Tobit 1:3-5
New Catholic Bible
The Suffering of the Righteous[a]
Tobit, a Righteous Man Put to the Test
A Model Israelite. 3 I, Tobit, have traveled along the paths of truth and righteousness throughout all the days of my life. I carried out many charitable deeds for my kindred and for those of my people who had been sent into exile with me to Nineveh in the country of the Assyrians. 4 While I was still a youth in my own country, the land of Israel, the whole tribe of my ancestor Naphtali had forsaken the house of David and Jerusalem, even though this city had been designated out of all the tribes of Israel, so that all those tribes might offer their sacrifices in the place where the temple, the dwelling place of God, had been constructed and consecrated for the enduring use of all future generations. 5 All my kindred and the entire house of my ancestor Naphtali used to offer sacrifice on all the mountains of Galilee to the calf that Jeroboam, king of Israel, had erected in Dan.
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- Tobit 1:3 Two sequences are juxtaposed. In two different places, two Israelites, two relatives, whose fidelity cannot be placed into doubt, are led to touch the depth of suffering. Even the Old Testament is aware, above all after the Exile, that suffering lies on the path of those who wish to serve God.
