The previous two verses serve to provide the setting for the story in time and on the map. At this point the story itself begins with the writer, speaking as Tobit himself, establishing Tobit’s pious character. Like the time and place, this is necessary for an understanding of the story (compare Job 1.1-5). Good News Translation and Contemporary English Version have introduced the first person direct speech at verse 1.
Walked in the ways of truth and righteousness all the days of my life: This indicates correct ways. To “walk in the ways of truth” is to do what each person ought to do. The metaphor walked may be retained in certain languages, but in a majority of languages it is best to drop it and to introduce the clause with something like “I have been honest…” (so Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version). Joining truth with righteousness establishes that Tobit did what was morally proper; Good News Translation expresses this as “I have been honest and have tried to do what was right” (similarly Contemporary English Version). All the days of my life is a literary device adding a note of authority to the story. In many languages it will be better style to put this phrase at the beginning of the verse, as Good News Translation and Contemporary English Version have done, and say “All my life I have been….” Tobit’s own death will be described at the end of the narrative in 14.11.
Acts of charity for my kindred and my people identifies Tobit’s piety as distinctively Israelite. The word for charity is used particularly of almsgiving; Good News Translation says “I often gave money” (Contemporary English Version “gave help” is too vague). Kindred refers to relatives, while my people goes beyond near relatives to show that Tobit’s concern did not stop with his immediate family, but included all Israelites who found themselves exiled in the foreign land of Assyria. Good News Translation renders my people as “fellow Jews,” but this is technically wrong, since Jews are people descended from the tribe of Judah, and the term is not much used before the time of the Babylonian exile, when the people of that tribe, that is, the Jews, were in exile. The events described in the book of Tobit take place at an earlier time, when people of the northern tribes were exiled in Assyria. In 11.17, however, the author does actually refer to the people as “Jews.”
Who had gone with me in exile to Nineveh: This may also be rendered as “people who the Assyrians had taken captive with me to Nineveh.” In some languages the sense of Nineveh as the capital city of the empire may be expressed as, for example, “the big village where the high chief lives.”
It is possible to restructure verse 3 as follows:
• All my life, I have been honest and tried to do what is right. And even after we were brought here to Nineveh, I often gave money to help my needy relatives and other Israelites who were in exile with me in Nineveh.
Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Tobit. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2001. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.