The wicked demon Asmodeus: The name Asmodeus is found nowhere else in the Bible. It probably comes from Persian, but Jewish tradition links it to an Aramaic word for “destroyer.” Demon may also be expressed as “dirty [or, evil] spirit.”

Before they had been with her as is customary with wives is a literal translation of a line that in Greek is delicately euphemistic; it avoids speaking directly about sex. Good News Translation “before the marriage could be consummated” is forthright, though at the risk of sounding a bit legal. New Jerusalem Bible “before ever they had slept with her as man with wife” offers another possibility. Or we may say “before she and her new husband had gone to bed on their wedding night.”

You are the one who kills your husbands: What the maid says here is a bitter accusation, as comes across clearly in Good News Translation. Our Greek text does not indicate how the husbands died. The alternate text says that they were strangled. See the New Revised Standard Version footnote, which refers to the alternate text, “Don’t you understand that you are strangling your husbands?” We are not following this text, however, and no note is needed.

Have not borne the name of a single one of them: The name is close to the Greek text, and the meaning of this statement is that none of Sarah’s husbands lived long enough for her to become known as “the wife of….” She is still known as the daughter of Raguel. Good News Translation and Contemporary English Version are highly interpretive, understanding “name” to mean “posterity”; that is, no son was born to continue on the father’s name. So Good News Translation has “but not one of them lived long enough to give you a son,” and Contemporary English Version combines this final clause with the clause “You are the one who kills your husbands” and translates “and each of those times you have killed your husband before he could give you a son.” The problem with this interpretation is that it gives the impression that these husbands had intercourse with Sarah, and that she may have produced daughters but not sons. What our text means the reader to understand is that Sarah remained a virgin (see 3.14). The other Greek text has “have had no benefit/joy from a single one of them” (see the New Revised Standard Version footnote). Some versions follow this; the two Greek verbs closely resemble one another in appearance. The text followed here, however, yields a perfectly clear meaning. After all, it is Sarah’s honor that is being insulted. So another possible model for the quote of the servant woman is “Look at you! You have had seven husbands. But you don’t carry the name of any of them,” or even “… No one thinks of you as the wife of any of them.”

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.