9.  The book of Tobit is extant in various texts—­Greek, Latin, Syriac, and Hebrew, the Hebrew forms being all translations from the Greek or Latin.  These texts differ in minor details, but have all sprung directly or indirectly from one original, which was probably Hebrew or Aramaic, though some maintain that it was Greek.  The book is thoroughly Jewish in its spirit.  The date of its composition is uncertain.  The common opinion of biblical scholars is that it was composed about 250-200 B.C.  In its general scope the book has a resemblance to that of Job.  A good man encounters suffering in the way of piety, but is finally delivered, lives in prosperity, and dies in a good old age.  The portraiture which it gives of domestic piety is very pleasing, and affords an instructive insight into the spirit of the age in which it was written.  It gives great prominence to deeds of charity; but the alms on which it insists so earnestly flow from inward faith and love.  In this respect they are distinguished from the dead works of the late Scribes and Pharisees.

III.  JUDITH.

10.  This book relates the exploit of Judith, a Jewish widow distinguished alike for beauty, courage, and devotion to her country.  When Holofernes, one of Nebuchadnezzar’s generals, was besieging Bethulia, a city of Judea, she went over to his camp with her maid in the character of a deserter, promised to guide him to Jerusalem, and by her flattery and artful representations so insinuated herself into his favor that he entertained her with high honor.  At last, being left alone with him at night in his tent, she beheaded him with his own falchion as he lay asleep and intoxicated, and going forth gave his head to her maid, who put it in her bag, and they two passed the guards in safety under the pretext of going out for prayer, as had been their nightly custom.  The head of Holofernes was suspended from the wall of the city, and when the warriors within sallied forth, the besieging army fled in consternation.  Judith receives as a reward all the stuff of Holofernes, lives at Bethulia as a widow in high honor, and dies at the age of one hundred and five.

11.  The historical and geographical contradictions of this book are too many and grave to allow the supposition that it contains an authentic narrative of facts.  It was manifestly written after the return of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity and the rebuilding of the city and temple (chaps. 4:3; 5:18, 19), when the nation was governed, not by a king, but by a high priest and Sanhedrim.  Chap. 4:6, 8; 15:8.  Yet it makes Nebuchadnezzar, who reigned in Babylon long before, king in Nineveh in the eighth year of his reign, whereas his father had destroyed Nineveh.  The attempts that have been made to reconcile these and other inconsistencies with true history are forced and unnatural.  Whatever historical truth may lie at the basis of the story, it is so interwoven