Asmodeʹus [the destroyer]

The demon of vanity and dress, called in the Talmud “the king of devils.”

The Asmodeʹus of domestic peace (in the Book of Tobit). Asmodeʹus falls in love with Sara, daughter of Ragʹuel, and causes the death of seven husbands in succession, each on his bridal night. After her marriage to Tobit, he was driven into Egypt by a charm, made by Tobias of the heart and liver of a fish burnt on perfumed ashes, and being pursued was taken prisoner and bound.

“Better pleased

Than Asmodeʹus with the fishy fume

That drove him, though enamoured, from the spouse

Of Tobit’s son, and with a véngeance sent

From Media post to Egypt, there fast bound.”

Milton: Paradise Lost, iv. 167–71.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.

Asmodeʹus [the destroyer]

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