Warfield on Jesus's Anger at the Death of Lazarus

One of B. B. Warfield’s most profound and widely read essays is “On the Emotional Life of Our Lord” first published in 1912. In the essay (originally written for a Princeton Theological Seminary faculty publication and republished many times since), Warfield considers all of those instances in the gospel accounts in which Jesus demonstrates deep and abiding emotions. It is at once a beautiful and moving essay, while at the same time a powerful statement that Christ’s true human nature brings forth true human emotions—ranging from compassion to anger. You can download the essay for free here, but there are new published versions (in booklet form with updated text and with introductions) here and here.

Since we are now in Easter week, I thought it would be a good time to consider Warfield’s discussion of Jesus’s anger upon learning of the death of his dear friend, Lazarus.

Warfield writes,

The same term [for anger] occurs again in John’s narrative of our Lord’s demeanor at the grave of his beloved friend Lazarus (John 11:33, 38). When Jesus saw Mary weeping — or rather “wailing,” for the term is a strong one and implies the vocal expression of the grief — and the Jews which accompanied her also “wailing,” we are told, as our English version puts it, that “he groaned in the spirit and was troubled”; and again, when some of the Jews, remarking on his own manifestation of grief in tears, expressed their wonder that he who had opened the eyes of the blind man could not have preserved Lazarus from death, we are told that Jesus “again groaned in himself.”

But is “groaning,” as in the Authorized Version translation too tame?

The natural suggestion of the word “groan” is, however, that of pain or sorrow, not disapprobation; and this rendering of the term in question is therefore misleading. It is better rendered in the only remaining passage in which it occurs in the New Testament, Mark 14:5, by “murmured,” though this is much too weak a word to reproduce its implications. In that passage it is brought into close connection with a kindred term which determines its meaning. We read: “But there were some that had indignation among themselves . . . and they murmured against her.” Their feeling of irritated displeasure expressed itself in an outburst of temper. The margin of our Revised Version at John 11:33, 38, therefore, very properly proposes that we should for “groaned” in these passages, substitute “moved with indignation,” although that phrase too is scarcely strong enough.

We all know that “Jesus wept” is the shortest verse in the New Testament. But Warfield says “wept” will not do!

What John tells us, in point of fact, is that Jesus approached the grave of Lazarus, in a state, not of uncontrollable grief, but of irrepressible anger. He did respond to the spectacle of human sorrow abandoning itself to its unrestrained expression, with quiet, sympathetic tears: “Jesus wept” (verse 36). But the emotion which tore his breast and clamored for utterance was just rage. The expression even of this rage, however, was strongly curbed. The term which John employs to describe it is, as we have seen, a definitely external term. “He raged.” But John modifies its external sense by annexed qualifications: “He raged in spirit,” “raging in himself” He thus interiorizes the term and gives us to understand that the ebullition [the process of boiling] of Jesus’ anger expended itself within him. Not that there was no manifestation of it: it must have been observable to be observed and recorded; it formed a marked feature of the occurrence as seen and heard. But John gives us to understand that the external expression of our Lord’s fury was markedly restrained: its manifestation fell far short of its real intensity. He even traces for us the movements of his inward struggle: “Jesus, therefore, when he saw her wailing, and the Jews that had come with her wailing, was enraged in spirit and troubled himself’ . . . and wept. His inwardly restrained fury produced a profound agitation of his whole being, one of the manifestations of which was tears.

Here we find the true meaning of “righteous anger.”

Why did the sight of the wailing of Mary and her companions enrage Jesus? Certainly not because of the extreme violence of its expression; and even more certainly not because it argued unbelief — unwillingness to submit to God’s providential ordering or distrust of Jesus’ power to save. He himself wept, if with less violence yet in true sympathy, with the grief of which he was witness. The intensity of his exasperation, moreover, would be disproportionate to such a cause; and the importance attached to it in the account bids us seek its ground in something less incidental to the main drift of the narrative. It is mentioned twice, and is obviously emphasized as an indispensable element in the development of the story, on which, in its due place and degree, the lesson of the incident hangs. The spectacle of the distress of Mary and her companions enraged Jesus because it brought poignantly home to his consciousness the evil of death, its unnaturalness, its “violent tyranny” as Calvin (on verse 38) phrases it. In Mary’s grief, he “contemplates” — still to adopt Calvin’s words (on verse 33), — “the general misery of the whole human race” and burns with rage against the oppressor of men. Inextinguishable fury seizes upon him; his whole being is discomposed and perturbed; and his heart, if not his lips, cries out, — “For the innumerable dead . . . Is my soul disquieted.”

Jesus rages at the consequences of our sin, and as Warfield points out, does something about it which only he could do.

It is death that is the object of his wrath, and behind death him who has the power of death, and whom he has come into the world to destroy. Tears of sympathy may fill his eyes, but this is incidental. His soul is held by rage: and he advances to the tomb, in Calvin’s words again, “as a champion who prepares for conflict.” The raising of Lazarus thus becomes, not an isolated marvel, but — as indeed it is presented throughout the whole narrative (compare especially, verses 24-26) — a decisive instance and open symbol of Jesus’ conquest of death and hell. What John does for us in this particular statement is to uncover to us the heart of Jesus, as he wins for us our salvation. Not in cold unconcern, but in flaming wrath against the foe, Jesus smites in our behalf. He has not only saved us from the evils which oppress us; he has felt for and with us in our oppression, and under the impulse of these feelings has wrought out our redemption.

Warfield’s words are often quoted at funerals—I certain have cited them. His words are surely something wonderful to meditate upon as we move toward Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Jesus’s rage at the consequences of our sin reminds us that the one who hated sin so much could do, and actually did do, something about it. He was wrought out our redemption!