=17, 18. He had lain in the grave four days already.= Various explanations are made respecting these four days; they are given in detail in _Andrews’ Life of Our Lord_. Since, however, we do not know definitely where Christ was, except that it was some point apparently beyond Jordan, and we do not know at all what engagements and duties detained him there, surmises as to the way in which these four days were taken up are decidedly unprofitable. The narrative seems to me clearly to imply that Lazarus was not dead when the messengers first reached Jesus. Probably of these four days, two were occupied by Christ in completing his ministry where he was when he received the message, and two, or part of two days, in a leisurely journey to the home of Lazarus.--=Bethany was nigh unto Jerusalem.= The use of the past tense _was_, not _is_, indicates that Bethany had ceased to exist at the time when John wrote his Gospel; it thus incidentally confirms the opinion that he wrote a considerable time after the destruction of Jerusalem, and when that city and its environs were lying waste.--=About fifteen furlongs off.= Literally, _stadia_. The _stadium_, is about six hundred feet; fifteen stadia or furlongs were, therefore, about nine thousand feet, or a little less than two miles. 19 And many of the Jews came to Martha and Mary, to[434] comfort them concerning their brother. [434] 1 Chron. 7:22; Job 2:11; 42:11; Rom. 12:15; 1 Thess. 4:18. =19. And many of the Judeans came to Martha and Mary.= The word _Jews_, as used by John, indicates always the inhabitants of Judea, as distinguished from those of other provinces in the Holy Land, and therefore generally those who were prejudiced against, if not absolutely hostile to Jesus. The fact that most of those who were present at the scene about to be described were these Judeans, is an important one, and must be borne in mind by the student, for it gives a peculiar color and significance to the entire narrative.--=To comfort them concerning their brother.= The Jewish mourning rites were most carefully defined by the Rabbinical law; they included rending the clothes, dressing in sackcloth, sprinkling of ashes or dust on the person, fasting, loud lamenting. Professional mourners were employed to increase the noisy demonstrations of grief (see Mark 5:38, note). The days of mourning were thirty, which were divided into three for weeping, seven for lamentation, and twenty for less demonstrative mourning. During the first three days the mourners were forbidden to wear their phylacteries or to engage in any servile work, or to bathe or anoint themselves; during the seven days they fasted or ate nothing but an occasional egg or some lentiles. After the funeral services were over (for account of which see Luke 7:12, note), friends and professional mourners came and sat with the afflicted ones upon the ground, no one speaking until the bereaved ones had done so, but every