Haydock’s Catholic Bible
Commentary on Tobit 6:8:
Ver.
8.
Its heart, &c. The liver, (v. 19.) God was pleased to
give to these things a virtue against those proud spirits, to make them, who
affected to be like the Most High, subject to such mean corporeal creatures, as
instruments of his power. Ch.—God sometimes makes use of things as remedies
which have, naturally, a different effect; as when Christ put clay on the eyes
of the blind man. Jo. 9. The things which the angel ordered were salutary, by
God’s appointment. W.—They could not act directly upon a spirit: but they might
upon the person troubled by one, as Saul was relieved by music. C. Diss.—The smoke was a sign of the devil’s
expulsion, and of the efficacy of prayer; or rather, God subjected the proud
spirits to such weak elements. Serar. q. 3. M.—Gr. “and he said to him, respecting the heart and liver, if any
demon or wicked spirit be troublesome, make these smoke before a man or a
woman, and the person shall be troubled no longer. (George Leo Haydock, Haydock’s
Catholic Bible Commentary [New York: Edward Dunigan and Brother, 1859],
Logos ed.)
A Catholic Commentary on
Holy Scripture on Tobit 6:5-9:
§ h 5. The internal organs of certain
species of fish are still considered valuable medicaments. 6. ‘The youth did as the
Angel told him, and having roasted the fish they ate it. And they journeyed
both of them together until they came to Ecbatana’. 8. It is clear that burning parts of the fish could have no direct
physical effect on incorporeal demons. The effect actually produced on
Asmodeus, 8:3, is due to the power of God and his Angel. However, there is
nothing against viewing this effect as produced in connexion with some
religious symbolism attached to the action. The effect would then be attained
indirectly through the material object, much as the effect of sacramentals
approved by the Church—holy water, the sign of the cross, etc. In Vg the heart
of the fish is mentioned in this verse, and the liver in 6:19 and 8:2. Other
forms of the text mention both the heart and the liver in all three passages.
The omission of one or the other word in Vg derives, perhaps, from the custom
of classing heart and liver together; so, if one only is mentioned the other is
to be presumed.
§ i 9. Many older Catholic commentators
considered the cure of Tobias’ blindness, through the application of the gall
of the fish, a natural process. The gall of various species of fish was
considered in antiquity to have valuable curative powers in diseases and
irritations of the eyes. Ointments made of this substance were highly prized
for their stimulating and cleansing properties. Hence, the effect of the
application of the gall (11:13 ff.) may have been a purely natural one,
produced by a natural agent. However, the author of the book in his whole
context seems to attribute the effect to God’s intervention on behalf of
Tobias, cf. 12:14, even though he
does not say precisely whether the healing was miraculous or natural. It would
be well to bear in mind that it is an angel who prescribes a remedy apparently
unknown to Tobias, and that the particular material used is an instrument for
the operation of the power of God. This incident recalls the cure of the blind
man by our Lord, Jn 9:6. (C. F. DeVine, “The Book of Tobias,” in A Catholic
Commentary on Holy Scripture, ed. Bernard Orchard and Edmund F. Sutcliffe [Toronto:
Thomas Nelson, 1953], 400)
Eerdmans Commentary on the
Bible on Tobit 6:4-9:
6:4–9 As
already noted, the saving of the fish heart, gall, and liver anticipates
crucial junctures in the story; indeed, their use is spelled out in detail so
that the reader knows specifically how the fish giblets are going to be used.
This passage is an indication that there was no clear separation between magic
and medicine in antiquity (Kee 1986). Although some substances were recognized
as having medicinal properties, it was also widely believed that many illnesses
were caused by demonic spirits of one sort or another. This is well known from
such NT passages as Mark 9:17–27 par. Matt 17:14–18 par. Luke 9:38–42 and Luke
13:11–16 in which an illness was thought to be caused by demonic possession. In
the same way, many medicines seemed to have symbolic and magical properties
rather than being thought to work by biochemistry alone. There was also the
question of illness being the consequence of sin (Luke 5:20–25; John 9:1–3; Jas
5:14–16); in the case of the 4QPrayer of
Nabonidus, the king’s illness is healed when an exorcist forgives his sins. Thus sin, demonic possession, and
illness are all connected in the cultural thinking of the time. Sin is not
explicitly involved in either the blindness of Tobit or the deaths of Sarah’s
husbands, but there is a strong contextual implication that both Tobit and
Sarah are absolved of their difficulties because of their righteousness. (Lester
L. Grabbe, “Tobit,” in Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible, ed. James D. G.
Dunn and John W. Rogerson [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2003], 742)
Anchor Yale Bible Commentary
on Tobit 6:5-9:
5. throw away the
guts … its gall, heart, and liver
… medicines. Though GI deletes
(see textual note ), 4QTob apparently has it: wmʿwh[y ṭrd sm hwʾ mrrth wlbb]h wkbdh (Fitzmyer, 4Q197; frg. 4 i; l.
9; pp. 4–6).
6. he [“they”
in GI, Syr, and one OL MS] ate
… the fish. GII is
preferred here for two reasons: 4QTobb has the verb in the singular,
wʾkl (Fitzmyer, 4Q197; frg. 4 i; l.
10; pp. 4–6); and much later Raphael assures Tobiah (and Tobit) that throughout
their trip he himself had never actually eaten anything (12:19). Compare Luke
24:41–43, where the resurrected Christ does
eat some broiled fish to prove that
he is a real person of “flesh and bones” (v 39) and not a ghost or phantom. In
John 21:1–14, however, the text does not expressly say that Jesus actually ate
any of the bread and fish.
the
rest
… he salted. Salting meat and fish to
preserve them on long trips was standard procedure for caravanners, says Milik
(1972: 210), who first proposed “he salted.” Salting was probably part of the
original text; for 4QTob may be restored as [wʾp lʾwrlḥʾ swh ml[yḥh šʾr]ytʾ, “moreover he sal[ted] the [re]st
for the journey” (Fitzmyer, 4Q196; frg. 13; l. 1; pp. 12–13). By deleting this
detail (see textual note ), the author of G may have thought he was merely
simplifying the narrative, just as he had at the beginning of the verse (see
textual note d-d).
However, Zimmermann (80–81) maintains that the narrator unwittingly removed one
of the “magical” elements in the original folktale: salt. Zimmermann quotes,
with obvious approval, Jones:
The principal function of salt in this connection, like
that of most other charms, was to ward off harm, chiefly by averting the
influence of malignant spirits [that would spoil the meat]. Salt is almost
universally thought to be abhorrent to evil demons (1923: 29f.).
Salt, one of the basic necessities of life (so Sir
39:26), served a variety of purposes in the Old Testament, it being used, for
example, as a condiment (Job 6:6), as an ingredient in cereal and burnt
offerings (Lev 2:13 and Ezek 43:24, respectively), and even as a rubbing
compound for a newborn baby (Ezek 16:4). Purifying and medicinal qualities are
attributed to it in 2 Kgs 2:19–22, where Elisha used salt to purify the spring
at Jericho. For more on its negative symbolic meanings and uses (as well as its
positive), see James F. Ross, “Salt,” IDB
4: 167.
7. in the fish’s
heart and liver, and in its gall. Here, the author of GII links
“heart and liver” as one medicine and “gall” as another (so also in vv 7, 17;
8:2), a distinction lost in GI (“Then the boy said to the angel,
‘Brother Azariah, of what use is the fish’s liver, heart, and gall?’ ”).
8. you must burn
them. The use of vile-smelling smoke to exorcise an evil spirit was a
widespread technique throughout the ancient world. Here, when introducing
Tobiah to the subject of fumigation, “Azariah” speaks only in broad
generalities, leaving the reader in some suspense as to specifics, a condition
that the narrator will gradually correct (see vv 16–18 and 8:2–8). Fumigation
of a demon, it would appear, works ex
opera operati, i.e., independently of faith or prayer (so also v 18; but
see 8:2–4). For a more detailed discussion of fumigation in Tobit as well as
elsewhere in the ancient world, see Note on “place them on the embers of the
incense” in 8:2.
never
again return to him. Literally, “will not remain with him for
the age.” Simpson (1913b) saw the phrase eis
ton aiōna (“for the age”), which occurs also in 7:11 and 8:21, as
suggestive of “another, beyond the present, world epoch” (523, n. 2). But if
so, nowhere else in Tobit is there any indication of such a Weltanschauung.
9. as for the gall,
rub it on a person’s eyes. Raphael’s prescription for the cure of blindness
is completely consistent with the Old Testament, where “with the one exception
of the incurable serpent bite (Num 21:9) biblical remedies and treatments are
all of a rational character and do not involve incantations or magic rites, nor
do they include the so-called ‘filth pharmacy’ ” (Munter 1971: 1180). The
prescription is also comparable to treatments for blindness elsewhere in the
Ancient Near East, where various animal organs were used in a medicinal fashion
to cure blindness. In Assyria, for instance, the gall of the Kuppū-fish was mixed with either butter
or salt to make a salve to cure “corneal patches,” although elsewhere the liver of sheep, camels, or frogs was
sometimes used for the same purpose (von Soden 1966). In Egypt, the gall of a
common eel, as well as that of the ʾbdw
fish, was used for diseases of the eyes (Gamer-Wallert 1970: 12–13, 64). Pliny
the Elder (23/24–79 c.e.) also reported the use of fish gall as an ointment for
the eyes (Nat. Hist. XXXIII 24). For
a discussion [in Danish] of Tobit’s healing from the perspective of an
ophthalmologist, see Lundsgaard (1911).
In the Talmudic period, perhaps because of the impact of
Mesopotamian, Persian, and Hellenistic influences, diseases and illnesses were
often explained and treated in more supernaturalistic/magical terms, especially
in the Babylonian Talmud (Patai 1987). To be sure, some Jews recognized that
insects and animals, especially flies, could be carriers of disease (cf. Ket. 77a) and that contaminated water
could cause illness (ʿAbod. Zar.
30a). Still, many Jews also believed, for instance, in the existence of a demon
of blindness, Shabriri (lit. “dazzling glare”), who at night rested on
uncovered water which, when drunk, caused blindness (Pes. 112a; ʿAbod. Zar.
12b). And to take another example, barrenness, which in the Old Testament was
strictly attributed to God (Gen 16:2; 20:18; 1 Sam 1:5), was often explained in
terms of the activity of demons like Ashmodai (see Comment III, pp. 211–15).
“The main contribution of talmudic medicine lies not so much in the treatment
of illness but rather, as in the Bible, in the prevention of disease and the
care of community health” (Kohler 1903: 1184).
and
then blow on them. Cf. 11:11. In attempting to “simplify” this
verse, GI omits this second and very important procedure (rubbing in
the gall was the first): “As for the gall, apply to the man who has white
patches on his eyes, and he will be cured.” It is unclear whether this blowing
in GII was intended to drive out the evil spirit or to “activate”
the ointment (as does, for instance, one’s blowing on a cut covered with
iodine). The ancients believed, for example, that sometimes a demon could be,
quite literally, expelled by a patient’s expectorating (HERE 4: 730). While a modern reader may find such combinations of
medical and magical techniques disconcerting, it is well to remember that “much
magic is nothing but primitive medicine” (Dancy 39).
will
get well. 4QTobb has wyḥyn, “and they will live” (Fitzmyer, 4Q197; frg. 4 i; l. 15; pp.
4–6). Whether the cure will be immediate (e.g., as in John 9:6) or gradual the
narrator does not say, preferring to keep his reader in suspense. (Carey A.
Moore, Tobit: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary [AYB 40A; New
Haven: Yale University Press, 2008], 200-2)
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