The Urantia Book
PAPER 168
THE RESURRECTION OF LAZARUS
168:0.1 IT WAS shortly after noon when Martha
started out to meet Jesus as he came over the brow of the hill
near Bethany. Her brother, Lazarus, had been dead four days and
had been laid away in their private tomb at the far end of the
garden late on Sunday afternoon. The stone at the entrance of the
tomb had been rolled in place on the morning of this day,
Thursday.
168:0.2 When Martha and Mary sent word to Jesus
concerning Lazarus's illness, they were confident the Master would
do something about it. They knew that their brother was
desperately sick, and though they hardly dared hope that Jesus
would leave his work of teaching and preaching to come to their
assistance, they had such confidence in his power to heal disease
that they thought he would just speak the curative words, and
Lazarus would immediately be made whole. And when Lazarus died a
few hours after the messenger left Bethany for Philadelphia, they
reasoned that it was because the Master did not learn of their
brother's illness until it was too late, until he had already been
dead for several hours.
168:0.3 But they, with all of their believing
friends, were greatly puzzled by the message which the runner
brought back Tuesday forenoon when he reached Bethany. The
messenger insisted that he heard Jesus say, "...this sickness is
really not to the death." Neither could they understand why he
sent no word to them nor otherwise proffered assistance.
168:0.4 Many friends from near-by hamlets and
others from Jerusalem came over to comfort the sorrow-stricken
sisters. Lazarus and his sisters were the children of a well-to-do
and honorable Jew, one who had been the leading resident of the
little village of Bethany. And notwithstanding that all three had
long been ardent followers of Jesus, they were highly respected by
all who knew them. They had inherited extensive vineyards and
olive orchards in this vicinity, and that they were wealthy was
further attested by the fact that they could afford a private
burial tomb on their own premises. Both of their parents had
already been laid away in this tomb.
168:0.5 Mary had given up the thought of Jesus'
coming and was abandoned to her grief, but Martha clung to the
hope that Jesus would come, even up to the time on that very
morning when they rolled the stone in front of the tomb and sealed
the entrance. Even then she instructed a neighbor lad to keep
watch down the Jericho road from the brow of the hill to the east
of Bethany; and it was this lad who brought tidings to Martha that
Jesus and his friends were approaching.
168:0.6 When Martha met Jesus, she fell at his
feet, exclaiming, "Master, if you had been here, my brother would
not have died!" Many fears were passing through Martha's mind, but
she gave expression to no doubt, nor did she venture to criticize
or question the Master's conduct as related to Lazarus's death.
When she had spoken, Jesus reached down and, lifting her upon her
feet, said, "Only have faith, Martha, and your brother shall rise
again." Then answered Martha: "I know that he will rise again in
the resurrection of the last day; and even now I believe that
whatever you shall ask of God, our Father will give you."
168:0.7 Then said Jesus, looking straight into
the eyes of Martha: "I am the resurrection and the life; he who
believes in me, though he dies, yet shall he live. In truth,
whosoever lives and believes in me shall never really die. Martha,
do you believe this?" And Martha answered the Master: "Yes, I have
long believed that you are the Deliverer, the Son of the living
God, even he who should come to this world."
168:0.8 Jesus having inquired for Mary, Martha
went at once into the house and, whispering to her sister, said,
"The Master is here and has asked for you." And when Mary heard
this, she rose up quickly and hastened out to meet Jesus, who
still tarried at the place, some distance from the house, where
Martha had first met him. The friends who were with Mary, seeking
to comfort her, when they saw that she rose up quickly and went
out, followed her, supposing that she was going to the tomb to
weep.
168:0.9 Many of those present were Jesus' bitter
enemies. That is why Martha had come out to meet him alone, and
also why she went in secretly to inform Mary that he had asked for
her. Martha, while craving to see Jesus, desired to avoid any
possible unpleasantness which might be caused by his coming
suddenly into the midst of a large group of his Jerusalem enemies.
It had been Martha's intention to remain in the house with their
friends while Mary went to greet Jesus, but in this she failed,
for they all followed Mary and so found themselves unexpectedly in
the presence of the Master.
168:0.10 Martha led Mary to Jesus, and when she
saw him, she fell at his feet, exclaiming, "If you had only been
here, my brother would not have died!" And when Jesus saw how they
all grieved over the death of Lazarus, his soul was moved with
compassion.
168:0.11 When the mourners saw that Mary had
gone to greet Jesus, they withdrew for a short distance while both
Martha and Mary talked with the Master and received further words
of comfort and exhortation to maintain strong faith in the Father
and complete resignation to the divine will.
168:0.12 The human mind of Jesus was mightily
moved by the contention between his love for Lazarus and the
bereaved sisters and his disdain and contempt for the outward show
of affection manifested by some of these unbelieving and
murderously intentioned Jews. Jesus indignantly resented the show
of forced and outward mourning for Lazarus by some of these
professed friends inasmuch as such false sorrow was associated in
their hearts with so much bitter enmity toward himself. Some of
these Jews, however, were sincere in their mourning, for they were
real friends of the family.
1. AT THE TOMB OF LAZARUS
168:1.1 After Jesus had spent a few moments in
comforting Martha and Mary, apart from the mourners, he asked
them, "Where have you laid him?" Then Martha said, "Come and see."
And as the Master followed on in silence with the two sorrowing
sisters, he wept. When the friendly Jews who followed after them
saw his tears, one of them said: "Behold how he loved him. Could
not he who opened the eyes of the blind have kept this man from
dying?" By this time they were standing before the family tomb, a
small natural cave, or declivity, in the ledge of rock which rose
up some thirty feet at the far end of the garden plot.
168:1.2 It is difficult to explain to human
minds just why Jesus wept. While we have access to the
registration of the combined human emotions and divine thoughts,
as of record in the mind of the Personalized Adjuster, we are not
altogether certain about the real cause of these emotional
manifestations. We are inclined to believe that Jesus wept because
of a number of thoughts and feelings which were going through his
mind at this time, such as:
168:1.3 1. He felt a genuine and sorrowful
sympathy for Martha and Mary; he had a real and deep human
affection for these sisters who had lost their brother.
168:1.4 2. He was perturbed in his mind by the
presence of the crowd of mourners, some sincere and some merely
pretenders. He always resented these outward exhibitions of
mourning. He knew the sisters loved their brother and had faith in
the survival of believers. These conflicting emotions may possibly
explain why he groaned as they came near the tomb.
168:1.5 3. He truly hesitated about bringing
Lazarus back to the mortal life. His sisters really needed him,
but Jesus regretted having to summon his friend back to experience
the bitter persecution which he well knew Lazarus would have to
endure as a result of being the subject of the greatest of all
demonstrations of the divine power of the Son of Man.
168:1.6 And now we may relate an interesting and
instructive fact: Although this narrative unfolds as an apparently
natural and normal event in human affairs, it has some very
interesting side lights. While the messenger went to Jesus on
Sunday, telling him of Lazarus's illness, and while Jesus sent
word that it was "not to the death," at the same time he went in
person up to Bethany and even asked the sisters, "Where have you
laid him?" Even though all of this seems to indicate that the
Master was proceeding after the manner of this life and in
accordance with the limited knowledge of the human mind,
nevertheless, the records of the universe reveal that Jesus'
Personalized Adjuster issued orders for the indefinite detention
of Lazarus's Thought Adjuster on the planet subsequent to
Lazarus's death, and that this order was made of record just
fifteen minutes before Lazarus breathed his last.
168:1.7 Did the divine mind of Jesus know, even
before Lazarus died, that he would raise him from the dead? We do
not know. We know only what we are herewith placing on record.
168:1.8 Many of Jesus' enemies were inclined to
sneer at his manifestations of affection, and they said among
themselves: "If he thought so much of this man, why did he tarry
so long before coming to Bethany? If he is what they claim, why
did he not save his dear friend? What is the good of healing
strangers in Galilee if he cannot save those whom he loves?" And
in many other ways they mocked and made light of the teachings and
works of Jesus.
168:1.9 And so, on this Thursday afternoon at
about half past two o'clock, was the stage all set in this little
hamlet of Bethany for the enactment of the greatest of all works
connected with the earth ministry of Michael of Nebadon, the
greatest manifestation of divine power during his incarnation in
the flesh, since his own resurrection occurred after he had been
liberated from the bonds of mortal habitation.
168:1.10 The small group assembled before
Lazarus's tomb little realized the presence near at hand of a vast
concourse of all orders of celestial beings assembled under the
leadership of Gabriel and now in waiting, by direction of the
Personalized Adjuster of Jesus, vibrating with expectancy and
ready to execute the bidding of their beloved Sovereign.
168:1.11 When Jesus spoke those words of
command, "Take away the stone," the assembled celestial hosts made
ready to enact the drama of the resurrection of Lazarus in the
likeness of his mortal flesh. Such a form of resurrection involves
difficulties of execution which far transcend the usual technique
of the resurrection of mortal creatures in morontia form and
requires far more celestial personalities and a far greater
organization of universe facilities.
168:1.12 When Martha and Mary heard this command
of Jesus directing that the stone in front of the tomb be rolled
away, they were filled with conflicting emotions. Mary hoped that
Lazarus was to be raised from the dead, but Martha, while to some
extent sharing her sister's faith, was more exercised by the fear
that Lazarus would not be presentable, in his appearance, to
Jesus, the apostles, and their friends. Said Martha: "Must we roll
away the stone? My brother has now been dead four days, so that by
this time decay of the body has begun." Martha also said this
because she was not certain as to why the Master had requested
that the stone be removed; she thought maybe Jesus wanted only to
take one last look at Lazarus. She was not settled and constant in
her attitude. As they hesitated to roll away the stone, Jesus
said: "Did I not tell you at the first that this sickness was not
to the death? Have I not come to fulfill my promise? And after I
came to you, did I not say that, if you would only believe, you
should see the glory of God? Wherefore do you doubt? How long
before you will believe and obey?"
168:1.13 When Jesus had finished speaking, his
apostles, with the assistance of willing neighbors, laid hold upon
the stone and rolled it away from the entrance to the tomb.
168:1.14 It was the common belief of the Jews
that the drop of gall on the point of the sword of the angel of
death began to work by the end of the third day, so that it was
taking full effect on the fourth day. They allowed that the soul
of man might linger about the tomb until the end of the third day,
seeking to reanimate the dead body; but they firmly believed that
such a soul had gone on to the abode of departed spirits ere the
fourth day had dawned.
168:1.15 These beliefs and opinions regarding
the dead and the departure of the spirits of the dead served to
make sure, in the minds of all who were now present at Lazarus's
tomb and subsequently to all who might hear of what was about to
occur, that this was really and truly a case of the raising of the
dead by the personal working of one who declared he was "the
resurrection and the life."
2. THE RESURRECTION OF LAZARUS
168:2.1 As this company of some forty-five
mortals stood before the tomb, they could dimly see the form of
Lazarus, wrapped in linen bandages, resting on the right lower
niche of the burial cave. While these earth creatures stood there
in almost breathless silence, a vast host of celestial beings had
swung into their places preparatory to answering the signal for
action when it should be given by Gabriel, their commander.
168:2.2 Jesus lifted up his eyes and said:
"Father, I am thankful that you heard and granted my request. I
know that you always hear me, but because of those who stand here
with me, I thus speak with you, that they may believe that you
have sent me into the world, and that they may know that you are
working with me in that which we are about to do." And when he had
prayed, he cried with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come forth!"
168:2.3 Though these human observers remained
motionless, the vast celestial host was all astir in unified
action in obedience to the Creator's word. In just twelve seconds
of earth time the hitherto lifeless form of Lazarus began to move
and presently sat up on the edge of the stone shelf whereon it had
rested. His body was bound about with grave cloths, and his face
was covered with a napkin. And as he stood up before them -- alive
-- Jesus said, "Loose him and let him go."
168:2.4 All, save the apostles, with Martha and
Mary, fled to the house. They were pale with fright and overcome
with astonishment. While some tarried, many hastened to their
homes.
168:2.5 Lazarus greeted Jesus and the apostles
and asked the meaning of the grave cloths and why he had awakened
in the garden. Jesus and the apostles drew to one side while
Martha told Lazarus of his death, burial, and resurrection. She
had to explain to him that he had died on Sunday and was now
brought back to life on Thursday, inasmuch as he had had no
consciousness of time since falling asleep in death.
168:2.6 As Lazarus came out of the tomb, the
Personalized Adjuster of Jesus, now chief of his kind in this
local universe, gave command to the former Adjuster of Lazarus,
now in waiting, to resume abode in the mind and soul of the
resurrected man.
168:2.7 Then went Lazarus over to Jesus and,
with his sisters, knelt at the Master's feet to give thanks and
offer praise to God. Jesus, taking Lazarus by the hand, lifted him
up, saying: "My son, what has happened to you will also be
experienced by all who believe this gospel except that they shall
be resurrected in a more glorious form. You shall be a living
witness of the truth which I spoke -- I am the resurrection and
the life. But let us all now go into the house and partake of
nourishment for these physical bodies."
168:2.8 As they walked toward the house, Gabriel
dismissed the extra groups of the assembled heavenly host while he
made record of the first instance on Urantia, and the last, where
a mortal creature had been resurrected in the likeness of the
physical body of death.
168:2.9 Lazarus could hardly comprehend what had
occurred. He knew he had been very sick, but he could recall only
that he had fallen asleep and been awakened. He was never able to
tell anything about these four days in the tomb because he was
wholly unconscious. Time is nonexistent to those who sleep the
sleep of death.
168:2.10 Though many believed in Jesus as a
result of this mighty work, others only hardened their hearts the
more to reject him. By noon the next day this story had spread
over all Jerusalem. Scores of men and women went to Bethany to
look upon Lazarus and talk with him, and the alarmed and
disconcerted Pharisees hastily called a meeting of the Sanhedrin
that they might determine what should be done about these new
developments.
3. MEETING OF THE SANHEDRIN
168:3.1 Even though the testimony of this man
raised from the dead did much to consolidate the faith of the mass
of believers in the gospel of the kingdom, it had little or no
influence on the attitude of the religious leaders and rulers at
Jerusalem except to hasten their decision to destroy Jesus and
stop his work.
168:3.2 At one o'clock the next day, Friday, the
Sanhedrin met to deliberate further on the question, "What shall
we do with Jesus of Nazareth?" After more than two hours of
discussion and acrimonious debate, a certain Pharisee presented a
resolution calling for Jesus' immediate death, proclaiming that he
was a menace to all Israel and formally committing the Sanhedrin
to the decision of death, without trial and in defiance of all
precedent.
168:3.3 Time and again had this august body of
Jewish leaders decreed that Jesus be apprehended and brought to
trial on charges of blasphemy and numerous other accusations of
flouting the Jewish sacred law. They had once before even gone so
far as to declare he should die, but this was the first time the
Sanhedrin had gone on record as desiring to decree his death in
advance of a trial. But this resolution did not come to a vote
since fourteen members of the Sanhedrin resigned in a body when
such an unheard-of action was proposed. While these resignations
were not formally acted upon for almost two weeks, this group of
fourteen withdrew from the Sanhedrin on that day, never again to
sit in the council. When these resignations were subsequently
acted upon, five other members were thrown out because their
associates believed they entertained friendly feelings toward
Jesus. With the ejection of these nineteen men the Sanhedrin was
in a position to try and to condemn Jesus with a solidarity
bordering on unanimity.
168:3.4 The following week Lazarus and his
sisters were summoned to appear before the Sanhedrin. When their
testimony had been heard, no doubt could be entertained that
Lazarus had been raised from the dead. Though the transactions of
the Sanhedrin virtually admitted the resurrection of Lazarus, the
record carried a resolution attributing this and all other wonders
worked by Jesus to the power of the prince of devils, with whom
Jesus was declared to be in league.
168:3.5 No matter what the source of his
wonder-working power, these Jewish leaders were persuaded that, if
he were not immediately stopped, very soon all the common people
would believe in him; and further, that serious complications with
the Roman authorities would arise since so many of his believers
regarded him as the Messiah, Israel's deliverer.
168:3.6 It was at this same meeting of the
Sanhedrin that Caiaphas the high priest first gave expression to
that old Jewish adage, which he so many times repeated: "It is
better that one man die, than that the community perish."
168:3.7 Although Jesus had received warning of
the doings of the Sanhedrin on this dark Friday afternoon, he was
not in the least perturbed and continued resting over the Sabbath
with friends in Bethpage, a hamlet near Bethany. Early Sunday
morning Jesus and the apostles assembled, by prearrangement, at
the home of Lazarus, and taking leave of the Bethany family, they
started on their journey back to the Pella encampment.
4. THE ANSWER TO PRAYER
168:4.1 On the way from Bethany to Pella the
apostles asked Jesus many questions, all of which the Master
freely answered except those involving the details of the
resurrection of the dead. Such problems were beyond the
comprehension capacity of his apostles; therefore did the Master
decline to discuss these questions with them. Since they had
departed from Bethany in secret, they were alone. Jesus therefore
embraced the opportunity to say many things to the ten which he
thought would prepare them for the trying days just ahead.
168:4.2 The apostles were much stirred up in
their minds and spent considerable time discussing their recent
experiences as they were related to prayer and its answering. They
all recalled Jesus' statement to the Bethany messenger at
Philadelphia, when he said plainly, "This sickness is not really
to the death." And yet, in spite of this promise, Lazarus actually
died. All that day, again and again, they reverted to the
discussion of this question of the answer to prayer.
168:4.3 Jesus' answers to their many questions
may be summarized as follows:
168:4.4 1. Prayer is an expression of the finite
mind in an effort to approach the Infinite. The making of a prayer
must, therefore, be limited by the knowledge, wisdom, and
attributes of the finite; likewise must the answer be conditioned
by the vision, aims, ideals, and prerogatives of the Infinite.
There never can be observed an unbroken continuity of material
phenomena between the making of a prayer and the reception of the
full spiritual answer thereto.
168:4.5 2. When a prayer is apparently
unanswered, the delay often betokens a better answer, although one
which is for some good reason greatly delayed. When Jesus said
that Lazarus's sickness was really not to the death, he had
already been dead eleven hours. No sincere prayer is denied an
answer except when the superior viewpoint of the spiritual world
has devised a better answer, an answer which meets the petition of
the spirit of man as contrasted with the prayer of the mere mind
of man.
168:4.6 3. The prayers of time, when indited by
the spirit and expressed in faith, are often so vast and
all-encompassing that they can be answered only in eternity; the
finite petition is sometimes so fraught with the grasp of the
Infinite that the answer must long be postponed to await the
creation of adequate capacity for receptivity; the prayer of faith
may be so all-embracing that the answer can be received only on
Paradise.
168:4.7 4. The answers to the prayer of the
mortal mind are often of such a nature that they can be received
and recognized only after that same praying mind has attained the
immortal state. The prayer of the material being can many times be
answered only when such an individual has progressed to the spirit
level.
168:4.8 5. The prayer of a God-knowing person
may be so distorted by ignorance and so deformed by superstition
that the answer thereto would be highly undesirable. Then must the
intervening spirit beings so translate such a prayer that, when
the answer arrives, the petitioner wholly fails to recognize it as
the answer to his prayer.
168:4.9 6. All true prayers are addressed to
spiritual beings, and all such petitions must be answered in
spiritual terms, and all such answers must consist in spiritual
realities. Spirit beings cannot bestow material answers to the
spirit petitions of even material beings. Material beings can pray
effectively only when they "pray in the spirit."
168:4.10 7. No prayer can hope for an answer
unless it is born of the spirit and nurtured by faith. Your
sincere faith implies that you have in advance virtually granted
your prayer hearers the full right to answer your petitions in
accordance with that supreme wisdom and that divine love which
your faith depicts as always actuating those beings to whom you
pray.
168:4.11 8. The child is always within his
rights when he presumes to petition the parent; and the parent is
always within his parental obligations to the immature child when
his superior wisdom dictates that the answer to the child's prayer
be delayed, modified, segregated, transcended, or postponed to
another stage of spiritual ascension.
168:4.12 9. Do not hesitate to pray the prayers
of spirit longing; doubt not that you shall receive the answer to
your petitions. These answers will be on deposit, awaiting your
achievement of those future spiritual levels of actual cosmic
attainment, on this world or on others, whereon it will become
possible for you to recognize and appropriate the long-waiting
answers to your earlier but ill-timed petitions.
168:4.13 10. All genuine spirit-born petitions
are certain of an answer. Ask and you shall receive. But you
should remember that you are progressive creatures of time and
space; therefore must you constantly reckon with the time-space
factor in the experience of your personal reception of the full
answers to your manifold prayers and petitions.
5. WHAT BECAME OF LAZARUS
168:5.1 Lazarus remained at the Bethany home,
being the center of great interest to many sincere believers and
to numerous curious individuals, until the day of the crucifixion
of Jesus, when he received warning that the Sanhedrin had decreed
his death. The rulers of the Jews were determined to put a stop to
the further spread of the teachings of Jesus, and they well judged
that it would be useless to put Jesus to death if they permitted
Lazarus, who represented the very peak of his wonder-working, to
live and bear testimony to the fact that Jesus had raised him from
the dead. Already had Lazarus suffered bitter persecution from
them.
168:5.2 And so Lazarus took hasty leave of his
sisters at Bethany, fleeing down through Jericho and across the
Jordan, never permitting himself to rest long until he had reached
Philadelphia. Lazarus knew Abner well, and here he felt safe from
the murderous intrigues of the wicked Sanhedrin.
168:5.3 Soon after this Martha and Mary disposed
of their lands at Bethany and joined their brother in Perea.
Meantime, Lazarus had become the treasurer of the church at
Philadelphia. He became a strong supporter of Abner in his
controversy with Paul and the Jerusalem church and ultimately
died, when 67 years old, of the same sickness that carried him off
when he was a younger man at Bethany.
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