Mary Magdalene Title


Mary Magdalene ImageIf the Magdalene and Mary of Bethany are the same woman and if this woman was Jesus' wife, Lazarus would have been Jesus's brother-in-law. Is there any evidence in the Gospels to suggest that Lazarus did indeed enjoy such a status?

Lazarus does not figure by name in the Gospels of Luke, Matthew, and Mark--although his "resurrection from the deal" was originally contained in Mark's account and then exised. As a result Lazarus is known to posterity only through the Fourth Gospel--the Gospel of John. But here it is clear that he does enjoy some species of preferential treatment--which is not confined to being "raised from the dead." In this and a number of other respects, he would appear, if anything, to be closer to Jesus than the discipes themselves. And yet curiously enough, the Gospels do not even number him among the disciples.

Unlike the disciples Lazarus is actually menaced. According to the Fourth Gospel the chief priests, on resolving to dispatch Jesus, decided to kill Lazarus as well (John 12:10). Lazarus is said to have been active in some way on Jesus' behalf--which is more than can be said of some of the disciples. In theory this should have qualified him to be a disciple himself--and yet he is still not cited as such. Nor is he said to have been present at the Crucifixion--an apparently shameless display of ingratitude in a man who, quite literally, owed Jesus his life. Granted, he might have gone into hiding, given the threat directed against him. But it is extremely curious that there is no further reference to him in the Gospels. He seems to have vanished completely and is never mentioned again. Or is he? We attempted to examine the matter more closely.

Lazarus resurrection imageAfter staying in Bethany for three months Jesus retires with his disciples to the banks of the Jordan, not much more than a day's distance away. Here a messenger hastens to him with the news that Lazarus is ill. But the messenger does not refer to Lazarus by name. On the contrary, he portrays the sick man as someone of very special importance. "Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick." (John 11:3) Jesus' reaction to this news is distinctly odd. Instead of returning posthaste to the succor of the man he supposedly loves, he blithely dismisses the matter: "When Jesus heard that, he said, This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby." (John 11:4) And if his words are perplexing, his actions are even more so: "When he heard therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was." (John 11:6) In short Jesus continues to dally at the Jordan for another two days despite the alarming news he has received. At last he resolves to return to Bethany. And then he flagrantly contradicts his previous statement by telling the disciples that Lazarus is dead. He is still unperturbed, however. Indeed, he states plainly that Lazarus' "death" has served some purpose and is to be turned to account. "Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep." (John 11:11) And four verses later he virtually admits that the whole affair has been carefully stage-managed and arranged in advance. "And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe nevertheless, let us go unto him." (John 11:15) If such behavior is bewildering, the reaction of the disciples is no less so "Then said Thomas, which is called Didymus, unto his fellow disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him." (John 11:16) What does this mean? If Lazarus is literally dead, surely the disciples have no intention of joining him by a collective suicide! And how is one to account for Jesus' own insouciance--the blaisè indifference with which he hears of Lazarus' illness and his delay in returning to Bethany?

The explanation of the matter would seem to lie, as Professor Morton Smith suggests, in a more or less standard "mystery school" initiation. As Professor Smith demonstrates, such initiations and their accompanying rituals were common enough in the Palestine of Jesus' era. They often entailed a symbolic death and rebirth, which were called by those names; sequestration in a tomb, which became a womb for the acolyte's rebirth; a rite, that is now called baptism--a symbolic immersion in water; and a cup of wine, which was identified with the blood of the prophet or magician presiding over the ceremony. By drinking from such a cup the disciple consummated a symbolic union with his teacher, the former becoming mystically "one" with the latter. Significantly enough, it is precisely in these terms that Saint Paul explains the purpose of baptism. And Jesus himself uses the same terms at the Last Supper.

As Professor Smith points out, Jesus' career is very similar to those of other magicians, healers, wonder-workers and miracle-workers of the period. Throughout the four Gospels, for example, he consistently meets secretly with the people he is about to heal or speaks quietly with them alone. Afterward he often asks them not to dilvuge what transpired. And so far as the general public is concerned he speaks habitually in allegories and parables.

It would seem, then, that Lazarus, during Jesus' sojourn at the Jordan, has embarked on a typical initiation rite, leading as such rites traditionally did to a symbolic resurrection and rebirth. In the light of the disciples' desire to "die with him" becomes perfectly comprehensible--as does Jesus' otherwise inexplicable complacancy about the the whole affair. Granted, Mary and Martha would appear to be genuinely distraught--as would a number of other people. But they may simply have misunderstood or misconstrued the point of the exercise. Or perhaps something seemed to have gone wrong with the initiation--a not uncommon occurrence. Or perhaps the whole affair was a skillfully contrived piece of stagecraft whose true nature and purpose were known only to a very few.

If the Lazarus incident does reflect a ritual initiation, he is clearly receiving very preferential treatment. Among other things, he is apparantly being initiated before any of the disciples--who, indeed, seem decidedly envious of his privilege. Buy why should this hitherto unknown man of Bethany thus be singled out? Why should he undergo an experience in which the disciples are so eager to join him? Why should later, mystically oriented "heretics" like the Carpocratians have made so much of the matter? And why should the entire episode have been expurgated from the Gospel of Mark? Perhaps because Lazarus was "he whom Jesus loved"--more than the other disciples. Perhaps because Lazarus had some special connection with Jesus--like that of brother-in-law. Perhaps both. It is possible that Jesus came to know and love Lazarus precisely because Lazarus was his brother-in-law. In any case the love is repeatedly stressed. When Jesus returns to Bethany and weeps, or feigns to weep, for Lazarus' death, the bystanders echo the words of the messenger, "Behold how he loved him!" (John 11:36)

The author of the Gospel of John--the Gospel in which the Lazarus story figures--does not at any point identify himself as "John." In fact he does not name himself at all. He does, however, refer to himself as "the beloved disciple," "the one whom Jesus love," and clearly implies that he enjoys a unique and preferred status over his comrades. At the Last Super, for example, he flagrantly displays his personal proxmity to Jesus, and it is to him alone that Jesus confides the means whereby betrayal will occur:

Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved.

Simon Peter therefore beckoned to him, that he should ask who it should be of whom he spake.

He then lying on Jesus' breast saith unto him, Lord, who is it?

Jesus answered, He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it. And when he had dipped the sop he gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. (John 13:23-26)

Who is this "beloved disciple" on whose testimony the Fourth Gospel is based? All the evidence suggests that he is in fact Lazarus--"he whom Jesus loved." It would seem, then, that Lazarus and the "beloved disciple" are one and the same person, and that Lazarus is the real identity of "John." This conclusion would seem to be almost inevitable. Nor were we alone in reaching it. According to Professor William Brownlee, a leading biblical scholar and one of the foremmost experts on the Dead Sea Scrolls, "From internal evidence in the Fourth Gospel . . . the conclusion is that the beloved disciple is Lazarus of Bethany."

If Lazarus and the "beloved disciple" are one and the same, it would explain a number of anomalies. It would explain Lazarus' mysterious disappearance from the scriptural account and his apparent absence during the Crucifixion. For if Lazarus and the "beloved disciple" were one and the same, Lazarus would have been present at the Crucifixion. And it would have been to Lazarus that Jesus entrusted the care of his mother. The words with which he did so might well be the words of a man referring to his brother-in-law:

When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!

Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home. (John 19:26-27)

The last word of this quotation is particularl revelatory. For the other disciples have left their homes in Galilee and, to all intents and purposes, are homeless. Lazarus, however, does have a home--that crucial house in Bethany where Jesus himself was accustomed to stay.

After the priests are said to have decided on his death, Lazarus is not again mentioned by name. He would appear to vanish completely. But if he is indeed the "beloved disciple," he does not vanish after all, and his movements and activities can be traced to the very end of the Fourth Gospel. And here, too, there is a curious episode that warrants examination. At the end of the Fourth Gospel Jesus forecasts Peter's death and instructs Peter to "follow" him:

Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following; which also leaned on his breast at supper, and said, Lord, which is he that betrayeth thee?

Peter seeing him saith to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do?

Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? follow thou me.

Then went this saying abroad amont the brethren, that that disciples should not die; yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not; but, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?

This is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true. (John 21:20-24)

Despite its ambiguous phraseology, the import of this passage would seem to be clear. The "beloved disciple" has been explicitly instructed to wait for Jesus' return. And the text itself is quite emphatic in stressing that this return is not to be understood symbolically in the sense of a "second coming." On the contrary, it implies something more mundane. It implies that Jesus, after dispatching his other followers out into the world, must soon return with some special commission for the "beloved disciple." It is almost as if they have specific, concrete arrangements to conclude and plans to make.

If the "beloved disciple" is Lazarus, such collusion, unknown to the other disciples, would seem to have a certain precedent. In the week before the Crucifixion Jesus undertakes to make his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, and in order to do so in accordance with Old Testament prophecies of a Messiah, he must be riding astride an ass. (Zechariah 9:9-10) Accordingly an ass must be procured. In luke's Gospel Jesus dispatches two disciples in Bethany, where, he tells them, they will find an ass awaiting them. They are instructed to tell the beast's owner that the "Master has need of it." When everything transpires as Jesus has forecast, it is regarded as a sort of miracle. But is there really anything very extraordinary about it? Does it not merely attest to carefully laid plans? And would not the man from Bethany who provides an ass at the appointed time seem to be Lazarus?

This certainly is the conclusion of Doctor Hugh Schonfield. He argues convincingly that the arrangements for Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem were entrusted to Lazarus and that the other disciples had no knowledge of them. If this were indeed the case, it attests to an inner circle of Jesus' followers, a core of collaborators, coconspirators or family members who alone are admitted to their master's confidence. Doctor Schonfield believes that Lazarus is part of just a circle. And his belief concurs with Professor Smith's insistence on the preferential treatment Lazarus received by virtue of his initiation, or symbolic death, at Bethany. It is possible that Bethany was a cult center, a place reserved for the unique rituals over which Jesus presided. . . .

In any case, the collusion which to elicit an ass from the "man from Bethany" may well be displaying itself again at the mysterious end of the Fourth Gospel--when Jesus orders the "beloved disciple" to tarry until he returns. It would seem that he and the "beloved disciple" have plans to make. And it is not unreasonable to assume that these plans included the care of Jesus' family. At the Crucifixion he had already entrusted his mother to the "beloved disciple's" custody. If he had a wife and children, they, presumably, would have been entrusted to the "beloved disciple" as well. This, of course, would be all the more plausible if the "beloved disciple" were indeed his brother-in-law.

According to much later tradition Jesus' mother eventually died in exile at Ephesus--from whence the Fourth Gospel is said to have subsequetly issued. There is no indication, however, that the "beloved disciple" attended Jesus' mother for the duration of her life. According to Professor Schonfield the Fourth Gospel was probably not composed at Ephesus, only reworked, revised, and edited by a Greek elder there--who made it conform to his own ideas.

If the "beloved disciple" did not go to Ephesus, what became of him? If he and Lazarus were one and the same, the question can be answered, for tradition is quite explicit about what beame of Lazarus. According to tradition as well as certain early Church writers, Lazarus, the Magdalene, Martha, Joseph of Arimathea, and a few others were transported by ship to Marseilles. Here Joseph was supposedly concecrated by Saint Philip and sent on to England, where he established a church at Glastonbury. Lazarus and the Magdalene, however, are said to have remained in Gaul. Tradition maintains that the Magdalene died at either Aix-en-Provence or Saint Baume, and Lazarus at Marsailles after founding the first bishopric there. One of their companions, Saint Maximim, is said to have founded the first bishopric of Narbonne.

If Lazarus and the "beloved disciple" were one and the same, there would thus be an explanation for their joint disappearance. Lazarus, the true "beloved disciple," would seem to have been set ashore at Marsailles, together with his sister--who, as tradition subsequently maintains, was carrying with her the Holy Grail, the "blood royal." And the arrangements for this escape and exile would seem to have been made by Jesus himself, together with the "beloved disciple," at the end of the Fourth Gospel.


Holy Blood, Holy Grail
Page 338-344


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Holy Blood, Holy Grail
by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh and Henry Lincoln
Mary Magdalene
Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3
Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6
Other Resources
References   Magdalene Links


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