Lazarus

Lazarus of Bethany is known from the Gospel of John as the brother of Martha and Mary and as the man whom Jesus raised from the dead. The evangelist locates him in Bethany, a village near Jerusalem, and describes him as one whom Jesus loved. When Lazarus fell ill, his sisters sent a message to Jesus. Jesus delayed two days before setting out, and upon arrival found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. After speaking with Martha and Mary, Jesus went to the tomb, prayed, and called Lazarus out; the dead man emerged bound in burial cloths. John presents the event as a sign that led many to believe in Jesus and, at the same time, as a turning point that intensified official hostility toward him. Lazarus is mentioned once more at a supper in Bethany, where Martha served and Mary anointed Jesus, and the text adds that the chief priests planned to kill Lazarus as well because so many were coming to Jesus on account of him.

The New Testament is silent on Lazarus’s parentage, the year of his birth, any marriage or children, and the circumstances of his eventual death. He is not named in the Synoptic Gospels, and nothing in the canonical writings describes a later ministry or episcopal office. What can be said with confidence is therefore limited to the Johannine narrative and to the fact that a cult of Lazarus of Bethany is already visible in late antiquity in both East and West.

Later Eastern tradition holds that, after the resurrection of Jesus, Lazarus left Judea during a period of persecution, came to Cyprus, and was appointed by the apostles Paul and Barnabas as the first bishop of Kition, the site of present-day Larnaca. In this account he lived some thirty years more and died a second time on the island. A tomb long venerated as his lies beneath the Church of Saint Lazarus in Larnaca. In the late ninth century relics believed to be his were taken to Constantinople; the Byzantine calendar commemorates that translation. These stories are attested in medieval sources and in local liturgy, but they are not corroborated by first-century evidence.

Western medieval legend, especially as it developed in Provence and as it was retold in collections such as the Golden Legend, offered another sequel. Lazarus, Martha, and Mary—Mary often being identified with Mary Magdalene—were said to have been cast adrift from the Holy Land and to have landed in southern Gaul. Lazarus was then described as the first bishop of Marseille and, in some versions, as a martyr. Relics associated with this tradition were claimed at Autun and at Marseille. Modern historical scholarship treats both the Cypriot episcopate and the Provençal voyage as pious legend rather than as recoverable biography, and the two cycles of stories cannot be combined into a single verified life.

Lazarus of Bethany should not be confused with the beggar named Lazarus in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus in the Gospel of Luke, although popular devotion has often blended the two, particularly in the patronage of lepers and in the name of the military Order of Saint Lazarus. In the Roman Catholic Church, Lazarus of Bethany is commemorated on 29 July together with Martha and Mary of Bethany. In the Eastern Orthodox Church the raising of Lazarus is celebrated on Lazarus Saturday, immediately before Palm Sunday, with further observances for the translation of relics. Because he belongs to the apostolic age, veneration of Lazarus arose through liturgical custom rather than through a later papal process of beatification or canonization.