Tobit 14:3-5
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
3 As he was dying, he summoned his son Tobiah and Tobiah’s seven sons, and commanded him, “Son, take your children(A) 4 and flee into Media, for I believe God’s word that Nahum[a] spoke against Nineveh. It will all happen and will overtake Assyria and Nineveh; indeed all that was said by Israel’s prophets whom God sent will come to pass. Not one of all their words will remain unfulfilled, but everything will take place in the time appointed for it. So it will be safer in Media than in Assyria or Babylon. For I know and believe that whatever God has said will be accomplished. It will happen, and not a single word of the prophecies will fail.
As for our kindred who dwell in the land of Israel, they will all be scattered and taken into captivity from the good land. All the land of Israel will become a wilderness; even Samaria and Jerusalem will be a wilderness! For a time, the house of God will be desolate and will be burned.(B) 5 But God will again have mercy on them and bring them back to the land of Israel. They will build the house again, but it will not be like the first until the era when the appointed times will be completed.[b] Afterward all of them will return from their captivity, and they will rebuild Jerusalem with due honor. In it the house of God will also be rebuilt, just as the prophets of Israel said of it.(C)
Read full chapterFootnotes
- 14:4–5 Nahum: one of the minor prophets, whose book contains oracles of doom against Nineveh. Here, in keeping with the period in which the story is set, the author makes Tobit speak as if the punishment of Nineveh, the destruction of Jerusalem (587 B.C.), the exile from Judah and the return, would all take place in the future. The technique of using the facts of past history as seemingly future predictions is a frequent device of apocalyptic writers. The good land: a favorite name for the promised land. Cf. Dt 1:35; 3:25; 4:21–22.
- 14:5 Until the era…completed: a reference to the coming of the day of the Lord, when a new, more perfect temple was to be expected. Cf. Hb 9:1–14.
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