Lazarus is Dead

by Richard Beard

  This attention to detail is respected throughout the pictorial record—it remains artistically true because it is true. From Giotto in 1304 to Rembrandt in 1630, Lazarus is clean-shaven. Van Gogh (1891) gives him a wispy ginger beard, but only because he sees himself as Lazarus, and Lazarus as him, as followers everywhere do for whichever Christ they choose.

  Can we be more precise? Bethany is an outlying village, and Lazarus is fit from regular trips into Jerusalem, with firm buttocks from the uphill tramp back home. He has a watchful look in his eyes. He never forgets that he’s a Nazarene despite his thirteen years in the south.

  And his age: he is thirty-two years old, the same age as Jesus, a man in his physical prime.

  In the darkest hour of the night, Joseph the father of Jesus barges into his best friend’s house, and hurries both families out to a waiting cart. He has an assertiveness about him, an absolute seriousness with which there is no arguing.

  ‘I haven’t got time to explain.’

  They must have been friends for Eliakim to trust him. Joseph and Eliakim are Bethlehem neighbours, workmates who travel daily to the Temple building site, and both from the line of David. Eliakim the father of Lazarus wouldn’t have bundled his family into the darkness for just anyone.

  Eliakim’s wife Sarah is pregnant again, and in the cart she bumps and shudders over the desert stones along with the toddlers, Jesus and Lazarus. The older girls Martha and Mary sometimes walk and sometimes ride, but Joseph and Eliakim trudge forever at either end of the cart, their emigrant convoy propelled by hope ahead and disaster behind.

  On the first day, or perhaps the second, the news of the massacre in Bethlehem overtakes them. Joseph doesn’t know what to say.

  ‘The children. They are very special.’

  ‘I know that.’ Eliakim understands instantly that they can’t go back. ‘Every child is special.’

  ‘The boys needed saving. Our boys.’

  ‘How did you know the soldiers were coming?’

  Joseph remembers the angel from his unbelievable dream.

  ‘I overheard some talk at the Temple.’

  Neither man stops walking.

  ‘Thanks,’ Eliakim says, eventually. ‘For everything.’

  ‘That’s what friends are for.’

  5.

  All the sources suggest that Lazarus was rich. By the time information begins to resurface in thirteenth-century Spain, in the Legenda Sanctorum, or Golden Legend, of 1260, Lazarus and his sisters live in separate opulent castles each with a view over Jerusalem.

  Not true (archaeologists have uncovered no remains of castles directly outside the city), but even in John’s pinched account there is convincing evidence of money. Lazarus owns an expensive tomb, with two separate chambers and a sliding door. As a dead man he is wrapped in linen, the finest textile available for shrouds. There is at least one bottle of three-hundred-shekel perfume in his house, later used by Mary to wash the feet of Jesus.

  This ability to generate wealth supports the view that Lazarus has connections with the Jerusalem Temple. And the village of Bethany, between the desert and the city, is perfectly placed to satisfy the Temple’s demand for sacrificial lambs.

  The numbers are astonishing. Each and every synagogue will expect to slaughter a thousand lambs a year. At new moons and the seven annual festivals, sinners make additional offerings of repentance. Many of these supplicants are the ill and sick whose prayers for forgiveness are the same as prayers for health—killing a sheep is ancient medicine.

  The rock-cut tomb, the expensive perfume, the shroud: Lazarus is an overseer. He makes a healthy living from underpaying the shepherds and overcharging the priests, an expert at the feints necessary to realise a profit, to get more for less, or something for nothing.

  His ambition to get on in the world may, possibly, have inhibited his spiritual growth, but he doesn’t care. Not caring gives him charisma, a self-reliance the Temple priests have learned to trust. He is weak on god, but gets things done. He’s an individualist before his time, a fact as biographically persuasive as his shaven face. Raised in small-town Nazareth, as a young man he moved the length of the country to live and work within walking distance of Jerusalem. He is enterprising and economically mobile. He is not like anyone else.

  From the Bethany cemetery to Jerusalem, Lazarus pulls two lambs behind him on a length of red rope. Small brown hooves skitter on the path as Lazarus lengthens his stride down the slope of the first valley. Within minutes, his clothes are drenched in sweat. He climbs hard up the next hill, hands pushing down on his thighs.

  Unusually, Absalom easily keeps up with Lazarus and the trotting lambs.

  ‘They believe it happened,’ he says. ‘They’re calling it a miracle.’

  ‘Must make it almost worthwhile getting married.’

  Lazarus would prefer to conserve his energy, but this is a conversation that Absalom is determined to have.

  ‘They swear on their mothers’ lives. The water turned into wine.’

  ‘They were drunk. It was a wedding. I know what they’re like in the Galilee. The water was poured into old jars, and peasants drink straight from the jar. It was dark and late. They smelled the old wine on the rims and tasted what they wanted to taste.’

  At the crest of the hill, Lazarus has to stop and rest. Today, for some reason, he is struggling to walk and talk at the same time. He blows hard as he catches his breath, his hands braced on his knees.

  ‘Anything wrong?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  The lambs jump past him and he pulls them back, then lifts his head.

  On the far side of the second valley is the shining city. From a distance, from above, red in the midday sunlight, the walls of Jerusalem never fail to impress him.

  ‘I thought Jesus was your friend,’ Absalom says.

  ‘He is my friend.’

  ‘Maybe this isn’t a good time.’ Absalom walks on ahead. ‘You have a lot on your mind.’

  Lazarus straightens up, wipes the sweat from his eyes. Nothing wrong with him that a brisk walk in the fresh air won’t cure. The story about Jesus at the wedding has upset him more than it should, because they aren’t in competition, not any more. Lazarus had forged ahead years ago. He was the one succeeding in Jerusalem, the capital city his second home.

  Inside the walls the streets and alleys of the city are alive with people, animals, noise.

  Lazarus is easily recognised by his cheekbones, the open curve of his lips, his jaw. There is a shine on the shaven skin of his face, and he stands out from the crowd like a foreigner. A boy tugs at his clothes.

  ‘Can Jesus make me a faster runner?’

  Lazarus growls and the boy runs away, laughing. Lazarus licks sweat from his upper lip and snorts at a shouted joke he doesn’t properly hear. Ishmael the baker stands outside his shop. He steeples his hands in front of his face, makes a little bow.

  ‘Lazarus,’ he says. ‘You’re looking well.’

  Along the narrow streets, sunlight spills off the overhead canopies and breaks on the paving stones into spikes. Lazarus carries his lambs one under each arm, protecting them from the shouting, begging, the hooves of beasts and the stench of daily sacrifice. Down the smoke-filled alleys barefooted boys run errands. Servant girls carry baskets of bread and a military patrol goes by, dark scarlet and tarnished metal, high-laced sandals slapping the warm worn pave-stones.

  In doorways and on corners sit the poor and crippled, but bad luck can happen to anyone. Lazarus is thinking ahead to his meeting with Isaiah, who is famously devout but whose daughter, alas, is one among the unfortunates. However high Isaiah rises in the council of priests, his daughter Saloma is there in his house as a penance, a reminder of the good left undone.

  ‘Come on,’ Lazarus says to Absalom. ‘Let’s not keep him waiting.’

  The Lazarus family and the Jesus family had been Bethle­hem neighbours, the fathers close friends, two young Davidians on the work gangs of the second Temple. Jo
seph would splice the wooden joists, Eliakim cut the stones for the walls. The stones were rougher work, but then Eliakim was the stronger of the two.

  Eliakim had named his second daughter Mary, after the serenity he admired in the wife of his friend. His own wife, Sarah, was a worrier. She suffered at the birth of each of their children, but for her fourth, after Martha, Mary and Lazarus, the conditions had been impossible. She used up the little strength she had on the exhausting journey into Egypt.

  Sarah died but the baby lived. It was a boy. Eliakim remembered the flight across the desert and chose not to name him Joseph.

  His second son and fourth child he named Amos, and as soon as Amos could walk he tagged along with Lazarus and Jesus. When they ran from the local Egyptian children, Amos ran too. The women forgave the older boys much for that—for their softness of heart. They allowed Amos to feel he belonged.

  They did the same when Herod died and the families moved back across the desert to Nazareth. The Galilee region was safer than Bethlehem, but unlike Joseph, Eliakim never warmed to life in the provincial north. The site work in the nearby town of Sephoris was less rewarding than god’s masonry at the Temple in Jerusalem. He was bringing up four children on his own, and constantly had to ask Joseph and Mary for help.

  Every evening Eliakim would walk home from a day’s heavy stonework and idealise his dead wife, who’d lived the last weeks of her pregnancy on a jolting cart in the baking open desert. He’d drink wine, and on bad days mutter and grumble about Joseph.

  ‘Should have kept his mouth shut.’

  He and his wife and children could have stayed behind in Bethlehem. The soldiers would have found Lazarus, he knew that, and Herod’s soldiers spared no one. Lazarus would now be dead, but children die all the time.

  His wife Sarah would have lived. Within two months the new baby Amos would have gone some way to replacing their poor lost Lazarus. They could have had more children, many more. Lazarus was replaceable but his wife was not. Lazarus wasn’t the one who should have been saved.

  The Sanhedrin, the ruling council of Jerusalem priests, insists on its place in any story of the life of Lazarus. Again, the Gospel of John provides valuable information. After his resurrection, ‘the chief priests made plans to kill Lazarus’ (John 12:10).

  That decision is a year in the future. In the meantime his job and his geographical closeness to Jerusalem suggest that Lazarus already has the Sanhedrin’s attention. Every year he sells the Temple as many sheep as he can, and Isaiah is the Temple priest charged with regulating the sale of beasts in the open-plan Court of the Gentiles.

  Up close, the marble cladding of the Temple is cracked, and in many places stained with soot from ceremonial torches. Doves crash against the sides of tight wicker cages. Lambs bleat in confusion, while behind their tables the currency changers sit with blank faces as they perform intricate sums in their heads.

  Lazarus acknowledges dealers and junior priests as he makes his way amongst them—they are his future, and friendly hearts are a reliable source of profit.

  Isaiah has taken over a recess in Solomon’s Porch, sheltered from the hustle of the main Temple courtyards. He has what they call in Jerusalem a ‘clean’ forehead, shawl wrapped tight over his receding hairline, a look much favoured in the city for its suggestion of honest intelligence. He is flanked by priests and guards as he centres himself on a formal high-backed chair. He glances at Absalom.

  ‘As a mark of my respect,’ Lazarus says, holding up the rope attached to the lambs, ‘and to bless our future dealings.’

  Lazarus has been working towards this meeting for some time, but the formality of Isaiah’s reception surprises him. The chair is not an encouraging sight, nor are the Temple guards. Lazarus adapts quickly, pulls his lambs forward, makes his eyes smile.

  A guard takes the lambs to one side. They bleat.

  Lazarus covers his heart with his hand in the sign of greeting. Isaiah waves the courtesy away, but Lazarus quickly completes the gesture, heart lips forehead. His skin is hot. He touches his forehead again. He’s burning from the inside out.

  ‘I trust your family is well,’ he begins.

  ‘My family is a gift from God.’

  ‘God has been generous.’

  ‘Lazarus, enough. We know each other better than that, but not as well as we might, it seems. We the priests are concerned about the rumours from Cana. You can help us, Lazarus. Tell us about your friend from the Galilee.’

  A chill descends on the room. Lazarus stifles a cough. He regrets ever mentioning it, but today’s water-into-wine isn’t the first that’s been heard of Jesus. There were the weeks in the desert, then the public baptisms at the river. People in Jerusalem took notice, and after one interested comment too many, Lazarus had been unable to resist.

  Yes, he and Jesus had once been friends. Good friends, actually. We grew up together. Now he curses himself for coveting the reflected glory.

  ‘At every festival there are fewer sacrifices,’ Isaiah says. ‘We both know who is responsible.’

  ‘That’s partly why I arranged to see you.’ Lazarus changes the subject. ‘These are unsettled times. We need to look to the future, we all do, in the interests of those we love. As Absalom the Rabbi of Bethany is my witness, I would like to marry Saloma your daughter.’

  In Eliakim’s honest opinion, his family would have fared better staying where they were in Bethlehem.

  Late each night he used to collapse on the floor, the handle of an empty wine jar twisting back his fingers. He groaned, wished he was dead. It was finished for Sarah, and she’d been lucky to die knowing her children were safe. Lazarus above all others was safe, and once clear of Bethlehem Sarah had gleamed with joy as if disaster had been forever defeated.

  Eliakim knew better. Children needed saving in Egypt, and in Nazareth, and would do until the end of time. There was no single day when the children didn’t need protecting.

  There were good times, too. Eliakim amazed the children with his stories about Jerusalem. A week in the big city, he said, especially at Passover, was worth a lifetime in a village like Nazareth. The Temple was a mile high and every massive stone was clad in spotless white marble. It was the home of the almighty that he and Joseph had built beam by beam, stone by stone. They were tradesmen by appointment to god.

  Eliakim could have been happy there, anywhere close to the city. They all could. Then he’d drink wine and remember to wish he was dead.

  Eliakim died when Lazarus was seven. He was working on the roof of the Roman theatre in Sephoris when a wooden scaffolding pole snapped beneath him. He fell twenty metres onto a pile of plasterer’s straw—instead of dying he broke his hip. He was carried back to Nazareth, and was recovering well. Then he caught pneumonia.

  Joseph stood last in line to make some farewell gesture to the body. The old fool was dead. His friend Eliakim, father of Martha, Mary, Lazarus and Amos, was dead. With the heel of his hand Joseph pushed a tear back towards his eye. Push it back. Death should never happen, for any reason, to anyone.

  4.

  Mary, the sister of Lazarus, is unmarried, but she is generally considered better looking than Martha because she does fewer domestic chores. ‘ “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me.” “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things”’ (Luke 10:40–41).

  Mary and Mary, the mother of Jesus and the sister of Lazarus. The number of Marys in the bible can seem clumsy, and a fiction writer would have edited out the confusion—the mother of Jesus and the sister of Lazarus (and also Mary Magdalene) should have different names so that readers can tell them apart.

  In fact there are two Marys for a simple reason: the sister of Lazarus is named after the mother of Jesus, and as a clue to her character the Mary connection is useful—the Lazarus Mary is a younger version of the Virgin Mary, and equally devoted to Jesus. Before too long, she will be washing his feet with her ha
ir.

  ‘You are unbelievable,’ she says to her brother. ‘Of course Isaiah said no. He’s more worried about Jesus, like every other Jerusalem priest. They’re so frightened by the truth they can barely breathe.’

  Mary is famously impractical. She doesn’t appreciate how Lazarus has planned it all out.

  He goes outside to think, stops at the bay tree and snaps off a leaf. He has a metallic taste in his mouth. He chews the leaf, spits it out, picks another which he slides between a gap in his teeth. The edge slices his gum. He swallows blood.

  At yesterday’s meeting he’d promised Isaiah that Saloma would want for nothing. Martha and Mary would care for her in Bethany, and the more lambs Lazarus traded in Jerusalem the more comfortable both she and Isaiah would be. It was a future any loving father should have grasped for his only daughter, especially if she was over the age of twenty and still unmarried because she had something wrong with her that nobody liked to mention.

  Isaiah had ignored this reasonable offer, and insisted on talking about Jesus.

  Lazarus feels his headache shift. It moves from behind his left eye to the centre of his forehead. He coughs once, twice, spits on the ground by the tree.

  ‘It’s absurd,’ he says to Mary, ‘Jesus and I haven’t been friends for years.’

  As adults, Lazarus and Jesus are easy to distinguish. One lives near Jerusalem and the other in the Galilee. One is clean-shaven, the other typically remembered as bearded.

  But as children in small-town Nazareth, the boys could barely be told apart. They were the same age, born within a week of each other in Bethlehem. They endured the same character-building trek across the desert, and lived side by side in Egypt (probably at Alexandria). By the time it was safe to return home, and they arrived in Nazareth, neither could remember a life without the other.