The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: S. John
And was troubled (Gr. and Vulg. He troubled Himself ). That is, He permitted freely and willingly to Himself the strong feeling both of indignation, as already mentioned, and of commiseration and tears, because of the common lamentation of Martha, Mary, and the rest ; for it would have been inhuman not to grieve and sympathise with them. For them therefore Jesus was troubled.
Note these passions of indignation, sorrow, commiseration, and weeping, were in such a manner in Christ as not to overbear His reason and will, or to arise unbidden as they are aroused with us ; but rather to follow His reason, and to be ruled and excited by it. On which account right reason always used to direct and regulate them. Therefore [S. John] says, He troubled Himself (turbavit Seipsum) ; not, He was troubled. Wherefore these passions were in Christ not so much passions as feelings in place of passions, freely taken, as divines teach, out of Damascene. For Christ was able as He chose to excite them, to soften, to moderate, to rule, to direct, much more completely than a charioteer does his horses and his chariot.
He troubled therefore himself: putting on the feeling of grief, anger, and compassion, and showing it by a change of voice and countenance because of grief. Therefore the proper cause of this murmur and trouble of Christ was the death of Lazarus, and the weeping of Mary and the Jews, as appears from the verses themselves . The misery therefore of Lazarus and of all men excited the pity of Christ, the pity excited indignation against such troubles, the indignation increased the pity, and at the same time with it aroused zeal, and a purpose of taking away those troubles, even with the casting away of His own life by the death upon the Cross, so great a benefit was alone to be purchased, according to what Isaiah says (lxiii. 4), “The day of vengeance is in my heart . . . and my fury it upheld me.”
Ver. 34. — And said, Where have ye laid him ? &c. Christ knew the place where Lazarus was buried : for, as S. Augustine argues, Didst thou know that he was dead, and art ignorant where he is buried ? Yet He asked the question ; because He acted with men after a human manner, and by the inquiry prepared Himself, and cleared the way for the raising up of Lazarus ; and excited the attention at once of Mary, Martha, and the Jews, so that they should watchfully consider the words and actions of Christ, who was about to raise him.
Symbolically, S. Gregory says: Christ recalling to the women the sin of Eve, says, “ I have placed the man in Paradise whom ye have placed in the tomb.”
Came and see . Eagerly they invite Jesus to come and see, hoping that He who had raised up strangers’ dead, would raise up also Lazarus His intimate associate, who was so beloved by Him.
Whence, mystically, the Gloss : “ See, that is pity ; ” for, as S. Augustine says, the Lord sees when He pities, according to this, “ Look upon my adversity, and forgive me all my sins.” S. Chrysostom, and after him Theophylact : He seemed to them about to go thither that He might weep, not that He might raise up [the dead].
Ver. 35. — Jesus wept. At seeing the sepulchre of Lazarus (although Chrysostom supposes that He wept when He groaned and was troubled, which is equally probable), to signify His love for him, and the grief He felt at his death.
Secondly, that He might weep with the sisters and the Jews who were weeping, and teach us to do the same. So S. Augustine. Hear S. Ambrose : “ Christ became all things to all men ; poor to the poor, rich to the rich, weeping with the weeping, hungering with the hungry, thirsting with the thirsty, full with the abounding ;
He is in prison with the poor man, with Mary He weeps, with the Apostles He eats, with the Samaritan woman he thirsts.”
Thirdly, that adding tears to His speech, He might make it stronger and more efficacious ; for tears are a sign of vehement grief and affliction, and also of desire and longing : wherefore God is accustomed to hear and answer prayers seasoned, and as it were armed,
with tears. So Christ on the [eve of the] Cross offering up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears, was heard in that He feared. [E. & Heb. V. 7, pro sua reverentia, Vulg.] So Tobit
(xii. 12) heard from S. Raphael, “ When thou didst pray with tears
[the words “ with tears,” cum lacrymis , are not in the LXX Greek], and didst bring the dead, .... I brought thy prayer before the
Lord.” So Jacob, wrestling with the angel, obtained a blessing
(Gen. xxxii. 29). Wherefore ? because he wept and besought him
(Hosea xii. 4). “The tears of penitents,” says S. Bernard, “are the wine of angels.” For it is the anguish of the mind in prayer which influences, and as it were compels God to pity, according as it is said, “a contrite and humble heart God shall not despise” (Ps. li. 17) ; just as the tears of an infant influence the mother, and obtain from her what it asks ; for God shows toward us the heart of a mother.
Other writers give different causes for the tears of Christ. First, Cyril says that Christ wept for the miseries of the human race incurred by sin. Secondly, Andrew Cretensis says that He wept for the unbelief of the Jews, and because they would not believe in Christ, even after they had seen the miracle of the raising of Lazarus. Thirdly, Isidore of Pelusium and Rupertus think that Christ wept for the very reason that he was about to recall Lazarus out of Limbo, that is, from the haven and state of peace, to the storms, dangers, and sufferings of this life.
Further, we read that Christ wept thrice : here at the death of Lazarus ; at the Cross (Heb. v. 7) ; at the sight of Jerusalem, and its impending ruin (Luke xix. 41). S. Bernard (Sermon 3, in Die Nativ.) says, “ The tears of Christ cause me shame and grief. . . . Can I still trifle, and deride His tears?” And soon after : “The Son of God sympathises (compatitur) and He weeps ; man suffers (patitur), and shall we laugh ? ” And S. Augustine says : “ Christ wept — let man weep for himself : wherefore did Christ weep, unless to teach man to weep ? Wherefore did He groan and trouble Himself, except that the faith of man, rightly displeased with himself, should in a manner groan in accusation of his evil works, so that the habit of sinning should yield to the violence of repenting.”
Ver. 37. — And some of them said , Could not this man , &c. Certainly He was able to do that, but would not, because He had determined to do something far greater, namely, to raise him up when dead and four days buried, which the Jews thought impossible, and therefore wondered that Christ had not hindered the death of Lazarus.
Ver. 38. — Jesus therefore, again groaning in Himself, &c. Note that Christ was here thrice greatly distressed, and wept. First, when He sees Mary and the Jews weeping (ver. 33). Secondly, when He saw the sepulchre of Lazarus (ver. 34). Thirdly, here, when He came to it, to show how pitiable was the lot of Lazarus when dead, and typically of sinners spiritually dead by their sins, and hereafter to die perpetually in the torments of hell. For it was they who drew forth from Him in the agony of His Passion tears of blood (Luke xxii. 44).
It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it For the more noble of the Jews were buried in caves or underground chambers, as appears in the case of the sepulchre of Abraham (Gen. xxiii. 9), Isaac and Jacob (Gen. xlix. 31), Joseph of Arimathea (Matt. xxvii. 60).
Mystically, S. Augustine says : “ This stone denotes the Mosaic Law, which was written on tables of stone, and included all under sin.”
Typically, the same says (Serm. 44, on S. John) : “ That mass placed on the sepulchre is the force of evil custom with which the soul is weighed down, nor permitted to rise up nor breathe.”
Ver. 39 .—Jesus said : Take ye away the stone Jesus commanded
this, first, that when the stone was taken away the Jews might both see the body of Lazarus, and smell that it was corrupted, and so think his raising a work of more power. Secondly, that He might speak in the presence of the body of Lazarus, and bringing it dead before God should obtain of Him that it be raised up.
Typically, S. Bernard (Serm. 4, De Assump.) : “ Let the stone be taken away, but let penitence remain, no longer weighing down and burdening the mind, but confirming and rendering it living and strong ; yes, let its food be to do the will of the Lord, which before it knew not.” So also training does not now constrain him who is free, as it is said, “ The law is not made for the righteous ; but rules and directs one who pays it a voluntary obedience into the way of peace.”