Tobit 3

NEW JERUSALEM	DOUAI-RHEIMS
1 Then, sad at heart, I sighed and wept, and began this prayer of lamentation:	1 Then Tobias sighed, and began to pray with tears,
2 You are just, O Lord, and just are all your works. Al your ways are grace and truth, and you are theJudge of the world.	2 Saying: Thou art just, O Lord, and all thy judgments are just, and all thy ways mercy, and truth, and judgment:
3 Therefore, Lord, remember me, look on me. Do not punish me for my sins or for my needless faults orthose of my ancestors.	3 And now, O Lord, think of me, and take not revenge of my sins, neither remember my offenses, nor those of my parents.
4 For we have sinned against you and broken your commandments; and you have given us over to beplundered, to captivity and death, to be the talk, the laughing-stock and scorn of al the nations among whom youhave dispersed us.	4 For we have not obeyed thy commandments, therefore are we delivered to spoil and to captivity, and death, and are made a fable, and a reproach to all nations, amongst which thou hast scattered us.
5 And now al your decrees are true when you deal with me as my faults deserve, and those of myancestors. For we have neither kept your commandments nor walked in truth before you.	5 And now, O Lord, great are thy judgments, because we have not done according to thy precepts, and have not walked sincerely before thee:
6 So now, do with me as you wil ; be pleased to take my life from me; so that I may be delivered fromearth and become earth again. Better death than life for me, for I have endured groundless insult and am indeepest sorrow. Lord, be pleased to deliver me from this affliction. Let me go away to my everlasting home; donot turn your face from me, O Lord. Better death for me than life prolonged in the face of unrelenting misery: Ican no longer bear to listen to insults.	6 And now, O Lord, do with me according to thy will, and command my spirit to be received in peace: for it is better for me to die, than to live.
7 It chanced on the same day that Sarah the daughter of Raguel, who lived in Media at Ecbatana, alsoheard insults from one of her father's maids.	7 Now it happened on the same day, that Sara daughter of Raguel, in Rages a city of the Medes, received a reproach from one of her father's servant maids,
8 For she had been given in marriage seven times, and Asmodeus, the worst of demons, had kil ed herbridegrooms one after another before ever they had slept with her as man with wife. The servant-girl said, 'Yes,you kill your bridegrooms yourself. That makes seven already to whom you have been given, and you have notonce been in luck yet.	8 Because she had been given to seven husbands, and a devil named Asmodeus had killed them, at their first going in unto her.
9 Just because your bridegrooms have died, that is no reason for punishing us. Go and join them, andmay we be spared the sight of any child of yours!'	9 So when she reproved the maid for her fault, she answered her, saying: May we never see son, or daughter of thee upon the earth, thou murderer of thy husbands.
10 That day, she grieved, she sobbed, and she went up to her father's room intending to hang herself.But then she thought, 'Suppose they were to blame my father! They would say, "You had an only daughterwhom you loved, and now she has hanged herself for grief." I cannot cause my father a sorrow which wouldbring down his old age to the dwel ing of the dead. I should do better not to hang myself, but to beg the Lord tolet me die and not live to hear any more insults.'	10 Wilt thou kill me also, as thou hast already killed seven husbands? At these words she went into an upper chamber of her house: and for three days and three nights did neither eat nor drink:
11 And at this, by the window, with outstretched arms she said this prayer: You are blessed, O God ofmercy! May your name be blessed for ever, and may al things you have made bless you everlastingly.	11 But continuing in prayer with tears besought God, that he would deliver her from this reproach.
12 And now I turn my face and I raise my eyes to you.	12 And it came to pass on the third day, when she was making an end of her prayer, blessing the Lord,
13 Let your word deliver me from earth; I can hear myself insulted no longer.	13 She said: Blessed is thy name, O God of our fathers: who when thou hast been angry, wilt shew mercy, and in the time of tribulation forgivest the sins of them that call upon thee.
14 O Lord, you know that I have remained pure; no man has touched me;	14 To thee, O Lord, I turn my face, to thee I direct my eyes.
15 I have not dishonoured your name or my father's name in this land of exile. I am my father's onlydaughter, he has no other child as heir; he has no brother at his side, nor has he any kinsman left for whom Iought to keep myself. I have lost seven husbands already; why should I live any longer? If it does not please youto take my life, then look on me with pity; I can no longer bear to hear myself defamed.	15 I beg, O Lord, that thou loose me from the bond of this reproach, or else take me away from the earth.
16 This time the prayer of each of them found favour before the glory of God,	16 Thou knowest, O Lord, that I never coveted a husband, and have kept my soul clean from all lust.
17 and Raphael was sent to bring remedy to them both. He was to take the white spots from the eyes ofTobit, so that he might see God's light with his own eyes; and he was to give Sarah the daughter of Raguel asbride to Tobias son of Tobit, and to rid her of Asmodeus, that worst of demons. For it was to Tobias before alother suitors that she belonged by right. Tobit was coming back from the courtyard into the house at the samemoment as Sarah the daughter of Raguel was coming down from the upper room.	17 Never have I joined myself with them that play: neither have I made myself partaker with them that walk in lightness.
	18 But a husband I consented to take, with thy fear, not with my lust.
	19 And either I was unworthy of them, or they perhaps were not worthy of me: because perhaps thou hast kept me for another man.
	20 For thy counsel is not in man's power.
	21 But this every one is sure of that worshippeth thee, that his life, if it be under trial, shall be crowned: and if it be under tribulation, it shall be delivered: and if it be under correction, it shall be allowed to come to thy mercy.
	22 For thou art not delighted in our being lost: because after a storm thou makest a calm, and after tears and weeping thou pourest in joyfulness.
	23 Be thy name, O God of Israel, blessed for ever.
	24 At that time the prayers of them both were heard in the sight of the glory of the most high God:
	25 And the holy angel of the Lord, Raphael was sent to heal them both, whose prayers at one time were rehearsed in the sight of the Lord.