Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of John 11:5
Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.
5. Now Jesus loved Martha ] The English Version loses much here, and still more in Joh 21:15-17, by using the same word ‘love’ to translate two different Greek words: nor can the loss be remedied satisfactorily. The word used in Joh 11:3, philein (Lat. amare), denotes a passionate, emotional warmth, which loves and cares not to ask why; the affection of lovers, parents, and the like. The word used here agapn, (Lat. diligere), denotes a calm, discriminating attachment, which loves because of the excellence of the loved object; the affection of friends. Philein is the stronger, but less reasoning; agapn the more earnest, but less intense. The sisters naturally use the more emotional word, describing their own feeling towards their brother; the Evangelist equally naturally uses the loftier and less impulsive word. The fact that the sisters are here included is not the reason for the change of expression.
Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus ] The names are probably in order of age. This and Joh 11:19 confirm what is almost certain from Luk 10:38, that Martha is the elder sister.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Verse 5. Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.] Therefore his staying two days longer in Bethabara was not through lack of affection for this distressed family, but merely that he might have a more favourable opportunity of proving to them how much he loved them. Christ never denies a less favour, but in order to confer a greater. God’s delays, in answering prayers offered to him by persons in distress, are often proofs of his purpose to confer some great kindness, and they are also proofs that his wisdom finds it necessary to permit an increase of the affliction, that his goodness may be more conspicuous in its removal.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
He doubtless loved them with a special, distinguishing love, as persons chosen in him to eternal life before the foundation of the world, given unto him by an eternal donation, called by him with an effectual calling, to own and receive him as their Saviour; but this text seemeth to speak of him as loving this family with a human love, which inclineth man to a complacency in an object beloved: he had a kindness for the whole family; they had showed them kindness in his state of humiliation, and he loved those that so loved him, Pro 8:17.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
5. Jesus loved Martha and her sisterand Lazaruswhat a picture!one that in every age hasattracted the admiration of the whole Christian Church. No wonderthat those miserable skeptics who have carped at the ethical systemof the Gospel, as not embracing private friendships in the list ofits virtues, have been referred to the Saviour’s peculiar regard forthis family as a triumphant refutation, if such were needed.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. Not only with an everlasting love, a love of complacency and delight, an unchangeable one, and which never varies, nor will ever end, with which he loves all his people alike; but with a very great human affection, and which was very singular and peculiar to them: these were the intimate friends, and familiar acquaintance of Christ, whom he often visited, at whose house he frequently was when in those parts; they were very hospitable to him; they kindly received him into their houses, and generously entertained him, and which he returned in love to them: hence Nonnus paraphrases the words,
“Jesus loved the women, , “who were lovers of hospitality”, by the law of kindness.”
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Now Jesus loved ( ). Imperfect active of picturing the continued love of Jesus for this noble family where he had his home so often (Luke 10:38-42; John 12:1-8). The sisters expected him to come at once and to heal Lazarus.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Loved [] . Notice the verb here : not fileiv, as ver. 3. See on 5 20. Lazarus is not mentioned in Luk 10:38 sqq.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1 ) “Now Jesus loved Martha,” (egapa de ho lesous ten Marthan) “Now Jesus loved Martha,” cared affectionately for Martha, with a spiritual love of good degree. It is believed that she was mentioned first as head of the household, and chief speaker, Joh 11:20-21; Luk 10:38,42.
2) “And her sister and Lazarus.” (kai ten adelphen autes kai ton Lazaron) ”And her sister (Mary) and Lazarus.” He dearly loved as well; Hence the delay in coming to them was not caused by either indifference or lack of care or concern, Joh 11:6. He loved them, as a family, Joh 13:1.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
5. And Jesus loved Martha and her sister, and Lazarus. These two things appear to be inconsistent with each other, that Christ remains two days beyond Jordan, as if he did not care about the life of Lazarus, and yet the Evangelist says, that Christ loved him and his sisters; for, since love produces anxiety, he ought to have hastened immediately. As Christ is the only mirror of the grace of God, we are taught by this delay on his part, that we ought not to judge of the love of God from the condition which we see before our eyes. When we have prayed to him, he often delays his assistance, either that he may increase still more our ardor in prayer, or that he may exercise our patience, and, at the same time, accustom us to obedience. Let believers then implore the assistance of God, but let them also learn to suspend their desires, if he does not stretch out his hand for their assistance as soon as they may think that necessity requires; for, whatever may be his delay, he never sleeps, and never forgets his people. Yet let us also be fully assured that he wishes all whom he loves to be saved.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(5) Now Jesus loved Martha.It is not easy to see the connection of this verse with that which precedes, or with that which immediately follows. The fact of His abiding two days where He was, seems indeed opposed to the thought of His special love for the family. The most probable explanation is that which connects Joh. 11:5-7 together, and makes the love the motive for going into Juda again.
The word rendered loved here is different from that in Joh. 11:3. There the word signifies the love of tender affection; here the word, means the love of chosen friendship. (Comp. Joh. 20:2; Joh. 21:15 et seq.) The difference here is not to be explained, as it frequently has been, by the difference in the persons who were the objects of the love; but by the difference of the persons whose words we read. In the language of the sisters, whose hearts are moved by the brothers illness, the word of fullest emotion is natural. In the language of the Evangelist the other word is no less so.
It will be observed that in this verse, as in Joh. 11:19 et seq., Martha takes the first place as the elder sister.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
5. Jesus loved Martha By placing Martha’s name first, John puts an unconscious contradiction upon all irreverent thought that the tenderest love of Jesus for one of the opposite sex was other than divinely sacred. The Greek term for love, in Joh 11:3, implies the love of affection; that in this verse of esteem or friendship.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister, and Lazarus.’
It is now emphasised that Jesus loved Mary, Martha and Lazarus. The author wishes it to be known that what followed was not to be seen as an indication that Jesus did not care, but rather that He cared deeply. Notice how he also balances out Martha and Mary. Mary had been especially mentioned in Joh 11:2, so Martha was especially mentioned here.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Joh 11:5. Now Jesus loved Martha, &c. On account of their unfeigned piety towards God, their friendship and affection towards each other, and their faith in him as the Messiah. See Joh 11:27. The evangelist mentions the love which Jesus bore to Mary, and her sister, and Lazarus, before he informs us, that, after receiving the message, he stayed two days without stirring from the place where he was.His design in this might be, to insinuate that our Lord’s delaying so long after the message came, did not proceed from want of concern for his friends, but had happened according to the counsels of his own wisdom. Had he gone as soon as the messenger from Martha arrived, there would have been nothing more in the recovery of Lazarus, than in that of Simon’s mother, or of many sick persons whom he had restored to health. Had he cured him without going to him, no greater effect of power would have been shewn in this miracle, than in the cure of the centurion’s servant; and might not the Jews, who lived at a distance from the scene of this transaction, have either questioned the reality of Lazarus’s sickness, or have imputed his cure to a collusion between him and Jesus, especially as there was so strong an intimacy between them? Had Jesus gone immediately after his death, and raised him either in his chamber, or as they were carrying him to the sepulchre, it might have been said that his death was a mere pretence; or, if it were granted that there was no fraud, itmight have been alleged, that he was only in a fit or trance, and recovered luckily from it just as Christ pretended to raise him. Nay, even upon the supposition that the restoring of Lazarus to life before his interment, should have been granted to have been a real and proper resurrection, it would have afforded no stronger proofs than the resurrection of the widow’s son: but the length of the time which Lazarus lay in the grave, put his death beyond all possibility of doubt, removed every suspicion of fraud, and so afforded Jesus a fit opportunity of displaying his love to Lazarus, as well as his own almighty power, by his unquestionable resurrection from the dead. Our Lord might also have a further view in thus heightening the circumstances of this miracle. The time of his own death being so near, he might intend hereby to convince his disciples, that, as he had life in himself, and could recal those to life who had been dead so long as to putrifyand become offensive, it was equally possible for him to raise himselfafter his own death, according to the intimations with which he always accompanied the predictions of his dying. Our Lord’s delay, it is true, kept Lazarus’s sisters in the most painful suspense, and at last pierced them with the affliction of seeing their brother die; yet they must, in the end, think themselves abundantly recompensed by the evidence accruing to the gospel from this astonishing miracle, as well as by the inexpressible surprise of joy which they felt on receiving their brother again from the dead.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Joh 11:5 is not an elucidation of Joh 11:3 (De Wette), seeing that Joh 11:4 intervenes; nor is it a preparation for Joh 11:6 (B. Crusius: “although He loved them all, He nevertheless remained”); but explains the motive impelling Him to open up to them the consolatory prospect referred to in Joh 11:4 : “Felix familia,” Bengel.
] An expression chosen with delicate tenderness (the more sensuous is not again used as in Joh 11:4 ), because the sisters are also mentioned. Comp. Xen. Mem . ii. 7. 12; Tittmann, Synon . p. 53; and Wetstein. Martha is named first , as being the mistress of the house, and the eldest (Joh 11:19 f.). Compare the preceding note. Hengstenberg’s remark is arbitrary: “Mary could not bear to be separated from Lazarus, because she had been most deeply affected by his death.”
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
5 Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.
Ver. 5. Jesus loved Martha ] The saints are all round about his throne, Rev 4:4 , because he is alike near to them for solace and tuition. Howbeit, as man; living among men, he was affected to some more than some, as to these three, and the beloved disciple. These were his Jedediahs, his singularly affected, and this was a high prerogative. Plato commendeth his country of Athens for antiquity of the people, &c., but chiefly for this, that they were beloved of the gods, . (Plato.)
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Joh 11:5 . It is quite true that denotes the more passionate love, and the more reasoning; but it is doubtful whether this distinction is observed in this Gospel. Passages proving the distinction are given by Wetstein.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
John
THE DELAYS OF LOVE
Joh 11:5 – Joh 11:6
We learn from a later verse of this chapter that Lazarus had been dead four days when Christ reached Bethany. The distance from that village to the probable place of Christ’s abode, when He received the message, was about a day’s journey. If, therefore, to the two days on which He abode still after the receipt of the news, we add the day which the messengers took to reach Him and the day which He occupied in travelling, we get the four days since which Lazarus had been laid in his grave. Consequently the probability is that, when our Lord had the message, the man was dead. Christ did not remain still, therefore, in order to work a greater miracle by raising Lazarus from the dead than He would have done by healing, but He stayed-strange as it would appear-for reasons closely connected with the highest well-being of all the beloved three, and because He loved them.
John is always very particular in his use of that word ‘therefore,’ and he points out many a subtle and beautiful connection of cause and effect by his employment of it. I do not know that any of them are more significant and more full of illumination with regard to the ways of divine providence than the instance before us. How these two sisters must have looked down the rocky road that led up from Jericho during those four weary days, to see if there were any signs of His coming. How strange it must have appeared to the disciples themselves that He made no sign of movement, notwithstanding the message. Perhaps John’s scrupulous carefulness in pointing out that His love was Christ’s reason for His quiescence may reflect a remembrance of the doubts that had crept over the minds of himself and his brethren during these two days of strange inaction. The Evangelist will have us learn a lesson, which reaches far beyond the instance in hand, and casts light on many dark places.
I. Christ’s delays are the delays of love.
If we could once get that conviction into our hearts, how quietly we should go about our work! What a beautiful and brave patience there would be in us, if we habitually felt that the only reason which actuates God’s providence in its choice of times of fulfilling our desires and lifting away our bitterness is our own good! Nothing but the purest and simplest love, transparent and without a fold in it, sways Him in all that He does. Why should it be so difficult for us to believe this? If we were more in the way of looking at life, with all its often unwelcome duty, and its arrows of pain and sorrow, and all the disappointments and other ills that it is heir to, as a discipline, and were to think less about the unpleasantness, and more about the purpose, of what befalls us, we should find far less difficulty in understanding that His delay is born of love, and is a token of His tender care.
Sorrow is prolonged for the same reason as it was sent. It is of little use to send it for a little while. In the majority of cases, time is an element in its working its right effect upon us. If the weight is lifted, the elastic substance beneath springs up again. As soon as the wind passes over the cornfield, the bowing ears raise themselves. You have to steep foul things in water for a good while before the pure liquid washes out the stains. And so time is an element in all the good that we get out of the discipline of life. Therefore, the same love which sends must necessarily protract, beyond our desires, the discipline under which we are put. If we thought of it, as I have said, more frequently as discipline and schooling, and less frequently as pain and a burden, we should understand the meaning of things a great deal better than we do, and should be able to face them with braver hearts, and with a patient, almost joyous, endurance.
If we think of some of the purposes of our sorrows and burdens, we shall discern still more clearly that time is needed for accomplishing them, and that, therefore, love must delay its coming to take them away. For example, the object of them all, and the highest blessing that any of us can obtain, is that our wills should be bent until they coincide with God’s, and that takes time. The shipwright, when he gets a bit of timber that he wants to make a ‘knee’ out of, knows that to mould it into the right form is not the work of a day. A will may be broken at a blow, but it will take a while to bend it. And just because swiftly passing disasters have little permanent effect in moulding our wills, it is a blessing, and not an evil, to have some standing fact in our lives, which will make a continual demand upon us for continually repeated acts of bowing ourselves beneath His sweet, though it may seem severe, will. God’s love in Jesus Christ can give us nothing better than the opportunity of bowing our wills to His, and saying, ‘Not mine, but Thine be done.’ If that is why He stops on the other side of Jordan, and does not come even to the loving messages of beloved hearts, then He shows His love in the sweetest and the loftiest form. So, dear friends, if you carry a lifelong sorrow, do not think that it is a mystery why it should lie upon your shoulders when there are omnipotence and an infinite heart in the heavens. If it has the effect of bending you to His purpose, it is the truest token of His loving care that He can send. In like manner, is it not worth carrying a weight of unfulfilled wishes, and a weariness of unalleviated sorrows, if these do teach us three things, which are one thing-faith, endurance, prayerfulness, and so knit us by a threefold cord that cannot be broken, to the very heart of God Himself?
II. This delayed help always comes at the right time.
The longest protraction of the fulfilment of the most yearning expectation and fulfilled desire will seem but as the winking of an eyelid when we get to estimate duration by the same scale by which He estimates it, the scale of Eternity. The ephemeral insect, born in the morning and dead when the day fades, has a still minuter scale than ours, but we should not think of regulating our estimate of long and short by it. Do not let us commit the equal absurdity of regulating the march of His providence by the swift beating of our timepieces. God works leisurely because God has eternity to work in.
The answer always comes at the right time, and is punctual though delayed. For instance, Peter is in prison. The Church keeps praying for him; prays on, day after day. No answer. The week of the feast comes. Prayer is made intensely and fervently and continuously. No answer. The slow hours pass away. The last day of his life, as it would appear, comes and goes. No answer. The night gathers; prayer rises to heaven. The last hour of the last watch of the last night that he had to live has come, and as the veil of darkness is thinning, and the day is beginning to break, ‘the angel of the Lord shone round about him.’ But there is no haste in his deliverance. All is done leisurely, as in the confidence of ample time to spare, and perfect security. He is bidden to arise quickly, but there is no hurry in the stages of his liberation. ‘Gird thyself and bind on thy sandals.’ He is to take time to lace them. There is no fear of the quaternion of soldiers waking, or of there not being time to do all. We can fancy the half-sleeping and wholly-bewildered Apostle fumbling at the sandal-strings, in dread of some movement rousing his guards, and the calm angel face looking on. The sandals fastened, he is bidden to put on his garments and follow. With equal leisure and orderliness he is conducted through the first and the second guard of sleeping soldiers, and then through the prison gate. He might have been lifted at once clean out of his dungeon, and set down in the house many were gathered praying for him. But more signal was the demonstration of power which a deliverance so gradual gave, when it led him slowly past all obstacles and paralysed their power. God is never in haste. He never comes too soon nor too late. ‘The Lord shall help them, and that right early.’ Sennacherib’s army is round the city, famine is within the walls. To-morrow will be too late. But to-night the angel strikes, and the enemies are all dead men. So God’s delay makes the deliverance the more signal and joyous when it is granted. And though hope deferred may sometimes make the heart sick, the desire, when it comes, is a tree of life.
III. The best help is not delayed.
Ah! there is a sad amount of lying and hypocrisy in prayers for spiritual blessings. Many petitioners do not want to have them. They would not know what to do with them if they got them. They make the requests because their fathers did so before them, and because these are the right kind of things to say in a prayer. Such prayers get no answers. If a man prays for some spiritual enlargement, and then goes out into the world and lives clean contrary to his prayers, what right has he to say that God delays His answers? No, He does not delay His answers, but we push back His answers, and the gift that is given we will not take. Let us remember that the two halves of the divine dealings are not regulated by the same principle, though they be regulated by the same motive; and that the love which often delays for our good, in regard to the desires that have reference to outward things, is swift as the lightning to answer every petition which moves within the circle of our spiritual life.
‘Whatsoever things ye desire, when ye stand praying, believe that’ then and there ‘ye receive them’; and the undelaying God will take care that ‘you shall have them.’
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
loved. App-135. Not the same word as in verses: Joh 11:3, Joh 11:36.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Joh 11:5. ) loved, in such a way as that it was evident to all; Joh 11:3, Lord, he whom Thou lovest. [Therefore there is no reason that any one should exceedingly dread the death of those whom Jesus loves.-V. g.] The motive cause of the raising again of the dead man, and of the whole of His mode of action preceding it, is herein contained.-, , and, and) Happy family!
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Joh 11:5
Joh 11:5
Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.-Martha seems to have been the head of the household, possibly from her energy and business habits. [Probably this explains why the sisters sent for him and that his delay in coming was not from indifference.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
loved: Joh 11:8, Joh 11:36, Joh 15:9-13, Joh 16:27, Joh 17:26
Reciprocal: 2Ki 4:20 – and then died Dan 10:19 – O man Mat 8:24 – but Joh 11:1 – Lazarus Joh 13:23 – whom
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
A LOVED FAMILY
Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.
Joh 11:5
The characters of these three people seem to have been somewhat different. Of Martha, we are told that she was careful aud troubled about many things, while Mary sat at Jesus feet and heard His word. Of Lazarus, we are told nothing distinctive at all. Yet all these were loved by the Lord Jesus. They all belonged to His family, and He loved them all. Let us bear this in mind in forming our estimate of Christians.
I. There are varieties in character, and the grace of God does not cast all Christians into one and the same mould. Admitting fully that the foundations of Christian character are always the same, and that all Gods children repent, believe, are holy, prayerful, and Scripture-loving, we must make allowances for wide varieties in their temperaments and habits of mind.
II. We must not undervalue others because they are not exactly like ourselves. The flowers in a garden may differ widely, and yet the gardener feels interest in all. The children of a family may be curiously unlike one another, and yet the parents care for all. It is just so with the Church of Christ. There are degrees of grace and varieties of grace; but the least, the weakest, the feeblest disciples, are all loved by the Lord Jesus.
III. Do not, therefore, despise or undervalue a brother.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
5
This is commented upon at verse 3.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Joh 11:5. Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. This simple record of His love for this family (note how significant is the separate mention of each one of the three) connects itself both with Joh 11:4 and also with the statement of Joh 11:5-6, these verses really constituting one sentence. The object of the Evangelist is to set before us the mind of Jesus: in Joh 11:4 we see the first principle of all, supreme regard to the glory of God; here His love for those on whom the affliction must fall, and whom (Joh 11:6) He cannot help save at the hour appointed by His Father. But when that hour has come, His obedience to His Fathers will and His love for His sorrowing friends unite in leading Him to Bethany (Joh 11:7).The word loved used in this verse is different from that which we find in Joh 11:3. The sisters use that which belongs to tender human friendship (see note on chap. Joh 5:20); the Evangelist the more lofty word, which so often expresses the relation of Jesus to His disciples. He loved them with a love with which the thought of His Fathers love to Himself is mingled.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Observe, 1. What an happy, because an holy and religious family, was here, and much honoured by Christ; Jesus loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus: wherever true piety dwells, it draws the eye and heart of Christ towards it. Christ had frequently and familiarly lodged under their roof, and he rewards them for their entertainment with his love; Jesus loved Martha, and her sister.
Where note, That Martha is here named first, though elsewhere Mary had the precedency, to shew, no doubt, that they were both equally dear to Christ.
Observe, 2. That although Christ loved Lazarus, yet he seems to neglect him, he delays going to him for some days: but could Christ absent himself from one so long, whom he loved so well? We find he did. Let us take heed then that we do not misinterpret Christ’s delays. He seldom comes at our time , but never stays beyond his own; our Saviour had a double end in staying thus long: namely, for greatening of the miracle, and confirming of their faith. Had Christ gone before Lazarus was dead, they might have attributed his recovery rather to the strength of nature, than to Christ’s miraculous power; or had Christ raised Lazarus as soon as he was dead, they might peradventure have thought it rather some trance or ecstasy, than a death and dissolution: therefore Christ stays so many days, that God might be the more glorified, and his own omnipotent power the more magnified.
We learn then, That when Christ delays to help them whom he dearly loves, it is always for wise ends and holy purposes.
Observe, 3. How the disciples, though they were dearly affected to Lazarus (for they had learned to love where their Master loved) yet they discourage Christ from going to him into Judea, for fear of violence offered to him. Master, the Jews of late sought to stone thee, and goest thou thither again? Here the disciples pleaded for their Master’s safety, at the same time aiming at their own: they were to go with him into Judea, and they well knew that their danger was inwrapped in his, therefore they seek to divert him from his intention.
O how has the fear of suffering made many of the friends of Christ decline an opportunity of glorifying God, and doing good to others!
But cannot God give safety in the midst of danger, if he pleaseth? Let us then not chuse our way according to our own apprehension, either of danger or safety: but as we see God going before us, if our call be clear, let us go on with courage, whatever difficulties lie in our way.
Observe, 4. How our Saviour corrects these fears of his disciples, by acquainting them with his call from God, to undertake this journey into Judea, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If man walk therein, he stumbleth not: but in the night he stumbleth. As if Christ had said, “As he that walks in the day is in no danger of stumbling, but in the night he is in danger; so as long as I have a call from God, and my working time lasts, there is a divine providence that will watch over me, and secure me from all danger; now my day is not fully spent, and therefore it is not in the power of mine enemies to precipitate my passion, or to bring the night of sufferings upon me before the appointed time; but ere long the night will come on, the working time will get over, and then shall both I and you stumble upon death; but while the day lasteth we are safe.”
Learn hence, 1. Every man has his twelve hours, that is, his working time, assigned him by God in this world.
2. Whilst these hours are not spent, and whilst his working time is unexpired, he shall not stumble, he shall not die, he shall not be disabled from working, while God has any work for him to do: neither the malice of men, nor the rage of devils, shall take him off till his work be finished.
3. Every man has his night as well as his day, in which he must expect and prepare to stumble; that is, to fall by death; for, when God has done his work by us and with us, he will withdraw his protection from us, but not his care over us.
We stumble upon death, and fall into the grave: but God receives us to himself, and at the end of our working season rewards us for our work.
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Vv. 5-7. Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6. When therefore he heard that he was sick, he remained yet two days in the place where he was; 7 then, when this time had passed, he says to the disciples,Let us go into Judea again.
It might be supposed that the remark introduced parenthetically into the narrative, in Joh 11:5, has as its purpose to prevent the idea that the delay of two days mentioned in Joh 11:6 arose from indifference. But the , therefore, of Joh 11:6, is opposed to this explanation. In order fully to understand the design of this remark, account must be taken of the of Joh 11:6, which supposes a understood in Joh 11:7 : Jesus loved Martha and Mary…and Lazarus….When therefore He heard of it, He remained, it is true (); but, afterwards He said: Let us go… We perceive thus that the remark of Joh 11:5 : He loved, refers not to the:He remained, of Joh 11:6, but to the order to set out given in Joh 11:7. This quite simple explanation does away with several forced suppositions, for example, that Jesus meant: Although Jesus loved, or this other: Because He loved, He remained, to the end of testing longer the faith of the two sisters. Jesus uses here the term of dignity, , instead of that of tenderness (Joh 11:3), either, as the interpreters think, because the question is of the affection of Jesus for the two sistersbut would not the Lord’s disciple be raised above such prepossessions?or rather because the nobler term is better suited to the pen of the evangelist, while the expression of tenderness was more appropriate in the mouth of the sisters. Martha occupies here, as in Joh 11:19, the first place (see on Joh 11:1).
Bretschneider, Strauss and Baur explain the two days’ delay mentioned in Joh 11:6 by a personal motive on Jesus’ part. He purposely desired to allow Lazarus to die, in order that He might have the opportunity, not only of healing him, but of raising him to life; these writers find here a proof of the non-authenticity of the narrative. But there is no allusion in the text to such an intention of Jesus; and even Joh 11:15 : I rejoice for your sakes that I was not there, positively excludes it; for Jesus may well rejoice in a divine dispensation, but not in a thing which He had voluntarily and purposely caused. Moreover, it will appear from the sequel of the story that, at the moment when Jesus received the message of the sisters, Lazarus had already breathed his last. If indeed, counting backwards, we reckon the four days mentioned in Joh 11:17; Joh 11:39, which elapsed from the burial of Lazarus to the arrival of Jesus at Bethany, these days can only be as follows: the fourth and last is that in which Jesus makes the journey from Peraea to Bethany. From Bethany to Jericho is a journey of about six hours, and from Jericho to the Jordan of an hour and a half. It was therefore, in all, a journey of seven and a half or eight leagues from the Jordan, near the place where Jesus was, to Bethany; it might easily be made in one day. The second and third days are the two which Jesus passed in Peraea after having received the message of the sisters. Finally, the first is that in which the messenger arrived in Peraea to inform Jesus. It was therefore in the course of this day, a little while after the departure of the messenger, that Lazarus died, and also in the course of the same day that he was buried, according to the Jewish custom.
Thus towards evening, when Jesus received the tidings of His friend’s sickness, He was already in the tomb. We see clearly how erroneous is the reckoning of Keim who says (i., p. 495): Three days were needed for Jesus to go from that region of Peraea to Bethany. Meyer is no less in error when he takes as the starting point of the four days which had elapsed since the burial of Lazarus (Joh 11:17) the day which followed the two days of waiting in Peraea. How could Jesus have taken three whole days for reaching Bethany from the Jordan? As to the reason which prevented Jesus from setting out on the journey immediately, it may be supposed, no doubt, with Lucke and Neander, that it was the work of His ministry in Peraea. But is it not better to say, with Meyer, that it was the waiting for the signal from the Father, by which Jesus always regulated His action? God might certainly act as Jesus, as a man, would not have done, and prolong the time of waiting with the design of making the miracle more manifest and more striking, with a view to the glory of His Son and His own glory.
Fuente: Godet Commentary (Luke, John, Romans and 1 Corinthians)
John dispelled any doubt about Jesus’ true love (Gr. agape) for this family. His delay did not show disinterest but divine purpose (cf. Joh 2:4; Joh 7:3-10).