John 11:1
New International Version
Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

New Living Translation
A man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany with his sisters, Mary and Martha.

English Standard Version
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Berean Standard Bible
At this time a man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Berean Literal Bible
Now a certain man was ailing, Lazarus of Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

King James Bible
Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha.

New King James Version
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha.

New American Standard Bible
Now a certain man was sick: Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

NASB 1995
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

NASB 1977
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Legacy Standard Bible
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Amplified Bible
Now a certain man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village where Mary and her sister Martha lived.

Christian Standard Bible
Now a man was sick, Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Holman Christian Standard Bible
Now a man was sick, Lazarus, from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

American Standard Version
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Aramaic Bible in Plain English
And a certain man was sick, Lazar of the town of Bethany, the brother of Maryam and of Martha.

Douay-Rheims Bible
NOW there was a certain man sick, named Lazarus, of Bethania, of the town of Mary and Martha her sister.

English Revised Version
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

GOD'S WORD® Translation
Lazarus, who lived in Bethany, the village where Mary and her sister Martha lived, was sick.

Good News Translation
A man named Lazarus, who lived in Bethany, became sick. Bethany was the town where Mary and her sister Martha lived. (

International Standard Version
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

Literal Standard Version
And there was a certain one ailing, Lazarus, from Bethany, of the village of Mary and Martha her sister—

Majority Standard Bible
At this time a man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

New American Bible
Now a man was ill, Lazarus from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

NET Bible
Now a certain man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village where Mary and her sister Martha lived.

New Revised Standard Version
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

New Heart English Bible
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus from Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister, Martha.

Webster's Bible Translation
Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha.

Weymouth New Testament
Now a certain man, named Lazarus, of Bethany, was lying ill-- Bethany being the village of Mary and her sister Martha.

World English Bible
Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus from Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister, Martha.

Young's Literal Translation
And there was a certain one ailing, Lazarus, from Bethany, of the village of Mary and Martha her sister --

Additional Translations ...
Audio Bible



Context
The Death of Lazarus
1At this time a man named Lazarus was sick. He lived in Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2(Mary, whose brother Lazarus was sick, was to anoint the Lord with perfume and wipe His feet with her hair.)…

Cross References
Matthew 21:17
Then He left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where He spent the night.

Luke 10:38
As they traveled along, Jesus entered a village where a woman named Martha welcomed Him into her home.

Luke 10:39
She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet listening to His message.

Luke 10:40
But Martha was distracted by all the preparations to be made. She came to Jesus and said, "Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her to help me!"

Luke 10:41
"Martha, Martha," the Lord replied, "you are worried and upset about many things.

Luke 10:42
But only one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, and it will not be taken away from her."

John 11:5
Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.


Treasury of Scripture

Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha.

Now.

John 12:10
But the chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death;

was sick.

John 11:3,6
Therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick…

Genesis 48:1
And it came to pass after these things, that one told Joseph, Behold, thy father is sick: and he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim.

2 Kings 20:1-12
In those days was Hezekiah sick unto death. And the prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz came to him, and said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live…

Lazarus.

John 11:5,11
Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus…

John 12:2,9,17
There they made him a supper; and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him…

Luke 16:20-25
And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, …

Bethany.

John 12:1
Then Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany, where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead.

Matthew 21:17
And he left them, and went out of the city into Bethany; and he lodged there.

Mark 11:1
And when they came nigh to Jerusalem, unto Bethphage and Bethany, at the mount of Olives, he sendeth forth two of his disciples,

Mary.

Luke 10:38-42
Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house…

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John 11
1. Jesus raises Lazarus, four days buried.
45. Many Jews believe.
47. The high priests and Pharisees gather a council against Jesus.
49. Caiaphas prophesies.
54. Jesus hides himself.
55. At the Passover they enquire after him, and lay wait for him.














(1) Now a certain man was sick.--This is connected with the preceding narrative to introduce the reason for our Lord's leaving His retirement to go again into the neighbourhood of Jerusalem.

Named Lazarus, of Bethany.--For the name "Lazarus," comp. Note on Luke 16:20, where it occurs as the solitary instance of a name in our Lord's parables. It will be seen from the Chronological Harmony of the Gospels, p. 36, that the parable was closely connected with the miracle in order of time. It is in every way probable that the form in which the truths of the world beyond the grave there took shape was suggested by the incidents which are here recorded. See also the suggestion that this Lazarus may have been identical with the young man that had great possessions, in Notes on Matthew 19:16 et seq. The induction rests upon an enumeration of instances which makes it at least probable in a high degree.

"Bethany," too, is familiar to us from the earlier Gospels (Matthew 21:17; Matthew 26:6; Mark 11:12; Mark 14:3; Luke 19:29; Luke 24:50). The modern name, El-Azirieh, or El-Lazirieh, connects it with the events of this chapter, being formed from El-Azir, the Arabic form of the name Lazarus. It is a poor village on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, about two miles from Jerusalem (John 11:18). . . .

Verses 1-57. -

7. Christ the Antagonist of death - a victory of love and power. The narrative of this chapter is a further advance in the proof that the unbelief of the Jews was aggravated by the greatness of the revelation. The issue of his sublime and culminating act of power, of his supreme and self-revealing work of transcendent tenderness and beauty, was a deeper and wilder passion of hatred. The evangelist completes his series of seven great miracles with one that in true and believing minds, evokes a new sense of the glory of God. This great last sign corresponds with the first (John it.) by being enacted amid the domestic and family life of a small and insignificant town, and also by express reference to the veritable manifestation involved in it of the δόξα Θεοῦ, on which we have frequently commented. Baur treated the narrative as an ideal composition, illustrating the great metaphysical utterance, "I am the Resurrection and the Life." Keim endeavored to reduce the whole narrative to a fiction, not so well contrived as some of the evangelist's tours de force. This is almost as arbitrary and offensive as M. Renan's endeavor (which held its place in numerous editions of his 'Vie de Jesus') to represent the miracle as a got-up scene, into which Christ, by a kind of Divine mensonge, allowed himself to be drawn. Subsequently, Renan has suggested that Mary and Martha told Jesus their persuasion that such a miracle would convince his enemies, and that he replied that his bitter foes would not believe him even if Lazarus were to rise from the grave; and that this speech was expanded by tradition into an actual event. This corresponds with what Weisse had suggested, that the story is an expansion of the Lord's conversation with the sisters at Bethany. Gfrorer ('Heiligthum und Wahrheit,' p. 311, Meyer) thought that it is the story of Nain over again in a developed form, and that Nain is equivalent to Bethany; and Schenkel has fancied that the parable of Luke 16. has been expanded into a narrative of genuine resurrection. Thorns has, in like manner, regarded it as the poetic expansion of the idea of the Christ as the Prince of life and Conqueror of death, and as based on the synoptic account of two resurrections, and on the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. These hypotheses are all incompatible with the simplicity of the account and with the apostolicity of the Gospel. Many attempts have been made to account for the silence of the synoptists concerning this narrative. Some writers, with Epiphanius, have said they feared, when their narratives were made public, to call such marked attention to the family of Bethany, lest they might have endangered their lives; but this is exceedingly improbable. Others have argued that this crowning miracle would not take such a conspicuous place in their less-carefully arranged records. It was only one of "many signs" wrought by our Lord with which they were familiar. Matthew (Matthew 9:18) and Mark (Mark 5:22) had already described the raising of Jairus's daughter from the bed of death, from what was believed by the onlookers to have been veritable dissolution; and Luke (Luke 7:11) had shown the Lord at the gates of Nain to have royally withstood the power of death, even when the corpse of a young man was being carried out to the burial. The narrative before us is not different in kind from these, though the prelude and the accompaniments of the miracle and its consequences are all wrought out with much dramatic force, while numerous touches, by-scenes, and references are introduced which give consummate interest to the whole. Another suggestion of moment is that it was not the purpose of the synoptists to detail the incidents of our Lord's ministry in Jerusalem. Let it not be forgotten that each of the evangelists records incident and discourse to which neither of the others had access. The peculiarities of Matthew and Luke are nearly as numerous as those of the Fourth Gospel. Why should not John bring forth facts from his memory which they had left untouched? (see Introduction, p. 96.). Verses 1-16. -

(1) The mystery and might of sacrificial love seen in the prelude of the miracle. Verse 1. - Now a certain (man) was sick, (named) Lazarus, of Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister Martha. The certain man who was sick, Lazarus (or Eleazar) by name, was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. The two prepositions ἀπὸ and ἐκ generally denote procession from, but the latter implies closer and more intimate original association; they here are put in apposition, though there are passages where they are discriminated (Luke 2:4; Acts 23:34; R.T. of Revelation 9:18). The contention of Gresswell that ἀπὸ referred to present residence, and ἐκ to nativity, and that the κώμη was to be found in Galilee, is not sound (see John 12:21; John 19:38). Bethany is mentioned to distinguish it from "Bethany beyond Jordan," referred to in John 1:28 (see note). The town is now known as El Azirieh, and is about a mile and a half from Jerusalem, on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives. Simonis interpreted the name to mean "house of depression," "valley-town" בֵּיתאּעֲנִיָּה (Lightfoot); Reland derives its name from בֵּית־הִינֵי, "house of dates" (see Matthew 21:17). It seems that palm branches could be then torn from the trees in the neighborhood. Arnold (Herzog., 'Enc.') derives its name from בֵּיתאּעֲנְיָּא (Aramaic), "house of the afflicted." The village has become well known in the circle of evangelic narrative from St. Luke's reference to Mary and Martha (Luke 10:38, etc.). Mary's name is probably mentioned first from the further record of her ecstatic love, which the other Gospels were diffusing through the world, and to which John makes an anticipatory reference. Her name had not been given before. In Matthew 26:13 and Mark 14:3 she was "a certain woman." John throws light on the ground of her gratitude. The efforts made by Bunyan, in his 'Jerusalem Sinner Saved,' and by Hengstenberg, to defend the pre-Reformation identification of "Mary" with the "Magdalene," and the Magdalene with the woman that was a sinner (cf. Luke 7:37 with Luke 8:2), rest on insufficient grounds. The identification of the two anointings with each other is without justification. All the circumstances are different - the time, the place, the obvious reason, the motive assigned by our Lord, the conversations which followed. If a woman who was a sinner had taken such a step, and this expression of her gratitude had been accepted by Jesus, Mary of Bethany found more ample reason for following her example (see Dr. Schaff's admirable and extended reply to Hengstenberg). B. Weiss acutely observes that this reference shows that in the circle for which the evangelist wrote Bethany was known as the home of the sisters, and Mary as the heroine of the anointing incident. Numerous other identifications, i.e. of Simon the Leper with Simon the Pharisee, Martha with Simon's wife, are precarious. Dean Plumptre's identification of Lazarus with the "rich young man" who is supposed to have given his all away to the poor, and who possessed nothing but a solitary garment; and his subsequent identification with the young man who fled away naked on the night of Christ's arrest, are specimens of ingenuity, but carry no conviction. The contrast between the ideas involved in the parable of Luke 16. and this narrative is so profound that we dismiss the hypothesis of the identity of the two Lazaruses. Strauss, Keim, and others deal with it as an expansion of the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, who is supposed actually to have been sent unto the people from the dead, but, in agreement with our Lord's prediction, winning no obedience. Vehement efforts are made in this and other ways to undo the commanding significance of the miracle. Bishop Wordsworth and Archdeacon Watkins are disposed to identify the Lazarus of the parable and the Lazarus of Bethany; the latter supposes the parable to have been delivered at the very time mentioned in Persea. Our Lord's statement, that the brothers of the rich man would not believe though one rose from the dead, was in some sense paralleled by the desire of the Jews to put Lazarus to death; but the reason given is that by reason of Lazarus "many of the Jews went away from them, and believed on Jesus" (John 12:11; cf. also John 11:45, "Many of the Jews, when they beheld what he did, believed on him").

Parallel Commentaries ...


Greek
At this time
δέ (de)
Conjunction
Strong's 1161: A primary particle; but, and, etc.

a [man]
τις (tis)
Interrogative / Indefinite Pronoun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 5100: Any one, some one, a certain one or thing. An enclitic indefinite pronoun; some or any person or object.

[named] Lazarus
Λάζαρος (Lazaros)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 2976: Probably of Hebrew origin; Lazarus, the name of two Israelites.

was
Ἦν (Ēn)
Verb - Imperfect Indicative Active - 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 1510: I am, exist. The first person singular present indicative; a prolonged form of a primary and defective verb; I exist.

sick.
ἀσθενῶν (asthenōn)
Verb - Present Participle Active - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 770: To be weak (physically: then morally), To be sick. From asthenes; to be feeble.

[He lived in]
ἀπὸ (apo)
Preposition
Strong's 575: From, away from. A primary particle; 'off, ' i.e. Away, in various senses.

Bethany,
Βηθανίας (Bēthanias)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 963: Of Chaldee origin; date-house; Beth-any, a place in Palestine.

the
τῆς (tēs)
Article - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

village
κώμης (kōmēs)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 2968: A village, country town. From keimai; a hamlet.

of Mary
Μαρίας (Marias)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 3137: Or Mariam of Hebrew origin; Maria or Mariam, the name of six Christian females.

and
καὶ (kai)
Conjunction
Strong's 2532: And, even, also, namely.

her
αὐτῆς (autēs)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive Feminine 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 846: He, she, it, they, them, same. From the particle au; the reflexive pronoun self, used of the third person, and of the other persons.

sister
ἀδελφῆς (adelphēs)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 79: A sister, a woman (fellow-)member of a church, a Christian woman. Fem of adephos; a sister.

Martha.
Μάρθας (Marthas)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 3136: Martha, sister of Mary and Lazarus of Bethany. Probably of Chaldee origin; Martha, a Christian woman.


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NT Gospels: John 11:1 Now a certain man was sick Lazarus (Jhn Jo Jn)
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