Cornelius a Lapide

John XI

Table of Contents

Synopsis of the Chapter

Christ raises Lazarus from death and the tomb. Hence, verse 47, the chief priests, envying Christ, gather a council against Him, in which Caiaphas the high priest prophesies that it is expedient that Christ should die for the people: wherefore, verse 54, Christ, avoiding their wrath, withdraws for a few days to Ephraim.

Before this chapter Jansenius and others close the acts of the third year of Christ's preaching; for this raising of Lazarus and its history occurred around the fourth and last Passover of Christ, as is clear from verse 55, at which He Himself was slain and crucified: wherefore it seems to have occurred around that time when it is wont to be read by the Church in the Sacrifice of the Mass, namely fourteen days before Good Friday and the Passion of Christ. So the learned men judge. See the Chronotaxis which I placed before the Gospels.

Vulgate Text: John 11:1-56

1. Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, of the town of Mary and Martha her sister. 2. (And Mary was she that anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped His feet with her hair: whose brother Lazarus was sick). 3. His sisters therefore sent to Him, saying: Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest is sick. 4. And Jesus hearing it, said to them: This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified by it. 5. Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus. 6. When He had heard therefore that he was sick, He still remained in the same place two days; 7. then after that He said to His disciples: Let us go into Judea again. 8. The disciples say to Him: Rabbi, the Jews but now sought to stone Thee, and goest Thou thither again? 9. Jesus answered: Are there not twelve hours of the day? If a man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world. 10. But if he walk in the night, he stumbleth, because the light is not in him. 11. These things He said, and after that He said to them: Lazarus our friend sleepeth; but I go that I may awake him out of sleep. 12. His disciples therefore said: Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well. 13. But Jesus spoke of his death: but they thought that He spoke of the repose of sleep. 14. Then therefore Jesus said to them plainly: Lazarus is dead; 15. and I am glad for your sakes that you may believe, that I was not there; but let us go to him. 16. Thomas therefore, who is called Didymus, said to his fellow disciples: Let us also go, that we may die with Him. 17. Jesus therefore came, and found that he had been four days already in the grave. 18. (Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, about fifteen furlongs off). 19. And many of the Jews were come to Martha and Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother. 20. Martha therefore, as soon as she heard that Jesus was come, went to meet Him; but Mary sat at home. 21. Martha therefore said to Jesus: Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died; 22. but now also I know that whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give Thee. 23. Jesus saith to her: Thy brother shall rise again. 24. Martha saith to Him: I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day. 25. Jesus said to her: I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in Me, although he be dead, shall live; 26. and every one that liveth, and believeth in Me, shall not die for ever. Believest thou this? 27. She saith to Him: Yea, Lord, I have believed that Thou art Christ the Son of the living God, Who art come into this world. 28. And when she had said these things, she went, and called her sister Mary secretly, saying: The Master is come, and calleth for thee. 29. She, as soon as she heard, riseth quickly, and cometh to Him: 30. for Jesus was not yet come into the town, but He was still in that place where Martha had met Him. 31. The Jews therefore, who were with her in the house and comforted her, when they saw Mary that she rose up speedily and went out, followed her, saying: She goeth to the grave to weep there. 32. Mary therefore, when she was come where Jesus was, seeing Him, fell down at His feet, and saith to Him: Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. 33. Jesus therefore, when He saw her weeping, and the Jews that were come with her weeping, groaned in the spirit, and troubled Himself, 34. and said: Where have you laid him? They say to Him: Lord, come and see. 35. And Jesus wept. 36. The Jews therefore said: Behold how He loved him. 37. But some of them said: Could not He that opened the eyes of the man born blind, have caused that this man should not die? 38. Jesus therefore again groaning in Himself, cometh to the sepulchre. Now it was a cave, and a stone was laid over it. 39. Jesus saith: Take away the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith to Him: Lord, by this time he stinketh, for he is now of four days. 40. Jesus saith to her: Did not I say to thee, that if thou believe, thou shalt see the glory of God? 41. They took therefore the stone away. And Jesus lifting up His eyes, said: Father, I give Thee thanks that Thou hast heard Me. 42. And I knew that Thou hearest Me always, but because of the people who stand about have I said it, that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me. 43. When He had said these things, He cried with a loud voice: Lazarus, come forth. 44. And presently he that had been dead came forth, bound feet and hands with winding bands, and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus said to them: Loose him, and let him go. 45. Many therefore of the Jews who were come to Mary and Martha, and had seen the things that Jesus did, believed in Him. 46. But some of them went to the Pharisees, and told them the things that Jesus had done. 47. The chief priests therefore and the Pharisees gathered a council, and said: What do we, for this man doth many miracles? 48. If we let him alone so, all will believe in him; and the Romans will come, and take away our place and nation. 49. But one of them, named Caiaphas, being the high priest that year, said to them: You know nothing, 50. neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not. 51. And this he spoke not of himself; but being the high priest of that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation, 52. and not only for the nation, but to gather together in one the children of God that were dispersed. 53. From that day therefore they devised to put Him to death. 54. Wherefore Jesus walked no more openly among the Jews; but He went into a country near the desert, into a city that is called Ephraim, and there He abode with His disciples. 55. And the pasch of the Jews was at hand; and many from the country went up to Jerusalem before the pasch, to purify themselves. 56. They sought therefore for Jesus; and they discoursed one with another, standing in the temple: What think you that He is not come to the festival day? And the chief priests and Pharisees had given a commandment, that if any man knew where He was, he should tell, that they might apprehend Him.

Verse 1: Now a Certain Man Was Sick, Lazarus of Bethany, of the Town of Mary and Martha His Sister

1. Now there was a certain man sick (Arabic: infirm), Lazarus of Bethany, of the town of Mary and Martha his sister. — The Syriac: And there was a certain man detained by disease, Loozar of Beth Anco (house of affliction), a village, brother of Mary and Martha; Vatablus: Lazarus was sick; Nonnus: with his knees grievously diseased Lazarus was scourged by burning heat, his limbs wasted by a fiery plague, near to death. Therefore this sickness was grave and lethal, for it soon brought on death.

LAZARUS, — noble and rich, and therefore a different man from the beggar Lazarus, ulcerous and lying at the gates of the Rich Man, Luke xvi.

FROM BETHANY, OF THE TOWN OF MARY AND MARTHA. — This is in apposition, as if to say: From Bethany, that is, from the town (i.e., the fortified place or village) of Martha and Mary Magdalene, in which namely they dwelt, and of which they were not so much the mistresses as the more honored inhabitants, and disciples and hostesses of Christ. Thus Theophylact, Leontius, and others. So in chapter i, 44, Bethsaida is called the city of Peter and Andrew, because they were its inhabitants, and not its lords.

Mystically: "Bethany" in Hebrew means, first, the house of affliction, as the Syriac translates, and this is fitting here. For Lazarus' sickness and death afflicted both himself and his sisters. Second, "Bethany" means the house of obedience. Hence St. Bernard, in his sermon to the Knights Templar, chapter xii: "In this place," he says, "it is intimated that neither the zeal of good action, nor the leisure of holy contemplation, nor the tears of the penitent can be accepted outside Bethany by Him who had such obedience that He chose rather to lose life itself, becoming obedient to the Father unto death."

Third, "Bethany," says Pagninus, is the same as house of response, or of the Lord's hearing, because there Christ heard Mary and Martha praying for the life of Lazarus. For the root ana with an ayin signifies to be afflicted, to obey, to respond, and to hear.

John passes from the deeds of Christ at the Feast of Dedication, as is clear from chapter x, 22, to the deeds of Christ shortly before the last Passover, as is clear from this chapter, verse 55, that is, he leaps from December to March: he therefore omits the deeds of Christ in January and February, because Luke recounts these fully from chapter xv to xix, from which I have summarily recounted the same in the Chronotaxis, numbers 51 to 57.

Verse 2: And Mary Was She That Anointed the Lord With Ointment, and Wiped His Feet With Her Hair

2. AND MARY WAS SHE THAT ANOINTED THE LORD WITH OINTMENT, AND WIPED HIS FEET WITH HER HAIR. — At Luke vii, 37, I showed that she was the same Mary who twice, or as others say thrice, anointed Christ, namely Mary Magdalene, though some suppose there were two, others three. Less correctly therefore does Leontius, whom the modern heretics follow, take "anointed" not of the past anointing in Luke, but of one to come shortly, six days before the death of Christ, of which in the next chapter, verse 3, so that here it would be an anticipation.

WHOSE BROTHER LAZARUS WAS SICK. — The Arabic: And Lazarus her brother was sick. John adds this to hint at the cause of Lazarus' raising, namely that he was Magdalene's brother, who, being wholly devoted to her Jesus, obtained from Him the raising of her brother Lazarus.

Verse 3: His Sisters Therefore Sent to Him, Saying: Lord, Behold, He Whom Thou Lovest Is Sick

3. HIS SISTERS THEREFORE SENT TO HIM (Jesus) SAYING: LORD, BEHOLD, HE WHOM THOU LOVEST IS SICK. Further, the sisters themselves did not go to Jesus but only sent messengers, both because they were women, to whom the care of the house belongs and for whom a long journey is unseemly; and because they had to assist their brother Lazarus as he lay dying; and because, confiding in Christ's kindness and love, they thought a mere message sufficed. So St. Chrysostom, Cyril, and Euthymius.

— Cyril, Theophylact, and Leontius think these words are those of one wondering and admiring, as if to say: How could it be that he whom Thou lovest, Lord, Thou Who hast dominion over life and death, should fall into sickness? How has sickness dared to invade one who loves Thee? And how is he held by languor whom Thy love takes hold of?

Others more simply think the sisters said this out of modesty and confidence. Hear St. Augustine, and from him Bede: "They did not say: Come, for one who loves needs only to be informed. They did not dare to say: Come and heal. They did not dare to say: Command there and it will be done here; for why not they also, if the faith of that centurion is on that account praised? For he said: Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed. None of these things say they, but only: Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest is sick — it suffices that Thou knowest: for Thou dost not love and forsake." This prayer is therefore an insinuation, but hidden and implicit, because it signifies the necessity and desire for the remedy, which is often more effective than an open request, because it is more humble, modest, reverent, and confident. So Suarez from St. Thomas, tract. on Prayer.

Thus this petition of the sisters shows, first, great faith; for they do not say: Come, hasten, lest death forestall him. For they believe that Christ can cure the absent, indeed raise the dead. So Cyril, Theophylact, Rupert.

Second, vast confidence, with which they trusted that Christ, upon receiving only news of the sickness, would bring the remedy to him. Hence they do not multiply words and prayers. Third, extraordinary charity: "Behold him whom Thou lovest," they say, as if to say: Thou lovest us, and we Thee: it suffices therefore to indicate to the lover the sickness of the loved one. For love prevails over all prayers. Fourth, of resignation: for they wholly resign themselves to Christ's providence, that He may determine and dispose concerning this sickness and the sick man whatever pleases His prudence and charity. Wherefore this prayer of theirs was efficacious, and is frequently to be imitated and used by us.

Tropologically Rabanus, and from him the Gloss: Lazarus, he says, is the sinner, who is loved by the Lord; for He came not to call the just, but sinners: the sisters are holy men, or good thoughts, which pray for the dissolving of sins.

Verse 4: This Sickness Is Not Unto Death, but for the Glory of God, That the Son of God May Be Glorified by It

4. AND JESUS HEARING IT, SAID TO THEM: THIS SICKNESS IS NOT UNTO DEATH (Syriac: is not lethal; Arabic: is not a sickness of death), BUT FOR THE GLORY OF GOD, THAT THE SON OF GOD MAY BE GLORIFIED BY IT. — "Not unto death," first, because this death of Lazarus will be not so much death as sleep; for immediately he will awake and rise from it. Hence, verse 11, He says: "Lazarus our friend sleepeth, but I go that I may awake him from sleep."

Second, as if to say: The end and aim of Lazarus' sickness is not death, but the glory of God; for God did not send this sickness upon Lazarus with this end, that He should take life from him through death, but rather that He might restore a greater life to him, and thus increase the glory of God. So St. Augustine: "It is not unto death," he says, "because even the death itself was not unto death, but rather unto a miracle, by which when done men would believe in Christ, and avoid true death."

Third, "not unto death," namely such as the common death of men is wont to be; that is, that the man should remain in it, and return no more to this life and this world: for although death separated Lazarus' soul from his body, yet it did not impose an end upon this present age, so that he should not return to it; which however death does. For soon, raised up by Christ, he returned to it, more alive, sound, and vigorous than before. So St. Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact, Euthymius, and others. Hence Nonnus translates, "it is not unto eternal death."

BUT FOR THE GLORY OF GOD. — By glory, first, Andrew of Crete in the Catena understands the cross and death of Christ: for this the envious Jews inflicted upon Christ because of His raising of Lazarus, and this chiefly glorified Christ. Second, Theodore of Heraclea, in the Catena, takes glory as that which was to come to Christ from the divulgation and celebrity of this raising made by Him through all Judea, indeed through the whole world. Third, and genuinely, take it as the glory of God, because men seeing Lazarus raised by Christ believed in Him as the Messiah and Son of God, and so glorified both Christ and God the Father. For so John explains this glory, saying verse 45: "Many therefore of the Jews who had come to Mary and Martha, and had seen the things Jesus did, believed in Him." Hence St. Augustine: "Such glorification," he says, "did not increase Him, but profited us."

Verse 5: Now Jesus Loved Martha, and Her Sister Mary, and Lazarus

5. NOW JESUS LOVED MARTHA, AND HER SISTER MARY, AND LAZARUS, — because of their singular love, devotion, and liberality toward Him, with which they fed Jesus with the Apostles; for Martha had the care of Jesus' hospitality; Mary, healed and converted by Christ, had devoted herself wholly to Him, and indeed accompanied Him as He went through the towns preaching, and supplied the expenses, Luke viii, 2. Lazarus imitated his sisters. John here introduces the mention of Jesus' love, not so much to signify that it was the cause of Lazarus' sickness, as Cyril thinks, as if to say: Therefore Jesus sent the sickness upon Lazarus because He loved him and his sisters, according to: "Such as I love, I rebuke and chastise," Apoc. iii, 19, but to signify that Jesus, upon receiving the news, plainly fixed Lazarus' sickness in His mind and memory, that He might heal him, but in a fitting manner and time. For His love made Him solicitous for Lazarus' health, and therefore on Lazarus' account He did all that John relates in the following verse and onward, and the word "therefore" signifies this, when He immediately adds: "When therefore He heard," as if to say: Jesus loved Lazarus, therefore when He heard that he was sick, He began seriously to think about healing him, and so disposed all His affairs that He might restore him to life and health at the right time.

Moreover, Jesus loved Lazarus and his sisters so much that for their sake He raised Lazarus from death, even though He knew that the raising of Lazarus would be for Him the cause of death and the cross: for on account of Lazarus being raised, the Pharisees killed Christ. The life of Lazarus, therefore, was the death of Christ.

Verse 6: When He Had Heard Therefore That He Was Sick, He Still Remained in the Same Place Two Days

6. WHEN HE HAD HEARD THEREFORE THAT HE WAS SICK, HE STILL REMAINED IN THE SAME PLACE (at Bethabara, chapter preceding, verse 20) TWO DAYS, — both that He might satisfy the multitude of men flocking to Him and show them that He was the Messiah, as there shown by John; and that He might confirm the same by a remarkable miracle beyond all exception, namely the raising of Lazarus. He therefore remained there for two days, so that in the meantime Lazarus might die, because He wished not to heal a sick man but to raise one dead, indeed buried four days and stinking: which was both a far greater benefit and a greater miracle, so that there might be no place for the calumnies of the Jews, that they should say Lazarus had not really died and therefore had not really been raised, but had only suffered a swoon or faint, and had returned to himself not by Christ's help but by the force of nature and youthful vigor. So St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Rupert.

Verse 7: Then After That He Said to His Disciples: Let Us Go Into Judea Again

7. THEN AFTER THAT HE SAID TO HIS DISCIPLES: LET US GO INTO JUDEA AGAIN, — namely, from Bethabara let us go to Bethany to raise Lazarus. By forewarning Christ fortifies His timid Apostles: for they feared to return with Jesus into Judea, because the Jews a little before, in the preceding chapter, verse 31, had wished to stone Him. So St. Chrysostom: "Nowhere else," he says, "did the Lord foretell to the disciples where He was going, save here, because they greatly feared lest, if He departed suddenly (without warning), they would be troubled: and they feared both for Him and for themselves; for they were not yet firm in the faith." So also Theophylact, Euthymius, and Theodore of Heraclea.

Furthermore St. Augustine: "Christ," he says, "departed from Judea as man, lest He be stoned; but in returning, as if forgetting His weakness, He showed His power."

Verse 8: Rabbi, the Jews but Now Sought to Stone Thee, and Goest Thou Thither Again?

8. THE DISCIPLES SAY TO HIM: RABBI (O Master and our Lord), THE JEWS BUT NOW SOUGHT TO STONE THEE, AND GOEST THOU THITHER AGAIN? — "Now," that is, a little before: for two months had already passed since then, as I said at the beginning of the chapter, and is gathered from the preceding chapter, verses 22 and following. The disciples say this because they feared for Christ from the Jews, and still more for themselves. So Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius.

Verse 9: Are There Not Twelve Hours of the Day?

9. JESUS ANSWERED: ARE THERE NOT TWELVE HOURS OF THE DAY? — First, Lyra and his followers expound thus, as if to say: Just as the twelve hours change during the day, and with them the air changes, so the minds of the Jews can easily be changed, so that those who before hated Me may now love and receive Me.

Second, St. Augustine, Bede, and Rupert, as if to say: Just as the twelve hours follow the day, that is, the sun and its course, so as to succeed one another in order, so it is for you to follow Me; for I am as it were your sun and day, and you surround Me as the twelve hours. Hear St. Augustine: That He might show Himself to be the day, He chose twelve disciples; but in this word He foresaw not Judas himself, but his successor. And the Gloss: Christ calls Himself the day in which they must walk, that they may not stumble, and without which those walking stumble, just as now the disciples do not wish Him to die who came to die for men: and He calls those who follow the day the hours.

Third, St. Cyril, as if to say: Some hours yet remain of My day, that is, of My life, in which I ought to preach and do good to the Jews: "night will come," that is, My slaughter and death, on account of which I will involve them in the darkness of destruction and calamities through Titus; for night is the symbol of vengeance and calamities.

Fourth, and genuinely, as if to say: The time of day is certain and fixed, namely of twelve hours (for it was now March, whose 21st is the equinox, when the days are equal to the nights, and consequently of twelve hours: although in other months too the Jews divided the day into 12 hours, but unequal, as also the night into four watches, which were longer in winter, shorter in summer), within which space of twelve hours, if anyone walks, he cannot stumble, because he has light by which he sees stones and other stumbling-blocks, and therefore takes care not to strike against them: so likewise a time of life has been fixed for Me by God the Father, in which I ought to walk, live, and work the works for which I was sent: which therefore I call day; and so in that time I have nothing to fear from the Jews, either for Myself or for you: for I cannot be killed before the time appointed for Me by the Father, that is, before the night and setting of My life comes. So Rupert, Toletus, Maldonatus, and others.

Verse 10: If a Man Walk in the Day, He Stumbleth Not; but If He Walk in the Night, He Stumbleth

10. IF A MAN WALK IN THE DAY, HE STUMBLETH NOT, BECAUSE HE SEETH THE LIGHT OF THIS WORLD: BUT IF HE WALK IN THE NIGHT, HE STUMBLETH, BECAUSE THE LIGHT IS NOT IN HIM. — First, St. Augustine expounds, as if to say: I exhort you, O My twelve disciples, to follow Me, as the twelve hours follow the day and the sun, if you do not wish to stumble and strike against something. And St. Chrysostom: Do not fear the Jews, he says, for we have done nothing worthy of death. Or: If anyone sees the light of this world, he is safe: much more is he safe who is with Me, unless he removes himself from Me.

Second, St. Cyril, as if to say: As long as it is the day of life, that is, as long as I live, I do good to the Jews, you have nothing to fear from the Jews: for this is day, that is, the time of kindness and beneficence; but when night comes, that is, the time of vengeance, when God through Titus will destroy Jerusalem and Judea, then you must fear and flee from Judea.

Third, and genuinely, as if to say: While it is day, that is, while the time of life remains to Me, you will not stumble, O disciples, by following Me into Judea; but when night comes, that is, death and the setting of My life, then the Jews will persecute you and kill you as My disciples, just as they have persecuted and killed Me. So Rupert, Toletus, and Maldonatus.

Mystically, he who follows the day, that is, the sun and light of faith and grace, does not stumble, does not fall into sins; but he who walks in night, that is, in the darkness of ignorance and concupiscence, falls into various faults and punishments. So the Interlinear. Hence the Apostle: "You were," he says, "heretofore darkness; but now light in the Lord: walk then as children of the light: for the fruit of the light is in all goodness, and justice, and truth," Eph. v, 8.

Verse 11: Lazarus Our Friend Sleepeth; but I Go That I May Awake Him out of Sleep

11. THESE THINGS HE SAID, AND AFTER THAT HE SAITH TO THEM: LAZARUS OUR FRIEND SLEEPETH: BUT I GO THAT I MAY AWAKE HIM OUT OF SLEEP. — He calls death sleep, because Lazarus was soon to be raised from it and to wake up. Hear St. Augustine: To the Lord he slept, Who raised him from the sepulchre with as great ease as you rouse a sleeper from his bed; but to men he was dead, who could not raise him. Thus Paul calls the dead those who sleep, because they are to rise again.

Verse 12: Lord, if He Sleep, He Shall Do Well

12. HIS DISCIPLES THEREFORE SAID: LORD, IF HE SLEEP, HE SHALL DO WELL. — The Arabic: if he is sleeping, he will wake up. For sleep in the sick is wont to be the sign and presage of returning health, and often its cause. So Cyril, Augustine, Jansenius, Maldonatus, and others. For sleep invigorates nature, strengthens the brain, concocts and consumes superfluous humors, calls forth sweat, fosters and increases natural heat, and so overcomes, dissipates, consumes, or expels the matter of disease. The sense is, as if to say: If Lazarus sleeps, let us allow him to sleep, that he may recover more quickly, therefore there is no reason for us to go to him. So St. Augustine and Cyril.

Verse 13: But Jesus Spoke of His Death; and They Thought That He Spoke of the Repose of Sleep

13. BUT JESUS HAD SPOKEN OF HIS DEATH; AND THEY THOUGHT THAT HE SPOKE OF THE REPOSE OF SLEEP, — because they simply took "he sleeps" as it sounds; not symbolically, as Christ understood, of death.

Verse 14: Then Therefore Jesus Said to Them Plainly: Lazarus Is Dead

14. THEN THEREFORE JESUS SAID TO THEM PLAINLY: LAZARUS IS DEAD. — Christ shows that He is a Prophet, indeed the Son of God, in that He reveals hidden and absent things: for such was this death of Lazarus, which He here plainly declares, so that the error of the disciples concerning his sleep may be removed. For the messenger had only announced the sickness to Christ, not the death.

Verse 15: And I Am Glad for Your Sakes, That You May Believe, That I Was Not There

15. AND I AM GLAD FOR YOUR SAKES, THAT YOU MAY BELIEVE, THAT I WAS NOT THERE. — Join these last words with "I am glad," as the Arabic joins them, as if to say: I am glad I was not there, namely present at Lazarus' death, that you may believe in Me, namely more firmly, perfectly, and robustly, says St. Augustine, when you see his resuscitation, which I am about to work: for if I had been present at the sick man, at the prayers of Martha and Mary I would have had to heal the sick man, else the Jews would have blamed Me for impotence or lack of mercy; or certainly I would have had to raise him immediately upon his death, which would have been less of a miracle and more dubious: but now I will raise one dead four days, so that all may see that this raising exceeds every force of nature, and is a clear miracle and the work of God alone. So Cyril, Euthymius, Rupert, and others. Otherwise St. Augustine and Bede, as if to say: I am glad I was not present at Lazarus dying, so that absent I might announce to you his death, and from there you might know Me to be the Messiah, and believe more in Me; for Lazarus had been announced as sick, not dead. Christ therefore, announcing him dead, showed that He knew this not humanly but divinely. For how, says Augustine, could it be hidden from Him Who had created him? from Whose hands the soul of the dying man had gone forth? The former reason is more valid, this one more natural.

BUT LET US GO TO HIM. — Christ speaks of the dead man as if of the living, because He was about to make him live again. So Cyril.

Verse 16: Thomas Therefore, Who Is Called Didymus, Said: Let Us Also Go, That We May Die With Him

16. THOMAS THEREFORE, WHO IS CALLED DIDYMUS, SAID TO HIS FELLOW DISCIPLES: LET US ALSO GO, THAT WE MAY DIE WITH HIM. — "Thomas," says Pagninus in his Interpretation of Hebrew Names, is the same as abyss or chasm; for this in Hebrew is called tehom; or twin or twin-brother, that is, born in the same birth with another: for teomim are twins brought forth in the same birth, as if with joined bodies.

Who is called Didymus. — The Syriac: who is called twin. Thomas therefore was not of two names, as though he had two names, first Thomas, then Didymus, as Nonnus wishes, but one and the same; for in Hebrew Thomas is the same as in Greek didymos, in Latin twin. Just as in Hebrew Messiah is the same as in Greek christos, in Latin anointed, says Angelus Caninius in Hebrew Names, chapter xiii. Therefore "is called" here is the same as "by interpretation."

Thomas therefore was called Didymus, that is, twin, either because he was born in the same birth with another brother, as Jacob and Esau were twins, as Euthymius wishes; or because he received this name from his ancestors, just as among the Romans we read that some were called Spurii, others Crassi, others Claudii, even though they themselves were neither illegitimate, nor fat, nor lame. So Toletus, Maldonatus, and others. Leontius adds that John interprets only Thomas' name in order to signify some excellence of his; but Theophylact, in order to signify his character, says, namely that he was Didymus, that is, twin, variable, inconstant, doubtful, double; but this does not fit this place: it fits however chapter xx, verse 24, where Thomas is called Didymus on account of his unbelief of Christ's resurrection. It seems rather that Thomas is here called Didymus as twin-brother of Christ; for such he here shows himself, when he offers himself ready to live and die for Christ and with Christ, and exhorts the others to do the same, saying: "Let us also go, and die with Him." For it is known that twins greatly love each other, and are alike in character and affections, so that when one rejoices, laughs, weeps, the other rejoices, laughs, weeps, and indeed when one is sick or dying, the other is sick or dies. This sometimes happens, but not always. For Jacob and Esau were dissimilar and diverse in character, indeed mutually opposed.

LET US ALSO GO, AND DIE WITH HIM, — not with Lazarus, as some would have it; for this seems insipid, but with Christ, Who had said a little before: "Let us go to him." Thomas, says Bede, before all the others exhorts his companions to go and die with Him, in which his great constancy appears. And the Interlinear: Behold the true affection of those who love, either to live with Him or to die with Him: such among the Gauls were the Soldurii, whose law and pact in war was either to conquer together or to fall together, as Julius Caesar testifies in his Commentaries, to which St. Paul seems to have alluded saying, II Cor. vii, 3: "You are in our hearts to die together and to live together," as I said there.

Further, what Thomas says, "Let us go and die," is as if he said: If we go with Jesus, we must die with Him, on account of the supreme hatred of the Jews against Him. If therefore He goes, let us also go, as His noble disciples and soldiers, and die courageously with Him as our leader: if He despises death, nay invades it, let us too despise and invade it. For he had not sufficiently understood what Christ had intimated in verse 9, that as yet no danger threatened Him from the Jews. So Cyril. He therefore offers himself to certain death for Christ, for he thought this was imminent: which was a remarkable proof of his extraordinary fortitude, as well as of his singular love for Christ.

Verse 17: Jesus Therefore Came, and Found That He Had Been Four Days Already in the Grave

17. JESUS THEREFORE CAME (to Bethany, as some Greek codices add), AND FOUND THAT HE HAD BEEN FOUR DAYS ALREADY IN THE GRAVE, — that is, buried four days. For the messenger came from the sisters to Jesus concerning Lazarus' illness, says Chrysostom, on the day on which Lazarus died, then for the two following days Jesus remained in Bethabara, and on the fourth day at last He went to Bethany: wherefore it seems that Lazarus died on the same day on which the sisters sent the messenger to Christ, as though by an earthly mass, the soul is weighed down, as it were also buried: for otherwise, had Christ come, Lazarus would not have lain four days in death and the tomb, as is said here. Whoever reads the Gospel recognizes these three kinds of dead whom the Lord raised. Perhaps one may consider too what differences the very voice of the One raising them has, since in one place He says: "Maiden, arise"; in another: "Young man, I say to thee, arise"; elsewhere He groaned in spirit, and wept, and groaned again, and then afterward cried out with a loud voice: "Lazarus, come forth." See the same Augustine, On the Words of the Lord according to John, tract. 44: "The first," he says, "is the tickling of delight in the heart; the second, consent; the third, the deed; the fourth, habit."

Thirdly, the Gloss from St. Augustine and Bede. The first day of death, he says, is that in which we are born with original sin; the second, in which, coming to the years of discretion, we transgress the natural law; the third, in which we despise the law; the fourth, in which we reject even the Gospel and grace of Christ itself. On the other hand, St. Bernard, in sermon 4 On the Assumption, takes the four days as the four motions and acts of the penitent: the first is of fear; the second, of struggle against sins; the third, of sorrow; the fourth, of shame over those same sins.

More probably Euthymius and Maldonatus hold that Lazarus indeed died on the very day on which the messenger came to Christ; but was buried on the following day, lest perhaps some hidden spark of life should still lurk in him; that from there Christ remained two days in Bethabara, and on the fourth day departed toward Bethany: but because this journey was of about ten hours (as is clear from the geographical maps of the Holy Land published by Adrichomius and others), which could scarcely be accomplished on foot by Christ and the Apostles in a single day; hence Christ arrived at Bethany on the next morning, which was the fifth day from Lazarus's burial, and raised Lazarus: for it was not fitting that He should raise him in the evening (lest the resurrection should seem illusory), but in the morning, or in full day. Therefore Lazarus had already been four days dead, that is, he had completed four whole days in the monument or sepulchre, and now the fifth day from the burial was in progress, so that it might be established to all that he was not only dead, but stinking and eaten by worms. Hence his raising by Christ was a most certain and most evident miracle, which the Scribes could in no way observe or carp at.

Tropologically: the four-days-dead man is the sinner who has the habit of sinning; who, being dead in sin and as though buried in it, without hope of pardon and spiritual life, lies as if in despair. For the first day is that on which one sins by consent of the will; the second, on which one consummates the sin in deed; the third, on which one repeats it and forms for oneself a custom and habit of it; the fourth, on which this habit forms a callus and turns, as it were, into nature—according to that saying of St. Augustine, Confessions bk. VIII, ch. 5: "From a perverse will sprang lust, and when lust was served it became custom; and when custom was not resisted it became necessity: by which, as by certain small links bound to one another, whence I even called it a chain, a harsh servitude held me fast." Such a sinner, therefore, must be roused from this sepulchre of sin by the great and rare grace of Christ: which, to signify, Christ cried with a loud voice: "Lazarus, come forth." So says St. Augustine.

Again Alcuin: The first day, he says, is the exaltation of sin in the heart; the second, the consent of the will to sin; the third, the deed, when we carry it out in action; the fourth, habit, when we become accustomed to it, and by being accustomed cling to it. St. Augustine says much the same, bk. I On the Lord's Sermon on the Mount, ch. 23: "Just as," he says, "one comes to sin by three steps—suggestion, delight, consent—so there are three differences of sin itself, in the heart, in the deed, in habit, as it were three deaths. One is, as it were, in the house, that is, when the will consents to lust in the heart; another already brought as it were outside the gate, when assent proceeds into deed; the third, when by the force of evil habit..."

Verse 18: Now Bethany Was Nigh Unto Jerusalem, About Fifteen Furlongs Off

Verse 18. NOW BETHANY WAS NIGH UNTO JERUSALEM, ABOUT FIFTEEN FURLONGS OFF. — A stadium is an eighth part of an Italian mile, or a thousand paces: it therefore contains 125 paces: so fifteen stadia contain 1875 paces; for sixteen stadia contain two thousand paces and make two Italian miles. John adds this to signify that many came from Jerusalem to Bethany, since it was so near, to console Martha and Mary in their grief over the death of Lazarus. So St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, Cyril, and others. Whence follows:

Verse 19: And Many of the Jews Had Come to Martha and Mary, to Comfort Them Concerning Their Brother

19. AND MANY OF THE JEWS HAD COME TO MARTHA AND MARY, TO COMFORT THEM CONCERNING THEIR BROTHER. — "Many," especially kinsmen, relations, friends; for these sisters were honorable, wealthy, and noble, such as are wont to have many friends or attendants. Add that the grief for a brother's death is bitter, and for softening it many, even strangers and those unknown, are accustomed to hasten for the sake of consoling. For this mourning for death is common to our whole nature, whence also consolation for it is common from all. So Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius.

Verse 20: Martha, as Soon as She Heard That Jesus Was Coming, Went and Met Him; but Mary Sat at Home

20. MARTHA, THEREFORE, AS SOON AS SHE HEARD THAT JESUS WAS COMING, WENT AND MET HIM: BUT MARY SAT AT HOME. — Keeping silence, mourning, and prayer after her manner: whence the news of Christ's coming reached not Mary but Martha; for Martha was the elder, presided over the household, and was wholly active and busy: therefore all letters and messages were brought first to her, not to Mary. But why did Mary herself not announce that Christ was coming? I answer: First, because the meeting of the arriving Christ allowed no delay. For Christ seems to have been near the house when Martha met Him. Secondly, because Martha wished to deal secretly with Christ, that she might inquire from Him whether there was any hope for her brother of raising or aiding him, as is clear from the following verse. Thirdly, because Mary, as I said, was devoted to quiet and prayer. Fourthly, because if she had summoned Mary, all the Jews would have followed her; and so a tumult would have broken out, and perhaps a quarrel and contention with them disputing with Christ. So Leontius. Finally, her joy at the coming of Christ carried her wholly to meet Him, so that she did not think of summoning her sister. I would rather say this than what some suppose, that she wished to snatch from her sister the honor of going to meet Christ; for this is too trifling and womanish, and unworthy of so great and holy a virgin.

Verse 21: Lord, if Thou Hadst Been Here, My Brother Had Not Died

21. THEN SAID MARTHA UNTO JESUS: LORD, IF THOU HADST BEEN HERE, MY BROTHER HAD NOT DIED, — because I know Thee to be so powerful that Thou canst ward off death; I likewise know Thee to be so loving of him and of us, that Thou wouldst not have allowed him to die. Tacitly, say Chrysostom, Cyril, and Theophylact, but reverently, sorrowfully, she as it were reproaches Christ for having come too late. But this opinion is opposed by the fact that on the very same day on which the messenger came to Christ about Lazarus's illness, Lazarus died. So that even if Christ had immediately set out on the journey, nevertheless, before He could have reached Bethany, Lazarus would have been dead. For the journey was nine hours. Rather, therefore, Martha blames herself for not having sent the messenger sooner to Christ, or at any rate in general she grieves and laments Christ's absence, namely that He was not present to restore health to Lazarus when sick, as we grieve over the chance absence of a physician, if anyone falls ill while he is away.

Martha does not seem yet to have had a perfect faith concerning Christ's deity, omniscience, and omnipotence. For if she had had this, she would have believed that Christ, even absent, knew of Lazarus's death, and could have cured him. She therefore believed Him to be a Prophet above all other Prophets; not yet however God, but being raised up and enlightened by Christ she soon believed this, v. 28.

Verse 22: But I Know That Even Now, Whatsoever Thou Wilt Ask of God, God Will Give It Thee

22. BUT I KNOW THAT EVEN NOW, WHATSOEVER THOU WILT ASK OF GOD, GOD WILL GIVE IT THEE, — and consequently if Thou ask of God the raising of Lazarus, though he is already four days in the tomb, God will give it Thee. She thought, says Cyril, that Christ had come not to raise Lazarus, but to console herself and Mary; therefore she asks Him to raise Lazarus, but tacitly, and with modest and humble resignation of her own will into Christ. Whence, as St. Augustine notes: "She did not say, But now I ask Thee to raise my brother: for how did she know whether it would profit her brother to rise? She said only this: I know that Thou canst; if Thou wilt, Thou wilt do it: for whether Thou wilt do it, is of Thy judgment, not of my presumption."

Verse 23: Jesus Saith Unto Her: Thy Brother Shall Rise Again

23. JESUS SAITH UNTO HER: THY BROTHER SHALL RISE AGAIN. — Jesus consoles Martha, grieving over her brother's death, with the hope of resurrection, but an ambiguous hope, so that He might gradually raise her up to the faith and hope of so great a miracle, by which He had decided soon to raise him, by which she might dispose herself and as it were merit it. So Leontius.

You will say: Why did Martha not keep Lazarus's body unburied and embalmed with balsam until Christ's arrival, so as more easily to move Christ to raise him? I answer first: Because it was the custom of the Jews to bury the dead on the following day. Second, because she did not know whether Christ was going to raise him or not. Third, because to keep a four-days-dead man unburied at home would have been an unusual thing, foul-smelling, and liable to slander. Fourth, because she believed that Christ could raise him even when buried, as she herself says here. Finally, Christ had put this thought into her, that following the course of nature she should bury her dead brother, to the end that He might raise him already buried, and thus His miracle and benefit would be greater. For this is God's way.

Hence learn morally that God often permits us to fall into tribulations, and allows them to grow to the utmost, and then by great power succors us, that He may show His omnipotence and supreme clemency and providence. Therefore the faithful must not despair, but increase hope and prayer, and hope most of all. For when every human aid fails, then divine aid is near and hastens, as Philo, ambassador to the emperor Caius, said. So God succored Abraham placed in straits, Gen. xx, and Joseph cast into oblivion in prison, Gen. xli, 12; likewise the Hebrews oppressed by Pharaoh, Exod. I and following, and especially when, the same being surrounded on one side by the sea, on another by mountains, on another by Pharaoh's army, He led them safely through with the Red Sea parted, and drowned the pursuing Pharaoh with his whole army when the sea returned, Exod. xiv. So in the time of the Judges He permitted them to be oppressed now by the Midianites, now by the Moabites, now by the Ammonites, now by the Philistines, that He might lead them to pray fervently and cry out to Him; and when this was done He immediately sent them Gideon, Ehud, Samson, and the other judges to deliver them. So He delivered the Jews destined for slaughter by Holofernes through Judith, and from Haman through Mordecai, and from Antiochus through the Maccabees. So He delivered David in the cave, surrounded by Saul, by sending a messenger to Saul that the Philistines were ravaging Judea, II Kings [II Sam.] xxiii, 26 and 27.

In like manner in wars despair is often the cause of hope, indeed of victory: for soldiers despairing of life fight for it most fiercely, lest they die unavenged; for which reason they are formidable and often conquer their conquering enemies. Whence that military maxim: "Drive not the enemy to despair. Lay a golden bridge for a fleeing foe. Join not hands with one who is desperate."

It is therefore proper to God, as to supply the defect of nature, so also to succor the abandoned and desperate, according to that saying: "To Thee the poor man is left; to the orphan Thou wilt be a helper." And that: "Deus ex machina; God appearing unexpectedly."

Verse 24: I Know That He Shall Rise Again in the Resurrection at the Last Day

24. MARTHA SAITH UNTO HIM: I KNOW THAT HE SHALL RISE AGAIN IN THE RESURRECTION (Syriac: in the consolation) at the last DAY. — Christ had said that Lazarus would rise, but ambiguously, not expressing whether now or on the day of judgment. Martha therefore, in order to elicit the resolution of this ambiguity from Christ's own mouth, adds: I know that he will rise on the day of judgment; but this will not be a special benefit to him, but common to all men; but if he is to rise before then, and is now to be raised by Thee, I would that Thou declare it plainly; for this will be a singular privilege to him and to all of us. Learn here that the Jews, and especially the Pharisees, believed in the immortality of the soul, and thence in the resurrection of bodies, and this is clear from II Maccabees xii, 48; Job, xix, 25; Acts xxiii, 8. For Martha here speaks from the understanding of the Jews, although Theophylact holds that she had learned of the resurrection from Christ.

Verse 25: I Am the Resurrection and the Life; He That Believeth in Me, Even Though He Be Dead, Shall Live

25. JESUS SAID TO HER: I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE. — The Syriac: I am the consolation and the life. For the Syrians call the resurrection consolation, because it is, in the utter desolation of this life for men, the supreme consolation both of the soul and of the senses and all the members, and of the whole man.

I am the resurrection and the life, — not formally, but causally; as though He said: I am the one who raises, I am the one who grants life (so in I Cor. i, it is said: "Who is made unto us justice, and sanctification, and redemption," that is, justifier, sanctifier, redeemer); through Me both the dead rise and the living live; therefore I can even now, before the general resurrection, raise thy brother back to life from death. Whence St. Augustine: "Thou sayest," he says, "my brother shall rise on the last day: thou sayest truly; but through Him by whom he shall then rise, he can rise now also, because I am the resurrection and the life;" that is, I am the cause of resurrection and of life, so that all rise through Me, and none can rise but through Me. I am the cause, I say, in a fourfold way: namely meritorious, efficient, exemplary, and final. For I have merited by My death the resurrection of all, and I will physically effect it on the day of judgment, and I have given the example of it in My own resurrection, which is the end of the resurrection of all. For all the faithful will rise to this end, that they may be conformed to Me rising in glory, and may glorify Me forever.

Furthermore, Christ silently answers that saying of Martha's: "Whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give Thee;" which words, says Theophylact, hint at Martha's imperfect faith, wherefore Christ perfects it. For she had said: "Whatsoever Thou shalt ask, etc." But Christ shows that He Himself is the one from whom she ought to ask, says Chrysostom. He therefore says: "I am the resurrection," as though He said: I have no need to ask God for the resurrection of thy brother, because I Myself through Myself can bestow the same; for I am the resurrection and the life, namely the resurrection of the dead and the life of the living, because I raise the dead from death, and bestow life on the living. By "life" He means that by which those who rise live, and something more. So Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius, and others.

Whence some expound it thus: I am the resurrection and the life, that is, I am the resurrection unto life, so that it is a hendiadys. Hence, explaining this life, He adds:

HE THAT BELIEVETH IN ME, EVEN THOUGH HE BE DEAD, SHALL LIVE. — To Martha asking that Lazarus's bodily life be restored, Christ responds and grants more, namely also the life of the soul, that is, that his soul should live here a new life by greater grace, and in the future by glory. The soul shall live, says St. Augustine, until the flesh rise, never afterward to die. The sense therefore is, as though He said: Not only shall thy brother rise when I raise him, but any faithful one who believes in Me with a living faith, formed by charity, "even though he be dead, shall live"; both because his soul shall always live by the life of charity and grace, and of glory in heaven; and because his body shall be raised by Me from death to a blessed and eternal life on the day of judgment, which is what Christ properly regards here. Therefore, although it dies, yet this will be only for a little time, so that that death may seem not so much death as sleep and slumber; for from it he will awake and rise on the day of judgment. Whence St. Cyprian, in his book On Mortality, citing and explaining this passage: "If we believe in Christ," he says, "let us have faith in His words and promises, and, not destined to die forever, let us come with glad security to Christ, with whom we shall both live and reign forever. That we die in the meantime, we pass through death to immortality; nor can eternal life succeed, unless it befalls us to depart from hence; this is not a departure, but a passage, and when the temporal journey has been run, a crossing over to things eternal."

Verse 26: And Everyone Who Lives and Believes in Me Shall Not Die for Ever. Believest Thou This?

26. AND EVERYONE WHO LIVES AND BELIEVES IN ME SHALL NOT DIE FOR EVER. — Christ was proving Himself to be the resurrection and the life, that is, the cause of resurrection and life to all the faithful and the saints; the resurrection, indeed, by saying: "He that believeth in Me, even though he be dead, shall live," namely because he shall be raised by Me from death to a blessed life; and the life, by saying: "And everyone who lives and believes in Me shall not die forever," as though He said: Just as I will raise the faithful dead to a blessed life, so also I will preserve in eternal life those still living who believe in Me, and will cause them not to die forever; for, although for a little time they die out of the debt of nature, yet a little after I will raise them from death to eternal life, so that they may seem not so much to have died as to have slept. Therefore I am the resurrection and life of all the faithful, both dead and living, because through the resurrection I will bestow perpetual life on all. So St. Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact, Leontius, Euthymius. For the unbelievers and wicked, though they too shall rise to life, yet because they rise to the torments of Gehenna, their life is hence to be called death rather than life.

Again some expound more broadly thus, as though He said: Everyone who lives a natural life, and believes in Me, and through faith formed by charity lives the life of supernatural grace, this man shall not die forever, because his soul shall not die through mortal sin, but shall remain in the life of grace: understand, unless he himself willingly squander and cast it away by sinning; but as for the body, although it die for a short time, yet it shall not remain in death, but shall be raised to eternal life, according to that of ch. III, v. 15: "That everyone who believes in Me may not perish, but have eternal life." This sense is clear on every side: Christ however here looks rather to the resurrection of the body than to the life of the soul, for He is treating of raising Lazarus.

BELIEVEST THOU THIS? — Christ requires faith in the resurrection not from Lazarus, since he is dead, but from his sister Martha, that through her she herself may obtain her brother's raising, and at the same time that she herself may be stirred up to a greater faith and hope of the resurrection, and thus may prepare herself for it with greater zeal and holiness. So, from the father asking that his son be freed from a demon, Christ requires faith, that he believe Him able to do this, Mark ix, 29, and from the bearers of the paralytic He requires a similar faith, Matt. ix, 3.

Verse 27: Yea, Lord, I Have Believed That Thou Art the Christ, the Son of the Living God, Who Hast Come Into This World

Verse 27. SHE SAITH TO HIM: YEA, LORD, I HAVE BELIEVED THAT THOU ART THE CHRIST (the Messiah promised to the Jews) THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD, WHO HAST COME INTO THIS WORLD. — The Arabic and Greek: ἐρχόμενος, that is, "coming" (which was a name of the Messiah); the Syriac: "Thou art to come to redeem and save the world."

THE SON. — In Greek ὁ υἱός, that is, that Son, namely the true, natural, and only-begotten of God. Christ perfected Martha's imperfect faith, saying: "I am the resurrection and the life." Whence she, inwardly illumined by Christ, burst forth into a perfect act of faith and said: I believe Thee to be the true Messiah, the Son of God, and therefore God, and the first cause of all resurrection and life. I believe Thee as God to be able to raise and vivify forthwith Lazarus and whomsoever of the dead Thou wilt. So St. Augustine, Cyril, Leontius, Maldonatus, Ribera, and St. Hilary, bk. VI On the Trinity.

But St. Chrysostom, Euthymius, and Toletus judge that Martha did not understand Christ's words when He said: "I am the resurrection and the life," etc., and therefore said in general and confusedly: I believe Thee to be the Christ, the Son of the living God, not distinguishing whether He was the natural Son of God or adopted, but only exalted and singular above the other Saints and Prophets.

Verse 28: The Master Is Present, and Calls Thee

28. AND WHEN SHE HAD SAID THIS, SHE WENT AND CALLED HER SISTER SECRETLY, SAYING: THE MASTER (the Arabic and Syriac add, "our") IS PRESENT, AND CALLS THEE. — Hence it is clear that Jesus had commanded Mary to be called, although the Evangelist did not narrate it before, out of zeal for brevity, content to hint at it here through the words of Martha executing Christ's command. So St. Augustine, Cyril, Leontius, Toletus, Maldonatus, and others.

SECRETLY, — because Mary was surrounded by Jews consoling her. Martha therefore calls her secretly, lest she stir up a tumult of the Jews if she should openly say that Jesus was present and was calling Mary. A little differently Theophylact: She reckoned, he says, Christ's presence as the call. For Christ's presence itself was calling Mary of its own accord, as love calls the lover to the beloved.

Verse 29: As Soon as She Heard This, She Rose Quickly and Came to Him

29. AS SOON AS SHE HEARD THIS, SHE ROSE QUICKLY AND CAME TO HIM;

Verse 30: For Jesus Had Not Yet Come Into the Town; but He Was Still in That Place Where Martha Had Met Him

30. FOR JESUS HAD NOT YET COME INTO THE TOWN (Syriac: into the village, into Bethany); BUT HE WAS STILL IN THAT PLACE WHERE MARTHA HAD MET HIM; — because Jesus wished to go to Lazarus's tomb, which according to Jewish custom was outside the village or town; for this reason He did not wish to enter Bethany, lest He should soon have to go out again to the tomb. He therefore remained outside it, that He might be nearer the tomb, and there He awaited Mary, who, being called, upon hearing the name of Jesus, burning with love and desire for Him, flew at once to Him, just as children run when they hear their mother has returned from abroad. So St. Chrysostom: "Neither dignity," he says, "nor grief, nor those sitting with her delayed her, etc. She was more fervent than her sister; for she was not abashed before the crowd, nor did she fear the Jews' opinion of Christ, but despised all human things when the Master was present."

Verse 31: The Jews Then Who Were With Her in the House Followed Her, Saying: She Goes to the Grave to Weep There

31. THE JEWS THEN WHO WERE WITH HER IN THE HOUSE AND WERE COMFORTING HER, WHEN THEY SAW MARY, THAT SHE ROSE UP QUICKLY AND WENT OUT, FOLLOWED HER, SAYING: SHE GOES TO THE GRAVE TO WEEP THERE. — Martha had secretly whispered in Mary's ear that Jesus was present; she alone therefore heard this, not the Jews, who, seeing her sudden and swift departure, supposed her to be going to her brother's tomb for the sake of wailing and weeping, and therefore followed her. By God's providence this was done, that many Jews following Mary might see Jesus raising Lazarus, and thus be unshakable witnesses of this raising, and believe in Him and induce others to believe. So St. Augustine.

Verse 32: Mary, When She Was Come Where Jesus Was, Fell Down at His Feet, and Said: Lord, if Thou Hadst Been Here, My Brother Had Not Died

32. MARY THEREFORE, WHEN SHE WAS COME WHERE JESUS WAS, SEEING HIM, FELL DOWN AT HIS FEET, AND SAID TO HIM: LORD, IF THOU HADST BEEN HERE, MY BROTHER HAD NOT DIED. — She fell at His feet out of reverence and gratitude, seeing that lately, while bathing them with tears and wiping them with her hair, she had heard: "Thy sins are forgiven thee; go in peace," Luke vii. She says the same as her sister Martha, because she had the same feeling of sorrow, the same faith, and hence the same words as Martha: she does not however say all that Martha said, hindered no doubt by tears, says Bede.

IF THOU HADST BEEN HERE, — because, as the Interlinear Gloss says, in Thy presence no infirmity dared appear, in the houses of those with whom Life was wont to lodge.

Verse 33: He Groaned in the Spirit, and Troubled Himself

[He was indignant] against death and the devil, through whose envy death had entered into the world, which was the cause of so much grief and weeping. So Cyril, Augustine, Bede, Lyra, Jansenius, and Ribera.

Secondly, and more particularly and properly with respect to the present matter, He groaned — that is, Jesus was indignant against the Jewish perfidy of those Pharisees and Scribes, on account of which God had decreed that Lazarus should die, so that Jesus might raise him — that is, from whose death had come forth so many tears and lamentations of Martha, Mary, and all their friends. Thus Toletus.

"Anger," says St. Basil in his homily On Anger, "is an aid to reason against sin, or like a soldier under a commander. Indignation is the sinew of the soul, supplying strength, constancy, and vigor for carrying out matters well and in order; it restrains the soul when it grows wanton in pleasure, as it were with a bit of iron. Just as a dog obeys the shepherd, so does anger obey reason, barking at and driving off the vices as if they were wolves," according to that word of Psalm IV: "Be angry, and sin not." Thus Christ, taking on anger, cast out the sellers from the temple with a whip, John II. Thus Moses, slaying twenty-three thousand, restrained the idolatry of the calf, Exodus XXXII. Thus Elijah consumed with heavenly fire the three captains of fifty sent by the king to arrest him, IV Kings I.

One must therefore be angry at sin, at concupiscence, at temptation. Hear St. Gregory Nazianzen, who begins his poem On Anger thus: "I am angry at anger, at the demon lodged within." For anger is, as it were, an inward demon, against which one must likewise be angry. This indeed is just anger, "which is like a certain soldier, reason's attendant, the avenger of desire," as Nicetas says in his commentary on Oration 43 of Nazianzen.

Concerning St. Malachy, Bishop of Ireland, St. Bernard writes thus in His Life: "His anger was in his own hand. When called, it came; when departing, it did not burst forth; it was borne by nod, not by impulse. He was not burned by it, but used it." And a little before: "In his own tribulation he was patient, in another's he was compassionate, and often also impatient. Indeed, filled with zeal, on behalf of some he was moved against others, so that, rescuing the helpless and restraining the strong, he might look out for the salvation of all." And further on: "Without agitation he moved among crowds; the time which he had given to leisure, he passed without idleness," etc.

This is what Christ says in Isaiah LXIII, 5: "My own arm saved Me, and My indignation itself helped Me. And I trampled down the peoples in My fury, and made them drunk in My indignation, and brought down their strength to the earth."

Now this groaning — that is, this indignation — in the first place was genuine anger, not merely a suppression of tears, for these passions and affections in Christ were not involuntary and violent, but voluntary and freely assumed, as I shall say presently. Thirdly, because after the groaning He troubled Himself. Therefore He did not repress the groaning, but rather, by troubling Himself, increased it.

I say therefore that Christ here drew forth the affection and act of groaning — that is, of indignation in spirit, that is, in the mind and in the innermost feelings of the soul — which He outwardly manifested by a sign and a groan, that is, by an indignant voice, in order to signify the grief He had conceived from the death of Lazarus and from the weeping of Mary and of the Jews (of which more presently); and in order by this groaning as it were to prepare and animate Himself for the arduous duel with death, to indicate how difficult would be the raising of Lazarus, four days dead, from death — especially with the devil resisting — on account of the glory which He foresaw would accrue to Him from it. Whence St. Augustine says: "In the voice of the One groaning appears the hope of the One about to rise again."

Indeed, Jesus foresaw that on account of the raising of Lazarus He would be crucified by the envious Pharisees; yet notwithstanding this He overcame Himself and willed to raise Lazarus — which was an act of heroic fortitude, which He made manifest by this groaning. So soldiers, when battle is at hand, groan and rouse and sharpen their wrath for the imminent, arduous, and perilous fight: for such is the whetstone of virtue and fortitude. Hence lions about to fight with bulls and elephants sharpen their wrath and roar, to rouse their spirits and strength and to strike the foe with their roar. Hence too, when the temptation of the devil, the flesh, or the world presses on, anger must be sharpened against them, that we may overcome them; for anger is overcome by concupiscence, just as by the difficulty of an arduous work.

And He Troubled Himself. — That is, He drew forth in Himself freely and of His own accord a great affection both of the indignation already spoken of and of compassion and tears, on account of the common weeping of Martha, Mary, and the rest; for not to condole with and to feel for them would have been inhuman. Therefore Jesus troubled Himself over these things.

Note: These passions of indignation, sorrow, compassion, and weeping were so in Christ that they did not anticipate His reason and will, nor arise unwillingly as they arise in us; but rather they followed reason, and were commanded and roused by it. Whence right reason was always directing and moderating them. Hence He says, "He troubled Himself," and not, "He was troubled." Therefore these passions in Christ were not so much passions as pro-passions freely assumed, as theologians teach from Damascene. For Christ could at His own will rouse them, lull them, moderate, rule, and bend them — far more than a charioteer rules his horses and chariot. See what was said at Matthew 26:37; whence St. Augustine says: "Who could trouble Him except He Himself? He was troubled because He willed it; He hungered because He willed it: it was in His power to be so or so affected." Theophylact gives the reason: "He shows," he says, "that He is a true man, and not one in appearance only, and He teaches us to suffer with others."

He therefore troubled Himself by inducing in Himself the affection of grief, anger, and compassion, manifesting it by a changed countenance and voice from sorrow. The proper cause, then, of this groaning and troubling of Christ was the death of Lazarus, and from it the weeping of Mary and the Jews, as is plain from the words themselves. For He says: "Jesus therefore, when He saw her weeping, and the Jews that were come with her, weeping, groaned in the spirit, and troubled Himself." For Jesus, seeing so great afflictions of Martha and Mary, His disciples, and the common weeping of all on account of the death of Lazarus, stirred up in Himself a groaning — that is, an act of indignation — by which He was indignant that this household, so hospitable, friendly, and devoted to Him, had fallen into such grief because of his death and their love toward him.

Consequently He was indignant at the whole human race — so noble, upright, sound, and immortal as it had been established by God — for having fallen into these hardships of sickness and death, and thence into so many weepings and groans (for this seemed unworthy); and thence He was indignant at sin, and equally at the devil, who was the origin and cause of so great an indignity and of all these evils. And by this indignation He utterly steeled His soul to drive away these evils — first from Martha and Mary, by raising Lazarus at once, and then from the whole human race, through His cross and death now at hand.

So then the misery of Lazarus and of men stirred up the compassion of Christ; compassion stirred up His indignation at so great hardships; indignation increased compassion, and along with it roused His zeal and resolve to drive away those hardships, even at the cost of His own life by death on the cross, by which so great a matter had to be bought by Him — according to that word of Isaiah 63:4: "The day of vengeance is in My heart, etc.; indignation itself helped Me."

Verse 34: Where Have You Laid Him? They Say to Him: Lord, Come and See

Christ knew the place of Lazarus's burial; for as St. Augustine argues: "You knew that he was dead, and are You ignorant where he is buried?" Yet He asks, because He dealt with men in a human manner, and by asking He prepared Himself and paved the way for the raising of Lazarus, and at the same time stirred up Mary, Martha, and the Jews to pay attention to so great a miracle, so that they might carefully consider all the sayings and deeds of Christ, who was about to raise him.

Symbolically, St. Gregory in Book IV, Letter 42: Christ, he says, recalling Eve's sin to the women, says: I placed the man in paradise whom you have placed in the tomb.

Come and See. — They eagerly invite Jesus to come and see, hoping that He who had raised strangers from the dead would also raise Lazarus, of His own household, so dear to Him. Whence the Interlinear Gloss mystically says: "See" means, "Have mercy": for, as St. Augustine says, the Lord sees when He has mercy, according to that word, "See my humility, and forgive all my sins." Otherwise St. Chrysostom, and after him Theophylact: He seemed to be going, he says, as one about to weep, not as one about to raise Lazarus.

Verse 35: And Jesus Wept

At the sight of Lazarus's tomb (though Chrysostom thinks He wept when He groaned and troubled Himself, which is equally probable), to signify the grief He had conceived from his death and His own love for him.

Secondly, that He might weep together with the sorrowing sisters and Jews, and teach us to do the same. So St. Augustine. Hear St. Ambrose, Book IV on Luke, at the end of the prooemium: "Christ became all things to all: poor with the poor, rich with the rich, weeping with those who weep, hungering with the hungry, thirsting with the thirsty, overflowing with those who have abundance. He is with the poor man in prison, He weeps with Mary, He feasts with the Apostles, He thirsts with the Samaritan woman."

Thirdly, that by adding tears to prayer He might make it more vehement and effective; for tears are a sign of vehement grief and affliction, as well as of affection and desire. Wherefore God is wont to hear prayers seasoned and as it were armed with tears. Thus Christ on the cross, "offering up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears, was heard for His reverence," Hebrews 5:7. Thus Tobit in chapter 12, verse 12, heard from St. Raphael: "When you prayed with tears, and did bury the dead, etc., I offered your prayer to the Lord."

Thus Jacob, wrestling with the angel, obtained his blessing, Genesis 32:26. Why? Because "he wept and entreated him," Hosea 12:4. "The tears of the penitent," says St. Bernard, "are the wine of angels." For compunction of mind in prayer is what moves and as it were compels God to have mercy, according to that word: "A contrite and humbled heart, O God, You will not despise," Psalm 50:19; just as the tears of an infant move its mother, and obtain from her what it asks; for God displays the bowels of a mother.

Others give other causes for Christ's tears. First, Cyril says that Christ wept for the miseries of the human race brought in by sin. Second, Andrew of Crete says that He wept for the unbelief of the Jews, who, even after seeing the miracle of Lazarus's raising, would still not believe in Christ. Third, Isidore of Pelusium in the Catena, and Rupert, hold that Christ wept because He was about to recall Lazarus from limbo — that is, from a harbor and state of rest — to the storms, dangers, and hardships of this life.

Christ is recorded to have wept three times. First, here at the death of Lazarus; second, on the cross, Hebrews 5:7; third, when seeing Jerusalem and its destruction, Luke 19:41. Moreover, St. Bernard in Sermon 3 for the Nativity: "The tears of Christ," he says, "beget in me both shame and grief, etc. Shall I still trifle with and make sport of His tears?" And soon after: "The Son of God has compassion and weeps: shall man suffer and laugh?" And St. Augustine here, Tractate 49: "Christ wept," he says, "let man weep for himself; for why did Christ weep, except that He taught man to weep? Why did He groan and trouble Himself, except that the faith of a man rightly displeased with himself ought in some manner to groan in accusation of his evil works, so that the custom of sinning may yield to the violence of penitence?"

Verse 37: Could Not He Who Opened the Eyes of the Man Born Blind Have Made It So That This Man Should Not Die?

Certainly He could have done so, but He would not, because He had decreed to do far more — namely, to raise a dead man of four days; which the Jews thought impossible, and therefore they marveled that Christ had not prevented Lazarus's death. "He who would not do so much as to keep him from dying," says St. Augustine, "is about to do something greater — to raise him, dead."

Verse 38: Jesus Therefore, Again Groaning in Himself, Came to the Tomb

Of this groaning I spoke at verse 33. Note: Christ was here three times deeply moved and wept: first, at verse 33, when He saw Mary and the Jews weeping; second, at verse 34, when He saw Lazarus's tomb from afar; third, here, when He came to it, to show how pitiable was the lot of Lazarus dead, and typically the lot of sinners spiritually dead through their sins, and about to die perpetually in the torments of Gehenna. For this is what drew bloody tears from Him in the agony of death, Luke 22:44.

Now It Was a Cave, and a Stone Had Been Laid Upon It. — For the nobler Jews were buried in caves or crypts, as is plain from the tomb of Abraham, Genesis 23:9; of Isaac and Jacob, Genesis 49:31; of Joseph of Arimathea, Matthew 27:60.

Mystically, St. Augustine: This stone, he says, denotes the Mosaic law, which, written on tablets of stone, was shutting all things up under sin.

Tropologically, the same St. Augustine in Sermon 44 On the Words of the Lord according to John: "That mass," he says, "set upon the tomb, is itself the force of hard habit, by which the soul is pressed down, and permitted neither to rise nor to breathe again."

Verse 39: Jesus Said: Take Away the Stone

Christ commanded this, first, so that the Jews, once the stone was taken away, might see Lazarus's body, and thus not only behold him as dead but also smell him as putrid, and so make the greater account of his raising. So St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius here, and St. Ambrose, On the Faith of the Resurrection. Second, that He might offer His prayer in the presence of Lazarus's body, present that dead body to God, and beseech that it be raised by Him.

Tropologically, St. Bernard, Sermon 4 On the Assumption: "Let the stone be taken away," he says, "but let penitence remain — no longer crushing and burdening, but strengthening and confirming the lively and vigorous mind. For its food (which it did not know before) is to do the will of the Lord; so too does discipline no longer bind the free man, according to that word: 'The law is not made for the just' (1 Tim 1:9); rather, it rules what is voluntary, and directs it into the way of peace."

Martha, the Sister of Him That Was Dead, Says to Him: Lord, by This Time He Stinks, for He Is Now of Four Days. — Origen, Cyril, and Rupert think that Martha said this so that Christ might not be offended by the deformity and stench of Lazarus's corpse; but Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius, Leontius, and Maldonatus think she said it because she was distrustful that Lazarus, four days dead, could be raised by Christ, and so that Christ might not attempt it — which she thought could not in any way be done. And this is intimated by the reproof soon made to her by Christ: "Did I not say to you, that if you believe, you shall see the glory of God?"

Mystically, St. Augustine, Sermon 44 On the Words of the Lord according to John: "The four-days Lazarus," he says, "signifies a sinner buried in the custom of sin, and as it were despaired of; so that it is said: 'He is of four days, he already stinks.' So the Lord came, to whom indeed all things were easy, and yet He showed a certain difficulty. There He groaned in spirit, showing that much outcry of rebuke is needed for those who have grown hardened through custom. Nevertheless at the voice of the Lord crying out, the bonds of necessity were broken. The dominion of hell trembled, Lazarus was given back alive. For the Lord sets free even from evil custom those who have been four days dead; for that four-days man, in the view of Christ willing to raise him, was but sleeping."

Verse 40: Did I Not Say to You, That If You Believe, You Shall See the Glory of God?

Namely, to see the miraculous raising of Lazarus, by which God, the author of so great a miracle, would be glorified. So Euthymius, Maldonatus, and others. For this raising brought great glory to Christ and to God. Here Christ silently intimates before the unbelieving Jews that He Himself is God; for He was about to raise Lazarus by His own command and His own power — which is a work of God alone.

"You shall see the glory of God" is therefore the same as "you shall see My glory," seeing I am God and the Son of God. So Leontius and Euthymius.

But where did Christ say this to Martha? I answer that Christ said this not in so many words, but as to its substance and meaning, to the messengers Martha had sent, at verse 4, when He said: "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified by it." So St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Rupert. Again and more plainly to Martha herself, at verse 23: "Your brother shall rise again." And at verse 25: "I am the resurrection and the life; he that believes in Me, even if he be dead, shall live, etc. Do you believe this?"

If You Shall Believe. — Christ rouses Martha's faith and hope as they wavered. For although she, running to meet Christ earlier, said at verse 27: "I have believed that You are the Son of the living God"; and at verse 22: "I know that whatever You shall ask of God, God will give You"; nevertheless, when it came to the point — when, I say, Christ, about to raise Lazarus, commanded the tomb to be opened — Martha began to waver; whence she said: "Lord, by this time he stinks; for he is of four days." She therefore had alternating motions of grace and nature, of faith and distrust, of hope and despair concerning the resurrection of Lazarus — such as we experience in ourselves, when, turned toward God, we hope to overcome all things, however difficult; but turned toward our own weakness, when we have to attempt some hard undertaking, we tremble, falter, and almost despair that it can be accomplished by us.

So raw recruits display great courage before the battle, but when the fight closes in, they are terrified at the first enemy charge and flee. Whence the saying: "Lions in peace, stags in battle." But veteran soldiers tremble like stags before the battle, but in the battle they stand their ground and fight like lions. By this distinction you may tell a veteran from a recruit.

Verse 41: They Therefore Took Away the Stone

And, when it had been removed, the stinking and putrid corpse of Lazarus appeared, so that it might be clear to all that he was truly dead, and so that Christ might present him as such to God by His prayers and offer him to be raised.

And Jesus, Lifting Up His Eyes on High (to God the Father — to teach us in prayer to lift up our eyes, and even more our minds, to God in heaven. So Damascene in the Catena; and there Andrew of Crete adds that Christ looked up to heaven as to His fatherland, to intimate that from there He had come down to earth), said: Father, I Give You Thanks, for You Have Heard Me. — Here, first, some think that Christ, when He groaned in spirit at verse 33, silently prayed in His mind to the Father that He might raise Lazarus, and received an answer from Him that Lazarus would be raised by Him; and that therefore Christ now says: "Father, I give You thanks, for You have heard Me." This is probable.

Secondly, others think that Christ had not prayed beforehand; wherefore the Father had heard not His prayer, but His desire, by which He was desiring to raise Lazarus. For God anticipates the vows of the pious and hears their desires, according to that word: "You have granted him the desire of his soul." And: "The Lord has heard the desire of the poor," Psalms 20:3 and 10:17. And: "Before they cry to Me, I will hear," Isaiah 65:24. So the sense will be, as it were: "I give You thanks, O Father, because You have consented to My wishes, and have willed the resurrection of Lazarus, which You saw that I was willing and desiring." So St. Chrysostom, Euthymius, Titelmannus, Jansenius, and Ribera.

But what Origen adds is improbable: that when Christ was preparing Himself to pray for the raising of Lazarus, God the Father anticipated Him, and before the prayer restored Lazarus's soul to his body. For that the soul was restored to the body not before but after the prayer is plain from verses 43 and 44.

Thirdly, plainly and fully, as if to say: I give You thanks, O Father, because hitherto You have always heard Me as I prayed, and constantly hear Me, and especially now, when at least silently and in mind I call upon You and beseech You for the raising of Lazarus. For You assure Me that I shall soon raise him. Here Christ teaches us the manner of praying — namely, that at the beginning of prayer we should give thanks to God for benefits received. For this giving of thanks reconciles God to us and inclines Him to grant the new benefits we ask. He who is grateful for lesser gifts deserves to receive greater ones. This is the confiding prayer of sons. Whence Christ adds:

Verse 42: I Knew That You Always Hear Me, but Because of the People Who Stand By, I Have Said It, That They May Believe That You Have Sent Me

As if to say: What I said aloud in verse 41, "Father, I give You thanks, because You have heard Me," I did not say for My own sake, as though it were something new to Me to be heard by You; for I know that You always hear Me, even when I pray in mind alone. But I said it for the sake of the people standing by, that they might believe that You have sent Me, from the fact that they see Me heard by You — as they will presently see Me heard, when by Your supernatural help I shall raise Lazarus.

Verse 43: And When He Had Said This, He Cried With a Loud Voice: Lazarus, Come Forth

With a Loud Voice, first, to show that this voice had the force of a great and powerful command, by which He was raising Lazarus from death — as God commanding nature and death. Whence Cyril: "A command worthy of God and royal," he says, "is 'Lazarus, come forth.'" For He said this not beseeching, but enjoining and commanding. A loud voice, then, signifies the great force and power which was recalling Lazarus from death to life. For this work was most difficult, and therefore required the highest and divine power, just as it required a loud voice. Again, the loud voice issued from the great affection and intensity of mind which Christ had toward this, and was the sign of it.

Secondly, to signify that Lazarus's soul was recalled from a remote place — namely, from the limbo of the fathers and the center of the earth — to his body buried in the earth; for we call out to those who are far away with a loud voice, so that they may hear, though separated souls have no need of any cry, for they do not hear a loud voice any more than a soft one, seeing they are bare and disembodied spirits.

Theophylact gives a third cause: He cried out loudly, he says, on account of the error of the Gentiles, who fabled that the souls of the dead dwell in their tombs; for He calls, as it were through a cry, one remaining far off in limbo.

The symbolic and anagogical cause was that by this loud voice He might represent the trumpet voice of the Archangel on the day of judgment, by which all the dead shall be raised. Whence St. Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact, and Euthymius assert that Christ here wished in deed to show what He had said in chapter 5, verse 25: "The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and those that hear shall live." Hear St. Ambrose in the book On the Faith of the Resurrection: "The Lord shows you how you shall rise again. For He raised not one Lazarus only, but the faith of all. If you believe as you read, your own mind also, which had been dead, comes to life again in that Lazarus. For what does it mean, that the Lord went to the tomb and cried with a loud voice, 'Lazarus, come forth,' unless He meant to furnish a specimen and give an example of the future resurrection? Why did He cry with a voice, as though He were not wont to work by His spirit, as though He were not wont to command in silence? Yet He did so in order to show that which is written: 'In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump they shall rise incorruptible' (1 Cor 15:52)."

Tropologically: the loud voice of Christ signifies the great impulse of prevenient grace, which is needed so that the sinner may be called forth from the custom of sin, in which he lies buried, to grace and new life. So St. Augustine, whose words I quoted at verse 39. Hence that word of Paul, Ephesians 5:14: "Rise, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall enlighten you."

Lazarus. — He calls him by his own name: "Lest," as St. Ambrose says in On the Faith of the Resurrection, "one raised might seem in place of another, or the resurrection might seem more a matter of chance than of command." Again, He addresses the dead man as if living, because to God all the dead are also living, says St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Euthymius.

Come Forth. — Not as though you had already risen and were now only to come forth outside the tomb, as Origen wrongly inferred from this. Rather, "come forth," that is, rise again, return from the dark and secret caverns of death and hell; return, O soul of Lazarus, from the innermost borders of the limbo of the fathers into this body, and thence into this life, this air, and this light which is common to all the living.

Tropologically: hear St. Gregory, Homily 26: "'Come forth' — For every sinner, while he hides his fault within his conscience, lies hidden inside, concealed in his own inmost chambers; but the dead man comes forth when the sinner willingly confesses his wickednesses. To Lazarus, therefore, is said, 'Come forth,' as if it were openly said to any dead person in sin: Why do you hide your guilt within your conscience? Come out now by confession, you who lie hidden within yourself by denial. Let the dead man then come forth, that is, let the sinner confess his fault. And let the disciples loose him as he comes forth, that the pastors of the Church may take away from him the penalty which he deserved — he who did not blush to confess what he did."

A little differently St. Bernard, Sermon 4 On the Assumption: "'Lazarus, come forth' — as if to say: How long shall the darkness of your conscience detain you? How long will you be pricked with a heavy heart in your own chamber? Come forth, advance, breathe in the light of My mercies. For this is what you have read in the prophet: 'I will bridle your mouth with My praise, lest you perish' (Is 48:9)."

Verse 44: And Immediately He That Had Been Dead Came Forth, Bound Feet and Hands With Winding Bands

Immediately. Note the power of Christ's voice, which raised the dead man most swiftly, so that the saying was the doing.

With Winding Bands. — In Greek κειρίαις, that is, funeral and sepulchral bandages, as the Syriac renders, with which the hands and feet of the dead are bound, so that they may be laid in a narrow coffin and fittingly arranged in it. The Arabic renders "linen cloths"; Nonnus: "Bound from foot to head, he had his whole body wrapped round with sepulchral bandages." Now, instita properly is a very slender strip which went round the hem of a woman's stola and was sewn underneath it, which honorable matrons used. Whence Horace, Book I of the Satires, Satire 2: "Whose matron's hem, sewn along the bottom, covers the ankles with its garment."

And His Face Was Bound With a Napkin, after the manner of the Jews, so that he might be signified to be dead, and so that the pale and grim face might not strike anyone with horror.

You will ask, why did Christ, in raising the dead man, not at the same time loose his bonds? They answer, first, Sts. Augustine, Chrysostom, Cyril, Leontius, and others: that the Jews might see that the same Lazarus was being raised who a little before, as a dead man, had been wrapped by them in bandages and a napkin — and not that he was a phantom, or some man hidden in the tomb as a sham.

Second, that the miracle might be twofold: for the first was the raising of the dead; the second, that although he was raised, yet still bound in his feet and with his face covered, he should nevertheless walk straight forward and go out of the tomb directly to Christ. So Chrysostom and Theophylact.

Tropologically, St. Augustine, Tractate 49: "He came forth," he says, "and yet he is still bound, still wrapped up; yet he has already come out. What does this signify? When you despise, you lie dead; and if you despise such great things as I have spoken of, you lie buried; when you confess, you come forth. For what is it to come forth, except to make yourself manifest as if by going out from hiding? But it is God who makes you confess, by crying with a loud voice — that is, by calling with great grace."

Again, St. Gregory, Morals Book IV, chapter 25: "Our Redeemer," he says, "raised the girl in the house, the young man outside the gate, but Lazarus in the tomb. For he still lies as it were dead in the house who lies hidden in sin. He is already as it were led out beyond the gate whose iniquity is laid open to the shamelessness of public commission. But he is weighed down by the mound of burial who, in the commission of wickedness, is further oppressed by the weight of long-standing habit. Yet these also the Redeemer in His mercy recalls to life, because very often divine grace illumines with the light of His regard not only those dead in hidden iniquities, but also those oppressed in open ones and burdened under the weight of evil custom."

Anagogically: St. Augustine, in Book of 83 Questions, Question 65: "Lazarus," he says, "coming out of the tomb, is the soul withdrawing from carnal vices, but still bound — that is, not yet free from the troubles of the flesh while it lives in the body; his face is covered with a napkin, for full knowledge cannot be had in this life; but it is said, 'Loose him' — for after this life the veils will be taken away, so that we may see face to face."

Jesus Said to Them: Loose Him and Let Him Go — to his own home. Christ commanded this of the Jews, that they themselves, handling Lazarus, might as it were touch and feel with their own hands the miracle wrought by Him and his raising. So St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Euthymius.

Symbolically: Christ sends sinners, bound by the ropes of their sins, to the Apostles and priests, that they may be loosed and absolved by them, saying: "Whatever you shall loose upon earth shall be loosed also in heaven," Matthew 18:18. So St. Augustine: "What," he says, "is 'Loose him and let him go'? What you shall loose on earth shall be loosed also in heaven." So also Bede, Rupert, and St. Gregory, Homily 26 on the Gospels, and in Book XXI of the Morals, chapter 9.

Moreover, St. Gregory notes that Christ first raised Lazarus to life, and then sent him to the disciples to be loosed, so that it might be signified that the sinner must first be roused by Christ to penitence and the resolve of a new life, and then be absolved from sins by the Apostles. St. Gregory adds that it is to be wished that Christ should first make the sinner alive through an act of perfect contrition and justify him and blot out the guilt, and then that the priests should absolve him from the penalty. But this is rare and not necessary. For many, not contrite but only attrite, confess their sins to the priest, and are absolved by him, by the power of the Sacrament, both from guilt and from penalty.

Finally, that Lazarus gave great thanks to Christ (though John is silent about it) is in no doubt to anyone; for he also dedicated to Him the life which he had received from Him, becoming His disciple, preacher, and Bishop of Marseilles. Whence, as such, he is enrolled in the Catalogue of the Saints in the Roman Martyrology on December 17; and in his honor the Emperor Leo VI built a magnificent basilica, as Zonaras attests, in Book III.

His life, gathered from the Acts of St. Martha, Magdalene, and Maximinus, is thus briefly described by Peter de Natalibus, Bishop of Equilium, in Book I of the Catalogue of the Saints, chapter 72: "Lazarus the Bishop, brother of Martha and Mary Magdalene, noble, of the stock of the Jews, rich and powerful, born of Syrus his father and Eucharia his mother, was after four days of death raised by the Lord from the dead. He was a disciple of Christ and a companion of the Apostles, and on the day of Pentecost was one of the number of one hundred and twenty disciples upon whom the Holy Spirit was bodily poured out. And then, together with the others, he pressed on with the preaching of the word of the Lord, and, having sold off all his goods as did the rest, laid the price at the feet of the Apostles, and took upon him the apostolic life and form. But in the persecution of the Jews which arose after the stoning of Stephen — so that all the disciples, save the Apostles, were scattered through the cities, as is said in Acts 8 — he, together with his sisters, and with St. Maximinus and St. Celidonius (who had been blind from birth), and with Marcella the maid of Martha, was placed in a small boat without oar or helmsman and exposed to the sea, being driven out from the borders of the Jews. And they, God guiding them, came to Marseilles, where, Magdalene preaching and the whole province being converted to God, he, in the 14th year after the Lord's passion, was appointed Bishop of Marseilles by the clergy and the people. And after Magdalene withdrew into the deserts of the mountains, he, living at Marseilles, happily governed the people of God; where also he rested in the Lord on the 16th of the Kalends of January, whose head is there shown in the mother church. It is said that Lazarus, raised by the Lord, immediately asked Christ whether it would be necessary for him to die a second time; and that thereafter he never laughed."

Verse 45: Many Therefore of the Jews, Who Had Come to Mary and Martha, and Had Seen the Things Jesus Did, Believed in Him

For by the clearness and greatness of so miraculous a raising of Lazarus, they were convinced that Jesus was a Prophet — nay, the Messiah, as He Himself was professing.

Verse 46: But Some of Them Went to the Pharisees, and Told Them the Things Jesus Had Done

St. Augustine is in doubt whether they did this with a good or an evil mind: "either reporting so that they might believe, or betraying so that they might rage," says the Gloss; for they could have done it in good faith, namely with this mind, that they might bend the Pharisees, if not to faith in Christ, at least to a milder disposition toward Christ — as Origen thinks.

But others everywhere judge that they did this with an evil mind: wherefore, having seen the raising of Lazarus, they did not believe (for St. John sets these in opposition to those who believed in the preceding verse) in Christ; nay, they did not believe that the miracle was real, but magical and delusive — as heretics nowadays, when they see the miracles of the Blessed Virgin of Loreto, or of Sichem, slander the same and say that they are either fabricated or sleight of hand. Euthymius probably suspects that these informers against Christ were those same men who had said at verse 37: "Could not He who opened the eyes of the man born blind have made it so that this man should not die?"

Verse 47: The Chief Priests Therefore and the Pharisees Gathered a Council, and Said: What Are We Doing? for This Man Does Many Signs

They themselves ought to have been convinced by so many of Jesus' signs and miracles and to have believed that He is the Messiah, the Son of God; but blinded by hatred and envy, they say and do the contrary; whence they do not even deign to name Him, but say: "This man," as though He were a mere and base man (they still call Him a man, says Chrysostom, who had received so great a demonstration of His divinity), and they deliberate about His murder and resolve to take away His life — He who had given life back to Lazarus, and from whom they ought to have sought and hoped for eternal life. So St. Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact. "They did not say: Let us believe," says St. Augustine, "for ruined men thought more how they might harm so as to destroy, than how they might take counsel for themselves lest they perish." Therefore their foolish heart was infatuated, by which they brought upon themselves and their whole Jewish nation present and eternal destruction. How great a folly, says Origen, and blindness, who, though they testify that He has performed many miracles, yet think themselves able to do something against Him, as if He could not rescue Himself from their snares.

Verse 48: If We Let Him Go on Thus, All Will Believe in Him; and the Romans Will Come and Take Away Our Place and Nation

That is: The Romans will destroy Judea and the whole Jewish nation. St. Chrysostom and Theophylact understand by "place" Jerusalem, the metropolis of Judea, and thence its whole kingdom. But Maldonatus takes it to mean the Temple; for the priests feared that this, with its victims and profits, would be snatched away from them by the Romans.

All Will Believe in Him. — See here the genius of envy and its fitting effect: the chief priests, wishing to obscure Christ's glory, rather make it more illustrious, by saying that all will believe in Him. Why then do you yourselves not also believe in Him? Hear St. Gregory, Morals Book VI, chapter 13: "They brought death upon Him, that they might hide from Him the devotion of the faithful: but faith grew from the very source whence the cruelty of unbelievers believed it was extinguishing it."

And the Romans Will Come and Take Away (Vatablus: will transfer us elsewhere) Our Place and Nation. — Some think that they mean this: If all believe in Jesus, all will depart from us and our Judaism, Synagogue and commonwealth to Him, and thus there will be no one to fight for us against the Romans who wish to impose their yoke upon us. Whence St. Augustine: "They feared," he says, "lest, if all should believe in Christ, no one would remain to defend the city and Temple against the Romans. Therefore they feared to lose temporal things, and did not think of eternal life, and so they lost both. But the Romans did take away both the place and the nation, by storming and deporting them."

More probably others say: If all believe Jesus to be the Messiah, King of the Jews, the Romans, lords of Judea, will be provoked against us, because we have made ourselves a new king and Messiah, namely Jesus, and have defected from Caesar Tiberius to Him: wherefore they will come in arms and take away — Greek ἄρουσιν, that is, they will seize, devastate and destroy Jerusalem and Judea, with the whole Jewish nation and commonwealth. So Chrysostom. "They wished," he says, "to stir up the people, as though endangered by suspicion of tyranny," — that is, If the Romans see Jesus leading crowds, they will suspect tyranny and destroy the city. But what armor-bearers or horsemen did Christ lead around with Him? Truly envy and hatred blinded them, so that they utterly erred and reasoned falsely. For first, Jesus was king of the Jews, not temporal but spiritual, who did not touch Caesar's temporal kingdom, but rather increased it. For He gave tribute to him and taught that it ought to be given to others, and so when the people wished to make Him a temporal king, He fled, John VI, 15. Secondly, the Jews ought to have valued more the eternal salvation of the soul than the temporal well-being of the body. Wherefore they ought rather to have lost the body than the soul; rather Judea than heaven. Add: Christ, if they had believed in Him, would have averted from them every evil, even temporal. Thirdly, if they had believed in Jesus, they would have learned from Him to obey the Romans, as their lords, and to pay tribute to them: wherefore they would have had nothing to fear from the Romans. Fourthly, the Romans destroyed Judea because they themselves killed their Messiah, by the just vengeance of God, as Titus himself, their destroyer, judged, according to Josephus. So St. Chrysostom, Cyril, Euthymius, Theophylact, who also add that the priests did not truly feel this in their mind, nor fear the coming of the Romans and destruction on account of Jesus, but pretended this only as a veil for their envy and hatred toward Jesus. Moreover they themselves, blinded, killing Jesus, rushed into the Roman sword and destruction, and, what is more, into eternal death and hell.

So today Machiavellians and Politiques, who prefer politics to religion, a kingdom to the faith, a commonwealth to the Church, and earthly goods to heavenly, temporal things to eternal, lose both, as St. Augustine rightly notes. An illustrious example in this age was Wolsey, who, offended with Charles V, persuaded Henry VIII, king of England, to repudiate Catherine, the aunt-wife of Charles, which he knew he himself desired; but at last, by the just judgment of God, he fell into Henry's displeasure, and, being seized by him, said: "Justly do I suffer these things, because while I was occupied in seeking the king's favor to the offense of God, I lost God's favor and did not gain the king's." So Sanders, in the Anglican Schism. Let these therefore learn from this that faith and piety do not take away politics and the temporal kingdom, but rather preserve and increase it; whereas unfaithfulness and impiety overthrow it. Whence Chrysostom notes, homily 6, that the Jews were not punished by God except when they forsook God's faith and worship, and he proves this from the story of Achior, Judith chapter 5.

Verse 49: But One of Them, Named Caiaphas, Being the High Priest of That Year, Said to Them

While the others were consulting, and neither finding nor determining what ought to be done, Caiaphas, as high priest, offers counsel and decides the whole matter. He is called "high priest of that year," because, whereas by the law, Exodus XXVIII, the high priesthood ought to last for the high priest until death, and after him pass to his firstborn son by a kind of hereditary right; the Roman governors frequently changed them either at their whim, or upon a price received from those who sought it. Hear Josephus, Antiquities Book XVIII, chapter 3: "Tiberius succeeded Augustus Caesar in the empire: by whom, he says, the fifth governor of the Jews was sent in place of Annius Rufus — Valerius Gratus. He, taking away the priesthood from Ananus, ordered Ishmael, son of Phabi, to be high priest: and shortly after, having deposed him, he transferred that honor to Eleazar, son of Ananus the high priest. Then after a year had passed, he reduced him too to the ranks, and bestowed the high priesthood on Simon, son of Camith, and he too, having spent a year in this dignity, was ordered to yield it to Joseph, surnamed Caiaphas." So the high priesthood among the Jews was not annual, as St. Augustine seems to gather from this passage, but was changed after several or fewer years, indeed sometimes even within the same year. Further, "Caiaphas," says Pagninus, in Hebrew means "vomiting with the mouth" (for קיא kai means to vomit, and פה pe is mouth), or a shrewd investigator and searcher. Fittingly, because he here vomited forth an impious sentence against Christ, and was a shrewd searcher and inventor of it.

Verse 50: You Know Nothing, Nor Do You Consider That It Is Expedient for You That One Man Should Die for the People, and That the Whole Nation Perish Not

That is: You, like commoners and private persons, are dullards and blockheads; you understand nothing in this matter, nor know what ought to be done, you settle nothing, define nothing, offer no fitting counsel; but I, as high priest enlightened by God, dispatch the matter in a word; I give the best counsel and settle the whole matter, saying: "It is expedient that one man," namely Jesus, though accused of no crime, indeed innocent and a Prophet, and worker of so great a miracle, "should die (be killed by us) for the people," so that the people may not through Him be endangered with the Romans; that is, lest the Romans, on account of Jesus, as if He were the Messiah and King of the Jews, take away their place and nation, and thus the whole nation perish not, but, with Him removed, remain safe and whole. This therefore was the impious, false and unjust judgment of Caiaphas, namely that it was expedient for the salvation of the people that the innocent Christ be killed, lest on His account the Romans lay waste Judea and the Jews. His reasoning was: because it is better that one perish than many, according to the saying: Better that one perish than unity and community — that is, Why then do you delay? why do you deliberate? I have no doubt that it is expedient that one Jesus die for all the Jews. So Toletus, Jansenius, Maldonatus and others.

Symbolically Origen: "They knew nothing," he says, "who did not know Jesus," according to that saying: If you know Jesus, it is enough, though you know nothing else. If you know not Jesus, it is nothing, though you know all else.

Verse 51: This He Did Not Say of Himself: but, Being the High Priest of That Year, He Prophesied That Jesus Would Die for the Nation

Note that Caiaphas, with the other chief priests most hostile to Christ, out of private hatred toward Him, wished to say plainly what the others tacitly hinted at but did not express — namely, that Christ must be taken out of the way for the safety of the people, lest they be invaded by the Romans, as I have already said: but the Spirit, when he wished to utter this, cast upon him, as upon a high priest and head of the Church, these words, by which he rather said the opposite, and confirmed and defined the truest faith in Christ — namely, that it was expedient that Christ should die for the people, that is, for the salvation of the people, and by His death, as though by a price paid, redeem the same from sin, the devil, death and hell, lest otherwise that people should perish forever. For this is what Caiaphas's words properly and precisely signify: otherwise, according to Caiaphas's impious mind against Christ, he ought rather to have said thus: It is expedient that one Jesus die instead of the whole people, or rather than the whole people; but now he does not say instead of, but for the people: which properly means for the salvation of the people, that He may save the people; and although Caiaphas did not understand this, much less intend it, yet St. John skillfully notes here, by the Holy Spirit's prompting, and as he notes it, so also other sincere and upright men hearing Caiaphas could at that time have noted the same thing; just as we note it. Hence learn how great care God has for the Church, and how He assists the Pontiff, who is its head, especially in the new law, which He instituted, sanctioned and governs — Christ, as its head and spouse, lest namely the Church, Christ's bride, stray from faith and truth.

Moreover, insofar as Caiaphas did not understand this mystery, he was not properly a Prophet, as Origen notes, because the Holy Spirit spoke through his mouth, just as the angel spoke through the mouth of the ass to the impious Balaam, Numbers XXII and following. Caiaphas therefore most wickedly twisted the words of the Holy Spirit to the killing of Christ. For he meant to say that it was expedient that Christ be taken away, lest the Jews through Him offend the Roman Caesars and governors. Whence St. Chrysostom says that the Holy Spirit moved Caiaphas's tongue, not his heart.

You will say: Therefore Caiaphas here erred in faith. I answer: I deny the consequence; rather, he defined the true faith, namely that it was expedient that Christ die for the salvation of the world, as I have already said; granted that he himself did not understand it, nor intend to say it; for he intended that Christ should be taken away, lest on His account the people be laid waste by the Romans, in which matter, although he erred against justice and piety, yet he did not err against faith. For the error here was about a political fact, namely whether Christ should be killed for the political state or not. Add that the Jewish high priest did not have that infallible assistance of the Holy Spirit which Christian Pontiffs have from Christ, and after Christ; especially since already, with Christ present, the Synagogue of the Jews was beginning to fall, and in its place the Church of Christ was rising and succeeding. Whence shortly after, Caiaphas with the whole council of the Sanhedrin proclaimed Jesus as a pseudo-Messiah deserving of death, which was an error in faith: wherefore then their Synagogue ceased to be the Church of God and began to be the Synagogue of Satan, when it denied and killed Christ, sent by God: of which see Matthew XXVII, 1 and following.

Finally, this prophecy of Caiaphas was about the death of Jesus certainly to come, certainly, I say, in its causes. For the Holy Spirit intended by his mouth to signify this, namely that it was expedient that Christ die for the salvation of men, and that He would certainly die for it, from the hatred, perverse mind and sentence of Caiaphas and his associates, which they showed sufficiently here by face and gesture. Whence shortly after, Jesus was in fact killed by them and died. Wherefore whatever prophecy there was here, the Holy Spirit gave it not by Caiaphas's merits, but by his pontifical office. So St. Augustine, Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact, Euthymius, Bede and others.

Verse 52: And Not Only for the Nation, but to Gather Into One the Children of God Who Were Dispersed

That is: It is expedient for Christ to die, not only for His own nation and ours, that is, for the Jews, but also for all the Gentiles who would believe in Christ, and are dispersed throughout the whole world. For these are called "children of God," not now actually and in fact, but in God's foreknowledge and predestination: because namely, through God's grace, they were destined to be faithful and holy, and therefore children of God. So St. Augustine and Chrysostom. This is what Christ foretold in chapter X, 16: "Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold (the Synagogue of the Jews), and those I must bring, and there shall be one fold and one shepherd."

Verse 53: From That Day Therefore They Thought How to Kill Him

Behold, here the wicked mind, intention and sentence of Caiaphas and his associates is plainly evident. For "they thought," the Greek is συνεβουλεύσαντο, which some translate as "they were deliberating." So Vatablus. The Arabic: "they took counsel"; better, Cyril, Leontius and Chrysostom: "They finished and fixed the consultation by a common decree, and as it were by a senatorial decree." Whence our translator renders, "they thought," that is, "they decreed"; the Syriac: "they were plotting" how to kill Him.

Verse 54: Jesus Therefore No Longer Walked Openly

Greek ἐν παρρησίᾳ, that is freely, openly, publicly. Hear Cyril: "As God, He knew what the Jews had decreed about Him, though no one reported it; as man, He withdrew Himself," because the hour of His death appointed by the Father had not yet come. He did this to give us an example of avoiding dangers of life by flight. So the same Cyril, Theophylact, Origen, Augustine, Bede, Rupert.

But He Went Away Into a Region Near the Desert, Into a City Called Ephrem, and There He Stayed With His Disciples. — "Ephrem" is the same as "Ephraim;" for the Greeks say "Ephrem" for "Ephraim," as in Psalm LXXVII: "The sons of Ephraim drawing and shooting the bow." Leontius thinks that Ephrem is Bethlehem, where Christ was born: but this is little probable, because Bethlehem was near Jerusalem, and there Jesus knew He would especially be sought by the chief priests. St. Jerome, in the Places of the Hebrews, and after him Jansenius, think "Ephrem" is Ephron, mentioned in II Chronicles XIII, 19; but there Ephron is written with ayin and nun, whereas Ephraim or Ephrem is written with aleph and mem. Ribera and others think Ephrem was situated above Jericho, near its desert; Adrichomius, on page 26, number 40, places Ephrem at the fifth milestone from Bethel toward the East, seven hours distant from Jerusalem, near the desert of Hai, not far from the brook Cherith, to which Elijah, fleeing Jezebel, withdrew and was fed by ravens, III Kings XVII.

Jesus withdrew thither, both to avoid for a time the wrath of the chief priests, and so that in this retreat, giving Himself to prayer and contemplation, He might rouse and arm Himself for the impending death and the arduous duel with the chief priests — indeed with Lucifer himself on the cross. Hence Ephraim and Ephrem hefer is the same as fertility, and Ephraim, son of Joseph, was a type of Christ, to whom his father gave this name, prophesying: "God has made me grow in the land of my poverty," Genesis XLI, 52; for thus Christ grew in a land which, though sterile, He Himself made fruitful in virtues and Saints.

Hence Ephraim is symbolically a type of the Church of the Gentiles, which has produced this abundant fruit. So Origen: "Jesus was conversing," he says, "long ago among the Jews, namely the divine Word through the Prophets; but He went away, and is not among them; He went however to the town which is near the desert, of which it is said: Many are the children of the desolate, more than of her that has a husband; and Ephrem is interpreted as fertility. For Ephraim was the brother of Manasseh, of the elder people consigned to oblivion; for after the people was given over to oblivion and passed by, abundance came forth from the Gentiles. Therefore the Lord, departing from the Jews, came into the land of the whole world, near the deserted Church, which is called a fertile city, and there He abides with His disciples until now."

Tropologically: Ephrem, situated near the desert, is a symbol of the holy soul devoted to solitude and prayer; for this soul becomes an Ephrem, that is, fruitful in good works; wherefore in it Jesus dwells through His abundant grace.

Verse 55: Now the Pasch of the Jews Was Near

Namely the last Pasch of Christ, in which He Himself, as the paschal lamb, was sacrificed on the cross for the salvation of the world, and therefore He was eagerly awaiting it. The Syrians say Pezcho for Pasch, which they interpret as "cheerfulness," because this feast was more cheerful than the others, just as it is supremely cheerful for Christians, on account of our redemption made in it by Christ on the cross, and His resurrection.

And Many Went Up to Jerusalem From the Country (from the neighboring towns, villages and hamlets, so the Syriac) Before the Pasch, to Sanctify Themselves, that is, to purge themselves by sacrifices and ceremonies from all legal uncleannesses, and to prepare themselves by prayers and sacrifices for celebrating and eating the Pasch rightly, as St. Thomas and Jansenius say, and therefore they were in Jerusalem some days before the Pasch.

Verse 56: They Therefore Sought Jesus, and Spoke One to Another, Standing in the Temple: What Do You Think, That He Does Not Come to the Feast-Day?

"Because (that) He does not come:" Greek ὅτι οὐ μὴ ἔλθῃ, which Cyril, Leontius and Vatablus render negatively, "that He will not come"; but St. Chrysostom, Theophylact and Maldonatus render it doubtingly, "whether perhaps He is not going to come to the feast-day?" The Syriac adds: "What do you think, that He will not come to the feast?" and the Arabic: "Does it seem to you that He is not coming to the festival?" Cyril thinks this is the questioning of those who believed in Christ, who by questioning said to unbelievers: Why does Jesus not come as usual to this common feast of the Pasch? Indeed because, as God, He foresees snares being prepared for Him in it by the Scribes. More plainly, St. Augustine, Chrysostom, Bede, Theophylact, Rupert, Euthymius think this is the questioning of the chief priests, Pharisees and their followers and ministers, who had decreed to apprehend Jesus, and therefore indignantly asked: Why does Jesus not come to the feast of the Pasch? Will He not celebrate this feast? Will He be a despiser and violator of the law, as we charge against Him? Why on these days preceding the Pasch does He not appear, to purify Himself with the others and prepare Himself for so great a feast?