Lazarus was very sick, so sick that his family thought he was dead and they actually wrapped him up and put him in a tomb. But Jesus knew that Lazarus was not really dead. He told them that he was just sleeping — that was the only thing his friends and relatives would have understood. People in those days wouldn’t have understood a concept like coma, or shock or even a near death experience — all modern day concepts.
But what Jesus did say was “This sickness is not unto death…“. In other words, Jesus was actually saying, “Lazarus is not dead, he’s just very sick”. Apparently, he knew that Lazarus would be sick and this would be an opportunity for him to heal Lazarus, not bring him back from the dead — to strengthen their faith — “…to the intent ye may believe…“
The writer of the gospel of John wrote: “Then said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead.” However, this would have been a contradiction, if he actually did say this since just a few verses before he said that Lazarus was not dead, even though his disciples thought Jesus meant Lazarus was just sleeping. Whatever the writer’s motive was in corrupting this verse is not clear, but it is a corruption in deed.
Jesus said,
“I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?” (Jn 11:25, 26)
The phrase “believeth in me“, actually means believeth what I say and teach. In the story about Lazarus, Jesus went there to wake him up, “Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep.” Supposedly, Jesus was saying that “Lazarus is dead“.
The truth is that Jesus would never have said this since he knows the soul never actually dies, it is the flesh that returns back to the Earth from where it came from and the spirit continues living — it never dies.
If Jesus said “Lazarus sleepeth“, then that is what he literally meant. As we know, the gospel writers frequently added things to what Jesus said and even changed the meaning of some things. I think this is the case in this particular story. Testing things with logic reveals Truth about them.
And verse 26 says “whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die“. The problem with this is that believing Jesus is not contingent on dying or not dying since the spirit never dies. Obviously, Jesus was talking about the spirit of man, since he said “shall never die“. This infers that whoever doesn’t believe in his teachings would die. And this, in reality, is not true. Evidently, the writer was inferring by the phrase “never die”, was one shall never go to Hell — which is false — since Hell doesn’t even exist.
Here the writer wants his reader to believe that if one doesn’t “believe in” (accept Jesus as savior), one “dies”, which means to go to Hell for eternity. Here logic reveals more lies that the writer is willing to feed the people for the intent of forcing one to accept Jesus (or Christianity) as the exclusive path to “salvation”, where no other religion can. The idea that a person can only be saved through Christianity is also untrue.
In verses 23 and 24, the writer adds more falsehoods:
“Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again. “
“Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.” (Jn 11:23, 24)
In the story, the writer wants the reader to believe that Jesus is speaking of bringing Lazarus back to life after he has been dead for 3 days. Unless Lazarus has been having a “near death experience”, this is impossible — even for Jesus! Once one has passed over the threshold of death on the other side, there is no coming back, ever! (to the same body at least)
But obviously Jesus knew Lazarus was not dead, but actually really in a sleep-like state that Jesus — if this story actually happened — knew he could bring the spirit of Lazarus back from. However, Jesus literally did say,
“Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep.” (Jn 11:11)
Jesus is not the only one who has ever performed this feat (that is if it even actually happened). What Jesus was really saying by “…awake him out of sleep” was that he was going to heal Lazarus. But here is the 100% proof that Jesus knew Lazarus was NOT DEAD:
This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby. (Jn 11:4)
This is absolute proof that the writers corrupted this passage.
So do you KNOW the four gospels are True and inerrant? If you took it for granted and believed this whole story, then you believed a lie and were deceived!
“And ye shall KNOW (not believe) the Truth, and the Truth shall set you free.” (Jn 6:63)