How did Lasarus die the second death?

Answer 1

A:The similarity of the stories of Lazarus, Martha and Mary in Luke's Gospel and John's Gospel can lead the casual reader to believe that the same Lazarus died and was resurrected twice. The confusion can be cleared up by understanding that John's Gospel was actually inspired by Luke's Gospel. It can then be understood that the author of John took the story from Luke and reworked it, producing a completely different but parallel story about Lazarus.

In Luke's Gospel, Martha and Mary are sisters and friends of Jesus, but are not related to Lazarus. Jesus tells a parable of Lazarus dying and going down to hell where he meets a rich man being punished for his sins. The rich man asks for Lazarus to be raised from the dead so that he can warn his friends of the fate that awaits them. This Lazarus was not intended to be understood as a real person.

John's Gospel says that Lazarus was the brother of Jesus' very close friends, Martha and Mary. His exact cause of death was unimportant, because Jesus was to raise Lazarus from the dead after several days. Having been raised from the dead, Lazarus was still mortal and would die again one day. The gospel does not say anything about the final death of Lazarus, although it does say that the priests talked about having Lazarus killed (John 12:10).

For theological reasons, the author of John wanted to make the resurrection of Lazarus the final trigger for the arrest of Jesus. He therefore moved the Cleansing of the Temple out of the way, to the beginning of his story, almost immediately after Jesus met John the Baptist. In John 12:19, the turning point is identified: "The Pharisees therefore said among themselves, Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing? behold, the world is gone after him.")