John 11:33

Here we have, I. Christ's tender sympathy with his afflicted friends, and the share he took to himself in their sorrows, which appeared three ways: -

1. By the inward groans and troubles of his spirit (Joh 11:33): Jesus saw Mary weeping for the loss of a loving brother, and the Jews that came with her weeping for the loss of a good neighbour and friend; when he saw what a place of weepers, a bochim, this was, he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled. See here,

(1.) The griefs of the sons of men represented in the tears of Mary and her friends. What an emblem was here of this world, this vale of tears! Nature itself teaches us to weep over our dear relations, when they are removed by death; Providence thereby calls to weeping and mourning. It is probable that Lazarus's estate devolved upon his sisters, and was a considerable addition to their fortunes; and in such a case people say, now-a-days, though they cannot wish their relations dead (that is, they do not say they do), yet, if they were dead, they would not wish them alive again; but these sisters, whatever they got by their brother's death, heartily wished him alive again. Religion teaches us likewise to weep with them that weep, as these Jews wept with Mary, considering that we ourselves also are in the body. Those that truly love their friends will share with them in their joys and griefs; for what is friendship but a communication of affections? Job 16:5.

(2.) The grace of the Son of God and his compassion towards those that are in misery. In all their afflictions he is afflicted, Isa 63:9; Jdg 10:16. When Christ saw them all in tears,

[1.] He groaned in the spirit. He suffered himself to be tempted (as we are when we are disturbed by some great affliction), yet without sin. This was an expression, either, First, Of his displeasure at the inordinate grief of those about him, as Mar 5:39 : "Why make ye this ado and weep? What a hurry is here! does this become those that believe in a God, a heaven, and another world?" Or, Secondly, Of his feeling sense of the calamitous state of human lie, and the power of death, to which fallen man is subject. Having now to make a vigorous attack upon death and the grave, he thus stirred up himself to the encounter, put on the garments of vengeance, and his fury it upheld him; and that he might the more resolutely undertake the redress of our grievances, and the cure of our griefs, he was pleased to make himself sensible of the weight of them, and under the burden of them he now groaned in spirit. Or, Thirdly, It was an expression of his kind sympathy with his friends that were in sorrow. Here was the sounding of the bowels, the mercies which the afflicted church so earnestly solicits, Isa 63:15. Christ not only seemed concerned, but he groaned in the spirit; he was inwardly and sincerely affected with the case. David's pretended friends counterfeited sympathy, to disguise their enmity (Psa 41:6); but we must learn of Christ to have our love and sympathy without dissimulation. Christ's was a deep and hearty sigh.

[2.] He was troubled. He troubled himself; so the phrase is, very significantly. He had all the passions and affections of the human nature, for in all things he must be like to his brethren; but he had a perfect command of them, so that they were never up, but when and as they were called; he was never troubled, but when he troubled himself, as he saw cause. He often composed himself to trouble, but was never discomposed or disordered by it. He was voluntary both in his passion and in his compassion. He had power to lay down his grief, and power to take it again.

2. His concern for them appeared by his kind enquiry after the poor remains of his deceased friend (Joh 11:34): Where have you laid him? He knew where he was laid, and yet asks, because, (1.) He would thus express himself as a man, even when he was going to exert the power of a God. Being found in fashion as a man, he accommodates himself to the way and manner of the sons of men: Non nescit, sed quasi nescit - He is not ignorant, but he makes as if he were, saith Austin here. (2.) He enquired where the grave was, lest, if he had gone straight to it of his own knowledge, the unbelieving Jews should have thence taken occasion to suspect a collusion between him and Lazarus, and a trick in the case. Many expositors observe this from Chrysostom. (3.) He would thus divert the grief of his mourning friends, by raising their expectations of something great; as if he had said, "I did not come hither with an address of condolence, to mingle a few fruitless insignificant tears with yours; no, I have other work to do; come, let us adjourn to the grave, and go about our business there." Note, A serious address to our work is the best remedy against inordinate grief. (4.) He would hereby intimate to us the special care he takes of the bodies of the saints while they lie in the grave; he takes notice where they are laid, and will look after them. There is not only a covenant with the dust, but a guard upon it.

3. It appeared by his tears. Those about him did not tell him where the body was buried, but desired him to come and see, and led him directly to the grave, that his eye might yet more affect his heart with the calamity.

(1.) As he was going to the grave, as if he had been following the corpse thither, Jesus wept, Joh 11:35. A very short verse, but it affords many useful instructions. [1.] That Jesus Christ was really and truly man, and partook with the children, not only of flesh and blood, but of a human soul, susceptible of the impressions of joy, and grief, and other affections. Christ gave this proof of his humanity, in both senses of the word; that, as a man, he could weep, and, as a merciful man, he would weep, before he gave this proof of his divinity. [2.] That he was a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief, as was foretold, Isa 53:3. We never read that he laughed, but more than once we have him in tears. Thus he shows not only that a mournful state will consist with the love of God, but that those who sow to the Spirit must sow in tears. [3.] Tears of compassion well become Christians, and make them most to resemble Christ. It is a relief to those who are in sorrow to have their friends sympathize with them, especially such a friend as their Lord Jesus.

(2.) Different constructions were put upon Christ's weeping. [1.] Some made a kind and candid interpretation of it, and what was very natural (Joh 11:36): Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved him! They seem to wonder that he should have so strong an affection for one to whom he was not related, and with whom he had not had any long acquaintance, for Christ spent most of his time in Galilee, a great way from Bethany. It becomes us, according to this example of Christ, to show our love to our friends, both living and dying. We must sorrow for our brethren that sleep in Jesus as those that are full of love, though not void of hope; as the devout men that buried Stephen, Act 8:2. Though our tears profit not the dead, they embalm their memory. These tears were indications of his particular love to Lazarus, but he has given proofs no less evident of his love to all the saints, in that he died for them. When he only dropped a tear over Lazarus, they said, See how he loved him! Much more reason have we to say so, for whom he hath laid down his life: See how he loved us! Greater love has no man than this [2.] Others made a peevish unfair reflection upon it, as if these tears bespoke his inability to help his friend (Joh 11:37): Could not this man, who opened the eyes of the blind, have prevented the death of Lazarus? Here it is slyly insinuated, First, That the death of Lazarus being (as it seemed by his tears) a great grief to him, if he could have prevented it he would, and therefore because he did not they incline to think that he could not; as, when he was dying, they concluded that he could not, because he did not, save himself, and come down from the cross; not considering that divine power is always directed in its operations by divine wisdom, not merely according to his will, but according to the counsel of his will, wherein it becomes us to acquiesce. If Christ's friends, whom he loves, die, - if his church, whom he loves, be persecuted and afflicted, - we must not impute it to any defect either in his power or love, but conclude that it is because he sees it for the best. Secondly, That therefore it might justly be questioned whether he did indeed open the eyes of the blind, that is, whether it was not a sham. His not working this miracle they thought enough to invalidate the former; at least, it should seem that he had limited power, and therefore not a divine one. Christ soon convinced these whisperers, by raising Lazarus from the dead, which was the greater work, that he could have prevented his death, but therefore did not because he would glorify himself the more.

II. Christ's approach to the grave, and the preparation that was made for working this miracle.

1. Christ repeats his groans upon his coming near the grave (Joh 11:38): Again groaning in himself, he comes to the grave: he groaned, (1.) Being displeased at the unbelief of those who spoke doubtingly of his power, and blamed him for not preventing the death of Lazarus; he was grieved for the hardness of their hearts. He never groaned so much for his own pains and sufferings as for the sins and follies of men, particularly Jerusalem's, Mat 23:37. (2.) Being affected with the fresh lamentations which, it is likely, the mourning sisters made when they came near the grave, more passionately and pathetically than before, his tender spirit was sensibly touched with their wailings. (3.) Some think that he groaned in spirit because, to gratify the desire of his friends, he was to bring Lazarus again into this sinful troublesome world, from that rest into which he was newly entered; it would be a kindness to Martha and Mary, but it would be to him like thrusting one out to a stormy sea again who was newly got into a safe and quiet harbour. If Lazarus had been let alone, Christ would quickly have gone to him into the other world; but, being restored to life, Christ quickly left him behind in this world. (4.) Christ groaned as one that would affect himself with the calamitous state of the human nature, as subject to death, from which he was now about to redeem Lazarus. Thus he stirred up himself to take hold on God in the prayer he was to make, that he might offer it up with strong crying, Heb 5:7. Ministers, when they are sent by the preaching of the gospel to raise dead souls, should be much affected with the deplorable condition of those they preach to and pray for, and groan in themselves to think of it.

2. The grave wherein Lazarus lay is here described: It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. The graves of the common people, probably, were dug as ours are; but persons of distinction were, as with us, interred in vaults, so Lazarus was, and such was the sepulchre in which Christ was buried. Probably this fashion was kept up among the Jews, in imitation of the patriarchs, who buried their dead in the cave of Machpelah, Gen 23:19. This care taken of the dead bodies of their friends intimates their expectation of their resurrection; they reckoned the solemnity of the funeral ended when the stone was rolled to the grave, or, as here, laid upon it, like that on the mouth of the den into which Daniel was cast (Dan 6:17), that the purpose might not be changed; intimating that the dead are separated from the living, and gone the way whence they shall not return. This stone was probably a gravestone, with an inscription upon it, which the Greeks called mnēmeion - a memorandum, because it is both a memorial of the dead and a memento to the living, putting them in remembrance of that which we are all concerned to remember. It is called by the Latins, Monumentum, monendo, because it gives warning.

3. Orders are given to remove the stone (Joh 11:39): Take away the stone. He would have this stone removed that all the standersby might see the body lie dead in the sepulchre, and that way might be made for its coming out, and it might appear to be a true body, and not a ghost or spectre. He would have some of the servants to remove it, that they might be witnesses, by the smell of the putrefaction of the body, and that therefore it was truly dead. It is a good step towards the raising of a soul to spiritual life when the stone is taken away, when prejudices are removed and got over, and way made for the word to the heart, that it may do its work there, and say what it has to say.

4. An objection made by Martha against the opening of the grave: Lord, by this time he stinketh, or is become noisome, for he has been dead four days, tetartaios gar esti quatriduanus est; he is four days old in the other world; a citizen and inhabitant of the grave of four days' standing. Probably Martha perceived the body to smell, as they were removing the stone, and therefore cried out thus.

(1.) It is easy to observe hence the nature of human bodies: four days are but a little while, yet what a great change will this time make with the body of man, if it be but so long without food, much more if so long without life! Dead bodies (saith Dr. Hammond) after a revolution of the humours, which is completed in seventy-two hours, naturally tend to putrefaction; and the Jews say that by the fourth day after death the body is so altered that one cannot be sure it is such a person; so Maimonides in Lightfoot. Christ rose the third day because he was not to see corruption.

(2.) It is not so easy to say what was Martha's design in saying this. [1.] Some think she said it in a due tenderness, and such as decency teaches to the dead body; now that it began to putrefy, she did not care it should be thus publicly shown and made a spectacle of. [2.] Others think she said it out of a concern for Christ, lest the smell of the dead body should be offensive to him. That which is very noisome is compared to an open sepulchre, Psa 5:9. If there were any thing noisome she would not have her Master near it; but he was none of those tender and delicate ones that cannot bear as ill smell; if he had, he would not have visited the world of mankind, which sin had made a perfect dunghill, altogether noisome, Psa 14:3. [3.] It should seem, by Christ's answer, that it was the language of her unbelief and distrust: "Lord, it is too late now to attempt any kindness to him; his body begins to rot, and it is impossible that this putrid carcase should live." She gives up his case as helpless and hopeless, there having been no instances, either of late or formerly, of any raised to life after they had begun to see corruption. When our bones are dried, we are ready to say, Our hope is lost. Yet this distrustful word of hers served to make the miracle both the more evident and the more illustrious; by this it appeared that he was truly dead, and not in a trance; for, though the posture of a dead body might be counterfeited, the smell could not. Her suggesting that it could not be done puts the more honour upon him that did it.

5. The gentle reproof Christ gave to Martha for the weakness of her faith (Joh 11:40): Said I not unto thee that if thou wouldest believe thou shouldest see the glory of God? This word of his to her was not before recorded; it is probable that he said it to her when she had said (Joh 11:27), Lord, I believe: and it is enough that it is recorded here, where it is repeated. Note, (1.) Our Lord Jesus has given us all the assurances imaginable that a sincere faith shall at length be crowned with a blessed vision: "If thou believe, thou shalt see God's glorious appearances for thee in this world, and to thee in the other world." If we will take Christ's word, and rely on his power and faithfulness, we shall see the glory of God, and be happy in the sight. (2.) We have need to be often reminded of these sure mercies with which our Lord Jesus hath encouraged us. Christ does not give a direct answer to what Martha had said, nor any particular promise of what he would do, but orders her to keep hold of the general assurances he had already given: Only believe. We are apt to forget what Christ has spoken, and need him to put us in mind of it by his Spirit: "Said I not unto thee so and so? And dost thou think that he will ever unsay it?"

6. The opening of the grave, in obedience to Christ's order, notwithstanding Martha's objection (Joh 11:41): Then they took away the stone. When Martha was satisfied, and had waived her objection, then they proceeded. If we will see the glory of God, we must let Christ take his own way, and not prescribe but subscribe to him. They took away the stone, and this was all they could do; Christ only could give life. What man can do is but to prepare the way of the Lord, to fill the valleys, and level the hills, and, as here, to take away the stone.

III. The miracle itself wrought. The spectators, invited by the rolling away of the stone, gathered about the grave, not to commit dust to dust, earth to earth, but to receive dust from the dust, and earth from the earth again; and, their expectations being raised, our Lord Jesus addresses himself to his work.

1. He applies himself to his living Father in heaven, so he had called him (Joh 6:17), and so eyes him here.

(1.) The gesture he used was very significant: He lifted up his eyes, an outward expression of the elevation of his mind, and to show those who stood by whence he derived his power; also to set us an example; this outward sign is hereby recommended to our practice; see Joh 17:1. Look how those will answer it who profanely ridicule it; but that which is especially charged upon us hereby is to lift up our hearts to God in the heavens; what is prayer, but the ascent of the soul to God, and the directing of its affections and motions heavenward? He lifted up his eyes, as looking above, looking beyond the grave where Lazarus lay, and overlooking all the difficulties that arose thence, that he might have his eyes fixed upon the divine omnipotence; to teach us to do as Abraham, who considered not his own body now dead, nor the deadness of Sarah's womb, never took these into his thoughts, and so gained such a degree of faith as not to stagger at the promise, Rom 4:20.

(2.) His address to God was with great assurance, and such a confidence as became him: Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.

[1.] He has here taught us, by his own example, First, In prayer to call God Father, and to draw nigh to him as children to a father, with a humble reverence, and yet with a holy boldness. Secondly, In our prayers to praise him, and, when we come to beg for further mercy, thankfully to acknowledge former favours. Thanksgivings, which bespeak God's glory (not our own, like the Pharisee's God, I thank thee), are decent forms into which to put our supplications.

[2.] But our Saviour's thanksgiving here was intended to express the unshaken assurance he had of the effecting of this miracle, which he had in his own power to do in concurrence with his Father: "Father, I thank thee that my will and thine are in this matter, as always, the same." Elijah and Elisha raised the dead, as servants, by entreaty; but Christ, as a Son, by authority, having life in himself, and power to quicken whom he would; and he speaks of this as his own act (Joh 11:11): I go, that I may awake him; yet he speaks of it as what he had obtained by prayer, for his Father heard him: probably he put up the prayer for it when he groaned in spirit once and again (Joh 11:33, Joh 11:38), in a mental prayer, with groanings which could not be uttered.

First, Christ speaks of this miracle as an answer to prayer, 1. Because he would thus humble himself; though he was a Son, yet learned he this obedience, to ask and receive. His mediatorial crown was granted him upon request, though it is of right, Psa 2:8, and Joh 17:5. He prays for the glory he had before the world was, though, having never forfeited it, he might have demanded it. 2. Because he was pleased thus to honour prayer, making it the key wherewith even he unlocked the treasures of divine power and grace. Thus he would teach us in prayer, by the lively exercise of faith, to enter into the holiest.

Secondly, Christ, being assured that his prayer was answered, professes,

a. His thankful acceptance of this answer: I thank thee that thou hast heard me. Though the miracle was not yet wrought, yet the prayer was answered, and he triumphs before the victory. No other can pretend to such an assurance as Christ had; yet we may by faith in the promise have a prospect of mercy before it be actually given in, and may rejoice in that prospect, and give God thanks for it. In David's devotions, the same psalm which begins with prayer for a mercy closes with thanksgivings for it. Note, (a.) Mercies in answer to prayer ought in a special manner to be acknowledged with thankfulness. Besides the grant of the mercy itself, we are to value it as a great favour to have our poor prayers taken notice of. (b.) We ought to meet the first appearances of the return of prayer with early thanksgivings. As God answers us with mercy, even before we call, and hears while we are yet speaking, so we should answer him with praise even before he grants, and give him thanks while he is yet speaking good words and comfortable words.

b. His cheerful assurance of a ready answer at any time (Joh 11:42): And I know that thou hearest me always. Let none think that this was some uncommon favour granted him now, such as he never had before, nor should ever have again; no, he had the same divine power going along with him in his whole undertaking, and undertook nothing but what he knew to be agreeable to the counsel of God's will. "I gave thanks" (saith he) "for being heard in this, because I am sure to be heard in every thing." See here, (a.) The interest our Lord Jesus had in heaven; the Father heard him always, he had access to the Father upon every occasion, and success with him in every errand. And we may be sure that his interest is not the less for his going to heaven, which may encourage us to depend upon his intercession, and put all our petitions into his hand, for we are sure that him the Father hears always. (b.) The confidence he had of that interest: I knew it. He did not in the least hesitate or doubt concerning it, but had an entire satisfaction in his own mind of the Father's complacency in him and concurrence with him in every thing. We cannot have such a particular assurance as he had; but this we know, that whatsoever we ask according to his will he heareth us, Jo1 5:14, Jo1 5:15.

Thirdly, But why should Christ give this public intimation of his obtaining this miracle by prayer? He adds, It is because of the people who stand by, that they may believe that thou hast sent me; for prayer may preach. 1. It was to obviate the objections of his enemies, and their reflections. It was blasphemously suggested by the Pharisees, and their creatures, that he wrought his miracles by compact with the devil; now, to evidence the contrary, he openly made his address to God, using prayers, and not charms, not peeping and muttering as those did that used familiar spirits (Isa 8:19), but, with elevated eyes and voice professing his communication with Heaven, and dependence on Heaven. 2. It was to corroborate the faith of those that were well inclined to him: That they may believe that thou hast sent me, not to destroy men's lives, but to save them. Moses, to show that God sent him, made the earth open and swallow men up (Num 16:31); Elijah, to show that God sent him, made fire come from heaven and devour men; for the law was a dispensation of terror and death but Christ proves his mission by raising to life one that was dead. Some give this sense: had Christ declared his doing it freely by his own power, some of his weak disciples, who as yet understood not his divine nature, would have thought he took too much upon him, and have been stumbled at it. These babes could not bear that strong meat, therefore he chooses to speak of his power as received and derived he speaks self-denyingly of himself, that he might speak the more plainly to us. Non ita respexit ad swam dignitatem atque ad nostram salutem - In what he said, he consulted not so much his dignity as our salvation. - Jansenius.

2. He now applies himself to his dead friend in the earth. He cried with a loud voice, Lazarus come forth.

(1.) He could have raised Lazarus by a silent exertion of his power and will, and the indiscernible operations of the Spirit of life; but he did it by a call, a loud call,

[1.] To be significant of the power then put forth for the raising of Lazarus, how he created this new thing; he spoke, and it was done. He cried aloud, to signify the greatness of the work, and of the power employed in it, and to excite himself as it were to this attack upon the gates of death, as soldiers engage with a shout. Speaking to Lazarus, it was proper to cry with a loud voice; for, First, The soul of Lazarus, which was to be called back, was at a distance, not hovering about the grave, as the Jews fancied, but removed to Hades, the world of spirits; now it is natural to speak loud when we call to those at a distance. Secondly, The body of Lazarus, which was to be called up, was asleep, and we usually speak loud when we would awake any out of sleep. He cried with a loud voice that the scripture might be fulfilled (Isa 45:19), I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth.

[2.] To be typical of other works of wonder, and particularly other resurrections, which the power of Christ was to effect. This loud call was a figure, First, Of the gospel call, by which dead souls were to be brought out of the grave of sin, which resurrection Christ had formerly spoken of (Joh 5:25), and of his word as the means of it (Joh 6:63), and now he gives a specimen of it. By his word, he saith to souls, Live, yea, he saith to them, Live, Eze 16:6. Arise from the dead, Eph 5:14. The spirit of life from God entered into those that had been dead and dry bones, when Ezekiel prophesied over them, Eze 37:10. Those who infer from the commands of the word to turn and live that man has a power of his own to convert and regenerate himself might as well infer from this call to Lazarus that he had a power to raise himself to life. Secondly, Of the sound of the archangel's trumpet at the last day, with which they that sleep in the dust shall be awakened and summoned before the great tribunal, when Christ shall descend with a shout, a call, or command, like this here, Come forth, Psa 50:4. He shall call both to the heavens for their souls, and to the earth for their bodies, that he may judge his people.

(2.) This loud call was but short, yet mighty through God to the battering down of the strongholds of the grave. [1.] He calls him by name, Lazarus, as we call those by their names whom we would awake out of a fast sleep. God said to Moses, as a mark of his favour, I know thee by name. The naming of him intimates that the same individual person that died shall rise again at the last day. He that calls the stars by their names can distinguish by name his stars that are in the dust of the earth, and will lose none of them. [2.] He calls him out of the grave, speaking to him as if he were already alive, and had nothing to do but to come out of his grave. He does not say unto him, Live; for he himself must give life; but he saith to him, Move, for when by the grace of Christ we live spiritually we must stir up ourselves to move; the grave of sin and this world is no place for those whom Christ has quickened, and therefore they must come forth. [3.] The event was according to the intention: He that was dead came forth, Joh 11:44. Power went along with the word of Christ to reunite the soul and the body of Lazarus, and then he came forth. The miracle is described, not by its invisible springs, to satisfy our curiosity, but by its visible effects, to conform our faith. Do any ask where the soul of Lazarus was during the four days of its separation? We are not told, but have reason to think it was in paradise; in joy and felicity; but you will say, "Was it not then really an unkindness to it to cause it to return into the prison of the body?" And if it were, yet, being for the honour of Christ and the serving of the interests of his kingdom, it was no more an injury to him than it was to St. Paul to continue in the flesh when he knew that to depart to Christ was so much better. If any ask whether Lazarus, after he was raised, could give an account or description of his soul's removal out of the body or return to it, or what he saw in the other world, I suppose both those changes were so unaccountable to himself that he must say with Paul, Whether in the body or out of the body, I cannot tell; and of what he saw and heard, that it was not lawful nor possible to express it. In a world of sense we cannot frame to ourselves, much less communicate to others, any adequate ideas of the world of spirits and the affairs of that world. Let us not covet to be wise above what is written, and this is all that is written concerning the resurrection of that Lazarus, that he that was dead came forth. Some have observed that though we read of many who were raised from the dead, who no doubt conversed familiarly with men afterwards, yet the scripture has not recorded one word spoken by any of them, except by our Lord Jesus only.

(3.) This miracle was wrought, [1.] Speedily. Nothing intervenes between the command, Come forth, and the effect, He came forth; dictum factum - no sooner said than done; let there be life, and there was life. Thus the change in the resurrection will be in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, Co1 15:52. The almighty power that can do it can do it in an instant: Then shalt thou call and I will answer; will come at the call, as Lazarus, Here am I. [2.] Perfectly. He was so thoroughly revived that he got up out of his grave as strongly as ever he got up out of his bed, and returned not only to life, but health. He was not raised to serve a present turn, but to live as other men. [3.] With this additional miracle, as some reckon it, that he came out of his grave, though he was fettered with his grave-clothes, with which he was bound hand and foot, and his face bound about with a napkin (for so the manner of the Jews was to bury); and he came forth in the same dress wherein he was buried, that it might appear that it was he himself and not another, and that he was not only alive, but strong, and able to walk, after a sort, even in his grave-clothes. The binding of his face with a napkin proved that he had been really dead, for otherwise, in less than so many days' time, that would have smothered him. And the standers-by, in unbinding him, would handle him, and see him, that it was he himself, and so be witnesses of the miracle. Now see here, First, How little we carry away with us, when we leave the world - only a winding-sheet and a coffin; there is no change of raiment in the grave, nothing but a single suit of grave-clothes. Secondly, What condition we shall be in in the grave. What wisdom or device can there be where the eyes are hoodwinked, or what working where the hands and feet are fettered? And so it will be in the grave, whither we are going. Lazarus being come forth, hampered and embarrassed with his grave-clothes, we may well imagine that those about the grave were exceedingly surprised and frightened at it; we should be so if we should see a dead body rise; but Christ, to make the thing familiar, sets them to work: "Loose him, slacken his grave-clothes, that they may serve for day-clothes till he comes to his house, and then he will go himself, so clad, without guide or supporter to his own house." As, in the Old Testament, the translations of Enoch and Elias were sensible demonstrations of an invisible and future state, the one about the middle of the patriarchal age, the other of the Mosaic economy, so the resurrection of Lazarus, in the New Testament, was designed for the confirmation of the doctrine of the resurrection.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Joh_11:33

When Jesus therefore saw her weeping

Christ concealing His glory

In this history our Saviour appears under two very different aspects.

As the sun, on some days, sometimes shines out in full strength, and sometimes is clouded over, and yet is still the same fountain of light, so it is with our Sun of Righteousness, on the day of the resurrection of Lazarus. He shines in full splendour when He exerts His power over the grave, and breaks asunder the bonds of death: but He hides all that majesty when He appears under a great commotion of mind, which vents itself in sighs and tears. (J. Jortin, D. D.)

The effects of bereavement

After sore bereavement, Sir Walter Scott says, I was broken-hearted for two years: and though handsomely pieced again, the crack will remain to my dying day. Tears--Tears are the inheritance of our eyes; either our sufferings call for them or our sins; and nothing can wholly dry them up but the dust of the grave. (Bp. Hopkins.)

He groaned in spirit

Groaned

The word occurs also in Joh_11:38; Mat_9:30; Mar_1:43; Mar_14:5. The original meaning is to snort, as of horses. Passing to the moral sense, it expresses disturbance of mind--vehement agitation. This may express itself in sharp admonition, in words of anger against a person, or in a physical shudder, answering to the intensity of the emotion. In each of the earlier Gospels the word is accompanied by an object upon which the feeling is directed. In the present context it does not go beyond the subject of the feeling. Here it is in the spirit (cf. Joh_12:21)

, and in verse 38 it is in Himself. Both mean the same thing; and point to the inner moral depth of His righteous indignation. Taken in connection with what follows some such rendering is required as He was indignant in the spirit and caused Himself to shudder. (Archdeacon Watkins.)

Natural emotions

At what and with whom was Jesus indignant? The notion of some Greek expositors that it was with Himself--that we have here the indications of an inward struggle to repress, as something weak and unworthy, that human pity, which found presently its utterance in tears--cannot be accepted for an instant. Christianity demands the regulationof the natural affections, but it does not, like stoicism, demand their suppression; so far from this it bids us weep with them that weep and seek not altogether to dry the stream of sorrow, but to bound it and keep it within its banks. Some suppose Him indignant in spirit at the hostile dispositions of the Jews and the unbelief with which this signal work of His would be received. Others, that His indignation was excited by the unbelief of Martha and Mary and the others, which they manifested in their weeping, testifying that they did not believe that He would raise their dead. But He Himself wept presently, and there was nothing in these natural tears of theirs to rouse a feeling of displeasure. Rather was it the indignation which the Lord of Life felt at all that sin had wrought. He beheld death in all its dread significance, as the wages of sin; the woes of a whole world, of which this was a little sample, rose up before His eyes: all its mourners and all its graves were present to Him. For that He was about to wipe away the tears of those present and turn for a little while their sorrow into joy, did not truly alter the case. Lazarus rose again, but only to taste a second time the bitterness of death; these mourners He might comfort, but only for a season; these tears he might staunch, only again hereafter to flow; and how many had flowed and must flow with no such Comforter to wipe them even for a season away. As He contemplated all this, a mighty indignation at the author of all this anguish possessed His heart. And now he will no longer delay, but will do at once battle with death and with Him that hath the power of death; and spoiling though but in part the goods of the strong man armed, will give proof that a stronger is here. (Abp. Trench.)

He was troubled, rather troubled Himself, for a certain Divine decorum tempers all we read of Him, and He is not represented to us as possessing a nature to be played upon by passive emotions. Why? We cannot fully tell. Perhaps, we may conceive the case of a physician coming into a room, where friends and children are sobbing over one whom they supposed to be doomed, himself weeping in sympathy though sure that he can heal. But at least this shows us that we have a real Christ. It was never invented. The imaginary Christ would have walked majestically up the slope of the Mount of Olives, and, standing with a halo of the sunset around his brow, have bidden the dead to rise. The real Christ was a dusty and wayworn man, who wept over the grave, and lifted up His eyes. The reality teaches us that the dead are not raised by a stoic philosopher, with an eye of ice and a heart of marble, but by One who is very Man with the tender weakness that is more beautiful than all our strength. His is more majestic as well as more moving. But could St. John have invented it? (Bp. Alexander.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

11:33 The loud weeping and wailing typified public displays of grief in this culture (Mark 5:38), as did beating one’s chest (Luke 18:13). • The Greek word translated deep anger expresses human outrage, fury, and anger. Jesus was furious, not at Martha or Mary, but at the futility of this scene and the people’s unbelief in light of the reality of the resurrection.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Joh 11:33. Τοὺς συνελθόντας, who had come with her) Joh 11:31.—ἐνεβριμήσατο, He groaned) Thus it was that, by a more austere [more severe] affection of the mind, Jesus restrained His tears; and presently after, at Joh 11:38, He broke off His tears [to which He had given way, Joh 11:35]: and by that very fact, the influence produced by them [His tears] on the bystanders was the greater; Joh 11:36, [The Jews were constrained to say, “Behold how He loved him!”]—ἐτάραξεν ἑαυτόν, He troubled Himself [‘was troubled,’ Engl. Vers.; and some MSS. of Vulg., “turbatus est in se ipso”]) The elegance of this reflexive [reciprocæ] phrase is inexpressibly striking: comp. ἔταξαν ἑαυτούς, They have ordered themselves [“addicted themselves,” Engl. Vers.], 1Co 16:15. The affections of Jesus’ mind were not passions, but voluntary emotions, which He had altogether in His own control; accordingly, this “troubling of Himself” was fully consonant with order, and the highest reason. The case is a weightier [more hard to understand] one, which is described subsequently, ch. Joh 12:27, τετάρακται, κ.τ.λ.; Joh 13:21; and yet it also is to be explained by means of the present passage. [So Christians are not, on the one hand, Stoics; but, on the other, they do not succumb to their own mental affections. They are not agitated with passions, properly so called.—V. g.]

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh_11:33-34.

Τοὺς συνελθ. αὐτῇ Ἰουδ.] The Jews who had come with her (see on Mar_14:53). Note the emphatic κλαίουσαν … κλαίοντας.

ἐνεβριμήσατο τῷ πνεύματι] Alone correct are the renderings of the Vulgate: infremuit spiritu; of the Gothic: inrauhtida ahmin; and of Luther: er ergimmete im Geiste, He was angered in the spirit. On τῷ πνεύματι, comp. Joh_13:21; Mar_8:12; Act_17:16. The words βριμάομαι and ἐμβριμάομαι are never used otherwise than of hot anger in the Classics, the Septuagint, and the New Testament (Mat_9:30; Mar_1:43; Mar_14:5), save where they denote snorting or growling proper (Aeschyl. Sept. 461; Lucean, Necyom. 20). See Gumlich, p. 265 f. For this reason the explanation of sharp pain (so also Grotius, Lucke, Tholuck, who thinks the word denotes a painful, sympathetic, and shuddering movement, not expressed in sounds, B. Crusius, Maier, and several; compare already Nonnus) must be rejected at the very outset, as opposed to the usage of the word. The same applies also to Ewalds notion[84] that it is simply a somewhat stronger term for στενάζειν or ἈΝΑΣΤΕΝΆΖΕΙΝ (Mar_7:34; comp. Joh_8:12). But at what was He angered? This is not expressed by τῷ πνεύματι (against this supposition ἘΝ ἙΑΥΤῷ in Joh_11:38 is sufficiently decisive), as though He were angry at being affected as He was (Τῷ ΠΆΘΕΙ). This view, which quite misconceives the humanity of Jesus, is taken by Origen, Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euth. Zigabenus, and several others.[85] Nor was His anger enkindled at death as the wages of sin (Augustine, Corn. a Lapide, Olshausen, Gumlich); nor at the power of death (Melanchthon, Ebrard),[86] the dread foe of the human race (Hengstenberg); nor at the unbelief of the Jews (Erasmus, Scholten) as well as of the sisters (Lampe, Kuinoel, Wichelhaus, Komm. üb. d. Leidensgesch. p. 66 f.); nor, finally, at the circumstance that He had not been able to avert this melancholy occurrence (De Wette). The last-mentioned notion is appropriate neither to the idea, nor to the degree of anger, nor to Joh_11:4; and the whole of these references are imported into the text. Brückners opinion: the anger is that of the Redeemer, misunderstood by His enemies, and not understood by His friends, is also an importation; so also Godets forced expedient: Jesus was indignant that, in performing this His greatest miracle, to which He found Himself pressed by the sobbings of those who were present, He should be pronouncing His own death-sentence; Satan purposed making it the signal of His condemnation, and some even of those who were weeping were destined to become His accusers. As though anything of all that were either to be found in the passage, or were even hinted at in it! The reference lying in the context was overlooked in consequence of the word Ἰουδαῖοι not being taken in the sense in which it is constantly used by John, namely, as the designation of the hostile party. It must be remembered that, in Joh_11:38 also, this inward wrath of the Lord was aroused by the behaviour of the Jews noticed in Joh_11:37. He was angered, then, at the Jews, when He saw them lamenting with the deeply-feeling Mary, and professing by their cries (of condolence) to share her feelings, whilst at the same time aware that they were full of bitter hostility to Him who was the beloved friend both of those who mourned and of him whom they mourned, nor is Joh_11:45 inconsistent therewith. Accordingly, the moving cause of His wrath lay solely in that which the text states (ὡς εἶδεν … κλαίοντας); the separative expression: ΑὐΤῊΝ ΚΛΑἾΟΥΣΑΝ … ἸΟΥΔΑΊΟΥς ΚΛΑΊΟΝΤΑς, sets forth the contrast presented by the procedure of the two, whilst going on together before Him. Alongside of the lamentation of Mary, He could not but see that the ΚΛΑΊΕΙΝ of the Jews was hypocritical, and this excited His strong moral indignation and wrath. John has simply expressed this indignation by the right term, without, as Lange thinks, combining in ἐνεβριμής the most varied emotions of the mind, as in a divine thunderstorm of the spirit. By the addition of τῷ πνεύματι the indignation experienced by Jesus is defined as having been felt in the depths of His moral self-consciousness. During this experience, also, the πνεῦμα of Jesus was a ΠΝΕῦΜΑ ἉΓΙΩΣΎΝΗς; see on Rom_1:4. John might also have written Τῇ ΨΥΧῇ (see on Joh_12:27); but Τῷ ΠΝΕΎΜΑΤΙ is more characteristic.

ΚΑῚ ἘΤΆΡΑΞΕΝ ἙΑΥΤΌΝ] not equivalent to ἘΤΑΡΆΧΘΗ Τῷ ΠΝΕΎΜΑΤΙ, Joh_13:21; nor even denoting, He allowed Himself to be troubled (agitated), surrendered Himself to the agitation (De Wette); but, as the active with the reflective pronoun necessarily requires, He agitated Himself, so that the outward manifestation, the bodily shuddering, during the internal movement of indignation, is designated by the words, and not the emotion itself.[87] Euth. Zigabenus remarks, in the main correctly: ΔΙΈΣΕΙΣΕ· ΣΥΜΒΑΊΝΕΙ ΓᾺΡ ΤΙΝΆΣΣΕΣΘΑΙ ΤᾺ ἈΝΏΤΕΡΑ ΜΈΡΗ ΤῶΝ ΟὝΤΩς ἘΜΒΡΙΜΩΜΈΝΩΝ. The use of the reflective expression has no dogmatic basis (Augustine, Bengel, and several; also Brückner and Ebrard suppose that it was designed to exclude the notion of the passivity of the emotion), but is simply due to its being more descriptive and picturesque. The reader is made to see how Jesus, in His inner indignation, shakes Himself and shudders.

ποῦ τεθείκ. αὐτόν;] This question He puts to Mary and Martha, and it is they also who answer it. Having experienced the stirrings of indignation, without any further delay, gathering Himself up for action, He now asks that which it was in the first instance necessary for Him to know. The assumption made by Hengstenberg,[88] that He already knew that which He asked, is due solely to exegetical presuppositions, and reduces the question to a mere formality.

[84] As though compelled to gather up all the deepest powers of love and compassion, first, in deepest emotion, repeatedly sighing and weeping, Gesch. Christi, p. 486. Somewhat differently in the Johann. SChr. I. p. 322: Like an old hero of the primeval age, like a Jacob, who, gathering together the deepest forces of his spirit, prepares for the combat, and in the midst of the struggle weeps aloud. Melanchthon has a similar idea.

[85] To much the same effect is Cyrils view, who takes τῷ πνεύματι to mean the Holy Spirit, and to be used instrumentally: τῇ δυνάμει τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος, Jesus was angered at the human compassion which He had felt. Hilgenfeld, in his Lehrbegr. p. 260, Evang. p. 296 (comp. Köstlin, p. 139), has recently modified this view as follows: a genuinely human feeling threatened to tear away the human person joined with the Logos from His fellowship with the Logos, and the displeasure of the Logos was therefore only able to express itself inwardly, to vent itself on the humanity. See, on the contrary, Weiss, Lehrbegr. p. 257. Interpretations like these spring from a soil which lies altogether outside the domain of exegesis. More simply, but also doing violence to the moral nature of the human compassion felt by Jesus, is the view taken by Merz (in die Würtemb. Stud. 1844, 2): He became angry with Himself because He had felt as if His heart would break.

[86] So also Luthardt (who is followed by Weber in his Zorne Gottes, p. 24): He was angered at death and him who has the power of death, His antagonist, that he had done such a thing to Him, that he had thus penetrated into His innermost circle, and had thus, as it were, thrown out threatenings against Himself. Comp. Kahnis, Dogmatik, I. p. 504: at the unnaturalness of death.

[87] As Hengstenberg maintains (Jesus stirs Himself up to energetic struggle, etc.); compare also Godet.

[88] So also Gumlich, after Augustine, Erasmus, Jansen, and others.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh 11:33 . Ἰησοῦς οὖν … αὐτόν . “Jesus, then, when He saw her weeping [ κλαίειν is stronger than δακρύειν and might be rendered ‘wailing’. It is joined with ἀλαλάζειν , Mar 5:38 ; ὀλολύζειν , Jas 5:1 ; θορυβεῖν , Mar 5:39 ; πενθεῖν , Mar 16:10 . Cf. Webster’s Synonyms ] and the Jews who accompanied her wailing,” ἐνεβριμήσατο τῷ πνεύματι , “was indignant in spirit”. The word ἐμβριμᾶσθαι occurs again in Joh 11:38 and in three other passages of the N.T., Mat 9:30 , Mar 1:43 ; Mar 14:5 . In those passages it is used in its original sense of the expression of feeling, and might be rendered “sternly charged”; and it is in each case followed by an object in the dative. In Mat 9:30 Jesus sternly charged or with strong feeling charged the healed blind man not to make Him known. In Mar 1:43 the leper is similarly charged. In Mar 14:5 the bystanders express strong feeling [of indignation, ἀγανακτοῦντες ] against Mary for her apparent extravagance. In all three passages it is used of the expression of strong feeling; but no indignation enters into its meaning in the former two passages. Here in John it is not feeling expressed, but τῷ πνεύματι , inwardly felt; and with only such expression as betrayed to observers that He was moved ( cf. Mar 8:12 , ἀναστενάξας τῷ πνεύματι ), for τῷ πνεύματι cannot be the object, for this does not give a good sense and it is contradicted by πάλιν ἐμβριμ . ἐν ἑαυτῷ of Joh 11:38 . It would seem, then, to mean “strongly moved in spirit”. This meaning quite agrees with the accompanying clause, ταραζεν ἑαυτόν , “and disturbed Himself”; precisely as we speak a man “distressing himself,” or “troubling himself,” or “making himself anxious”. To say that the active with the reflexive pronoun indicates that this was a voluntary act on Christ’s part is to introduce a jarring note of Doketism. His sympathy with the weeping sister and the wailing crowd caused this deep emotion. To refer His strong feeling to His indignation at the “hypocritical” lamentations of the crowd is a groundless and unjust fancy contradicted by His own “weeping” (Joh 11:34 ) and by the remark of the Jews (Joh 11:35 ).

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

33. Ἰησοῦς οὖν ὡς εἶδεν αὐτὴν κλαίουσαν κτλ., “Jesus, then, when He saw her wailing and the Jews which came with her also wailing.”

ἐνεβριμήσατο τῷ πνεύματι. Cf. v. 38 ἐμβριμώμενος ἐν ἑαυτῷ, this being the only other occurrence of the verb in Jn. In its primary sense, ἐμβριμᾶσθαι is “to snort” like a horse (cf. Æsch. Septem c. Theb. 461); while in the LXX it means “to show indignation” (Dan 11:30), ἐμβρίμημα being used of the anger of Yahweh at Lam 2:6. A similar use of the cognate words occurs Psa 7:12 (Aq.), Isa 17:13 (Symm.), and Eze 21:31. In Mar 14:5 ἐνεβριμῶντο αὐτῇ carries the idea of indignation: “they roared against her,” sc. in their indignation at the waste of the ointment. But in Mar 1:43, Mat 9:30, ἐμβριμησάμενος αὐτῷ and ἐνεβριμήσατο αὐτοῖς can hardly mean that Jesus was angry with the leper or the blind men whom He had cured: “strictly charged them” is the rendering of the R.V., but it is doubtful if this adequately represents ἐμβριμᾶσθαι, or if any Greek parallel can be cited for such a meaning.

All three occasions on which this rare word is applied to Jesus (Mar 1:43, Mat 9:30, Joh 11:33, Joh 11:38) were occasions, as we must suppose, of intense emotion. The cure of a leper, the restoring of sight to the blind, the preparation of Himself for so stupendous a task as the raising of Lazarus from the tomb, must have involved the output of spiritual energy in a degree which we cannot measure. The narrative of vv. 33-43 reveals, as no other passage in the N.T. does, that the working of “miracles” (however we try to explain them) was not achieved without spiritual effort or without the agitation of the human spirit of Jesus. “He shuddered” (ἐτάραξεν ἑαυτόν): “He shed tears” (ἐδάκρυσεν). And the verb ἐμβριμᾶσθαι may well express the physical effect of powerful emotion upon His voice. It represents the inarticulate sounds which escape men when they are physically overwhelmed by a great wave of emotion. And Jesus, the Perfect Man, experienced this as He experienced all else that is human and not sinful. As He charged the leper and the blind whom He had relieved to tell nothing of what had been done for them, He stumbled over the words, the loud and harsh tone of His voice indicating His agitation. “He roared at them” would not exactly convey the sense, for that would suggest violence of speech or of command. But it is nearer the primary meaning of ἐνεβριμήσατο than “strictly charged them.” So in the present passage “He groaned in spirit” is probably the best rendering; but, if not explained, it might suggest the groaning of one in sorrow, and this ἐνεβριμήσατο cannot mean. But the groaning, like the tears and the shuddering, were the outward and bodily indications of a tremendous spiritual agitation and effort.1 ἐμβριμώμενος ἐν ἑαυτῷ, He arrived at the tomb, not “indignant” at anything nor “groaning” with loud outbursts of sorrow, but making those inarticulate sounds which are the expression of mental agitation and strain.

D has the variant ἐταράχθη τῷ πνεύματι ὡς ἐνβρειμούμενος, which d renders “conturbatus est spiritu sicut ira plenus.” But, as has been said, anger is not primarily suggested by the verb ἐμβριμᾶσθαι, nor does the idea of Jesus being angry enter into the story of the Raising of Lazarus.2

ἐνεβριμήσατο τῷ πνεύματι καὶ ἐτάραξεν ἑαυτόν. Cf. 12:27 ἡ ψυχή μου τετάρακται and 13:21 ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐταράχθη τῷ πνεύματι. Putting these passages side by side, it is not easy to make a distinction between the use of ψυχή and πνεῦμα. In each case the “soul” of Jesus, as we would say, was troubled. So again Jn. tells of His death in the words παρέδωκεν τὸ πνεῦμα (19:30; see note in loc.); but he makes Jesus speak of His death in 10:17 in the words ἐγὼ τίθημι τὴν ψυχήν μου. We have not now to do with the psychological doctrine of Paul; we are only concerned with the Johannine use of the two words πνεῦμα and ψυχή; and while recognising that πνεῦμα suggests what is Divine (4:24), and that ψυχή suggests the bodily life (12:25) in Jn. as in other writers, it is not legitimate to differentiate them sharply in a verse like that before us. The Lucan parallelism (Luk 1:47):

μεγαλύνει ἡ ψυχή μου τὸν κύριον,

καὶ ἠγαλλίασεν τὸ πνεῦμά μου ἐπὶ τῷ θεῷ …

shows that the words may be used synonymously; and the Johannine usage agrees with this. See on 12:25.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Vv. 33, 34. “When therefore Jesus saw Mary weeping and the Jews who were with her weeping, he shuddered in his spirit and was troubled, 34 and he said, Where have you laid him. They say unto him, Lord, come and see.”

The particle therefore establishes a relation of causality between the grief of Mary and those with her and the extraordinary emotion by which Jesus is seized at this moment. This relation is likewise indicated by the words:when He said, and by the repetition of the participle weeping, which, like a refrain, ends the two clauses. It is now generally acknowledged that the term ἐμβριμᾶσθαι (from βριμάζειν, to neigh, to roar) can only designate a shudder of indignation. See the thorough demonstration in the essay of Gumlich, Stud. u. Krit., 1862, pp. 260-269. This sense is applicable even to passages such as Mat 9:30, Mar 1:43, in which this word marks the stern tone of menace. We must set aside therefore, first of all, the meaning: to be seized with grief (Lucke), and to groan deeply (Ewald).

But what can be the object of Jesus’ indignation? According to Chrysostom, Cyril, and other Greek interpreters, this is the same emotion which He experiences on hearing the sobs and which He endeavors in vain to master. According to Chrysostom, τῶ πνεύματι, His spirit, designates theobject of His indignation (He is indignant against His own spirit, that is to say, against the inward weakness which He feels), while Cyril sees in the Spirit the divine nature of Jesus reacting against His human nature; the same nearly, even at the present day, Hilgenfeld. The meaning given by Chrysostom, having very little naturalness in itself, would in any case require the use of ψυχή, the soul, instead of πνεῦμα, the spirit. For the soul is the seat of the natural emotions; comp. Joh 12:27; πνεῦμα, the spirit, designates the domain of the higher impressions appertaining to the relation of the soul to the divine. And if Jesus really struggled against a sympathetic emotion, how was it that He surrendered Himself to it the very next moment with perfect simplicity (Joh 11:35)? The explanation ofCyril tends to make the divine being and the human in Jesus two distinct personalities. Meyer and Weiss think that Jesus was indignant at the hypocritical tears of the Jews, which form a shocking contrast to the sincere grief of Mary. Reuss also inclines to this idea: Jesus revolts at the ostentation of this insincere grief. But the two participlesweeping are in a relation of agreement, not of contrast.

Others apply this movement of indignation to the want of faith which Jesus discerned at once in Mary and in the Jews (Keim, Strauss). But in the word weeping, twice repeated, the notion of grief is expressed, rather than that of unbelief; and a moment later, Jesus also weeps Himself! Some interpreters (Calvin, Olshausen, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, Keil) think that the indignation of Jesus is directed against the power of death and against Satan, the invisible enemy who wields this terrible weapon against men (Joh 8:44). It would be necessary to admit, with this explanation, that, while the indignation felt by Jesus (Joh 11:33), is directed towards the murderer, the tears which He sheds in Joh 11:35 are the expression of the pity with which the victims inspire Him. But how does it happen that nothing of a like nature manifests itself in Jesus in the other resurrections which He has effected? There must be in this case a peculiar circumstance which produces this altogether exceptional emotion.

An analogous emotion is mentioned only in Joh 13:21, at the moment when Jesus sees the treason of Judas in preparation: “He was troubled in his spirit.” The spirit is the seat of the religious emotions, as the soul is that of the natural affections. Thus in Joh 12:27, Jesus says: My soul is troubled, because the foreseeing of His sufferings makes His nature shudder, while here and in chap. 13 it is in His spirit that He is agitated, because in both cases He sees Himself in immediate contact with evil in its blackest form, and because with a holy horror he feels the nearness of the invisible being who has taken possession of the heart of Judas, and (in our passage) of that of His declared enemies. This parallel throws light on the groaning of Jesus in Joh 11:33. On one side, the sobs which He hears around Him urge Him to accomplish the raising of His friend to life; but, on the other hand, He knows that to yield to this solicitation, and to cause the glory of the Father to break forth conspicuously at this moment, is to sign the sentence of His own death. For it is to drive to extremes His enemies and him who leads them to act.

From the most glorious of His miracles they will draw a ground of condemnation against Him. A portion of these very persons whose sighs were pressing Him to act, will be among those who will cause Him to pay with His life for the crime of having vanquished death. Horror seizes Him at this thought; there is a diabolical perversity here which agitates His pure soul even to its lowest depths. We may recall the words of Jesus: “I have done many good works; for which do you stone me?” This is what is most directly referred to in these words. This agitation extended so far as to produce in Jesus an outward commotion, a physical trembling, expressed by the words: He was troubled. But the expression is chosen by the evangelist in such a way as to remove any idea of an unreasonable or merely passive agitation: the question therefore is not of a simple reaction of the moral on the physical with the purpose of restraining within Himself the impression produced upon Him (Weiss), or with that of preparing Himself by an energetic resolution for the conflict which He was about to engage in with the devil and with death (Augustine, Calvin, Hengstenberg, Keil). The Greek term can scarcely express such ideas. It seems to me that the physical agitation indicated by these words: He was troubled, is the mark of an energetic reaction by which Jesus, in some sort, threw off the emotion which had for a moment overpowered Him and recovered the full control of His being. This internal revolution terminated in this sudden and brief question: Where have you laid him? The two καί, and, bring out the intimate connection between these different emotions which succeed each other so rapidly within Him.

Frédéric Louis Godet — Commentaries on Luke, John, Romans, and 1 Corinthians — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1870s–1890s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

These are tokens that he was greatly moved, but yet they were without sin: and these affections are proper to man’s nature.

Christ took upon him together with our flesh all affections of man (sin only excepted) and amongst them especially mercy and compassion.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

When Jesus . . . saw her weeping, and the Jews . . . weeping . . . he groaned in the spirit--the tears of Mary and her friends acting sympathetically upon Jesus, and drawing forth His emotions. What a vivid and beautiful outcoming of His "real" humanity! The word here rendered "groaned" does not mean "sighed" or "grieved," but rather "powerfully checked his emotion"--made a visible effort to restrain those tears which were ready to gush from His eyes.

and was troubled--rather, "troubled himself" (Margin); referring probably to this visible difficulty of repressing His emotions.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 33. He groaned in the spirit, c.] Here the blessed Jesus shows himself to be truly man and a man, too, who, notwithstanding his amazing dignity and excellence, did not feel it beneath him to sympathize with the distressed, and weep with those who wept. After this example of our Lord, shall we say that it is weakness, folly, and sin to weep for the loss of relatives? He who says so, and can act in a similar case to the above according to his own doctrine, is a reproach to the name of man. Such apathy never came from God: it is generally a bad scion, implanted in a nature miserably depraved, deriving its nourishment from a perverted spirit or a hardened heart; though in some cases it is the effect of an erroneous, ascetic mode of discipline.

It is abolishing one of the finest traits in our Lord's human character to say that he wept and mourned here because of sin and its consequences. No: Jesus had humanity in its perfection, and humanity unadulterated is generous and sympathetic. A particular friend of Jesus was dead; and, as his friend, the affectionate soul of Christ was troubled, and he mingled his sacred tears with those of the afflicted relatives. Behold the man, in his deep, heart-felt trouble, and in his flowing tears! But when he says, Lazarus, come forth! behold the GOD! and the God too of infinite clemency, love, and power. Can such a Jesus refuse to comfort the distressed, or save the lost? Can he restrain his mercies from the penitent soul, or refuse to hear the yearnings of his own bowels? Can such a character be inattentive to the welfare of his creatures? Here is God manifested in the flesh! living in human nature, feeling for the distressed, and suffering for the lost! Reader! ask thy soul, ask thy heart, ask the bowels of thy compassions, if thou hast any, could this Jesus unconditionally reprobate from eternity any soul of man? Thou answerest, NO! God repeats, NO! Universal nature re-echoes, NO! and the tears and blood of Jesus eternally say, NO!

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

33. He groaned in his spirit. If Christ had not been excited to compassion by their tears, he would rather have kept his countenance unmoved, but when, of his own accord, he conforms to those mourners, so far as to weep along with them, he gives proof that he has sympathy, (συμπάθεια.) For the cause of this feeling is, in my opinion, expressed by the Evangelist, when he says that Christ saw Mary and the rest weeping Yet I have no doubt that Christ contemplated something higher, namely, the general misery of the whole human race; for he knew well what had been enjoined on him by the Father, and why he was sent into the world, namely, to free us from all evils. As he has actually done this, so he intended to show that he accomplished it with warmth and earnestness. Accordingly, when he is about to raise Lazarus, before granting deliverance or aid, by the groaning of his spirit, by a strong feeling of grief, and by tears, he shows that he is as much affected by our distresses as if he had endured them in his own person.

But how do groaning and trouble of mind belong to the person of the Son of God? As some reckon it absurd to say that Christ, as one of the number of human beings, was subject to human passions, they think that the only way in which he experienced grief or joy was, that he received in himself those feelings, whenever he thought proper, by some secret dispensation. It is in this sense, Augustine thinks, that the Evangelist says that he was troubled, because other men are hurried along by their feelings, which exercise dominion, or rather tyranny, to trouble their minds. He considers the meaning therefore to be, that Christ, though otherwise tranquil and free from all passion, brought groaning and grief upon himself of his own accord. But this simplicity will, in my opinion, be more agreeable to Scripture, if we say that the Son of God, having clothed himself with our flesh, of his own accord clothed himself also with human feelings, so that he did not differ at all from his brethren, sin only excepted. In this way we detract nothing from the glory of Christ, when we say that it was a voluntary submission, by which he was brought to resemble us in the feelings of the soul. Besides, as he submitted from the very commencement, we must not imagine that he was free and exempt from those feelings; and in this respect he proved himself to be our brother, in order to assure us, that we have a Mediator, who willingly pardons our infirmities, and who is ready to assist those infirmities which he has experienced in himself.

It will perhaps be objected, that the passions of men are sinful, and therefore it cannot be admitted that we have them in common with the Son of God. I reply, there is a wide difference between Christ and us. For the reason why our feelings are sinful is, that they rush on without restraint, and suffer no limit; but in Christ the feelings were adjusted and regulated in obedience to God, and were altogether free from sin. To express it more fully, the feelings of men are sinful and perverse on two accounts; first, because they are hurried along by impetuous motion, and are not regulated by the true rule of modesty; and, secondly, because they do not always arise from a lawful cause, or, at least, are not directed to a lawful end. I say that there is excess, because no person rejoices or grieves, so far only as is sufficient, or as God permits, and there are even some who shake themselves loose from all restraint. The vanity of our understanding brings us grief or sadness, on account of trifles, or for no reason whatever, because we are too much devoted to the world. Nothing of this nature was to be found in Christ; for he had no passion or affection of his own that ever went beyond its proper bounds; he had not one that was not proper, and founded on reason and sound judgment.

To make this matter still more clear, it will be of importance for us to distinguish between man’s first nature, as it was created by God, and this degenerate nature, which is corrupted by sin. When God created man, he implanted affections in him, but affections which were obedient and submissive to reason. That those affections are now disorderly and rebellious is an accidental fault; that is, it proceeds from some other cause than from the Creator. Now Christ took upon him human affections, but without (ἀταξία) disorder; for he who obeys the passions of the flesh is not obedient to God. Christ was indeed troubled and vehemently agitated; but, at the same time, he kept himself in subjection to the will of the Father. In short, if you compare his passions with ours, they will differ not less than pure and clear water, flowing in a gentle course, differs from dirty and muddy foam.

The example of Christ ought to be sufficient of itself for setting aside the unbending sternness which the Stoics demand; for whence ought we to look for the rule of supreme perfection but from Christ? We ought rather to endeavor to correct and subdue that obstinacy which pervades our affections on account of the sin of Adam, and, in so doing, to follow Christ as our leader, that he may bring us into subjection. Thus Paul does not demand from us hardened stupidity, but enjoins us to observe moderation

in our mourning, that we may not abandon ourselves to grief, like unbelievers who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13;)

for even Christ took our affections into himself, that by his power we may subdue every thing in them that is sinful.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(33) He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled.—The word rendered “groaned” occurs, besides in this verse and Joh_11:38, three times in the New Testament; in Mat_9:30 (“and Jesus straitly charged them”); Mar_1:43 (“and He straitly charged him”); and Mar_14:5 (“and they murmured against her”). Comp. Notes at these places. The original meaning of the word is “to snort, as of horses.” Passing to the moral sense, it expresses disturbance of the mind—vehement agitation. This may express itself in sharp admonition, in words of anger against a person, or in a physical shudder, answering to the intensity of the emotion. In each of the passages in the earlier Gospels the word is accompanied by an object upon which the feeling is directed. In the present context it does not go beyond the subject of the feeling. Here it is “in the spirit” (comp. Joh_13:21); and in Joh_11:38 it is “in Himself.” Both mean the same thing; and point to the inner moral depth of His righteous indignation; the object of it, however, is not expressed.

For the rendering “and was troubled” the margin gives, as the exact force of the Greek, “and He troubled Himself”; and this is to be preferred. These words do not express the inner emotion; for that has been expressed in the strong words which have gone before. They point rather to the physical movement which accompanied the emotion, and made known to others the indignation which was excited in His own spirit. The force of the whole sentence would require, in English, some such rendering as “He was indignant in the spirit, and caused Himself to shudder.”

Very different views have been put forth as to the cause of this intensity of emotion in our Lord. The cause supplied by the text is that He saw Mary lying at His feet weeping; and the Jews also weeping which came with her. Real sorrow, which calls forth all His sympathy, is accompanied by the mockery of sorrow, which can shed tears for the brother, whom they afterwards seek to kill (Joh_12:10)! These Jews are those who had sought to stone their Teacher, and had resolved to cut off from all religious and social intercourse every one who acknowledged Him as the Messiah! With hearts full of hatred they can profess to be comforters, and can mingle their tears with hers. The severest words that fell from the lips of Christ were those which denounced the hypocrisy of priests, Pharisees, and scribes. It is this hypocrisy which now stirs in His spirit an anger so intense that it causes nerve and muscle and limb to tremble beneath its force.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

33–44. The Sign

33. weeping … weeping] The repetition is for emphasis, and to point a contrast which is the key to the passage.

he groaned in the spirit] Better, He was angered in the spirit. The word translated ‘groaned’ occurs five times in N.T.; here, Joh_11:38; Mat_9:30; Mar_1:43; Mar_14:5 (see notes in each place). In all cases, as in classical Greek and in the LXX., it expresses not sorrow but indignation or severity. It means (1) literally, of animals, ‘to snort, growl;’ then metaphorically (2) ‘to be very angry or indignant;’ (3) ‘to command sternly, under threat of displeasure.’ What was He angered at? Some translate ‘at His spirit,’ and explain (α) that He was indignant at the human emotion which overcame Him: which is out of harmony with all that we know about the human nature of Christ. Others, retaining ‘in His spirit,’ explain (β) that He was indignant ‘at the unbelief of the Jews and perhaps of the sisters:’ but of this there is no hint in the context Others again, (γ) that it was ‘at the sight of the momentary triumph of evil, as death, … which was here shewn under circumstances of the deepest pathos:’ but we nowhere else find the Lord shewing anger at the physical consequences of sin. It seems better to fall back on the contrast pointed out in the last note. He was indignant at seeing the hypocritical and sentimental lamentations of His enemies the Jews mingling with the heartfelt lamentations of His loving friend Mary (comp. Joh_12:10): hypocrisy ever roused His anger.

was troubled] The margin is better; He troubled Himself, i.e. agitated Himself, allowed His emotion to become evident by external movement such as a shudder.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And said, where have ye laid him?.... This he might say as man, though he, as the omniscient God, knew where he was laid; and that it might appear there was no juggle and contrivance between him, and the relations of the deceased; and to raise some expectation of what he intended to do; and to draw the Jews thither, that they might be witnesses of the miracle he was about to work.

They say unto him; That is, Martha and Mary,

Lord, come and see; it being but a little way off.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

33 When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which came with her, he groaned in the spirit, and was troubled,

Ver. 33. When Jesus saw her weeping] Tears are most effectual orators to Christ; when he was going to the cross, he could find time to look back and comfort the weeping woman.

And was troubled] So as for the present he could not utter himself. Yet these passions in Christ were, as clear water in a crystal glass, without sin.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He groaned in the spirit - The word rendered “groaned,” here, commonly denotes to be angry or indignant, or to reprove severely, denoting violent agitation of mind. Here it also evidently denotes violent agitation - not from anger, but from grief. He saw the sorrow of others, and he was also moved with sympathy and love. The word “groan” usually, with us, denotes an expression of internal sorrow by a special sound. The word here, however, does not mean that utterance was given to the internal emotion, but that it was deep and agitating, though internal.

In the spirit - In the mind. See Act 19:21. Paul purposed in the spirit that is, in his mind, Mat 5:3.

Was troubled - Was affected with grief. Perhaps this expression denotes that his countenance was troubled, or gave indications of sorrow (Grotins).

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

He groaned in the spirit, and troubled himself. The Latin and Greek, both in this and the 38th verse, express a more than ordinary inward trouble. Christ, as he was truly man, had the affections and passions of human nature; yet so that he was master, even of the first motions, which could not raise in him any disturbance or disorderly inclinations. He permitted, therefore, and, as it is said, raised in himself these affections of compassion and grief at this time. (Witham)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

The apostle speaks of Christ, Heb 4:15, as an High priest that can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, and one that can have compassion, Heb 5:2. Martha’s and Mary’s passion for their dead brother was their infirmity; Christ is touched with the feeling of it: he, to show himself truly man,

groaned in himself; it being natural to us to be affected with the afflictions of others, and to weep with those who weep. But here ariseth a question, whether Christ was troubled from a natural necessity, as we sometimes cannot forbear weeping to see others weep bitterly, or out of choice? Some of the ancients think it was out of choice. Mr. Calvin and others think that it was out of a natural necessity; not that he could not govern his passions (as we sometimes cannot) by reason, but that he could not, as man, forbear his passion.

I shall translate what Mr. Calvin speaks, most judiciously, in the case, determining neither way, but leaving it to the reader’s judgment. "But how," saith he, "do gnawing and trouble of spirit agree to that Person who was the Son of God?" Because to some it looketh very absurd to say, that Christ, as one of us, is subject to human passions; they think Christ no otherwise at any time either grieved or rejoiced, than as he, so often as he thought fit, voluntarily assumed to himself those passions by a secret dispensation. Augustine thought that Christ in this sense is said to have groaned, and to have been troubled; whereas other men’s passions transport them, and exercise a tyranny over them, to the disturbance of their minds: he therefore thinks the meaning is, that Christ, being otherwise sedate, and free from passions, sometimes voluntarily took these passions. But in my judgment, it is a much plainer and simpler sense of this scripture, if we say, that the Son of God, taking upon him our nature, did also freely with it put on our affections (which are our natural infirmities); so as he in nothing differed from us, but in this, that he had no sin. Nothing by this is derogated from the glory of Christ; for he voluntarily submitted to take our nature upon him, by which he became like to us in our human affections. And we must not think, that after he had voluntarily submitted to take our perfect nature upon him, that he was free from the passions and affections of it: in this he proved himself to be our Brother, that we might know that he is a Mediator for us, who can easily pardon our infirmities, and is ready to help us as to those infirmities, which he hath experienced in his own person. If any one object, That seeing our passions are sinful, it doth not agree to the nature of him who was the Son of God to share with us in them; I answer, There is a great deal of difference (as to these passions) between us and Christ; for our affections are therefore faulty, because they are intemperate, and inordinate, and keep no bounds; but in Christ, though they be, yet they are composed, and moderate, and in obedience to God. The passions of men are faulty upon two accounts:

1. As they are turbulent, and not governed by the rule of moderation.

2. As they often rise without any due ground or foundation, or are not directed to a right end.

They are in us a disease, because we neither grieve nor rejoice in measure, and to that degree alone which God permits and allows; many rather give the reins to their passions. And such is the vanity of our minds, that we are grieved and troubled for little or no causes, being too much addicted and cleaving to the world. There was no such thing in Christ, no passion in him ever exceeded its just bounds, or was exercised but upon a just and reasonable cause. To make this yet clearer, we must distinguish between man in his creation, and the degenerate nature of man, as it is corrupted through sin. When God at first created man, he created him with natural affections, but such as were under the command of reason: that our passions are now inordinate, and rebellious, is accidental to our nature. Christ indeed took our affections upon him, but without that disorder which fell into them by the fall, which causeth us that we cannot obey them and God. He was greatly troubled, but not so as by his trouble to become disobedient to his Father. In short, if we compare our affections with his, there will appear as great a difference, as between pure water and that which is dirty and filthy. And the single example of Christ is enough to make us reject the stoical apathy (or want of passion); for from whom, if not from him, should we fetch the highest rule of perfection? Let us therefore rather study to correct and tame that disorder in which our passions are entangled, and follow Christ as our guide, that we may bring them into order. Thus Paul, 1Th 4:13, doth not require of us a stony stupidity, but commands us to govern our grief, that we may not mourn as men without hope. For Christ therefore took our affections upon him, that we by his grace may be enabled to subdue whatsoever is vicious in them."

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

33. Groaned in the spirit—Commentators have been much perplexed by the undeniable fact that the Greek word for groaned here is expressive of anger rather than grief. Alford explains it of the peremptory and half-indignant volition with which even many a minister at a funeral represses the rise of undue sympathy with the weeping or relatives. We prefer the interpretation of Stier. The Son of man is indignant at the great Enemy, the cause of sorrow and death, with whom he ever struggles, and whom, by dying, he must subdue.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Vers. 33-44. (3) The struggle with death.

When Jesus therefore saw her walling, and the Jews wailing who came with her, he was moved with indignation in the spirit, and troubled himself. The sight of the wailing Mary and the wailing Jews, who took up her grief and, according to Oriental custom, adopted her expression of it with loud cries and emphatic gestures, praising the dead, and lamenting his loss, produced a most wonderful impression on the Lord Jesus. Meyer thinks that the contrast between their hypocritical or professional tears and her genuine emotion, the blending of these incongruous elements, the combination of a profound affliction of a dear friend and the simulated grief of his bitter enemies, led him to manifest the feeling here described. But we have no right to import such an element into the scene. The concerted wailing was, however, the occasion of what is described in very remarkable terms, enebrimhsato tw pneumati kai etaraxen eauton . The first expression occurs again in ver. 38. Westcott says in the three places where it elsewhere occurs (Mat_9:30 Mar_1:43 14:5) there is "the notion of coercion arising out of displeasure," a motion "towards another of anger rather than sorrow." The verb brimaomai and its compounds is used in the classics and the LXX in the sense of hot anger, neither pain nor grief. (though it is not very evident that it goes so far as this in Mar_1:43) Luther translated it ergrimmete, and Passow gives no other meaning. This seems generally accepted. But at what was Jesus angered? This can be answered only by deciding whether tw pneumati is the dative of the object, or whether it is the instrument or sphere of his holy indignation. According to the old Greek expositors, Origen, Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact and they are followed by Alford and Hilgenfeld, the latter of whom finds in it a hint of the Gnostic Christology which, in his opinion, pervades the Gospel the anger might have been directed against his own human spirit, at that moment tempted into an unfilial strain of sympathy with the mourners; yet, if this be its meaning, why was it that Jesus subsequently wept himself? and why, instead of exciting himself, instead of shuddering with his bitterness of feeling, did he not (as Hengstenberg says) compose and quiet himself? Beside, th quch would have been a far more appropriate term to use for the effective and sympathetic part of his nature than pneumati . It is possible, if "the spirit" expresses that part of his human nature in special fellowship with the Father, to suppose that he felt a certain antagonism with that within himself which had prompted to some immediate manifestation of Divine power, and to translate, He sternly checked his spirit." But the miracle of Divine struggle with death followed so immediately that this cannot be the true explanation (Westcott suggests it as an alternative, but not the best interpretation). The tw pneumatic , must be the sphere of his holy wrath, for which we must find some explanation. Meyer"s seems (as already said) to be altogether insufficient. So also in our opinion is that of Godet, viz. that this act of victorious conflict with death, on which he was entering, involved his own death-warrant by being the occasion of the last outbreak of malice on the part of the Jews. Such a fact would be out of harmony, not only with the Fourth Gospel, but with the (synoptic) struggle in Gethsemane. Now, without enumerating various other interpretations of the passage, we think Augustine, Erasmus, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, Moulton, meet our difficulty by the suggestion that death itself occasioned this indignation. Though, like the good Physician in the house of mourning, he knew the issue of his mighty act, yet he entered with vivid and intense human sympathy into all the primary and secondary sorrows of death. He saw the long procession of mourners from the first to the last, all the reckless agony, all the hopelessness of it, in thousands of millions of instances. There flashed upon his spirit all the terrible moral consequences of which death was the ghastly symbol. lie knew that within a short time he too, in taking upon himself the sins of men, would have taken upon himself their death, and there was enough to rouse in his spirit a Divine indignation, and he groaned and shuddered. He roused himself to a conflict which would be a prelibation of the cross and the burial. He took the diseases of men upon himself when he took them away. He took the death-agony of Lazarus and the humiliation of the grave and the tears of the sisters upon himself when he resolved to cry, "Lazarus, come forth!" and to snatch from the grasp of the grim conqueror for a little while one of his victims. Compare the toil of Hercules in wrestling with death for the wife of Admetus. Compare also Joh_13:21, where moral proximity to the treacherous heart and ghastly deed and approaching doom of Judas made him once more to shudder.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He groaned - So he restrained his tears. So he stopped them soon after, ver. 38. He troubled himself - An expression amazingly elegant, and full of the highest propriety. For the affections of Jesus were not properly passions, but voluntary emotions, which were wholly in his own power. And this tender trouble which he now voluntarily sustained, was full of the highest order and reason.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

The sorrow of Jesus:

v. 33. When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which came with her, He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled,

v. 34. and said, Where have ye laid him? They said unto Him, Lord, come and see.

v. 35. Jesus wept.

v. 36. Then said the Jews, Behold, how He loved him!

v. 37. And some of them said, Could not this man, which opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have died?

While Mary had poured out the sorrow of her heart to the Lord, the Jews that had been in the house with her also came up. Now Mary was weeping and wailing, and the Jews joined her, for such deep and unrestrained sorrow is infectious. All this moved Jesus very deeply; He was indignant in the spirit, deeply affected. The spectacle distressed Him so badly that He worked Himself up into a state of anxiety and emotion. He was strongly agitated over the power which the enemy of mankind, death, was here exhibiting over human beings. For death had certainly shown himself in this instance as the king of terrors, in taking from these sisters their brother and protector, one who was, besides, a friend to Himself. Death is a cruel enemy, for in a moment he destroys the happiness of families and friends, and rends the closest ties asunder. And behind death stands the hideous figure of him that has the power of death, the devil, the murderer from the beginning. Jesus inquired for the location of the grave, since He wanted those present to accompany Him there. He, the Source and Champion of life, here went forth to meet the enemy of life and to tear his prey from him. This He could do, for He was more than a mere human being; He possessed the power of Almighty God. But that He was also a true human being He here showed. For as the procession was coming near to the grave, the tears arose to the eyes of Jesus, and He wept. The feeling of grief was so strong as to draw these tears from His eyes. And with His tears He hallowed the tears, the grief, of the believers at the graves of those that are dear to them. This action of Jesus elicited various comments. Some of the Jews were deeply moved by this touching show of love and sympathy. But others were skeptical. They knew of His healing of the man that had been born blind, and in a half-puzzled, half-jeering way asked why He did not prevent death, with such power at His disposal. The fact that unbelievers sneer at the one or the other feature of Christianity should in no way discourage the Christians in their work, for if Christ had such experiences, His followers can expect no less.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Observe here, 1. The condolency and tender sympathy expressed by our Saviour upon this occasion: He groaned in his spirit, and was troubled: or, as the original has it, he troubled himself, intimating that our Saviour’s passions were pure and holy, not like ours, muddy and mixed with sinful imperfection. The commotions of his affections were like the shaking of pure water in a crystal glass, which still remains clear; and they arose and were calmed at his pleasure; he was not overpowered by them, but had them at his command.

Learn hence, That as Christ took upon him the human nature so he did assume also human affections, thereby evidencing himself to be our brother and near kinsman, according to the flesh.

Learn, 2. That the passions and affections, which our Saviour had and expressed, were always holy and innocent: he was not without them, but he was above them; they did never violently and immoderately trouble him, but when he pleased, he troubled himself Jesus groaned in spirit, and troubled himself.

Observe, 2. How our Saviour manifests his condolency and tender sympathy with Martha and Mary, by his weeping. Jesus wept: partly from compassion, and partly for example; in compassion first to humanity to see how miserably sin had debased the human nature and rendered man like unto the brute beasts that perish.

Secondly, in compassion to Lazarus, whom he was now about to bring back into a sinful and troublesome world. Thus St. Jerome, Non flevit Chrystus lachrymas nostras, &c. "Christ, says he, did not weep tears, he mourned over Lazarus, not because dead, but because now to be brought again to life."

Again Christ wept for our example, to fetch sighs and tears from us, at the sight of others’ miseries, and especially at the funerals of our godly friends.

Learn hence, That mourning and sorrow, and this expressed by tears and weeping, is an affection proper for those that go to funerals, provided it be decently kept within due bounds and is not excessive: for immoderate sorrow is hurtful to the living, and dishonourable to the dead: neither is it an argument of more love, but an evidence of less grace.

Note, 3. How the Jews observing Christ’s sorrow for, admire his love to, dead Lazarus: Behold, how he loved him! Christ’s love to his people is admirable and soul amazing: such as see it may admire it, but can never fully comprehend it.

Note, 4. How some of the malicious Jews attempt to lessen the reputation of our Saviour, not willing to own him to be God, because he did not keep Lazarus from dying; as if Christ could not be the Son of God, because he did not at all times, and in all cases, exert and put forth his divine power. Whereas Christ acted freely, and not necessarily, governing his actions by his own wisdom, as he saw most conducing to the ends and purposes of his own glory.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

33, 34. He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled. The word rendered “groaned” undoubtedly means “was indignant,” and is so rendered in the margin of the Revision. Jesus was deeply moved by the grief of Mary, but the hypocritical weeping of the Jews who followed her, and who were acting according to the rules, filled him with indignation.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

he was deeply moved in his spirit and was troubled

John combines these phrases that have similar meanings to express the intense emotional distress and possible anger that Jesus experienced. AT: "he was greatly upset" (See: Doublet)

Where have you laid him

This is a milder way of asking, "Where have you buried him?" (See: Euphemism)

Jesus wept

"Jesus began to cry" or "Jesus started crying"

translationWords

spirit

trouble

lord

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

33–44. THE SIGN

33. κλαίουσαν … κλαίοντας. The repetition emphasizes a contrast which is the key to the passage.

ἐνεβριμήσατο τ. πνεύματι. Infremuit spiritu; He was angered, or was moved with indignation in the spirit. Ἐμβριμᾶσθαι occurs five times in N.T., here, Joh 11:38; Mat 9:30; Mar 1:43; Mar 14:5 (see notes in each place). In all cases, as in classical Greek and in the LXX., it expresses not sorrow but indignation or severity. It means (1) literally, of animals, ‘to snort, growl;’ then (2) metaphorically, ‘to be very angry or indignant;’ (3) ‘to command sternly, under threat of displeasure.’ What was He angered at? Some translate ‘at His spirit,’ and explain (α) that He was indignant at the human emotion which overcame Him: which is out of harmony with all that we know about the human nature of Christ Others, retaining ‘in His spirit,’ explain (β) that He was indignant ‘at the unbelief of the Jews and perhaps of the sisters:’ but of this there is no hint in the context. Others again (γ) that it was ‘at the sight of the momentary triumph of evil, as death, … which was here shewn under circumstances of the deepest pathos:’ but we nowhere else find the Lord shewing anger at the physical consequences of sin. It seems better to fall back on the contrast pointed out in the last note. He was indignant at seeing the hypocritical and sentimental lamentations of His enemies the Jews mingling with the heartfelt lamentations of His loving friend Mary (comp. Joh 12:10): hypocrisy ever roused His anger.

The πνεῦμα is the seat of the religious emotions, the highest, innermost part of man’s nature, the ψυχή is the seat of the natural affections and desires. Here and in Joh 13:21 it is Christ’s πνεῦμα that is affected, by the presence of moral evil: in Joh 12:27; Mat 26:38; Mar 14:34, it is His ψυχή that is troubled, at the thought of impending suffering: comp. Joh 10:24.

ἐτάραξεν ἑαντόν. Turbavit se ipsum; He troubled Himself. Not a mere periphrasis for ἐταράχθη, turbatus est (Joh 13:21). He allowed His emotion to become evident by some external movement such as a shudder. His emotions were ever under control: when they ruffled the surface of His being (Joh 2:15), it was because He so willed it. Turbaris tu nolens: turbatus est Christus quia voluit (S. Augustine).

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

33.] In explaining this difficult verse, two things must be borne in mind: (1) that ἐμβριμάομαι can bear but one meaning, that of indignor (“infremuit,” Vulg.),—the expression of indignation and rebuke, not of sorrow. This has been here acknowledged by all the expositors who have paid any attention to the usage of the word. (2) That both from ὠς εἶδεν, &c.,—from καὶ ἐτάραξ. ἑαυτ., and ver. 35,—the feeling in the Lord was clearly one of rising sympathy, which vented itself at last in tears.

These two things being premised, I think the meaning to be, that Jesus, with the tears of sympathy already rising and overcoming His speech, checked them, so as to be able to speak the words following. I would read ἐνεβρ. τ. πν., καὶ ἐτ. ἑαυ., καὶ εἶπεν in immediate connexion, as expressing the temporary check given to the flow of His tears,—the effort need to utter the following question. And I would thus divest the self-restraint of all stoical and unworthy character, and consider it as merely physical, requiring indeed an act of the will, and a self-troubling,—a complication of feeling,—but implying no deliberate disapproval of the rising emotion, which indeed immediately after is suffered to prevail. What minister has not, when burying the dead in the midst of a weeping family, felt the emotion and made the effort here described? And surely this was one of the things in which He was made like unto His brethren. Thus Bengel: “Ita Jesus austeriore affectu lacrymas hic cohibuit, et mox ver. 38 abrupit. Eoque major earum fuit auctoritas.”

Meyer’s explanation deserves mention: that our Lord was indignant at seeing the Jews, His bitter enemies, mingling their hypocritical tears (Crocodilsthranen) with the true ones of the bereaved sister. But, not to say how unworthy this seems of the Person and occasion, the explanation will find no place in ver. 38: for surely the question of the Jews in ver. 37 is not enough to justify it. Still perhaps any contribution to the solution of this difficult word is not to be summarily rejected.

τῷ πν. is not the dat. after ἐνεβρ., ‘rebuked His spirit,’—but in Spirit: see ἐν ἑαυτῷ ver. 38.

Indignation over unbelief and sin, and death the fruit of sin, doubtless lay in the background; but to see it in the words (with Olsh., Stier, and Trench), seems unnatural.

ἐτάραξεν ἑαυτόν is understood by Meyer, and perhaps rightly, as describing an outward motion of the body,—He shuddered: and so Euthym.: διέσεισε (not, as Bloomf. somewhat confidently asserts, a blunder of the scribes for διεσείσθη, but the (so-called) intrans. sense of σείω, in which it was used of this very act of ‘shaking’ bodily: of. Xen. Cyneg. iii. 4, αἱ δὲ τὰ ὦτα μὲν ἀκίνητα ἔχουσιν, ἄκρᾳ τῇ οὐρᾷ σιέουσιν: ib. vi. 15, ταχὺ ταῖς οὐραῖς διασείουσαι: cf. also the impersonal usage, Thuc. iv. 52, τοῦ αὐτοῦ μηνὸς ἱσταμένου, ἔσεισε)· συμβαίνει γὰρ τινάσσεσθαι τὰ ἀνώτερα μέρη τῶν οὕτως ἐμβριμωμένων· Cyril’s comment is, ἐπειδὴ οὐ μόνον θεὸς κατὰ φύσιν ἀλλὰ καὶ ἄνθρωπος ἦν ὁ χριστός, πάσχει καὶ νῦν τὸ ἀνθρώπινον· ἀρχομένης δέ πως ἐν αὐτῷ κινεῖσθαι τῆς λύπης, καὶ νευούσης ἤδη πρὸς τὸ δάκρυον τῆς ἁγίας σαρκός, οὐκ ἐφίησιν αὐτὴν τοῦτο παθεῖν ἐκλύτως, καθἁπερ ἔθος ἡμῖν, ἐμβριμᾶται δὲ τῷ πνεύματι, τουτέστι τῇ δυνάμει τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος ἐπιπλήττει τρόπον τινὰ τῇ ἰδία σαρκίʼ ἡ δέ, τὸ τῆς ἑνωθείσης αὐτῇ θεότητος οὐκ ἐνεγκοῦσα κίνημα, τρέμει τε καὶ θορύβου πλάττεται σχῆμα καὶ συγχέεται. πένθος γὰρ οἶδεν ἀναῤῥιπίζειν. τοῦτο γὰρ οἶμαι σημαίνειν τὸ ἑτάραξεν ἑαυτόν.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He groaned in the spirit [ενεβριμησατο τω πνευματι] . See on Mr 1:43. The word for groaned occurs three times elsewhere : Mt 9:30; Mr 1:43; Mr 14:5. In every case it expresses a charge, or remonstrance, accompanied with a feeling of displeasure. On this passage there are two lines of interpretation, both of them assuming the meaning just stated.

(1) Tw pneu. mati, the spirit, is regarded as the object of Jesus ' inward charge or remonstrance. This is explained variously : as that Jesus sternly rebuked the natural shrinking of His human spirit, and summoned it to the decisive conflict with death; or that He checked its impulse to put forth His divine energy at once.

(2) Takes in the spirit, as representing the sphere of feeling, as Joh 13:21; Mr 8:12; Luk 10:21. Some explain the feeling as indignation at the hypocritical mourning of the Jews, or at their unbelief and the sisters' misapprehension; others as indignation at the temporary triumph of Satan, who had the power of death.

The interpretation which explains tw pneumati as the sphere of feeling is to be preferred. Comp. ver. 38, in himself. The nature of the particular emotion of Jesus must remain largely a matter of conjecture. Rev. renders, in margin, was moved with indignation in the spirit.

Was troubled [εταραξεν εαυτον] . Literally, troubled Himself. Probably of the outward manifestation of His strong feeling.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.