Jonah, Tobit, Judith

Should I try to review these three narratives as literature or as 'inspired' religious texts? They are certainly both, the only debatable issue being the nature and source of the 'inspiration.' "Jonah" is included in the canon of the Old Testament by Protestants, while "Tobit" and "Judith" are usually included in the Apocrypha. This 93-page study pamphlet comes from a catholic publisher and has both the 'imprimatur' and 'nihil obstat' certifications. Roughly the upper half half of each page is the narrative in the translation of the New American Bible; the lower half of each page consists of notes and explications by Irene Nowell, O.S.B. Much of Nowell's commentary focuses on the historical provenance of the three narratives, which she explicitly identifies as "fictions" intended as exhortations to the contemporaries of the anonymous authors. All three were composed centuries after the events they narrate. "Jonah" was written around the Fifth century BCE, "when the Jews were still recovering from the Babylonian Captivity..." Nowell interprets it as a polemic against the "attitude of exclusivity and rigid observance of the law" which prevailed among Jews of that era. The man Jonah is sent to preach to non-Jews in the city of Nineveh. It's a short text, just a page and a half in my own Swedish cathechism Bible, and it's replete with thorny ambiguities, much stranger and subtler than the simple tale of Jonah and the Whale. "Tobit" is the story of an exceptionally pious Jew held in exile in Assyria in the era of Sennacherib. Many of its historical details are inaccurate and it was probably written generations later as a parable of appropriate piety. Tobit shows his courage by piously burying the corpses of executed Jewish criminals, an act for which he is punished. He is also 'tested', like Job, by blindness. Eventually, he sends his son Tobias on a dangerous journey to Media to recover money which he had sequestered with a kinsman. Tobias is aided by a kinsman/servant who turns out to be the archangel Raphael in disguise, one of the seven 'helpers' of G*d. With such help, it's no surprise that Tobias returns with the money and with a proper wife, plus a salve that restores his father's vision. Rapahel then reveal his identity and departs skyward. "Judith" portrays the invasion of the lands along the eastern Mediterranean coast by the armies of the great Babylonian king Nebuchanezzar, around 593 BCE, under the command of the general Holofernes. The tale was written as much as four hundred years after the historical events; many of the details are faulty, and the geography is thoroughly scrambled. Holofernes has trapped a Jewish frontier settlement in a ruthless siege, and the Jews are losing hope. Judith, a beautiful Jewish widow, rails against them for their lack of faith. She crosses the siege lines, pretends that she is betraying her countrymen, lies guilefully, and 'seduces' Holofernes with her beauty. Holofernes wines and dines her in expecta