Image Details

A Hebrew fragment of Tobit. Found in Cave 4 at Qumran, this Dead Sea Scroll contains parts of the Book of Tobit. This and other fragments in Hebrew and Aramaic from Qumran are the earliest known copies of Tobit. These texts are now assigned for study and publication to Catholic University Professor Joseph Fitzmyer.

Although no one is certain, says author A. J. Levine, Tobit may have been composed in Aramaic in third-century B.C.E. Syria or Mesopotamia, only a century or two before the copy shown here. The oldest complete copies of Tobit are contained in fourth- or fifth-century copies of the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Hebrew Scriptures.