Tobit: Chapters 8 to 14

Last time, the Book of Tobit began.  Now to end it.

CHAPTER 8

No sooner has Sarah told she’s going to be wed than they are wed.  Now there’s a demon to deal with – and boy is it anticlimactic.  Tobiah puts on embers, and the demon is repulsed by the smell and leaves.  Oh, and reason Tobiah puts them on the embers?  Raphael tells him too, of course.  Jeez, even with these easy actions Tobiah is just a puppet.  And then when it’s over with, Raphael pursues the demon, finds him in Egypt and binds him.

You know what this is starting to remind me of?  Pumaman.  That was a terrible MST3K movie (a great MST3K episode, but a terrible movie).  In it, the supposed hero is really just a front for the nominal sidekick, who does almost all the work.  Same here – Tobiah doesn’t do much, while Raphael does it all.  OK, it isn’t fair because Raphael is an angel doing the Lord’s work, but you’d like to see some initiative by the lead actor.

Once the demon is gone, Tobiah and Sarah pray to God, just as they were told too. 

There is an interesting little sidenote, though.  Sarah’s dad tells his servants to dig a grave.  After all, all of his would-be-sons-in-law die overnight, so let’s not waste time.  His reasons for grave digging aren’t purely pragmatic, though.  If Tobiah dies, it’ll bring new disgrace to the family, so let’s bury him before anyone finds out.  Jeez, uh, yeah.  That’s shrewd, I’ll give him that.  But a bit nasty. 

He’s redeemed, though, by being genuinely happy when Tobiah lives through the night.  Interesting little side story, though.  He tells Tobiah that the son-in-law can have his wealth when he dies. 

CHAPTER 9

Now that the wedding has been consummated, it’s time for the wedding feast.  It’s to last two weeks.  Dang, these guys sure know how to party after a wedding! 

There is a downside for Tobiah, though.  His parents will count the days until he returns, and will fear him dead if he’s not back in time.  So he asks Raphael for help.  (Of course he does!  What else would he do!)  Actually, it’s a bit confusing.  When I read it, I though he wanted Raphael to go home ahead of him and tell his parents that he still lives.  But that isn’t what happens.  He goes ahead to …someone.  I dunno quite who though.  It’s a bit confusing. 

Short chapter – just six verses.  (Though, to be fair, verses here are longer than in most of the Bible).

CHAPTER 10

Now we get to the really heartwarming parts of the book.  Wait – first we have to get the build up.  We’ve flashed back to Tobit and his wife, Anna.  (About time I mentioned her name, right?)  They wait and wait for their son.  Tobit is concerned, but Anna is the one who really gets ahead on the worry.  She soon decides that her son has died – that must be why he’s not back yet.  While you can feel for her, she also comes off like a bit of a drama queen here.  It’s like many stereotypical Jewish moms you see on TV, who can’t stop thinking of their sons.  When Tobit tries to calm her down, she lashes out at him, “You be still, and do not try to deceive me!  My son has perished!”  See what I mean?  Drama queen. 

But Raphael and Tobiah do set off for home.  They first say their big goodbyes to new father-in-law Raguel.  It’s a nice scene with Raguel saying to Tobiah and Sarah, “And may I see children of yours before I die!”  The exclamation point really sells it here. 

CHAPTER 11

As they approach home, Raphael has an idea.  Of course he does.  You wouldn’t expect Tobiah to have an idea of his own, now would you?  He tells Tobiah to hurry ahead of Sarah to prepare his house for her.  (Mind you, Raphael will hurry with Tobiah, so I wonder who is helping Sarah go forward.  It’s not like she knows the way or anything).

As they approach, Anna sees her son and you can imagine how happy she is.  To her credit, instead of taking the drama queen approach and focusing  on herself, she immediately tells her husband that Tobiah is back. 

Raphael now has more info for the puppet-like Tobiah.  Time to take out that fish gall.  Your dad’s eyes will be wide open when he’s out to see you, so blow the gall gunk in his eyes, and it’ll cause the solidified bird poop to shrink and they can be peeled from his eyes.  Tobiah does it.

Actually, the moment when Tobit loses the bird poop is a bit gruesome.  It’s not a simple easy moment of it disappearing.  The scales shrink just a bit, and now Tobiah has to pull them out of his dad’s eyes.  Here’s what the Bible says, “Holding [Tobit] firmly, [Tobiah] said, `Courage father.’  Then he applied the medicine to his eyes, and it made them sting.   Tobiah used both hands to peel the white scales from the corners of his eyes.”  Man, that sounds rough.  Why did the Bible feel the need to make the procedure sound so painful and unpleasant?  Think – a guy is using both hands (unsanitized, of course) to rip something out of his dad’s eyes.  Yikes!  I’ll say this much – at least we get to see Tobiah do something, but what a way to make him an active character in his own story.

But this is the big culmination of the story – now Tobit can see again!  He’s thrilled and says, “I can see you, son, the light of my eyes!”  Yeah, this story does some of these nice moments right.  Then he prays to God his thanks.  When Tobit goes walking around town, people are stunned to see him moving so fast – and without a guide! 

CHAPTER 12

Well, now it’s epilogue time.  First Raphael leaves the story.  The Tobit family decides to pay them half the money they brought back.  That’s nice of them – and Raphael sure earned it. 

Raphael is going to leave, and gives hem some parting words advice.  It’s basic do-good stuff.  But then he lays the bomb on them.  I’m not really the relative of someone Tobit used to know – I’m an angel of God.  They fall on the floor in fear, and Raphael tells them not to worry.  Then he tells them to write down this entire story, which I guess is the supposed justification in the Book for its own authenticity. 

Quick note.  This Bible book has a different view on angels than the earlier Bible book.  In Genesis, an angel was a form of God in this world.  God’s raw form is too, well, too godly to really mingle with humans, so he puts himself here in an avatar like creature – an angel.  (That’s why when the three angels meet Sarah in Genesis, the pronouns go back and forth from singular to plural in a rather confusing manner).

In Tobit, the angel is more a modern one.  He’s not God in this world.  He’s a servant of God; a messenger.  He does God’s bidding.  But he is separate from God.

CHAPTER 13

This is just a song of praise.  It’s not a bad song or anything, but it has nothing to do with the story.  Tobit sings a song praising God for standard reasons of righteousness, without any reference to the story that just happened.  It’s like there’s a poem the author really liked, and he put it in right here.

CHATPER 14

Now it’s wrapping things up.  It’s now many years later, and Tobit is on his deathbed.  How many years later?  Well, we’re told he went blind at age 58, and now he’s …. 112 years old!  So assume he was blind for a few years and it’s 50 years later.  I never quite got why the Bible liked these too-long lives.  Early on it makes sense to collapse big time frames.  (Can you imagine how boring the early begots would be if it was 30 years per generation, yet it still covered over 1,000 years?)  But why now?  I guess it signifies the person is a godly individual that the Lord favors.

But it causes me to think about things literally.  If it’s 50 years after the main story, then Tobiah is about 70 or so, as is Sarah (who should actually be older, what with the seven dead husbands).  We’re told they have seven sons and that’s nice, but shouldn’t they have a helping of grandsons and even great-grandsons? Eh, I shouldn’t worry about these little things so much.

The parting words are actually a letdown.  It’s not a sentiment of how much he loves his family and his good fortune or even the Lord so much.  No, it’s all about what the future holds.  He says a prophet of old’s words will come true and Nineveh will be destroyed, so his kids should leave.  Then he “foresees” the next several centuries of Jewish life – Babylon, the captivity, the return, etc.  It’s a bit annoying because I know this story was written after all of that, and I’ve read this in Kings and Chronicles already. 

As he’s winding down, he says they should leave after his wife dies.  Wait – she’s still alive, too?  She must also be around 110 years old.  Yeah, but we don’t get an age for her, just a brief sentence a little later on that she died. 

So Tobiah and Sarah go to where her family is from – and her dad still lives, too!  Boy, everyone is 110 years old in this family.  In fact, his wife is still alive, too!  Dang, some family.  Well, I guess it’s about time the old man lives to see his grandsons, as he said he’d hope to way back when.  But he dies and Tobiah and Sarah get his land.  They are happy and prosperous. It’s a happy ending.

Tobiah dies at age 117, the oldest of them all.  And, curtain.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

So what can I say?  My 10-year-old self liked it more than it deserved.  Oh, don’t get me wrong.  It is a good Bible book.  It is enjoyable with some real moment of humanity – the prayers for death, Tobit’s happy ending, heck – even the father-in-law digging a grave for Tobiah.  The Bible is at its best when it’s at its most human, and that happens here.

But Tobiah is a non-entity.  And the ending goes on a bit too long.  Also, all the fixation about marrying relatives – OK, it fits Moses law, but it sure hasn’t aged well to modern ears.

I can see why it was left out of the Bible.  The fictional stories in the Bible – Ruth, Daniel, Esther, etc – really only work if they can be tied to some broader issue.  Esther saved the Jews.  Ruth is the grandmother of David.  Daniel sees the writing on the wall.  It’s not just stories of people, but can be related to the broader themes of Jewish history.  Tobit doesn’t do that.  It’s just a story about good people who overcome obstacles with the help of the Lord to have happy endings. It’s a heartwarming story, but it’s just a story. 

But it was an enjoyable enough story for the Catholics to put in the Bible, and I do like it, but I also completely understand why the Jews and Protestants opt to leave it out.  

Click here to begin the Book of Judith.