mother tongue, realized that the figure of sleep, as used of death, implied a

subsequent awakening, and so we find them continually adding the epithets

'perpetual', 'eternal', 'unawakened', 'brazen', to the word 'sleep', in order

to exclude the idea of awakening natural to it.  Estius says 'sleeping is

thus applied to men that are dead, and this because of the hope of

resurrection; for we read no such thing of brutes'.  The early Christians

rightly called their burying places koimeterion, 'sleeping places', from

which comes the English 'cemetery'.

To the believer who is prepared to accept whatever may be the teaching

of the inspired Word, these passages are of themselves sufficient proof that

in the Scriptures death is likened to sleep, and because the Scriptures are

true, and no figure employed by them can be misleading, the two words 'sleep

and awaken', used to indicate 'death and resurrection', leave no room for a

conscious interval, where, it is taught, the disembodied dead are more alive

than they were in life.

In order that no unexplained difficulty shall be permitted to becloud

the issue, we can now return to John 11:

'He whom Thou lovest is sick' (11:3).

'This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the

Son of God might be glorified' (11:4).

We have already seen that Lazarus died, and the record of his burial

follows.  The words 'not unto death' cannot therefore mean that our Saviour

was mistaken.  We may learn the intent behind these words by comparing them

with another comment found in John:

'Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?

Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that

the works of God should be made manifest in him' (9:2,3).

In this passage the Lord is not teaching that the man or his parents

were the exceptions to the universal rule, and were sinless.  He was

indicating that this special calamity of blindness was allowed, or even

planned, in order that, by the miracle of his healing, the works of God that

set Him forth to be the Messiah, should be made manifest.  So, also, the

sickness of Lazarus, though it ended in actual death, had a greater purpose

in it, namely the glorifying of God and of His Son.  In verse 14 of John 11

we read, 'Then said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead'.

'Plainly' (parrhesia) -- Four times this word occurs in John's Gospel

as the translation of the Greek parrhesia, and in each case it is used in the

explanation of a parable or proverb.

'If Thou be the Christ, tell us plainly' (John 10:24).

'Then said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead' (11:14).

'These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh,

when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you

plainly of the Father' (16:25).

'His disciples said unto Him, Lo, now speakest Thou plainly, and

speakest no proverb' (16:29).

In John 10:6, in allusion to the previous verses regarding the fold,

the shepherd and the robber, this word paroimia, 'proverb', is translated

'parable'.  This 'proverb' is then 'plainly' stated in John 10:7-18.  When,