Lazarus Saturday #
On the eve of the celebration of the Lord Jesus Christ’s Entry into Jerusalem, the Church commemorates the resurrection of Lazarus, since this miracle, according to the Gospel of John, took place just before the Lord entered the Holy City.
The Evangelist tells us little about Lazarus: that the Lord loved him, calling him “our friend,” and that He wept deeply over his death; also, that Lazarus and his sisters Martha and Mary were the children of a certain Simon the leper. Leprosy, a dreadful disease that disfigures the face and body, causing pieces of rotting flesh to fall off, evoked horror in ancient times. People regarded lepers as rejected by a Higher Power and in turn rejected them, expelling them from society and forbidding them to live in populated areas. Naturally, members of a leper’s family also bore the mark of exclusion. Perhaps this is why Simon’s children, though adults, unlike most of their peers, remained unmarried: others may have shunned marriage ties with a family marked by the stigma of a terrifying and repulsive illness. Yet their father’s affliction and the undeserved contempt of others did not embitter Lazarus and his sisters, but rather deepened in them a longing for what is divine and pure. “O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is” (Psalm 63:1) — with these words of the Psalmist, Lazarus likely often cried out in his loneliness and humiliation, having learned from his youth to place all his hope in God, rather than in people, and not to seek friendship and love in vain from them, but from Him who judges righteously and sees the depths of the heart.
Christ, who came, as it is written, “not to break a bruised reed” (Matthew 12:20), brought comfort to the humbled, the despised, and the rejected. He loved even these children of a leper for the purity of their souls, tested through suffering, and in His journeys often visited their home with His disciples. However, when He learned that Lazarus was seriously ill, the Lord did not immediately hasten to him, but remained where He was for two more days. Afterward, He said to the disciples, “Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep.” By calling Lazarus “our friend,” that is, a friend not only of His but also of all the disciples, He shows that they too, following the example of their Teacher, loved Lazarus. The disciples said, “Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well.” The Evangelist explains that Jesus spoke of his death, but they thought He was speaking of natural sleep. Then Jesus said to them plainly, “Lazarus is dead. And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe; nevertheless let us go unto him” (John 11:11–15).
Arriving in Bethany, the hometown of Lazarus, Christ and His disciples were met by Martha, who informed them that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. A brief dialogue follows between the Lord and Martha—brief, yet so profound that the Evangelist records it in full. Martha says, “Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. But I know, that even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee.” Jesus replies, “Thy brother shall rise again.” Martha says, “I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.” Jesus says to her, “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?” Martha answers, “Yea, Lord: I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world” (John 11:21–27).
The Apostle John, the first in the history of the Christian Church to be called “The Theologian,” is here, as throughout his Gospel, attentive to everything that bears witness to the divine and human nature of Christ. From the mouth of Martha—a simple woman crushed by grief—comes a confession of Christ as both God and man, in an indivisible and unconfused union. In her words, “if thou hadst been here,” she acknowledges her Teacher as truly man; and in affirming her belief that “he that believeth in Him shall never die,” she confesses Him as God, the Giver of eternal life. We can already hear in Martha’s words the very confession that the Church would proclaim three centuries later at the Council of Nicaea: “I believe… in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God […] Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father…” A few more days would pass, and the Lord, in His farewell discourse with His disciples, would reveal to them the truth about the Holy Spirit, fully engraving upon their hearts the mystery of the Consubstantial Trinity.
Approaching the cave where the dead man had been buried, Christ commands that the stone covering its entrance be rolled away. “Lord, by this time he stinketh: for he hath been dead four days,” Martha objects. Jesus says to her, “Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?” When the mouth of the cave is opened, the Lord lifts His eyes to heaven and says, “Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me.” And then, crying with a loud voice to the dead man, He commands him to come forth. “And he that was dead came forth,” the Evangelist continues, “bound hand and foot with graveclothes: and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose him, and let him go” (John 11:39–44).
Throughout the account of this miracle, Jesus is revealed as both man and God. As God, He knows of Lazarus’s death and of his coming resurrection — and as man, He grieves and sheds tears for him. As man, He commands those standing nearby to roll away the stone from the tomb — and as God, He orders the dead man to come forth into the light. In the figure of the buried and resurrected Lazarus, the Lord foreshadows what will soon happen to Himself. By raising His friend, He prefigures His own resurrection — and, afterward, the resurrection of all.
Consumed by envy, hatred, and unbelief, the chief priests and scribes of the Jews, instead of glorifying the work of God, resolve to kill both Jesus and Lazarus whom He had raised (John 11:53; 12:10). The horror lies in the fact that this decision is made by those who had been appointed to declare the will of God to the people and to offer prayers and sacrifices on their behalf. “Christ worked many miracles, but none so enraged them as this — neither the healing of the paralytic nor of the blind man,” comments St. John Chrysostom. “That is because the miracle of Lazarus was more astonishing by its very nature, and it was performed after many other signs. And indeed, it was a wonder to see a man four days dead walking and speaking. A fine thing indeed to add to a feast — to celebrate it with a murder!” the saint exclaims sorrowfully (Homilies on the Gospel of John). Such is the power of envy — it can darken the mind of a man, even a servant of God, until he becomes an instrument of the devil. With all his strength, the believer must guard his soul against the disease of envy, which can utterly extinguish both faith and virtue within the heart.
According to Church Tradition, after the Lord’s ascension into heaven and the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, Lazarus, having gone out to labor in the sowing of God’s word with the other disciples, became the first bishop of the Christians on the island of Cyprus. He labored there for many years and died in peace, remaining until the end of his life a living sermon of the truth of Christ. “Having come to know, beloved, the work of God, do not doubt the resurrection: let Lazarus serve thee as a mirror — and, seeing in him thine own reflection, believe in thy rising. The same voice that raised Lazarus will raise us all, as the apostle says: ‘For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible’ (1 Corinthians 15:52) — by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory unto the ages of ages. Amen” (St. John Chrysostom, Second Homily on Lazarus the Four-Days-Dead).
Stichera at “Lord, I Have Cried” — Tone 6 #
1.
O Lord, Thy voice hath shattered the dominion of Hades,
and the word of Thy power hath drawn forth from the tomb one four days dead.
Lazarus hath become a saving prefiguration of renewal unto life.
All things are possible for Thee, O Master, King of all:
grant cleansing to Thy servants and great mercy.
2.
O Lord, taking Thy disciples with Thee,
Thou camest to Bethany to raise up Thy friend.
And weeping over him according to the law of human nature,
as God Thou didst raise him who had lain four days in the grave.
And to Thee did he cry aloud, O Savior:
Blessed art Thou, O Lord, glory be to Thee!
Tropar — Tone 1 #
Confirming the general resurrection before Thy Passion,
Thou didst raise Lazarus from the dead, O Christ our God.
Wherefore, we also, like the children, bearing the symbols of victory,
cry out unto Thee, the Conqueror of death:
Hosanna in the highest! Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord!