1
Then during the reign of Esar-haddon 1 I returned home, and my wife Anna and my son Tobias were restored to me. At our festival of Pentecost, which is the sacred festival of weeks, a good dinner was prepared for me and I reclined to eat.
2
When the table was set for me and an abundance of food placed before me, I said to my son Tobias, "Go, my child, and bring whatever poor person you may find of our people among the exiles in Nineveh, who is wholeheartedly mindful of God, 2 and he shall eat together with me. I will wait for you, until you come back."
3
So Tobias went to look for some poor person of our people. When he had returned he said, "Father!" And I replied, "Here I am, my child." Then he went on to say, "Look, father, one of our own people has been murdered and thrown into the market place, and now he lies there strangled."
4
Then I sprang up, left the dinner before even tasting it, and removed the body 3 from the square 3 in one of the rooms until sunset when I might bury it. 3
5
When I returned, I washed myself and ate my food in sorrow.
6
Then I remembered the prophecy of Amos, how he said against Bethel, 7
"Your festivals shall be turned into mourning,
and all your songs into lamentation."
And I wept.