And they made him a supper there: and Martha served. But Lazarus was one of them that were at table with him.
εποιησαν ουν αυτω δειπνον εκει και η μαρθα διηκονει ο δε λαζαρος εις ην των ανακειμενων συν αυτω
13 Church Fathers comment on this verse
“Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus was,” and He supped with them, while Martha served and Lazarus reclined at table. Here is proof of Lazarus’ undoubted resurrection: many days later he was alive and eating. From this it is also clear that the supper was in Martha’s house, because they received Jesus as His friends and beloved ones. Some, however, say that it was in another person’s house. Mary, meanwhile, was not serving, but was a disciple.
The Evangelist, wishing to show the truth of Lazarus’ resurrection, says: “And Lazarus was one of those reclining with Him.” For after appearing alive he did not immediately die, but remained on earth for a long time, ate, drank, and did the other ordinary things. By saying that “Martha served,” he indicated that the meal was in her house. Notice, I ask you, this woman’s faith. She did not entrust the service to maidservants, but performed it herself directly. Paul also speaks of the widow who washed the feet of the saints (1 Tim 5:10).
Despising the plot of the Jews, the Lord voluntarily gives Himself over to suffering when the time to suffer has come. He comes to Bethany, not to Jerusalem, so that by His sudden appearance among the Jews He may not inflame them to anger. Rather, by the report that He is nearby, He tempers the heat of their fury.
He eats together with Lazarus, thereby reminding those present of His divine authority. By his narrative the Evangelist shows that Christ did not despise the Law. Therefore it is precisely "six days before Passover," when the lamb had to be bought and kept until the fourteenth day, that He eats with Lazarus.
Perhaps on the day before taking the lamb, the Jews had the custom of celebrating somewhat, not according to the Law, but according to custom. Then, after taking the lamb, they would pass the time until Passover in fasting, restraint, and holiness.
It seems that in this respect also the Lord honored the customs of the feast. The amazed Evangelist says that the man four days dead eats together with Christ, in remembrance of His divine omnipotence. He also introduces Martha, who out of love for Christ serves and is zealous in her labors.
So that people would not think Lazarus was a phantom, but had truly risen from the dead, he was one of those reclining at table. He lived, spoke, and ate food. The truth was revealed, and the unbelief of the Jews was thrown into confusion. And so the Lord reclined with Lazarus and the others, while Martha, one of Lazarus’ sisters, served.
Martha showed great care and solicitude, and served Christ with all her heart. Mary sat at the feet of Jesus and kissed them. Christ looks upon them with His divine gaze, encourages them, and rejoices in the purity of their way of life and in the offering of their blameless service.
Have you seen this great mercy revealed to all, that Lazarus was one of those reclining with Jesus? Have you seen that He not only gave him life again and snatched him from the hands of death, but also granted him this great honor of eating with Him at His supper?
O the great mercies that God grants to those who love Him and keep His commandments! Moreover, you have seen that this mercy was beautifully fulfilled. Lazarus reclined and ate with Jesus, for Jesus commanded His holy apostles to eat and drink with men.
"Lazarus, you ate and drank with My Father. Come to Me, Lazarus, and I will drive away the stench from your flesh, over which death had power, and I will give you fragrance.
See, I will go to Jerusalem, and everyone will see you walking with Me in the body in which you slept in the tomb for four days. I gave you life so that you might truly serve others again. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you" (Mt 7:2).
See the commentary on Jn 12:1. The sisters of Lazarus prepared a supper for Jesus Christ as their teacher and benefactor, whom they now regarded as more than man.
Let us listen, beloved. Even now the sacred trumpet of the Gospels proclaims glad tidings to the Church of God. What does it set forth for the joy of believers? We shall make it the crown of our discourse and the guide of what follows.
John the Evangelist, the son of thunder, drew ineffable mysteries from the field of the Lord's heart, fruitful with all wisdom. He says, "Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, who had died and whom He raised from the dead. They made Him a supper, and Martha served. Lazarus was one of those reclining with Him."
The disciple of truth acted beautifully. Lazarus had recently been bound in the prison of Hades, but had come forth. By the defeat of death he had mocked the bonds of death.
He had been freed from the inhospitable burial cloths. John brings him into view again and, passing over all who dined with Him, names this one man by name.
The Evangelist's aim was not to glorify the One of whom he preached by the participation of noble persons at the supper and table. Nor was it to tell something pleasant.
His aim was to show from the Wonderworker's own works, known to all, that He is God. Such was Christ's work, and the greatest of works: the raising of Lazarus, who had died and turned to corruption.
For this reason he presents Lazarus as dining with the Lord. He proclaims the miracle to the whole world as something not invented by fantasy.
He makes the wonder of that radiant feast a cause of joy. There Lazarus was offered as the first refreshment, like spiritual food for the guests.
It was a wondrous supper, where the pleasure of the belly was put aside and the souls of those reclining were delighted. It was an astonishing gladness, in which the one who had become a table for corruption again became a table full of wonders for living men.
When He who abounds in all things entered under the roof of the poor, He had to add riches to the poor. From His will, as from an inexhaustible spring, blessings flow forth.
So also at Cana of Galilee He added a banquet of wine not produced by agriculture. It was fitting to bring forward the one freed from death before all.
It was fitting to reveal him, like a paradise of every sweetness, to those gladdening and being gladdened. In him no odor of corruption appeared, for through the divine summons he received an incorrupt fragrance.
Nor was there any damage to his members, for the Creator was the One who restored him by His command. In general, nothing great or small appeared in him by which mutilation usually reveals itself in those who suffer violence.
Rather, he was a whole statue, everywhere complete and beautiful to behold, down to the hair.
Thus the Evangelist fittingly arranges this feast. He does so both from the pure love, I mean, of the most virtuous people who received the guests, and from the wonders of Him who had been shown superabundantly to be God.
For he knew, he knew clearly, that this above all usually delighted the divine gaze, if the Savior receiving service [...] as he had heard from Him: "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me" (Jn 4:34).
The will of the Father and the Son is the salvation of men. The salvation of men is faith in Him who is always glorified together with the Father and the Holy Spirit in the highest.
As He says in the Gospels, "This is the will of My Father, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life" (Jn 6:40).
Desiring our salvation, He cried out elsewhere: "I came to cast fire upon the earth" (Lk 12:49). He is the Lover of mercy, who thirsted to be thirsted for. He swore by Himself that He does not desire the death of the sinner, but that he turn and live (Ezek 33:11).
The Savior came to cast fire upon the earth, which He formed with His hands and sanctified by the divine breath.
The Savior came to cast fire upon it, that is, upon man. He came to kindle again man's free will, with which man was honored by Him from the beginning.
The inventor of evil and deceit had taken this will from man and enslaved it in the passions of dishonor.
The Savior came to cast upon man this enlightening fire, this life-giving fire, the fire of the knowledge of God. It destroys the thorns of impiety and causes pious seeds to grow.
It destroys and uproots everything contrary to nature. It plants and cultivates the natural blessings of pious seeds.
Man was voluntarily carried away by deception and by his own will brought upon himself, through disobedience, the death foretold to him by God. So also, once freed from the stupor of error, he might again know what is fitting.
He might partake of God through confession and through longing for Him.
The Lord kindled and inflamed this divine and enlightening fire for the salvation of the Jews also in Lazarus. He set before them, as it were, a trustworthy proof for salvation.
Signs are always given not for believers, but for unbelievers, as the beginning of salvation (1 Cor 14:22). Thus, when they contradicted and opposed the truth, He showed by the works of His almighty power that He is indisputably God.
As He Himself says in one place, "If you do not believe Me, believe My works, that you may understand that the Father is in Me and I am in the Father" (Jn 10:38).
That is, as the radiance of the sun is in the sun, and the sun is in the ray, indivisibly and unchangeably, because of consubstantiality and equal power, διὰ τὸ ὁμοούσιον καὶ αὐτοσθενές.
And elsewhere: "He who has seen Me has seen the Father" (Jn 14:9), just as "the tree is known by its fruit" (Mt 12:33; Lk 6:44). And in another place: "I and the Father are one" (Jn 10:30), indicating equality of honor and equality of power.
But let us return to the subject. "They made Him a supper, and Lazarus was one of those reclining with Him." This is spoken very splendidly, to give true assurance that the resurrection of the one saved from death was not imaginary.
So also the Lord Himself, after His saving resurrection, manifested Himself to His true disciples. He took food and ate before their eyes, according to the law of human nature.
Therefore now too Lazarus, who by the Lord's command conquered the law of nature and death, dines with the Master. The risen man rejoices with Him who raised him.
The clay reclines with the Potter. The one who escaped darkness keeps feast with the Light. The one who had walked in bonds rejoices with Him who courageously set the bound free.
He who, in the very furrows of death, that is, in the burial cloths, deceived Hades by his mighty swiftness, feasts with the risen Lord.
But I turn to you, Evangelist. Open to us, divine head John, your sacred tablets, for we are powerless to embrace the immeasurable depth of the miracle.
Yes, he says, Lazarus reclined with Jesus. He was the old and new man whom Jesus, through His living and almighty word, called from corruption to life.
The newborn reclined, as with a nurse, with Him who by His command proclaimed the new birth of men.
Among the Jews, newborn children usually lay together with the mothers who had given birth and were filled with joy. For "when a woman gives birth, she has sorrow, because her hour has come. But when she has delivered the child, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a man has been born into the world" (Jn 16:21).
So also our Lord, when He was about to raise Lazarus from Hades, wept in His mercy and was moved with compassion. He saw human nature being destroyed and grieved with those who had gathered.
Then He invisibly rebuked the one who held the power of death. Visibly, He cried out to the one held by death. He accomplished the great sign of His almighty power and revealed the pledge of the universal resurrection.
Therefore He reclined with the one in whom this had been done. He rejoiced, since He had assured by His deeds that He is our life and resurrection (Jn 11:25).
For this too had already been foretold by Him through the prophet: "I will rejoice in doing good to them" (Jer 32:41).
The honorable disciples of the Savior and sisters of the one raised served this miracle and their own feast. One brought refreshment, the other love of God.
Martha was hospitable like a daughter of Abraham, lover of the poor like Job, and lover of Christ like Peter. She kept open a door that loved hospitality for everyone who entered.
Therefore she did not receive the Creator and Lord of the angels under her roof secretly or in ignorance, as Lot once sheltered the angels. She received Him with good knowledge and disposition.
Such was Martha, with such qualities and such cares.
Let us all despise transient matter and now go to meet Christ the Savior, hastening to Bethany, so that we may feast with Him and with His friend Lazarus and the Apostles. Through their entreaties may we be delivered from former evils. Cleansed of every stain of thought, we shall blamelessly behold His divine Resurrection, which Thou hast offered to us, taking away Adam’s and Eve’s tears.
A supper was offered to Jesus, at which Lazarus reclined with Him and the Apostles, while Martha served. Her sister Mary took a pound of precious nard ointment (see Lk 7:38), anointed the feet of Jesus with it, and wiped them with her hair. The whole house was filled with fragrance.
There a supper was prepared for Him, during which grace-filled conversation took place. It again won for Christ several believers among the notable Jews who had come to verify personally the miracle worked upon Lazarus. But this conversation was marked by one remarkable event, which signified the arrival of the decisive moment in the Savior’s earthly life (Mt 26:1-13; Mk 14:3-9; Jn 12:2-11). While Martha, as usual, busied herself with household duties, Mary sat at Christ’s feet and listened to His sweet discourse.
There, that is, in Bethany, they prepared a supper for Him. The indefinite phrase "they prepared" is defined by the whole preceding narrative about the resurrection of Lazarus. His Bethany friends, Lazarus, Martha, and Mary, prepared the supper for Him, and of course they did so in their own house (Jn 11:20; cf. Chrysostom).
This is confirmed by the following words, that Martha served as mistress of the house (cf. Lk 10:40-41). The addition that Lazarus was one of those reclining with Him does not indicate that the supper was not prepared in Lazarus's house, or that he was a guest in another's house.
It is added because Lazarus is later mentioned (Jn 12:9-10) as one of the persons active in the narrative. It also reminds us of the Lord's great miracle accomplished upon him.
This supper, described here by the Evangelist, is distinct from a similar supper that also took place in Bethany before the last Passover, and was described by the first two Evangelists (Mt 26:6ff.; Mk 14:3ff.). The Orthodox Church receives this in this way, as is very clearly expressed in the Synaxarion for Holy Wednesday and in the services of Holy Week (cf. Chrysostom and Theophylact).
Although there is a visible similarity between John's description of the Bethany supper and that of the first three Evangelists, the similarity is explained by the likeness of the events themselves. Yet the text itself contains indications that different events are being described, though similar ones.
According to John, the supper was six days before Passover. According to Matthew and Mark, it was two days before. According to John, Mary the sister of Lazarus anointed the Lord. According to the first two, it was a certain woman.
According to tradition, she was the same sinner who had anointed the Lord much earlier in Galilee, in the house of Simon the Pharisee (Lk 7:36ff.). According to John, Mary anointed the Lord's feet. According to the first Evangelists, she anointed His head.
According to John, the supper was in the house of Lazarus. According to Matthew and Mark, it was in the house of Simon the leper. According to John, only Judas made a remark against Mary. According to the first two, other disciples did as well.
These differences are so significant that they indicate a difference in the events themselves. Yet, since the events themselves are similar, the Evangelists' descriptions of them are also similar.
Is it probable that such an event was repeated within so brief a time, from Saturday to Wednesday? There is nothing improbable in this, especially since the motives for the Lord's anointing by the women were different in each case.
The sister of Lazarus did this from a feeling of profound gratitude for the resurrection of her brother. The other woman did it under the impulse of a more disinterested feeling. Therefore a greater reward is promised to her than to the former, according to the Synaxarion for Great Wednesday.
In general, there is no obstacle to receiving both anointings as distinct. Only one thing may cause perplexity. After the Lord had rebuked Judas for his reproach of Mary at the first supper, how could the other disciples, a few days later, make a similar reproach to another woman at a similar supper and event?
But their motive was different from Judas's (cf. Chrysostom and Theophylact). Moreover, in those few days so much had happened, and of such importance, that the supper at Lazarus's house could have been somewhat forgotten.
Then perhaps this time too they were carried away by Judas's wicked instigation. Finally, at that time they were still imperfect, as the notes on the parallel passages in Matthew and Mark and the Synaxarion for Great Wednesday explain.
Because of the external similarity of the reproach made by Judas to Mary, and by the other disciples to the other woman, the Lord's answer to this reproach is essentially the same. Yet concerning the latter woman the Lord said more than He said about Mary.
Thus one must accept that, according to the accounts of all the Evangelists, during His public ministry the Lord was anointed at suppers three times. Once was still in the midst of His public ministry, in some Galilean city, in the house of Simon the Pharisee, by a woman who was plainly a sinner (Lk 7:37ff.).
The second time was by Mary, the sister of Lazarus, six days before Passover in Bethany in her own house (Jn 12:3ff.). The third time was also in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, probably the same person as Simon the Pharisee (Lk 7:36 and note), two days before Passover.
This was done by a woman who, according to tradition, was the same former public sinner who had earlier anointed Him in the house of Simon the Pharisee.
"They prepared a supper." The law concerning Sabbath rest was no obstacle to arranging a supper when everything necessary had been prepared beforehand. "A pound" means, properly, a litra (cf. Jn 19:39). A litra contained twenty to twenty-four lots.
Verses 1-3. "Jesus, six days before the Passover, came to Bethany..." From His solitude in Ephraim (Jn 11:54), the Savior went to Jerusalem through Jericho. There He visited Zacchaeus, and as He left Jericho He healed two blind men (Lk 19:1-28).
Then He came to Bethany "six days before the Passover," that is, six days before Passover. The Passover was to begin on Friday evening (Jn 18:28). The day six days before Passover was Saturday.
"They made Him a supper there," a Saturday supper. The Evangelists Matthew (Mt 26:6) and Mark (Mk 14:3, 5) describe this supper after describing the Savior's entry into Jerusalem. In St. John it appears before the entry.
But those Evangelists do not strictly follow chronological order in other cases either, while St. John is precise in observing time. According to St. Matthew (Mt 26:6) and Mark (Mk 14:3), the supper was prepared in the house of Simon the leper.
According to St. John as well, Lazarus was one of those reclining, one of the guests, and therefore was not the host providing the meal. Simon, who received the heavenly guest, is called a leper. This suggests that he was one of those healed by Jesus from that terrible disease, which removed the sick person from contact with people.
Filled with gratitude toward the heavenly Healer, Simon prepared a supper of love for Him. He invited to the same supper the risen Lazarus, as one who had been deemed worthy of the special mercy of wondrous Jesus Christ.
"Martha served." She appeared this way earlier as well (Lk 10:40). In this way, and no other, she could express her grateful love toward Him who had raised her brother. "Lazarus was one of those reclining." This also showed that the former dead man was now completely well.
"Then Mary, taking a pound of costly ointment of pure nard, anointed the feet of Jesus..." The Evangelists Matthew and Mark recount the same thing. But St. Luke speaks of another woman (Lk 7:37-50).
St. Luke's event occurred in the city of Nain (Lk 7:11, 37), not in Bethany. That took place in the house of Simon the Pharisee. This took place in the house of Simon the leper.
There a sinful woman anointed the feet. Here it is Mary, the pious sister of Lazarus. There the action is received by the Savior as the expression of repentant love (Lk 7:41-50). In Mary's action, the Savior shows preparation for His burial.
The event in Nain occurred after the second Passover, while the event in Bethany took place just before the Savior's sufferings on the Cross. Therefore Renan was frivolous if he himself took the woman mentioned by St. Luke to be Mary, the sister of Lazarus.
He was altogether shameless in slandering St. Luke when he wrote of him: "Mary of Bethany is taken by him to be the converted sinner."
"Taking a pound of costly ointment of pure nard." Nard is an aromatic plant (Song 1:11, 12, 13; Song 4:13), cultivated in southern India. Oil was pressed from its roots. It was the finest of aromatic liquids and an object of luxury.
This aromatic liquid was prepared best in the city of Tarsus in Asia Minor. The nard is called πιστικός, from πίστις, meaning faithful, unadulterated nard. According to the Arabic translation, it is "pure nard."
According to Pliny, there was nardus sincera and pseudonardus, pure nard and false or adulterated nard. "Pure nard," says Pliny, "is recognized by its lightness, red color, pleasant fragrance, and astringent yet pleasant taste."
In the adulterated kind, oily extracts of other aromatic plants were mixed with Indian nard. Most often this was Cretan or Syrian nard, inferior in quality to Indian nard. Whole, pure nard was costly and valued very highly.
According to Judas's estimate, 300 denarii could have been obtained for Mary's vessel of nard (Jude 1:5), in our reckoning up to sixty rubles.
Among the ancients, before supper, feet were washed and sometimes anointed with oil (Talmud tract. Menachot. 85). Children were especially obliged to render this service to parents. In Aristophanes one reads: "My daughter first washed me and anointed my feet" (Vesperae v. 605).
Thus blessed Mary acted, according to St. John. In St. Matthew and Mark, the anointing of the head is mentioned. Among the Jews this anointing served as a sign of respect shown to a teacher (Lightfoot ad Math 26, 7). The same occurred among the Greeks, according to Athenaeus.
Therefore Mary first poured the precious myrrh upon the Lord's head, and then anointed His feet with it. The rite expressed Mary's filial love toward the heavenly Teacher. Yet only the rich could use a whole pound of fragrant nard for such a rite.
How rich Mary was in love, though she was not rich in money! It was not enough for her that costly oil was used. She wiped the anointed feet not with a towel, but with the hair of her head. What reverent love!
The Gospel of the beloved disciple speaks more precisely and definitely than the preceding Synoptic Gospels about the Lord’s stay in Judea and Jerusalem, and about the days preceding the great and dread sacrifice offered for the human race.
Yet in Mt 26ff. and Mk 14:3ff. there is a direct indication that the Lord was anointed with myrrh by a woman during an evening meal in Bethany. The distinctive point is that the house where the meal was held is called the house of Simon the leper, whose name is not found in John the Theologian.
On the other hand, John indicates that the woman of the Synoptic Gospels who anointed the Lord with myrrh was Mary. That Mary and the woman in the Synoptic Gospels are one and the same person is also confirmed by this: in Matthew and Mark, as in John, the Lord stops the reproaches made against the woman over the waste of the myrrh, and says, "The poor you always have with you."
In all three Gospels this event takes place before the entry into Jerusalem and the Lord’s suffering. Plainly this is one and the same event, of which all three Evangelists speak.
John’s distinctive point is that he names the one who expressed the thought that the myrrh had been wasted. He says that it was Judas Iscariot. He also indicates the hidden reasons, that is, the state of Judas’ soul, because of which he expressed his opinion about the myrrh.
There is no need to repeat what we said above at the beginning of chapter 11, that Mary and the sinful woman of Lk 7 have nothing in common. Here we add only that, according to the course of Luke’s narrative, the sinful woman washed the Lord’s feet with tears somewhere in Galilee, in the house of Simon the Pharisee.
In Lk 7:1-2 and 38, the Lord is in Capernaum in the first verse and in Nain in the eleventh verse. This Simon indeed had the same name as Simon the leper, with whom, according to Mt 26:6, the Lord was in Bethany. But he certainly was not the same person. The name Simeon or Simon was very common. In the New Testament alone we meet seven different Simeons.
In John there is no indication at all whose house contained the meal. It could have taken place in the house of a relative of Lazarus named Simon the leper, probably one healed by the Lord. Perhaps he was the father of Lazarus and his sisters.
This supposition was already made in the famous Historia Ecclesiastica of Nicephorus Callistus Xanthopulus, book 1, chapter 27, on the basis of some ancient tradition. This would explain why Lazarus was one of those reclining, and not the host of the feast, and why Martha served at the meal.
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 19 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS