John 12:10

Blind cunning of the blind, to wish to kill one who had been restored to life! As if [Jesus] could not restore to life one who had been killed when he had been able to restore to life one who had died! And, indeed, he …

The Pharisees, however, are so inhuman that they want to kill not only Jesus but also Lazarus, because he served as an occasion of salvation for many through the miracle performed upon him, leading simple people to faith. Thus even the beneficence of Jesus became …

The chief priests consulted, how to kill Lazarus also - Here is the plain reason why the other evangelists, who wrote while Lazarus was living, did not relate his story.

But the chief priests,.... With the rest of the sanhedrim: consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death; as well as Jesus, and that for no other crime, but because he was raised from the dead by him; which shows what consciences these men had, and how horribly wicked they were; that they stopped at nothing, whereby they might satisfy their malice and envy, and secure their worldly interests and advantages.

19 The Pharisees therefore said among themselves, Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing? behold, the world is gone after him. This story of Christ's riding in triumph to Jerusalem is recorded by all the evangelists, as worthy of special remark; and in it we may observe, I. The respect that was paid to our Lord Jesus by the common people,

Consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death - As long as he lived they saw an incontestable proof of the Divine power of Christ; therefore they wished to put him to death, because many of the Jews, who came to see him through curiosity, became converts to Christ through his testimony. How blind were these men not to perceive that he who had raised him, after he had been dead four days, could raise him again though they had slain him a thousand times?

The chapter we have now begun finishes a most important division of John's Gospel. Our Lord's public addresses to the unbelieving Jews of Jerusalem are here brought to an end. After this chapter, John records nothing but what was said in private to the disciples. We see, for one thing, in this passage, what abounding proofs exist of the truth of our Lord's greatest miracles. We read of a supper at Bethany, where Lazarus "sat at the table" among the guests—Lazarus, who had been publicly raised from the dead, after lying four days in the grave.

The chapter we have now begun finishes a most important division of John's Gospel. Our Lord's public addresses to the unbelieving Jews of Jerusalem are here brought to an end. After this chapter, John records nothing but what was said in private to the disciples. We see, for one thing, in this passage, what abounding proofs exist of the truth of our Lord's greatest miracles. We read of a supper at Bethany, where Lazarus "sat at the table" among the guests—Lazarus, who had been publicly raised from the dead, after lying four days in the grave. No one could pretend to say that his resurrection was a mere optical delusion, and that the eyes of the bystanders must have been deceived by a spirit or vision. Here was the very same Lazarus, after several weeks, sitting among his fellow-men with a real material body, and eating and drinking real material food. It is hard to understand what stronger evidence of a fact could be supplied. He that is not convinced by such evidence as this may as well say that he is determined to believe nothing at all. It is a comfortable thought, that the very same proofs which exist about the resurrection of Lazarus are the proofs which surround that still mightier fact, the resurrection of Christ from the dead. Was Lazarus seen for several weeks by the people of Bethany, going in and coming out among them? So was the Lord Jesus seen by His disciples. Did Lazarus take material food before the eyes of his friends? So did the Lord Jesus eat and drink before His ascension. No one, in his sober senses, who saw Jesus take "broiled fish," and eat it before several witnesses, would doubt that He had a real body. (Luke 24:42.) We shall do well to remember this. In an age of abounding unbelief and scepticism, we shall find that the resurrection of Christ will bear any weight that we can lay upon it.

That they might put Lazarus also to death - When men are determined not to believe the gospel, there is no end to the crimes to which they are driven. Lazarus was alive, and the evidence of his resurrection was so clear that they could not resist it. They could neither deny it, nor prevent its effect on the people. As it was determined to kill Jesus, so they consulted about the propriety of removing Lazarus first, that the number of his followers might be lessened, and that the death of Jesus might make less commotion. Unbelief stops at no crime. Lazarus was innocent; they could bring no charge against him; but they deliberately plotted murder rather than believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.