Background and History

The chapters above are the King James Apocrypha. This essay is the setting of Tobit: who is said to have written it, when and where the book places the story, what happens in it, which copies have been found, and why the Protestant canon does not include it.

Canon and Authorship

Jerome’s prologue to Kings, quoted under Church Lists, names Tobias among the books set aside from the twenty-two. Westminster Confession 1.3 , also quoted there, says the books commonly called Apocrypha are no part of the canon. The Catholic Encyclopedia records Origen’s statement that the Hebrews do not use Tobias, while the Church does.

The book opens as the words of Tobit (Tobit 1:1). The Catholic Encyclopedia says the supposed Hebrew original is lost, and that an Aramaic original is only a probable opinion. It sets the captivity beside 2 Kings 15:29 and the fall of Nineveh in the Greek copies beside one another.

At a Glance

Author	The book opens as the words of Tobit. The Catholic Encyclopedia says that, if the story is fact, the elder and younger Tobias wrote it during the exile.
Date	The Catholic Encyclopedia’s own view, if the story is fact, is the early seventh century B.C. It also reports later dates others have assigned: Ewald 350 B.C., Hagen the bulk to 280 B.C., Grätz A.D. 130, and Kohut A.D. 226.
Place	The book names Nineveh and the tribe of Nephthali. A modern city for Nineveh was not added on this page.
Genre	A family narrative of exile, a journey with Raphael, and a commendation of almsgiving.
Chapters	14
Verses	244 in this King James Apocrypha
Key verse	Tobit 12:9 Apocrypha Not part of the 66-book Protestant canon. Catholic and Orthodox churches accept these books as deuterocanonical. For alms doth deliver from death, and shall purge away all sin. Those that exercise alms and righteousness shall be filled with life:Tobit 12:9 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source

Setting

Tobit 1:1

The book of the words of Tobit, son of Tobiel, the son of Ananiel, the son of Aduel, the son of Gabael, of the seed of Asael, of the tribe of Nephthali;Tobit 1:1 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source introduces the book as the words of Tobit, son of Tobiel, of the tribe of Nephthali. The story is set in the exile at Nineveh. Tobit 14:15 But before he died he heard of the destruction of Nineve, which was taken by Nabuchodonosor and Assuerus: and before his death he rejoiced over Nineve.Tobit 14:15 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source says that before Tobit died he heard that Nineveh was taken by Nabuchodonosor and Assuerus.

The Text

The Catholic Encyclopedia says the original, supposed to have been Hebrew, is lost, and that an Aramaic original is only a probable opinion. Jerome made the Vulgate from an Aramaic copy in one day, with a rabbi who knew Aramaic and Hebrew. The encyclopedia distinguishes the shorter Greek text of Alexandrinus and Vaticanus from the longer text of Sinaiticus.

Manuscripts

The same article describes those Greek recensions and later Hebrew and Aramaic copies, including Neubauer’s Aramaic text from a Bodleian manuscript. The Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library lists the book of Tobit among three Apocrypha works found among the Scrolls, with Ben Sira and the Epistle of Jeremiah. This page does not name a cave number or a language for those Tobit copies, because the page that was opened does not.

Structure and Themes

The narrative follows Tobit’s piety in exile, his son’s journey, and Raphael’s disclosure of his name. Tobit 12:9

For alms doth deliver from death, and shall purge away all sin. Those that exercise alms and righteousness shall be filled with life:Tobit 12:9 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source says that alms deliver from death and purge away all sin, and that those who exercise alms and righteousness shall be filled with life. The Catholic Encyclopedia notes that Polycarp cites Tobit 4:10 and 12:9 on almsgiving, and that Origen wrote that the Hebrews do not use Tobias, yet the Church does.

Rulers at the Time

The Catholic Encyclopedia discusses the Assyrian kings named in the versions. It says the Vulgate, the Old Latin, and the Aramaic name Salmanasar as the king who led Nephthali away, while 2 Kings 15:29 In the days of Pekah king of Israel came Tiglathpileser king of Assyria, and took Ijon, and Abelbethmaachah, and Janoah, and Kedesh, and Hazor, and Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali, and carried them captive to Assyria.2 Kings 15:29 · King James VersionOpen source names Tiglath-pileser, and that the Greek texts read Enemesar, which the encyclopedia explains as Sargon. On the fall of Nineveh it says the Vaticanus text names Ahasuerus and Nabuchodonosor, and it treats that pairing as a scribe’s mistake beside the Sinaiticus reading. This King James line is the Nabuchodonosor and Assuerus sentence at Tobit 14:15

But before he died he heard of the destruction of Nineve, which was taken by Nabuchodonosor and Assuerus: and before his death he rejoiced over Nineve.Tobit 14:15 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source. Reign years beyond the ones that article states were not added.

Issues With This Book

Tobit 1:15

Now when Enemessar was dead, Sennacherib his son reigned in his stead; whose estate was troubled, that I could not go into Media.Tobit 1:15 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source says, “Now when Enemessar was dead, Sennacherib his son reigned in his stead.” Britannica records Sennacherib as the son of Sargon II. The Catholic Encyclopedia sets the book’s account of the captivity beside 2 Kings 15:29 In the days of Pekah king of Israel came Tiglathpileser king of Assyria, and took Ijon, and Abelbethmaachah, and Janoah, and Kedesh, and Hazor, and Gilead, and Galilee, all the land of Naphtali, and carried them captive to Assyria.2 Kings 15:29 · King James VersionOpen source, and it sets the fall of Nineveh in the Greek copies beside one another. The Jewish Encyclopedia dates the book about 200–50 BC and says the Jewish canon did not receive it. Jerome says Tobias is not in the canon. Carthage and Trent do receive it. Those lists are under Church Lists and on How Was the Bible Canon Decided?.

Tobit 12:9

For alms doth deliver from death, and shall purge away all sin. Those that exercise alms and righteousness shall be filled with life:Tobit 12:9 · King James Version (Apocrypha)Open source is the sentence Catholic writers cite when they connect almsgiving with deliverance from sin. This site has no article devoted only to almsgiving. The canon lists that receive or refuse the book are quoted under Church Lists. Is Purgatory Biblical? is the page that quotes the Catechism on prayer for the dead, which that Catechism ties to 2 Maccabees rather than to this verse.

On This Site

These articles quote the church lists and the passages that those lists argue from. They link back to this collection.

Church Lists

The Council of Trent, session 4 (1546), receives Tobias, Judith, Esther, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch with Jeremiah, Daniel, and two books of Maccabees, and it anathematizes a knowing refusal. That decree’s first and second books of Esdras are Ezra and Nehemiah, not the books titled 1 Esdras and 2 Esdras in this King James Apocrypha. The decree does not name the Prayer of Manasseh as its own book. The English of the decree is quoted on How Was the Bible Canon Decided, and What Is the Apocrypha?

Catechism of the Catholic Church, 120 says the Church discerned the canon by apostolic Tradition and counts 46 Old Testament books, including Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, and 1 and 2 Maccabees.

The Confession of Dositheus, from the Synod of Jerusalem in 1672, answers “What Books do you call Sacred Scripture?” by naming, among the books Cyril Lucaris had called Apocrypha, “The Wisdom of Solomon,” “Judith,” “Tobit,” “The History of the Dragon,” “The History of Susanna,” “The Maccabees,” and “The Wisdom of Sirach,” and it says “we judge these also to be with the other genuine Books of Divine Scripture genuine parts of Scripture.” That sentence, on the English hosted by CRI/Voice, does not name 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras, or the Prayer of Manasseh. The host says the English is adapted from J. N. W. B. Robertson’s 1899 translation. The brackets around “Bel and the Dragon” on that page are the editor’s.

Anglican Article VI says the other books, “as Hierome saith,” the Church “doth read for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet doth it not apply them to establish any doctrine.” The article’s other books include the Third and Fourth of Esdras, Tobias, Judith, the rest of Esther, Wisdom, Jesus the Son of Sirach, Baruch, the Song of the Three Children, Susanna, Bel and the Dragon, the Prayer of Manasses, and the First and Second of Maccabees. Its canonical First and Second of Esdras are Ezra and Nehemiah. The sentence is on the Articles of Religion and on What Do Anglicans Believe?

The books commonly called Apocrypha, not being of divine inspiration, are no part of the canon of the Scripture, and therefore are of no authority in the church of God, nor to be any otherwise approved, or made use of, than other human writings.

That is Westminster Confession 1.3, as printed by the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. What Do Protestants Believe? quotes the same paragraph.

The Lutherhaus Wittenberg records a complete German Bible of 1534, printed by Hans Lufft in Wittenberg, titled Biblia, das ist, die gantze Heilige Schrifft Deudsch. A Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek record of a 1536 Lufft Apocrypha title page reads “Apocrypha. Das sind Bücher: so nicht der heiligen Schrifft gleich gehalten: und doch nützlich und gut zu lesen sind.” Bruce Metzger, writing in Christianity Today in 1957, says the 1534 edition gathered the books between the Old and New Testaments under that heading and did not include 1 and 2 Esdras. The 1534 leaf itself was not opened for this page.

The New Testament and These Books

These pages do not cite a sentence in the New Testament that names Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, or Maccabees as Scripture. Jude 14 says Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, and the next verse continues that prophecy. First Enoch is not one of the fourteen books in this King James Apocrypha. The text and the history are on 1 Enoch.

1 Maccabees 9:27 says there was great affliction in Israel, “the like whereof was not since the time that a prophet was not seen among them.” 2 Maccabees 15:38 is the writer’s own limit: if the story is done well, that is what he desired, and if slenderly and meanly, that is what he could attain.

2 Maccabees 12:44 says that if Judas had not hoped the slain would rise, it would have been superfluous and vain to pray for the dead. Verse 45 says he made a reconciliation for the dead, that they might be delivered from sin. This King James text has no verse 12:46. The Catechism’s footnote 607 names 2 Maccabees 12:46 for that reconciliation. Is Purgatory Biblical? quotes the churches on that dispute and does not decide it.

Tobit 12:9 says alms deliver from death and shall purge away all sin. Sirach 3:30 says water quenches a flaming fire and alms make an atonement for sins. Those sentences are what the pages that discuss almsgiving and atonement are quoting. This site does not have a separate article whose only subject is alms.

Jewish Lists

Josephus, Against Apion 1.8 (William Whiston’s translation), says the Jews have “only twenty two books, which contain the records of all the past times; which are justly believed to be divine,” five of them Moses, thirteen the prophets after Moses through Artaxerxes, and four hymns and precepts. History written since Artaxerxes “hath not been esteemed of the like authority with the former by our forefathers, because there hath not been an exact succession of Prophets since that time.”

Jerome’s prologue to Kings, the Prologus Galeatus, in Kevin P. Edgecomb’s public-domain translation, counts twenty-two books and says “whatever is outside of these is set aside among the apocrypha.” He names Wisdom, “the book of Jesus son of Sirach,” Judith, and Tobias as not in the canon, and he says the first book of Maccabees is Hebrew and the second is Greek. The translation is at tertullian.org.

Athanasius, Festal Letter 39 (367), counts twenty-two Old Testament books and includes “Jeremiah with Baruch, Lamentations, and the epistle” as one book. He then names Wisdom of Solomon, Wisdom of Sirach, Esther, Judith, and Tobit as “not indeed included in the Canon, but appointed by the Fathers to be read.” The English is the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers text on New Advent.

Melito of Sardis, quoted by Eusebius in Church History 4.26.14, lists the Old Testament books he learned in the East. The list includes “Wisdom also” and does not name Tobit, Judith, Sirach, or the books of Maccabees.

The Jewish Encyclopedia (1906), “Bible Canon,” says the Jewish canon is twenty-four books: the five of the Law, eight of the Prophets, and eleven Writings. It summarizes the baraita in Bava Batra 14b as Law; Prophets (Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and the Minor Prophets); and Writings (Ruth, Psalms, Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles, Lamentations, Daniel, Esther, Ezra, and Chronicles). That summary does not include Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch as its own book, or Maccabees. The English of the Talmud on Sefaria is copyrighted, so this page does not reprint it.

3 Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, and Psalm 151 are not in this King James text.

Tobit