On the same day, at Ecbatana in Media, it so happened that Raguel's daughter Sarah also had to listen to abuse, from one of her father's maids. For she had been married to seven husbands, but the wicked demon Asmodeus killed them off before they could have intercourse with her, as it is prescribed for wives. So the maid said to her: "You are the one who strangles your husbands! Look at you! You have already been married seven times, but you have had no joy with any one of your husbands. Why do you beat us? Because your husbands are dead? Then why not join them! May we never see a son or daughter of yours!" (Tobit 3: 7-9)

The story shifts hundreds of miles to Medea in what is now Iran.

Sarah - like Tobit - is the subject of insults and abuse as a result of her sufferings. Evidently Sarah - like Tobit - is angry: she beats her maids.

Asmodeus enters Jewish demonology during the exile. He is probably of Persian provenance.

In the Testament of Solomon, the creature explains, "I am called Asmodeus among mortals, and my business is to plot against the newly wedded, so that they may not know one another. And I sever them utterly by many calamities; and I waste away the beauty of virgins and estrange their hearts. . . . I transport men into fits of madness and desire when they have wives of their own, so that they leave them and go off by night and day to others that belong to other men; with the result that they commit sin and fall into murderous deeds."

The Talmud includes other stories of Asmodeus.

Above is Sarah awaiting Tobias by Rembrandt. (A portrait of Rembrandt's common law wife Hendrickje)