Homily on the resurrection of Lazarus (Mambre, 1)

A. Of the Blessed Mambre Vercanoł, a Discourse on the Resurrection of Lazarus All the divine signs of our Lord Jesus Christ are those which are important, and there are those which are even more important, which have in particular the consolation of the heavenly hope. But when we see the resurrection, by means of that particular resurrection, believe in the whole of the parts from Adam until the second coming. There is that which our Lord conducted according to the nature of our being, and there is that which is according to the theoretical arts of our nature; for the beginning takes its start from the head of man. But the shadow-painting artists first lay their hands on the outlines of the images of kings, and they form all the members of the body from within upward, and then by means of the head it is recognized who it is. According to this example, our Lord also at the beginning made wine from water, and then all the healings of the members of God into health: with feet, with hands, with ears, and all the rest; and he made the demons likewise persecuted by man.

But as the time of his completion drew near, the fulfillment of the signs revealed the resurrection of Lazarus to all. For as John the Evangelist, after the other wonders, does not speak concerning the signs, but enters directly into the discourse of the crucifixion concerning Lazarus. If you say that the washing of his feet at Mary’s grants remission of sins and not the healing of a wound. To which also the allusion of the same age is the sanctity of the pagans and the sound of the children, the testimony of the prophetic books, and many other great things from the resurrection of Lazarus up to the crucifixion and the luminous resurrection of our Lord. As when God brought many from the dead and showed them to many, he gave good news to the world concerning the salvific resurrection, it is called a realization, but it does not enter into the number of the first signs, although it is higher in abundance.

Now, according to John, the sign was established concerning Lazarus, as a head over the living, as the royal honor of a man among men in the unity of the living. It was boundless and was bounded; by the count of years it came to completion, and by a particular sign he established the resurrection of the beloved, and then he took himself and withdrew into boundlessness, and with light he filled the whole world. Now there was, it says, a certain sick man named Lazarus in Bethany, a village of Mary and Martha. Jesus was on the other side of the river Jordan, where John was performing baptism; he was spreading those places, hunting the whole desert into life. His relatives sent to him and said: Behold, the one whom you loved has fallen ill. He healed the sick man, established the power over death, preached concerning the glory of God. That sickness, it says, is not unto death, but

for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified in him. He tarried two days, and gave leave to the brigand to enter the house of the beloved. The worker of corruption entered, and wrought confusion according to his will. To the youth Mariam they gave no answer, neither of going and healing, nor of not going and making it of no account. They named the name of the sick man, and heard the name of the glory, and departed. Sorrow according to the vision, and joy there was none in the midst. With many entreaties they sent, and with great supplication they begged, and they recalled the reception according to the law. They did not call him to the tomb, nor did they believe with doubts in the Raiser of all, but humanly they hastened while the sickness had not yet ended from his life. For while the spirit dwells in the sin-laden body, it stumbles more often than it stands firm, as the Holy Spirit says through the mouth of David: "The spirit that goes forth does not return again.

Not God forgets, but also remembers the forgotten one again, and renews the nature of their goodness. As the Apostle Paul renews the disbelief of others with his own tongue: How shall the dead rise, or with what body shall they come? The moving spirit having gone out and departed, the whole body has fallen into corruption; not only the dissolution of the joints, but also the substance of the body has turned to dust. It was necessary to use the parable of the seeds: That which dies shall be made alive, to bring them to assent to the resurrection. According to this example, the waves of Lazarus' sorrows were storming in their hearts, and as if armed with faith in God, as if calling a skilled physician to the sick, they sent a word of mediation to him. He shows a confrontation from two sides; from afar he took the pulse of the sick man, examined minutely, and truthfully made the account: That illness, he says, is not unto death, but unto sleep and slumber.

Being asleep, people are metaphorically trampled, and if they cannot help their loved ones, by their awakening God is glorified, and in that glory the Son also rejoices and delights. The apostles came to Mary and could not relate the revelation of the Lord's words. Death became arrogantly proud and fulfilled the desires of its wickedness. Jesus says to the disciples: Come, let us go from Judea. And there the fear of death came, and it troubled them even more grievously than Lazarus's sisters. Lord, they say, now the Jews seek to kill you, and you go back? He set before them the words of light: He who goes, he says, by light does not stumble; he made known that he who fears death does not see it. Do not now speak of the vision of your bodily eyes; this sight is because of the fear of humans and all living creatures, for the weak are wary of the powerful, constantly trembling and shuddering, they complete the vicissitudes of the life of this world. I speak of the vision of the faithful, which shows the expected in the glimpsed, and the sudden at the moment.

He foretells. If one has not obtained such a vision in the soul, if one goes in the middle of the night, he stumbles; and the darkness is always with him. Just as he dismissed the apostles from Mary as if they were careless with empty thoughts, so also he wished to reveal to them the manifestation of the mystery. Why? Because once and twice they saw the sign of the resurrection and did not believe; instead, having themselves without fear, they taught him also to be fearful. Now, they say, the Jews threaten to kill you, and have you returned there again? To be killed and to die are the same. He raised the twelve-year-old daughter of the high priest; likewise, he took the one-month-old child in the city of Nain and set him up from the bier. He who can restore one dead person can also restore many. And if he made the death of others fugitive, even more so yours. Why are you so struck with fear and trembling? Are you not about to depart from this body? Are you not always instructed by this word: Do not fear those who can kill the body, but cannot kill the soul? He once and for all casts both soul and body away from death altogether.

And on Mount Tabor, the same voice from the Father with tears: "This is my beloved Son, hear him with tears." You, instead of hearing him, wish to give orders. "Do not go," they say, "to Judea, for they will kill you." And if the mystery of the resurrection of Lazarus had been revealed to you, you would not have believed. Therefore, because of the weakness of the mind, he here disturbed the power of the words, so that he might instruct their hearers a little. At one time he says: "That illness is not unto death." And again he says: "It is for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified in him." The illness was inevitably unto death, and the glory flowed from the death to the sight of the entire incredulous multitude. Then, with words, he made the disciples, until the dead man was finished with burial in the tomb; after this he says to them: "Lazarus, our friend, has fallen asleep, and I go to awaken him.

O Lord, you speak as if to children. You offer milk as to infants. You give birth in a motherly way, and you nurture in a nurse-like manner. When were you the chamberlain of Lazarus, that you should go and awaken him from his sleep? The distance of your journey is a two days' walk, and until you go, does Lazarus remain entirely in sleep? Is he perhaps drowsy from a light slumber? Or is he stupefied from a deep, unbroken sleep? Or is there any man who could be in sleep for four days and four nights without end? And now, do you go to awaken him? And his disciples, who hastened to send their servants to you, why do they not awaken him? They did not send to you because of his sleep, but rather they earnestly begged you because of his mortal illness, that you might go and heal him. Indeed, the disciples were innocent lambs; whatever they saw of him and knew, and whatever they heard of him and believed, they were utterly unable to comprehend the divine mystery.

Lord," they say, "if he slept, then he lives." Many sick persons sleep and do not live. O flatteries of the ignorant! They wished to appease the hidden power; they knew that our Lord loved that house in Bethany, and in that house, the innocent Lazarus; and they did not wish any grief to come upon that house and his household. Therefore, more than for Lazarus, the Lord had compassion on them. He stripped bare the hidden mystery, and said plainly: "Lazarus, our friend, is dead." And so that they might not suddenly be startled—either by shrieking, or by lamenting, or by shedding tears upon the words—immediately he offered consolation. "And I am glad," he says, "for your sake, that you may believe, because I was not there." Behold, again, wall upon wall, responses that could not wholly reach the surface. The name of death and of joy sounded simultaneously in their ears, and they could not even attain to astonishment because of the double-tongued utterance, just as the timidity of Thomas makes us aware of his dull ignorance.

He says, "Come, let us go there." And Thomas says, "Let us also come and go there, for we die with him." He goes to raise the dead man; they prepare the living one for death. How many perplexities there were in that place! It is easier for a farmer to put fallow land to work than for the learned to bring the ignorant to knowledge and agreement. The farmer labors with the untamed land for a short time and has much consolation from it; but to put a man hardened by ignorance to work is the power of God alone. As much as the disbelief grew on both sides, the evil one had double joy from every quarter. But since He was God incarnate, the mediator between God and men, He neither delayed nor was ashamed to put all disbelief to shame, but according to His paternal power He performed a mighty deed.

He came, says [the text], Christ, and found Lazarus, dead for four days, for he was in the tomb. And since the village was near Jerusalem, three miles away, consider that the whole multitude of the city had gone out, poured forth, and come to that place of mourning. Now it is the custom of our nature that we love to hear bad news more than good news, especially that of others rather than of ourselves, and to enter a house of mourning rather than a house of rejoicing. One [comes] from bodily shamelessness, another from a love of evil in trampling [others], and many from talkativeness and backbiting, and few are those who share in the sorrow of the mourner. For this reason the whole multitude of the city had gathered at his tomb; the village had become a city and the city a village, although the multitude of the crowd was not of [their] own will; the miracle was wrought in the midst of Jerusalem. Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went forth to meet him; but Mary remained sitting in the house.

Both fell down with praiseworthy blessing: one as the word of the mouth, and the other as the heart, the vessel of thought. The heart was established firmly in its place; the word, interpreter of the heart, proceeded forward and recounted the lamentations of the grieving heart to the hearer of that one who had come to remove the mourning from the house of the beloved. The Word knew that all the comforters who had come and gathered, each individual person, were full of grief and sadness, and the sad do not cheer the sad, and the mourner does not console the mourner, unless they add a double woe upon the woe. "Do not be troubled," they say, "my brother also died more prematurely than he. That one had brought a bride into the house, but departed from this world childless; no memory remained, his name was lifted from among the living." Another woman comes forward and says: "I had an only son; my husband died, I have no sister or brother, and that child, like a flower at its crown, withered; he did not reach the city of his betrothal, did not enter the bridal chamber, did not see the enjoyment of this world; the hope turned back, broken; the orders of succession and inheritance were destroyed.

And others, even more grievous than these, repeat: they break the heart, they twist the sinews, they steal the eyelids, the nerves become slack, the joints are loosened, the whole strength of the body grows weak and falls; woe upon woe, and cry upon cry, and burning upon burning, and the reopening of the first wounds, and the torment of the first evils. Whether it is fitting to speak consolation in such a matter, I do not know; for one man had come to console, and all sat in inconsolable mourning. All this crowd Martha left, and said to Jesus, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But now I know that whatever you once ask of God, God will give you." Spiritual wisdom and divine love and true faith and unerring prophecies—these four are kindred brothers, for the mover of them is one: God.

Just as the master craftsman blows into a single mouthpiece, and the multitude of pipes sound together—one thin, one thick, and one even deeper, and the others each according to their own register—though they are many in number, it is one voice and not many; according to the hand of the player, the choices of the sounds appear, and the work is one, and that same suffices for all. Thus also Mary and Martha and Lazarus among the dead, and if there was any other in that house who believed like them, though each spoke differently, yet the faith of all was one: they loved one love, Christ, and all had one spiritual understanding. From the unanimity of the many, Martha prophesied and said: Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Where life is, death does not enter. Many times the Lord had entered the house of Martha and Mary; death would flee from the village, let alone from the house.

He spoke this with heavenly wisdom: “He who receives a prophet in the name of a prophet shall take the reward of a prophet. But he who receives God shall inherit the divine wisdom.” From wisdom, prophecy was withdrawn. “But now I know,” he says, “that whatever you once ask of God, God gives you.” Yet this is a prophetic utterance: more than anything, God has opened and closed. In giving to you, not only the resurrection of one dead, but also of the ages past from eternity. But perhaps to some this speech may seem deficient—either the asking of God, or the giving of him. This the Lord himself said: “All things were given to me by my Father.” And he confirms the minds of the hearers: “No one knows the Father except through the Son, and no one knows the Son except through the Father.” This utterance teaches unity, not duality or subordination. For this reason our Lord also agreed with the faith of Martha.

Jesus said to her: “Your brother will rise.” Martha said: “I know that he will rise there on the day of resurrection, the last day.” And the Lord revealed to her at once the last and the first: “I myself am the resurrection and the life.” The doors of heaven opened to the woman; she saw the self-kindled light; she reached the place without descent; she became like the son of Zebedee. She did not fall upon the visible breast of Christ, but she ascended to the intellectual power; she kindled the Word of life; she was immersed in that same life; she came with tears and was filled with laughter; she was sorrowful and became joyful; the eyes of her mind opened; the inner man was illuminated; grief departed; the color of her face brightened; the afflictions of her body were healed; she forgot the false comforters, the bringers of news of her brother; she heard the good news of the resurrection; while her brother had not yet been raised from the dead by the hand of the dead one, she saw the living one, the living one and the life-giver of all the dead.

I myself am the resurrection and the life. Elijah raised the dead man, and he died again; likewise Elisha raised one and two. I am not only the raiser, but also the resurrection. I raise and I make alive unto immortality. He who believes in me, even if he dies, is alive; and he who is alive and believes in me shall not taste death eternally. This our Lord said to Martha, and immediately he demanded from her the reward of the teaching: “Do you believe this which you have now heard?” And she said to him: “Yes, Lord, I believed that you are the Son of the living God, who was to come into the world.” As we said above, the woman put on the four prophetic portions in that place. “You are the one who was to come into the world.” “He was in the world,” she says, “and you say ‘was to come.’” She repeated the words of the prophets, which the woman also said in her confusion: “When the Messiah comes, he will tell us everything.

He spoke of the birth from the Virgin, and he hinted at the second coming. For he who sees the beginning also looks to the end. As if once he had gone down to the underworld, he learned everything, spoke a little, and heard the great things of God. He came as a sorrowful man, he departed as an angel of God with joy. He did not go and say to his sister, "The teacher has come and is calling you." Truly indeed: without letters he teaches, and without syllables he composes and fulfills all the needs of learning. He said "teacher," and entered into the order of the disciples. He spoke with Mary in silence, and he made disciples in that same teaching, willingly, easily persuaded. When he heard, he arose immediately and came to God. To the same place and the same joy, to the same Teacher. He cast one part in secret and one part openly, both of them from this sorrowful world into the unsorrowing joy of life.

The Jews who had come to console Mary about her brother remained empty and devoid of heavenly consolation. The mourners and the sorrowful sat there in the front of the house, mingled with tears, and with that same grief they said to one another: Let us go then to the tomb to weep for him. They arose and went with him—not to the resurrection, but to the tomb of the dead. To whom it is given, it is said, let it be given to him and increased; and to whom it is not given, even if he has something more, they take that from him. Not because of the generosity of the giver, but because of the baseness of the recipients. They were always lovers of tombs. Not only did they leave the dead men there, but they also made false gods and called them dead. The prophet says: Their women sat and wept for Tammuz. From among them Mary arose and came to that one whom she had known beforehand, that he who had been able to grant me many sins is worthy; the same is able to dispel from me my grievous sorrow.

She fell at his feet and repeated the same words which her sister had spoken: "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." The children of one school, speaking one word, speak with pleasure and agreement and unanimity, according to the teacher's will, urging them to the same learning. Thus also both sisters, by one art, were caught in one living heavenly hunt; they loved one love, the Lord, and one knowledge they both drank; they saw a man and believed in God; from the fullness of their hearts they repeated the same words. From a laboring body sweat bursts forth, and from a sorrowful heart tears burst from the eyes, not only over the dead, but also over a living beloved when he comes from afar. Mary saw Jesus; two pangs of love pressed her: the memory of the dead and the sight of the living beloved. She did not cry out according to worldly custom, but with great humility she shed tears before the merciful one; so piteous a sight that it made all those Jews weep aloud.

In the same unanimity our Lord equalized, tear to tear, and sorrow to sorrow; he considered that he mourned the same mourning. For the evangelist says: "Seeing the same, Jesus was troubled in his spirit;" as if he was saddened by all his power. He could not speak plainly, "Where have you laid him?" but he spoke with a groan, not reproaching, but weeping and with tears, with half-speech as one sharing in sorrow and mourning over his beloved. In the torrential rains, the fields of the laborers become abundant; cliffs and deserts put forth the green shoots of the cultivated. Likewise, the tears of men bring the incarnate God to great compassion; he became their companion in mourning, so that men might be consolers together with God. Many seeds, lying hardened for many years under the soil, were without sprout; it was fitting for heaven and earth to rain upon them; for if one grain should sprout, immediately then there is expectation for all to sprout.

Where have you laid him?" he says. "Lord," they say, "come and see." He was still hunting for the salvation of men. From Bethany to Bethabara there are seventy-two miles. From such a distance he knew of Lazarus's death. Having come near, and at the very gate, he is ignorant. "Where have you laid him?" he says. You have laid him, and I take him. You have laid him dead, and I take him alive. You carry him with a bier, and I make him proceed with a voice. But if this is so, why do you ask, Lord? Divine works were to be wrought in that place, lest men be deprived of something. For many times heavenly revelations occurred among them. The incorporeal powers appeared in bodily form, but did not become incarnate. This one alone bears both operations. For this reason he is cautious on both sides alike. Not only did he increase the tears, but also by asking he confirmed, and from them he received true testimony.

See, they say, how much he loved him, for he himself wept. Not only the eyes of the body weep, but all the limbs sweat. By this also our Lord was many times brought low in the world; so deeply did he learn embodiment, even to the point of giving more contemptible causes for blasphemy. So that they might say, "This one, who opened the eyes of the blind, could not do it, for he said, 'Do not die.'" "You," he says, "are accustomed to blaspheme. You who divided the great sea and performed many wonders, you blaspheme, and you are not grateful to God, but you liken him to a beast; and you deny by oath in Moses. If Moses had not made a path through the sea, Pharaoh would have cast the whole people upon the edge of his own sword." You who saved such a multitude from the jaws of death, you do not accept grace; and you are not grateful for the healing of the blind.

The breath of the blind man was living, and it moved the body; his eyes were dead. Breath does not dwell in a dead body, nor does the light of the sun in dead eyes. If he had revived the dead eyes and granted the departed light from within, then if he were dead in the whole body, he would be revived from there. But you, as much as you wish, persist in the same blasphemy; perhaps in the same place you will be ashamed because of the first and last blasphemy of yours, especially when many from your midst glorify God over the great wonders that you will see. Jesus went to the tomb there, where they had placed Lazarus, in a cave, and a stone was set at the entrance of the cave. It was the custom of the ancients to fortify their tombs with great labor, because the hope of resurrection was far from them; they knew only this life and believed only in the bitterness of this death, and they considered the tombs as the memorial of the dead, they made the grave a memorial for them, and they carved the name of the dead upon the door.

The expectation of the resurrection had passed among all, for which reason even Moses unwillingly bowed to the custom of the ancients: If someone’s brother should die childless, another brother shall enter the wife of the deceased and raise up offspring in the name of his brother—devices for the sake of the inheritance of the land to be allotted. And again, the second law opposed this, and the Israelites had the same custom at the tombs of the dead. Jesus says: Remove the stone from the mouth of the tomb. From which the earth trembled, the mountains melted; for the sake of a small stone he sought help from men—not help, but witnesses. The assistance that he placed upon men with tears, the same he demanded in return for the removal of the stone. Men work the earth, and angels have the heavens. The Lord of angels and men had come to that place; angels were of no use in assistance, whose custom it is to work their own earth, and he commanded.

You say, "Take this stone from above," and you look into that tomb, whether the dead one is inside, whether the sight of the dead one is dreadful. Your eyes shall be witnesses tomorrow, your backs to the weight of this stone. Your eyes to the dead corpse, and the stench of the putrefaction to the nostrils of all who are near. And amid so many witnesses, you cannot be certain of the resurrection of the dead one. He knew their evil custom; from all sides he contrived to restrain them from blasphemy. The sister of the dead one said, "Lord," she says, "now he must be putrid, for it is the fourth day." Jesus says to her, "Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?" To men, from the dead comes the stench of putrefaction; to God, from the sinner. The whole world was putrid in common; He was not disgusted nor turned His face from anyone, but seasoned all with His own sweet fragrance.

The laborer has no stench from the rotted seed, but his mind is full of joy, and his intellect is intoxicated with the fragrance of his own fields, to which Isaac gave a small testimony in his own examination and in his blessing of Jacob. That which you called corruption, O Martha, from it spring forth the incorruptible lives of men. Only believe in God without doubt, and from that source a sweet and living fragrance will be your foundation, so bright and luminous that you can even see the glory of God through that faith. In earth where seeds have not been cast, even if clouds rain upon it many times, wheat will not sprout. And in a tomb where no dead one has been placed, even if many heavenly trumpets sound over it, no one will see in it the resurrection of a dead person. Truly a dead one has been placed in this tomb of yours. You confess death, but the Lord promises and bestows living life and resurrection.

Repeat and triple the same testimony, so that the mouths of blasphemous men may be put to shame, when they see the four-day dead alive in the midst of your square. Do not doubt at all concerning the stench of your Lord’s all-holy ones; it is salt that sweetens the most foul-smelling body, it is light that penetrates all blinded eyes, it is a voice, the opening of all deafened hearings, which even now you see in deed with your beloved brother: you find him with your eyes and with your mind you comprehend his glory. And as they lifted the stone from the door of the tomb, Jesus raised his eyes to heaven and said: Father, I thank you because you heard me, and I knew that you always hear me, but for the sake of this assembly that stands around, I do this so that they may believe that you sent me. Before the stone was lifted, the Lord raised Lazarus for us, and before Jesus raised his eyes to see the Father, and before he called out with a voice, the Father heard him—not only at that time, but at all times; but for the beholders and hearers, only at that time.

Who is there whose soul is separate from the body? No one among the living, for this is inseparable: the unity of the single Trinity. Be ashamed, Theodoret! Do not raise your eyes to the heavens, Nestorius! For you are blind of eye from the unity of the Holy Trinity, because of your corrupt unity you narrate a shameful teaching. One, they say, reads, and one listens; one entreats, and one is entreated; one is compassionate, and one is brought to compassion; as if he has no power of resurrection, he calls upon the Father with a voice for the help of the dead one. O, how detestable are the words of these men, not only in the eyes of the wise, but even among those who are most ignorant in the holy Church. In the house of the high priest, when he raised his daughter from the dead, he did not entreat, did not implore, did not beseech, nor did he look to the heavens, nor did he call upon the Father. He looked at the dead one and said, "Talitha cumi: girl, arise!

He arose as from sleep; he stood up immediately as if healthy; at once and many times he became worthy. Likewise in the city of Nain, a great crowd was following the bier; no one among men besought him, nor did he present entreaties to the Father; he merely stretched forth his hand to the bier, and the dead one immediately stood up. Likewise in every miracle: where he performed it in person, he showed the power of the Divinity; and where he presented entreaties to the Father, he showed the perfect love. For the sake of the people, he says, I do it. And he himself interprets the meaning: That these may believe that you sent me into the world. True thanksgiving to the Father on behalf of men: I thank you, Father, he says, for you concealed this from the wise and the learned, and revealed it to innocent children. We all have fallen under grave sins; but those who divide the indivisible nature have fallen under unforgivable sins; as if they are unable to cause disturbance there, they themselves are disturbed and distressed within themselves; they are blasphemed by men and condemned by God, and are erased from the book of life.

But let us hasten from there to reach the tomb of Lazarus, which it is not fitting to call a tomb, but rather the resurrection of the dead. When Jesus said this, he cried out with a loud voice and said: "Lazarus, come forth outside!" And the dead man came out, with his feet bound and his hands swathed in bandages and his face wrapped. Pay close attention, I beseech you. When you apply yourself to reading the divine Scripture and understanding the power of its words, let not a single word pass through your mind unheeded; all the sequences are pregnant with heavenly wisdom, and they give birth to spiritual words for wise minds. For the unlearned they become barren, and for those capable of memory they become prolific. So too for each of the hearers whose ears are sound, according to that, the circumstances of the mind become sweet. He cried out with a loud voice and called the dead man. Not that the intensity of the voice roused him—no. And do not even think that.

If the dead once raised the dead, there was no voice of speech in between. He cried out because of the multitude of people, that through the voice he might dissolve all opposition; he compelled all that is visible, drawing them to himself. But he asks, he says, with the dead: "Let it remain unclean until this evening." He fulfilled the commands of the laws; he stood far from that tomb, twelve paces, not approaching the dead; instead of the hand, he intensified the voice; the voice became a heavenly thunder; the tears, the dew of shining clouds; the hardness of the stone softened, and it became a fruitful garden. The stones, which are without shoots from grasses, withered and softened at the intensity of the voice, and received the fullness of the shining rain, and applied the dissolution of the seed. The smell of decay turned into a sweet fragrance; the voice entered the tomb, took hold of the hand of the dead, neither dragged nor led, for he was bound with bonds, as the angel took the prophet Habakkuk by the hair, bringing the cooked food and the stew, and carried the entire meal to the reapers.

The word of God is swifter than an angel of heaven, and as swift as it is, so much the more powerful is it. Jesus says to them, “Untie this one and let him go.” Those whom you bound, untie; and those whom you wrapped, unwrap; and those whom you swathed, strip away. Do not shrink back, for there is no odor of decay. Do not recoil according to the laws, for he is not dead, but alive. See with your own eyes the signs; touch with your own hands. Open the closed mouth, and you, along with the other witnesses concerning the shroud, all of you be witnesses of the resurrection which you see. By one fruit the whole fruit of the earth is known, particularly at the present time, and the good news for the future. O sickness, hope of life; O sickness, sign of resurrection; O sickness, antagonist of death; O sickness, enemy of the slanderer; O sickness, foundation of faith; O sickness, reproach of the half-believers.

I do not call it sickness, but health of sickened minds. I do not call it deadly sickness, but healing of afflicted persons. I do not call it sickness unto the sleep of death, but the standing up of those who have fallen asleep unto death. I do not call it sickness, but the image of our own resurrection. Let us marvel at the wondrous resurrection of Lazarus, let us be illumined by the divine operation, let us rejoice in the resurrection of Lazarus, confirming the same hope in ourselves. Let the souls of the saints also be delighted, for they are to put on again the bodies which the slanderer caused to die. Let death mourn the destruction of its kingdom, let hell also lament the breaking of its power, let the first-created one rejoice at the coming of the shepherd in search of the lost sheep, let the faithful clap their hands at the renewal of Lazarus, let the demons take up mourning for themselves, seeing their destruction.

They will be evangelized, who dwell in the tombs with the hope of the resurrection. Let not death any longer terrify us, let not the slanderer who caused death make us tremble. We have found the tree of life; the cherub’s flaming sword’s guardianship has withdrawn; the operation of the death-dealing tree has been obstructed; the leaf of the fig tree has been torn, for it has become for us a herald of incorruption on this day of resurrection. O the power of the divine voice, which rent the underworld and snatched the spirit seized by death from without! O the power of the divine voice, which renewed the dissolved limbs again into life! O the power of the divine voice, which gathered the dried-up spirit from the nostrils into the dissolved body, working nothing more dishonorable than the first creation! O the power of the voice, which, raising the four-days-dead from the tomb, delivered on foot, brought him in haste to the place where he was.

Let us stand, O beloved ones, with our minds upon this voice with pure faith, and let us see with the eyes of the mind the same life-giving Christ himself, and by confessing the same to us—resurrection and life—let us not doubt the common resurrection, for behold, that voice is about to raise us also from the tombs. Let us hasten from now on to store up the most beneficial works for the coming resurrection, so that we do not go forth without lamps to meet the bridegroom; for when we are summoned from the tombs, let us find mercy ready at hand, the oil by which our lamps are illumined. For after that there is no market of merchants; you have no means to buy what you hope for. Now is the season of commerce; now are the gatherings of the poor; let us store up treasure with those whom the moth does not approach; let us entrust the treasure to them, and the thief cannot cut through the corner; let us place it in their hands for safekeeping, so that we may find it in the hands of the judge.

Let us hasten to the loosening of the sins, sharper than the setting of the tribunal; let us propitiate the judge before the setting of the throne; let us not stand naked in the public square of the tribunal; it is better now to speak only with the judge; it is easy from here to loosen the accusations. For when the light dawns in the midst of the night, and the boast of the righteous appears—that is, the promised Bridegroom—let us be able to meet him with bright lamps, so that, having survived the judgment, we may be worthy to enter the bridal chamber, inheriting with the invited ones the unending joy in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory forever. Amen.