The Guardian Angel as Healer and Wife-Finder: The Case of Raphael

Tobiah and the Angel Raphael
artist: Jacopo Vignali

A Multi-tasking Angel

Raphael means "God has healed" in Hebrew, hence the healing angel.

In the Book of Tobit, where Raphael appears for the first time in biblical literature, he has other functions: recorder of charitable works, intercessor, prober, travel companion, debt-collector, demon-binder, and wife/husband finder.

The Angel, the Young Man, the Dog, and the Fish

An angel incognito, Raphael (mistaken as Azariah) accompanies a young man Tobiah and his dog to go to the Land of Media (today's Iran). The mission is to collect a debt.  Somebody owed a huge amount of money to Tobit, Tobiah's father: ten talents (around 600 kilos of silver). Tobit is blind and depressed. He wanted the money back before he dies.

On the first night of the journey, the group encamps by the Tigris River. As Tobiah washes his feet in the water, a large fish (ICHTHUS MEGAS in Greek) suddenly jumps on him and starts to swallow his foot. The hero cries.

Raphael knows the secret power of that fish.  So tells Tobiah: "Catch hold of the fish and hang on to it"! 

The narrator does not only mean here a simple act of fishing but one that involves a struggle—"to grasp" (EPILAMBANOMAI) and "to be in control" (EGKRATES) of the fish.

The young man does as he was told. He "lifted it from the Earth"—an similar to Heracles who wrestles with Thanatos lifting the latter from the Earth.

Raphael instructs the young man to cut open the fish, take out its gall, heart, and liver and keep these.

When its heart and liver are burned, the scent can ward off demons and evil spirits. The gall is medical and would be used to heal Tobit's blindness.

The Wife-Finder

The nocturnal struggle with the mythical fish initiates the young man to adulthood. He is now ready to marry. 

When the journey continues, the quest for the ten talents has shifted to Tobiah's search for a wife.

The group finally reaches the house of Raguel in Ectabana, who has a beautiful daughter named Sarah.

The future bride, however, remains single because every time she was given in marriage, the night before the wedding, her bridegroom was attacked and killed by a demon called Asmodeus. 

She already had seven dead would-be husbands.

Raphael tells Tobiah not to worry. With the liver and heart of the ICHTHUS MEGAS, the demon will be repelled.

On the night of the honeymoon, Tobiah does as he was told. The fishy smell expels the demon. It flees to the upper regions of Egypt, so Raphael pursues. The angel binds its hand and foot. Raphael returns to Media right away (3 hours of flying time from Cairo to Tehran today = 2000+ kilometers).

A Prayer Before Honeymoon

Before going to bed, the Tobiah and Sarah pray together, a  beautiful prayer that can be prayed by newlywed couples (8:5-7):

Blessed are you, O God of our ancestors; 

blessed be your name forever and ever!

 Let the heavens and all your creation bless you forever. 

You made Adam, and you made his wife Eve to be his helper and support;

and from these two the human race has come.

You said, 'It is not good for the man to be alone;

let us make him a helper like himself.' 

Now, not with lust, but with fidelity 

I take this kinswoman as my wife.

Send down your mercy on me and on her, 

and grant that we may grow old together. 

Bless us with children.

Introduction to the Book of Tobit

Here's a good introduction to the Book of Tobit. Click on this link.