Tobit — Chapter 11

AT UBI INTROIERIS DOMUM TUAM STATIM ADORA DOMINUM DEUM TUUM ET GRATIAS AGENS EI ACCEDE AD PATREM TUUM ET OSCULARE EUM — When you arrive home, first worship God and give thanks, then approach your father. Raphael teaches: when departing on a journey first go to the temple to invoke God's guidance; and when returning first give thanks in the temple. This was the custom of devout men. Lapide quotes Pacatus (Panegyrics): 'On entering great cities we first visited the sacred temples and shrines dedicated to the Supreme Deity, then the forums, baths, and gymnasia.' St. Benedict's Rule: 'Let guests be first led to prayer.' So St. Antony visiting Paul the First Hermit (Jerome, Vita Pauli).

TUNC PRAECUCURRIT CANIS QUI SIMUL FUERAT IN VIA ET QUASI NUNTIUS ADVENIENS BLANDIMENTO SUAE CAUDAE GAUDEBAT — Bede's mystical interpretation: 'The figure of this dog is not to be despised, for as a fellow-traveler of the Angel, it signifies the Doctors of the Church who by contending with heretics drive ravenous wolves from the sheepfold of the Chief Shepherd. And fittingly it is said to rejoice by wagging its tail, for the tail, as the end of the body, signifies the end of good action — that is, its perfection, or rather the reward without end which is bestowed.'

ET CONSURGENS CAECUS PATER COEPIT OFFENDERE PEDIBUS — Pineda (mystically): 'Tobias the blind represents the Jewish people rising from the sleep of their stubborn perfidy and running toward the Lord, though stumbling in their works, until they receive the full light of faith and good action, regenerated in Christ and instructed.' Augustine: 'Blind in body was Tobias, yet he saw the light of justice; his wife with physical sight was spiritually blind in defending the theft.'

ET COEPERUNT AMBO FLERE PRAE GAUDIO — They embraced and wept for joy. The Greek adds the mother said: 'I have seen you my son — now I am ready to die'; as Simeon said (Luke 2:29): 'Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.'

TUNC SUMENS TOBIAS DE FELLE PISCIS LINIVIT OCULOS PATRIS SUI ET SUSTINUIT QUASI DIMIDIAM FERE HORAM — Tobias spread the gall of the fish (callionymus) on his father's eyes; after about half an hour, the albugo (cataract-like membrane, like the skin of an egg) began to emerge from his eyes. Tobias grabbed it and pulled it away — and immediately his father's sight was restored. Lapide argues this was a natural healing aided by Raphael: the gall's acrimony eroded and dissolved the cataract. Tobias the elder had been blind four years (from age 56 to 60 by the Latin Vulgate; the Greek gives eight years). Lapide relates the parallel cure of Gregory of Tours's father Florentius: Gregory's son dreamed of being asked about the book of Tobias, and told to do similarly — a fish was caught, applied as directed, and all the swelling and pain immediately departed. The same story is related almost verbatim by Gregory of Tours himself (De Gloria Confessorum, ch. 40). Bede (mystically): 'The albugo signifies the self-complacency of those who appear white and just in their own eyes; the membrane of an egg signifies the blindness of those who hold the foolish hope of a Christ not yet born; when removed by Raphael, they acknowledge the Messiah has already come and redeemed the world.'