemosynis; St Ambrose, De Tobia; St Augustine, De doctrina christiana II, 8; St Gregory the Great, Homilies on the Gospels 34; St Bede, In librum beati patris Tobiae; Councils of Rome (382), Hippo (393) and Carthage (397); Pope St Innocent I, Letter to Exsuperius (405); Council of Florence, Cantate Domino (1442); Council of Trent, Session IV (1546); Pontifical Biblical Commission, response of 23 June 1905; Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), "Tobias"; Missale Romanum (1962), Missa pro sponso et sponsa and feast of St Raphael; Breviarium Romanum.