Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus – Readings

Commentary on 1 John 4:7-16; John 11:19-27 or Luke 10:38-42

There is a choice of Gospel readings for today’s Memorial, each one featuring Martha and Mary and one focused around the death of Lazarus.

The first is from Luke’s Gospel and describes an occasion when Jesus went to visit the family’s house in Bethany. It was not far from Jerusalem and it seems that Jesus was a regular visitor there. On this occasion we are told that Mary was sitting at the feet of Jesus and listening to him. Martha, on the other hand, was fussing about in the kitchen getting the meal ready. After a while, Martha complained (perhaps there was there a slight hint of jealousy and resentment here):

Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her, then, to help me.

Jesus replied:

Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things…Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.

Jesus had said elsewhere that his followers should not be anxious or worried:

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing…seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matt 6:25,33)

Jesuit Father Anthony de Mello used to say: “Why worry? If you worry, you will die. If you don’t worry, you will die. So why worry?” Martha gives the impression that Mary is just sitting there doing nothing. But in fact, she is listening to Jesus—listening to the Word of God.

Many of us are very busy, run off our feet from dawn to dusk. But what are we busy about? What was Martha busy about? We need to stop and listen, as Mary did. ‘Busy-ness’ is not a virtue. The important thing is to be active about the right things—and to know what is the right thing to do, we have to stop and listen.

The alternative Gospel reading is from John. It is story of raising of Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus was the brother of Mary and Martha. Jesus had been told some days before that Lazarus was seriously ill, but did not immediately respond. By the time Jesus reached Bethany, Lazarus was already dead for four days.

When the sisters heard that Jesus had arrived, Martha, typically, rushed out to greet him while Mary stayed mourning in the house. As soon as Martha saw Jesus, she told him that if Jesus had been there earlier, Lazarus would not have died. But she was confident that any prayer Jesus would make to his Father would be answered.

Jesus said to her:

Your brother will rise again.

Replied Martha, expressing her faith in a future life:

I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.

In so speaking, she draws from Jesus one of the great sayings of John’s Gospel:

I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?

In other words, those who believe in Jesus as Lord and follow his Way immediately enter a life that will never end, although the body, of course, will pass away.

This, in turn, draws a great profession of faith from Martha:

Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.

It is a statement on a par with that of Peter at Caesarea Philippi earlier on.

And that, of course, is what this whole chapter is about. Jesus, the Son of God, as the Source of Life. It is also a preparation for Jesus’ own death from which he will rise in glory and be reunited with his Father. The same future is promised to us.

The First Reading for the Memorial is from the First Letter of John. It is one of the most central passages in all of the New Testament. It is about love being at the very centre of our lives. Love here is agape, a very special kind of love. It can be defined as an unconditional reaching out for the well-being of the other person. It is the love that God extends to us. It is the love that motivated all that Jesus did and said. It has to be at the heart of all we do and say. It is the essence of Christian living. The word agape, or some form of it, occurs 16 times in the short passage of today’s reading. We are to love in this way because that is what God does. It is what Jesus did. When we love in this way we become like God. And wherever this kind of love is expressed, God is there, because God is this love.

We Christians do not have any monopoly on this love. It can be found in all kinds of people. But let us make sure it is the driving force in our own lives, not just for our own sake, but for the sake of everyone else, for:

By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love [agape] for one another. (John 13:35)

It is the best thing that could be said about any of us and the only thing that matters.

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Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus

Martha and Mary were sisters who lived with their brother Lazarus in Bethany, a town not far from Jerusalem. Jesus seems to have been a regular visitor and, on one occasion, he gently reproved Martha for her complaint that her sister Mary was not helping her in the preparation of the meal. The words of Jesus in this passage are proffered by some as indicating the excellence of the contemplative life (represented by Mary) over the cares of the active life (represented by Martha), although there is not universal agreement on this interpretation.

In the Gospel of John, Martha also appears on the occasion of the miracle of Lazarus’ return to life, when the expression of her faith in Jesus and his divine power was the occasion for his great statement:

I am the resurrection and the life.

John also records that Jesus was again in their house six days before his last Passover and that Martha was serving the meal. Basically, these three events are all that we really know about Martha.

But as in the case of many Gospel personalities, legends grew up around Martha and her family. Mary, too, in some of these legends was identified with Mary Magdalene, an interpretation not normally supported by modern commentators. There was a medieval legend that Martha, Mary Magdalene and Lazarus were responsible for the evangelisation of the district of Provence in France. Martha’s remains were said to have been discovered and put in a shrine at Tarascon in 1187.

Pictures of Martha reflect both the Gospel stories and the legends. She is invoked as the patron of housewives and lay sisters in religious congregations. She is shown with a ladle, a broom, or a bunch of keys.

Martha is also represented with a dragon, which she was supposed to have tamed at Tarascon by sprinkling it with holy water. She then wrapped her sash around its neck before bringing it to Arles where it was killed. She is also represented in scenes of the raising of Lazarus, for example, in the Romanesque sculpture at Chichester Cathedral in England.

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