The Resurrection of Christ as opposed to the Resurrection of Lazarus

According to the Gospel of John, the resurrection of Lazarus was the closest occasion to the national celebration at the entry of the Lord Jesus Christ into Jerusalem (see: John 12:18), and this entry, in turn, was, as it were, the forerunner of the suffering of the Lord and the Resurrection that followed. In strict accordance with the Gospel narrative, the Divine Service Charter of our Orthodox Church specifies to celebrate the resurrection of Lazarus on Saturday, the eve of the Lord’s Entry into Jerusalem, and establishes the closest connection between these holidays. One troparion (“General Resurrection...”) is assigned for both of them. And in general, in the service of these holidays, both memories seem to be intertwined. At the same time, the services of these two holidays are, as it were, a prologue to the services of Holy Week and harbingers of Bright Easter. Without dwelling on the historical connection between the resurrection of Lazarus and the last days of the Lord’s earthly life and His Resurrection, the Church in its worship also reveals the ideological connection between these events. By raising Lazarus from the dead, the Lord “before His passion” wanted to “assure” (prove that there would certainly be) a general resurrection. And since the “firstfruits” of the general resurrection is the Resurrection of Christ, then the Lord, by raising Lazarus, assured His own Resurrection. Just as at Tabor the Lord “showed His glory to His disciples” so that they would not be tempted when “they saw Him crucified,” so now, in view of the impending suffering, the Lord revealed Himself as the “Conqueror of death,” so that suffering and death on the cross could not later eclipse the disciples’ faith in the Resurrection of Christ and beyond it in the future general resurrection. The resurrection of Lazarus, therefore, is proof of the Divinity of Christ and that He is “Lord of the living and the dead.” The close connection - both historical and ideological - of Lazarus' Resurrection and the Resurrection of Christ should not, however, obscure for us the most significant difference between these two events, the difference that makes them phenomena - each completely, almost to the point of opposites of a special order. Lazarus was resurrected for this world in order to continue his former earthly, bodily life in its present conditions. Therefore, he was resurrected with his original body. In his body, the process of decay that had just begun was stopped, but the body itself did not become incorruptible: Lazarus then died again, and his body, to one degree or another, underwent corruption. As a phenomenon of this world in its present, cursed state, Lazarus’s body possessed all the properties inherent in material things and was observable by the external senses of man. Therefore, all those present were witnesses of the resurrection of Lazarus, regardless of their spiritual mood, whether they wanted this event or not, it was seen by both believers in Christ and the enemies of Christ (see: John 11:45–46). In the same way, anyone could verify the resurrection of Lazarus: to do this, they only had to go to Bethany and see the resurrected one there (see: John 12:9-11). It is not surprising that the enemies of Christ had the idea of ​​​​killing Lazarus in order to eliminate this literal proof of what Christ had done. The fact that the resurrection of Lazarus belongs to the order of phenomena in this world made it possible for the evangelist to describe the resurrection of Lazarus in all the details, like any other event from the earthly life of the Lord Jesus Christ. From this description we learn some very characteristic features. For example, in order to call Lazarus from the tomb, it was necessary to first roll away the stone that blocked the entrance to the tomb: Lazarus’ body was still subject to the conditions of material life. In response to the creative: “Lazare, get out!” – Lazarus, however, came out of the tomb, although he was bound in burial shrouds (“by miracle assuring a miracle”), but he could not free himself from the shrouds without outside help. The Gospel narrative of the resurrection of Lazarus provided a completely definite historical theme for church poetry and iconography. The imagination of a poet or artist can, of course, color this theme with some minor details. For example, to depict the confusion of hell and death, who received the command to release Lazarus and foresee that this will lead to the need to later release other dead people. The poet can try to reveal the inner experiences of the resurrected Lazarus and the like. But all these details come down to the main topic and, in essence, cannot add anything to it. This theme, in particular for the iconographer, is quite specific: an open tomb and a swaddled Lazarus emerging from the tomb in front of the crowd. There is no room for any hesitation or speculation in the question of how Lazarus came out of the tomb: the gospel narrative gives a completely definite answer to this question. This is not what we see in relation to the Resurrection of Christ. First of all, not a single evangelist says how Christ was resurrected. The evangelists talk only about the appearances of the already Risen Lord, but do not describe the event of the Resurrection itself. As if the holy evangelist Matthew comes closest to the very moment of the Resurrection of Christ, telling about the descent of the lightning Angel, who rolled away the stone from the door of the tomb and “sitting on it... From the fear of this the guards shook and were as if they were dead” (Matthew 28: 2-4). This gospel story provides later artists with a theme for depicting the Resurrection of Christ. According to the Gospel, they depict an Angel sitting on a stone rolled away from the tomb, and the guards, defeated or running away in fear. And to this truly evangelical material they make a very significant addition from themselves, from their own conjecture: they immediately depict the Risen One Himself coming out of the tomb with the sign of victory. One gets the impression that the stone was rolled away from the tomb in order to enable the Risen One to emerge from the tomb, just as it was necessary during the resurrection of Lazarus, and as if the unbelieving warrior-guards were eyewitnesses of the Resurrection of Christ and were horrified not so much by the sight of the Angel, but by the Risen One Himself. It is not difficult to see how deeply the Gospel story is distorted by such an artistic rendering, or, more precisely, by arbitrary reinterpretation. According to the Gospel, the Angel rolled away the stone from the door of the tomb not in order to give way to the risen Lord, but, on the contrary, to show that He was no longer in the tomb: “he is not here, for there is no rising,” and to give “those who seek Jesus crucified” the opportunity to verify with their own eyes the emptiness of the tomb, looking at the place “where the Lord lay.” This means that the Resurrection had already taken place before the descent of the Angel, before the stone was rolled away - something inaccessible to all eyes and incomprehensible had happened. Therefore, the soldiers could not be witnesses of the Resurrection. The Evangelist makes it clear that the myrrh-bearing women who came to the tomb witnessed not only the earthquake, the descent of the Angel and other things, but also the very horror of the fleeing. The myrrh-bearers were right there. The angel, as if contrasting them with the frightened warriors, says: “Do not be afraid,” and then only promises the myrrh-bearers that they will see the Lord in the future. If the myrrh-bearers did not see the Resurrection, then even more so the soldiers could not see it. Moreover, the further behavior of the soldiers would be little understandable if they were eyewitnesses of the Resurrection? The centurion, who witnessed only the death of the Crucified One, came to the realization: “Truly this is the Son of God.” Could the eyewitnesses of the Resurrection have remained unaffected in their indifference? In any case, after what they had experienced, they would hardly have accepted bribery so easily. After all, there is no reason to assume that the warriors are as fierce as the high priests and scribes. The soldiers, like the centurion, rather performed only their service and were not personally interested, as the enemies of Christ were interested. It’s another matter if the soldiers did not see the Risen One - then they knew for sure only one thing, that the body of the Crucified One was not in the tomb. The only question was how to explain the disappearance of the body, who and how took it from the coffin; and it was not so difficult, especially for pieces of silver, to persuade your conscience to bow to the fable of the scribes. Thus, in contrast to the resurrection of Lazarus, the Gospels do not give us factual material for depicting or describing the very event of the Resurrection of Christ: no one saw how the Lord was resurrected and how He came out of the tomb. Later artists who depict the Risen One emerging from the tomb convey, at best, only the idea of ​​the event, and not its actual side. Our Orthodox Church, in its liturgical poetry and iconography, always remains faithful to the Gospel narrative. In the Easter canon we sing: “Having kept intact the signs (seals) of Christ, you have risen from the grave” (Song 6:1). Not only was the stone not rolled away, but the seals lying on it were not touched when the Resurrection of Christ took place. And “life shone forth from the tomb,” while the tomb was still “sealed.” The resurrected One came out of the tomb in the same way and entered the Apostles through a “closed door”, without opening them; came out of the coffin without any external signs that could be noticed by an outside observer. “Enclosed in the tomb by Thy indescribable (subject to ordinary spatial forms and other conditions of this-worldly life), indescribable (free from this-worldly forms and inaccessible to earthly observation) Thou hast risen Christ" (Canon of the Week of St. Thomas. Song 3:2). In particular, “you did not feel when you were resurrected, the warriors who guarded You.” Like the Nativity from the Virgin, the Resurrection of Christ remains a mystery, “sealed to those who seek” (inaccessible to earthly research), and appears, like a miracle, only “by faith to those who bow to the mystery” of the Resurrection (stichera “on praise” of the 5th tone). An ordinary researcher of an empty coffin can only discover what the soldiers knew: that the Buried One is no longer in the coffin; and that He was resurrected, and how He was resurrected, is a miracle that is revealed only to believers. Accordingly, genuine church iconography, which, as we have seen, was concerned with the external, physical side of the resurrection of Lazarus (Lazarus’s exit from the tomb), almost forgets such a theme (exit from the tomb) when it moves on to depicting the Resurrection of Christ, and loves to depict primarily the spiritual side of the Resurrection of Christ, its otherworldly essence: the descent of the Lord the Victorious into hell, the liberation of Adam and Eve and other prisoners of hell, and the like. Without talking about how the Lord rose from the dead, the evangelists talk about the appearances of the Risen One. But in this respect, too, a significant difference is revealed between the risen Lord and Lazarus. After the resurrection, everyone could see Lazarus. One could even deliberately go to Bethany to look at him, while the Apostle Peter directly said about the appearances of the risen Lord that “God did not show Him to be all man, but (only) to us, the witness ordained of God” (Acts 10:40–41). The Lord Jesus Christ appeared only to those to whom He wanted or who stayed with Him in His misfortunes (Luke 22:28) and by this stay and communication with Him during His earthly humiliated life, He prepared himself for the contemplation of the glory of Christ and His Kingdom (the eleven Apostles, the Mother of God, the Myrrh-bearers and other disciples), or to those whose “persistent striving against the prick” of grace He wanted to break and decide to turn someone from a persecutor into his chosen vessel (Acts 9:5-15). Moreover, by appearing to whom He wanted, the Lord, so to speak, could control His appearance. He traveled with Luke and Cleopas, talked, lay down for supper, and suddenly became invisible to His interlocutors (see: Luke 24:31). Sometimes the Lord appeared, but in such a way that at first He was not recognized even by people very close to Him, who constantly saw Him before His suffering, and did not recognize Him until He Himself let them know by some action familiar to them. For example, for Luke and Cleopas, the breaking of bread reminded them of past meetings with the Lord, and “the eyes were opened and they knew Him” (Luke 24:31). To the fishermen of Tiberias - a wonderful catch of fish after the command to cast the ship on the right hand (see: John 21:6, cf.: Luke 5:4-5). Mary Magdalene is a common name by name (see: John 20:16). Along with this ability to be invisible at will or visible not in all the usual details, the resurrected body of the Savior had the freedom to penetrate through all sorts of material barriers without destroying them. Just as the Savior came out unrestrained from the sealed tomb, without touching either the stone or the seals, so he entered the Apostles through a “closed door,” without opening them. In general, the glorified flesh of the Son of God was, from an earthly point of view, so materially subtle, so free from our usual gross material imperfections and limitations, that at the first appearance of the Lord, the Apostles first “saw the spirit” (Luke 24:37). In order to dispel this opinion, they needed not only to “see His hand and nose”, not only “to touch Him and see... having flesh and bones” - it was necessary for the One who appeared, given by the Apostles themselves, “to bake a part of the fish and from the honeycombs of the bees... there was poison before them” (Luke 24:39,42,43). Only after this “the disciples rejoiced (having been truly convinced) that they saw their former Teacher, the Lord,” crucified, buried and, therefore, resurrected (John 20:20). Thus, although the Risen Lord returned to earthly life for some time, he no longer belonged, in essence, to this this-worldly world, even by His bodily nature. True, the glorified flesh of the God-man remained after the Resurrection as His former flesh, borrowed from the first old Adam, with all its former individual characteristics (external image, voice, even to the “ulcers of the nails” on the hands and feet, and to the perforated rib inclusive); but it was flesh already transformed, spiritualized, freed from the gross materiality of this world and from other consequences of the ancestral oath - in a word, it was the flesh of the second, new Adam, which passed from corruption to incorruption, beginning the life of the next century. The evangelists, whose task was primarily to testify to the truth of the Resurrection, do not specifically speak about such a transformed state of the bodily nature of the Risen God-Man - they only make us assume this state with their narratives. This question is revealed more directly and in more detail by the Holy Apostle Paul in the 15th chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians. The Apostle first of all establishes the closest, or, better, inextricable connection between the Resurrection of Christ and the future resurrection of the dead and the mutual dependence of faith in the first and faith in the second. “If the dead do not rise, then neither does Christ rise” (1 Cor. 15:16). Without the resurrection of the dead, there will be neither purpose nor meaning for Christ's Resurrection, just as the apostolic preaching and the entire Christian faith in general will be aimless and meaningless, namely: Christ Himself did not need either the incarnation or the Resurrection, and if “Christ is raised from the dead,” then only in order to be “the firstfruits of the dead” (v. 20), to be the first in the endless series of the dead who are resurrected to Life Eternal. Just as from Adam everyone received a mortal nature and die, so, having united with Christ, “all will live.” But without fail, “each in his own order: the firstfruits is Christ (besides Christ, there is no resurrection), then those of Christ” (in Greek: “οί του Χριστου”; in the Slavic text it is not entirely accurate: “those who believed in Christ,” v. 23), that is, those who are their own, wholly belong to Him, vitally merged with Him. This means that the “resurrection of life” (John 5:29) is not, as it were, some objective consequence of the resurrection, mechanically extending to the entire human race, regardless of people’s personal relationship to Christ: the resurrection of life can be the lot of only “Christ’s” who have united with Christ into a new, regenerated humanity, resurrected for eternal life, and then a general restoration (apokatastasis), when the Son “will give up the kingdom to God and the Father... that God may be all things in all.” (1 Cor. 15:24,28). In the Gospel of John, the Lord Jesus Christ shows more specifically who these Christ's are, how they become so, and why they can participate in the resurrection. “My flesh is truly meat, and My blood is truly beer,” introducing into man the beginning of a new, eternal life. Namely: “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I am in him” as the fullness and source of life. Therefore, “just as the living Father sent Me, and I live for the Father’s sake; and the one who poisons Me will live for My sake.” This means that “eating My flesh and drinking My blood will have eternal life,” because it has Me within it, the Source of life, as if it has become organically one with Me. Precisely, as such, “I will raise him up at the last day” (John 6:55–57,54). “But someone says: How will the dead rise? What kind of body will they come with?” (1 Cor. 15:35). The apostle responds with a comparison: “bare grain is sown,” insignificant in size and having neither appearance nor goodness; and “God gives him a body... and to every seed his own body.” The plant that emerges from the grain is, of course, one with the grain, even one with it in essence, but it is incomparable with it in its richness of forms, beauty, and development; it already lives a completely different life. “So is the resurrection of the dead: it is sown into corruption and raised into incorruption; it is not sown in honor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness and raised in strength; a natural body is sown, a spiritual body is raised” (vv. 37, 38, 42–43). Man rises, of course, with his former bodily nature, but a transformed nature, freed from all infirmities and imperfections (as the consequences of sin), and most importantly - incorruptible, no longer belonging to the spiritual (carnal, mortal) world, but to the spiritual. The first world originates from the first Adam, and the second from the second. The first Adam “became a living soul,” by his bodily nature he belonged to the animal world and, as (a consequence of sin) not having risen above the dust from which he was created, he was subject to death and return to the dust. The Last Adam, the Resurrected One, is the Life-Giving Spirit. He, by His human nature, is completely free from all imperfections and limitations of animal or mental life, and not only is not a slave to dust, but “the Lord is from heaven. Jacob is the ringed, so are the rings; and those who are in heaven, and those who are in heaven” (vv. 45,47–48). Born from the first Adam, people follow him to serve the dust and die; on the contrary, by following the Risen Christ, people should become heavenly and live forever. The opposition between these two worlds, or kingdoms, is so great and irreconcilable that it is impossible, while belonging to the first, to become a participant or member of the second. “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, but corruption will inherit incorruption” (v. 50). Whether this is understood in a moral sense, in the sense of life according to the principles of the flesh, or in a direct physical sense, in the sense of being endowed with earthly, mortal, bodily nature - in both cases, a person will not enter the Kingdom of God. To enter, “it is fitting for this corruptible to put on incorruption, and for this dead thing to put on immortality,” then the word of Scripture will be fulfilled: “...death was sacrificed in victory. Where is the sting of death, where is the victory of hell” (vv. 53–55). The true victory over death does not consist in the fact that the deceased comes to life again and returns to his former earthly life, but in the fact that the dead flesh is so transformed, spiritualized, cleansed of everything earthly and mortal, that death would have no power over it, just as it does not have power over the Risen Christ. “Christ has risen from the dead; to whomever dies no more, death has no power over him” (Rom. 6:9). The resurrected flesh was so transformed that it ceased to belong to the earthly world and became simply unattainable for the forces and laws operating in the earthly world (including death). This explains why Lazarus, resurrected in a corruptible body, could not leave the tomb without first rolling away the stone; why the shrouds that were tied around his body during burial remained on his body and continued to bind him even after the resurrection; it was necessary to untie them in order to free Lazarus. In contrast, the resurrected flesh of the Life-Giver freely emerged from the tomb and from the shrouds, without even touching them; all this remained somewhere far below and lost the power to hold the Risen One, who already belonged to another world. It is impossible to imagine that the Risen Lord, rising from his deathbed, threw off his burial shrouds, as they throw off his clothes, or as Lazarus freed himself from the shrouds. If any analogy is permissible here, it would be better to imagine ice wrapped in shrouds. The heat melts the ice and the water leaves the shrouds, leaving them still tied; they can no longer hold water. So the shrouds of the buried Christ remained bound in the tomb in the same form as they clothed the body of the Buried One, but the latter was no longer in them. Is this not what the Gospel narrative wants to point out when it mentions that “the sir lay in a single retinue in one place?” Doesn't this mean that the sir remained wrapped in a bandage that wrapped around the head of Christ? Then it would be quite understandable why “the other disciple” at the first glance at the lying linens “both saw and believed” (John 20:8). He immediately saw that what happened here was not at all what Mary Magdalene first thought; by no means “having not taken the Lord from the tomb, neither do we know where I laid Him” (v. 2). Within the limits of earthly possibilities, it was impossible to take the Buried One from the shrouds (moreover, saturated with adhesive substances and, probably, stuck together) without untying the shrouds (and perhaps tearing them). This means that the Lord came out of the tomb “into the resurrection of life” (John 5:29) and the burial shrouds simply lost the ability to contain the transfigured flesh of the Risen One, as if it had already passed on to another world. This belonging of the resurrected flesh to the other world also explains why the Lord was visible only to those to whom He wanted to appear, and only when He wanted to. Moreover, He appeared only to those “ordained of God” (Acts 10:41), who were already “οί του Χριστου” - Christ’s: although they were still in mortal flesh, they already lived in soul the life of the future century and therefore were prepared to receive its revelations. But again, these people saw the Risen One only under the special influence of His grace each time, which gave them the ability for this perception. That is why the Holy Church begins her Easter canon with the invitation: “Let us cleanse our feelings (from everything sinful, vain, corruptible, because only then) and we will see (at least mentally, spiritually) Christ - Christ, shining with the unapproachable (for flesh and blood) light of the Resurrection,” and we will hear Him: “Rejoice.” In such spiritual contemplation of the glory of the Risen Lord and in sincere communication with Him, in fact, lies the bliss of Eternal life in the Kingdom of Heaven. Therefore, in the eighth song we sing: “Come... on the special day of the Resurrection, let us partake of the Kingdom of Christ.” But since, while we are clothed with mortal flesh and belong to this world, all such contemplations, all spiritual enjoyment of the Kingdom of Christ represent only the dawn of the future day, only a weak foretaste of future blessings, the Easter canon ends with the prayer: “O great and most sacred Easter, Christ! About wisdom, and the Word of God, and Power! Grant us the opportunity to partake of You in the eternal days of Your Kingdom.” April 14/27, 1933, Moscow You might be interested in: