“Your voice, O Lord, destroyed the kingdom of Hades, and by the power of Your word, You raised Lazarus from the tomb after four days. He became the saving pre-figurement of the resurrection…”
(Stichera from the Saturday of Lazarus)
Almost every week of the Great Fast has its special liturgical features. The same must be said of its Saturdays and Sundays which are dedicated to some event in the life of Jesus Christ, His Blessed Mother and the Church or the Saints.
The special characteristic of the sixth week of the Forty Days Fast is that it spiritually prepares us for two great and glorious events in the life of Jesus Christ: the resurrection of Lazarus from the dead, to which are dedicated the Saturday before Palm Sunday, and the triumphal entry into Jerusalem of our Lord Jesus Christ, which the Church celebrates on Palm Sunday.
Let us examine closely the spiritual significance of the week of Palm Sunday and the celebration of the Saturday of Lazarus.
The Week of Palm Sunday
In our liturgical books this week bears the name the week of palms (i.e., palm branches), flowers or blossom-bearing week. The dominant theme of the services of this week is the ending of the Great Fast and the preparation of the faithful for the great miracle of the raising of Lazarus from the dead and Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.
Strictly speaking, the Great Fast ends on the Friday of this week. The Saturday of Lazarus is outside the scope of the Great Fast. That this is a concluding service is evident when on Friday we sing in the stichera of Vespers:
“Having completed the Forty Days Fast for the benefit of our souls, permit us, O Lover of mankind to also see the holy week of Your Passion, so that during this week we may glorify Your majesty and Your incomprehensible Providence regarding us as we sing with one mind and heart: Glory to You, O Lord!”
In the first centuries of Christianity, it was customary for the monks to leave their monasteries during the period of the Great Fast to retire into the desert to spend the Forty Days Fast in prayer and fasting. On the Friday before Lazarus Saturday, however, they returned again to their monasteries. Therefore, in the canon of the Thursday Matins service the Church calls out to them:
“You who are in the deserts and caves, assemble and come to greet with songs the Lord of glory who comes riding on a donkey.” (Ode 4) At solemn Vespers on the Eve of Palm Sunday, all the monks who had assembled began singing with joy, “Today the grace of the Holy Spirit has gathered us together, and we, having taken up Your Cross, exclaim, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, hosanna in the highest.”’
The leading character in the church services of this week is the righteous Lazarus. The Monday service calls this week the vestibule to Lazarus Saturday: “The vestibule to the resurrection of Lazarus is opened,” says the eighth Ode of the canon of Matins, “for Christ is coming to wake the dead Lazarus from sleep and to conquer death with life.” In the eighth Ode of the canon of Tuesday’s Matins we sing: “Rejoice, O Bethany, home of Lazarus, for Christ having come to you, accomplished the glorious resurrection of Lazarus.”
In the services of this week the Church frequently calls upon the faithful to prepare themselves worthily with good deeds to meet Christ:
“Bearing the branches of good deeds and the palm branches of chastity, let us all prepare ourselves to meet Christ who is approaching Jerusalem as our God.” (Ode 9 of the canon of Monday Matins) “Uniting love with mercy, let us, the faithful hasten to offer our good works up to Christ as a prayer, asking that He raise us also from the grave of our secret passions.”
(Ode 4 of the canon of Thursday’s Matins)
The Celebration of the Saturday of Lazarus
The celebration of the event of the resurrection of Lazarus on the Saturday before Palm Sunday, dates back to the first centuries of Christianity. In the fourth century in the East, the Saturday of Lazarus was already a universal and solemn feastday. The pilgrim Silvia Egeria who lived in the fourth century, gives a detailed description of the celebration of Lazarus Saturday at that time in Jerusalem. In the Diary of her pilgrimage we read that on this day following the morning Divine Liturgy there was a procession to the home of Lazarus in Bethany, approximately two miles from Jerusalem. The bishop of Bethany, priests, monks and the faithful took part in the procession. On the way, not far from Bethany, the procession stopped for a visit to the church which stands on the very spot where Mary, the sister of Lazarus, met the Lord and told Him of the death of her brother. In this church, the Gospel which refers to this meeting of Mary with Christ was read. Afterwards the procession continued to the tomb of Lazarus, chanting hymns and psalms along the way. Such a multitude had already gathered there that they filled not only the place itself but also overflowed into the surrounding fields. At the grave of Lazarus a service was held which included the reading of the Gospel relating to the resurrection of Lazarus. During the seventh and eighth centuries, the Church hymnographers, St. Andrew of Crete, St. Cosmas of Maiuma, and St. John of Damascus composed sticheras and canons for the service of Lazarus Saturday. This service bears the character of a feast of our Lord, as is evident from the hymns sung at Matins service of Sunday, “The Choir of Angels”: “Now that we have seen the Resurrection of Christ;” and “Holy is the Lord our God”. On this day instead of the Trisagion Hymn “All who have been baptized into Christ” is sung at the Liturgy, recalling that at one time, on the Saturday of Lazarus, the catechumens were baptized.
A venerable tradition of the Church relates that Lazarus, after his resurrection, left Bethany because the Jewish leaders sought to kill him. He then sailed to the island of Cyprus, where he became a bishop, and lived for thirty years after his resurrection, before he died.
The Prologue, that is, the book containing biographies of the Saints of the Eastern Church, gives October 17 as the date of the translation of the relics of Lazarus. The Prologue relates that the Byzantine emperor, Leo the Philosopher (886-912), built a church in Constantinople in honor of Lazarus. The relics of Lazarus were discovered by emperor Leo on the island of Cyprus where they were enshrined in a marble casket bearing the inscription: “The Four-day Lazarus, Friend of Christ.” The emperor Leo ordered these relics to be transferred to a silver casket and placed in the Church of Lazarus in the capital city of Constantinople.
The Latin Church commemorates the feast of Lazarus on Friday of the fourth week of the Great Fast and again on the 17th of December.
The Meaning of the Miracle of the Resurrection of Lazarus
Jesus Christ wrought many miracles during His lifetime but none was so rich in its effects as the resurrection of Lazarus.
For many, this miracle was convincing proof of Christ’s divinity. One of the Fathers of the Church said: “Our Saviour snatched the daughter of Jairus from the hands of death, the youth of Naim from the jaws of death, but Lazarus He snatched from the very bowels of death.” This miracle marks the apex of Christ’s self-revelation. Here Christ reveals himself as the Lord of life and death, the Conqueror of death, and as the Almighty God Himself. The renowned church writer and ascetic, Father Maurice Meschler, S.J., reflecting on the greatness of this miracle and the impact it had on the Jews, says: “The one who worked this miracle was not Jesus of Nazareth, not the mighty teacher of the law, not one of the prophets of old, nor a spirit from another world, it was the living God Himself. One word from Him rings through the abysses of eternity and brings the soul back from the ends of the world beyond; a flash of lightning pierces the darkness of the grave, and rekindles in the dead bones the spark of life.” (Life of Jesus Christ, Vol. II, pp. 103-104) This miracle is the symbol of the glorious resurrection of Christ and at the same time, the prefigurement of the resurrection of all people.
The magnitude of this miracle and the publicity attending it were the immediate causes of Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. The people, in their enthusiasm for Christ, greeted Him not only as their prophet, but also as their Messias, their King and Lord.
Finally, the resurrection of Lazarus hastened the passion and death of our Saviour. Great crowds of people came to believe in Christ and to follow Him; this disturbed the leaders of the Jews, who immediately after Christ’s entry into Jerusalem, called a meeting: “The chief priests and the Pharisees therefore gathered together a council, and said:
‘What are we going to do? For this man is working many signs. If we let him alone as he is, all will believe in him’…So from that day forth their plan was to put him to death.” (Jo. 11,47-48 and 53 and 12,10)
May this great and wonderful miracle of the resurrection of Lazarus strengthen also our faith in the divinity of Christ and in our own personal resurrection. That same Christ, who raised the four-day Lazarus from the dead, in His own time will raise us also to a life of eternal happiness. He Himself assured us of this when He said:
“I am the Resurrection and Life. Whoever believes in me, even though he die, shall live!” (Jo. 11,25)
