So now, my children: See the notes at verses 8-9. The use of the connector So now sums up and stresses what he has been teaching his children.

See what almsgiving accomplishes: Contemporary English Version makes it clear that accomplishes means gaining God’s protection by saying, “you can see that God will protect you if you give to the poor.”

And what injustice does—it brings death may be rendered “But, when you treat others unjustly, you will be killed.”

But now my breath fails me: But now signals that he has to stop speaking. He would like to continue with his final words, but he knows he is about to die and does not have the strength to say anything more. My breath fails me is a literal rendering, which can be interpreted as in Good News Translation, “I am very weak,” or as “I am dying.” More effectively, it is “my life is ebbing away.” Zimmermann’s translation uses an interesting punctuation device, the ellipsis ( … ), to good effect here: “my spirit faints away….” If readers can understand this punctuation device, some translators may want to try it in their own languages.

Then they laid him on his bed: We are not told in verse 3 whether Tobit was standing, sitting in a chair, sitting in bed, or what his position was when he gave his final words. Apparently he was not lying in bed. Those around him helped him into bed, where he died.

Both Good News Translation and New Revised Standard Version begin a new paragraph with the statement concerning Tobit being placed in bed and dying, but the Handbook urges translators to follow Traduction œcuménique de la Bible and Revised English Bible in using this sentence to end the previous paragraph.

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.