Lazarus

by Alain Absire

Story of Lazarus after Jesus has raised him from the dead, but not restored him to his former self. He becomes a tragic figure, a wanderer seeking Jesus from place to place to restore him.

Genres: Fiction

Unknown Binding

First published March 1, 1988

Reviews

[Eric_W · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lazarus, has, as the basis for the story, a most startling premise: that when Jesus raised Lazarus from the grave he brought him back from the dead but not back to life. Jesus comes to Lazarus's tomb, after failing to heed pleas from Lazarus' family to heal him from the illness which caused his death. Jesus performs the miracle at the tomb, but Lazarus, while he walks and breathes, and becomes a testament to the miracle, can no longer make love to his wife, no longer has the strength to work at his craft, cannot sleep; indeed cannot die! When the Sanhedrin try to have him murdered because they fear the evidence of Jesus' miracles, Lazarus does not bleed from the multiple stab wounds, nor does he feel pain. He realizes he has become a walking zombie, smelling of the dank tomb, reeking of death, a source of curiosity and. disgust, but unable to die.

Lazarus becomes obsessed with finding Jesus to discover why God has done this to him. He traces Jesus to Jerusalem only to discover him being crucified. He then hears of the resurrection and tries to find the resurrected Christ. Along the way he meets the Apostles who are hiding in fear of retribution from the Jewish authorities, and Jair, the blind man to whom Jesus gave back his sight. Each he questions, receiving platitudes or even deceit. Mary. Jesus's mother. tells him "fear not, everything he does is for the glory of God." John tells him it is important that he not look alive or no one would believe he had been brought back from the dead. Lazarus asks. "What kind of God is it who, in order to be recognized, is willing to destroy forever someone who never did any harm?" who in fact had aided his Son when he was hiding from the authorities. People keep asking Lazarus what death was like, expecting tales of heaven and visions of Abraham, yet he insists it was only nothingness, like a "black pit."

Absire’s vision of the world is truly bleak. Murderers and beggars are familiar features of the landscape. In the end Lazarus holes up in an abandoned sewer while Jerusalem is destroyed by the Romans. He has a terrifying thought, "What if Yahweh does not exists, never had existed. And that everything the children of Israel put their faith in, that he had faith in, was a lie." In the end he abandons himself to await eternity in a semi-alive state, his desolate journey having become a nightmare.

The Chicago Tribune describe Lazarus in a mastery of understatement: "It is hard to picture a more effectively sustained achievement: Bleakness here is wrapped in gloom inside a shroud of despair within a veil of dreariness enveloped by a swathe of nothingness." I'm still not quite sure why I finished the book except that the tale is riveting, insidiously beckoning the reader toward a glimmer of hope and light only at the end to dash you upon the rocks of utter gloom.

[Padraic · Rating 4 out of 5]

A hard book to recommend, as it is difficult to come by anymore. Absire asks a simple question: what did Lazarus do next? Answering this in the context of biblical criticism is impossible - Lazarus seems to serve only a symbolic purpose in John. But novelists are like dogs: if it smells interesting, it is interesting. Thus Lazarus is forty shades of gray, bloodless, and emits a freakishly cold vibe to those around him. What's more, he starts to hate Jesus for not leaving him a clue as to his next move. True this is 20th century French agnosticism bumping up against a 2000 year old tradition - but still...

[Shelley Alongi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am still trying to decide what I think of this book. I chose it only because the national Library service did an audio recording with one of my favorite narrators and I was in the mood for listening to him so I picked up this book and downloaded it. I didn’t know anything about this either before reading this book but some of the reviews on on this website were helpful in giving me ideas of what others thought of it. I was glad I The only one who was surprised at its story. It is a combination of increasingly hateful theology, a bearable horror read, I am not into horror fiction. Considering someone who is raised from the dead but not really alive is not an idea I would have imagined with any creativity. I kept reading the book to find out if Lazarus found reconciliation that he did. I admit that working the distraction of hey novel is a new event in my reading experience. Have the end draws closer we understand that the death Lazarus experience before being called again to life was preferable to the distraction he was witnessing. And his continuing hate for the son of God whom he had helped was a surprise for me. From a literary and writing standpoint the descriptions of this book were amazing. I always admire anyone who can translate a story into a second language and maintain its original writing style. I don’t think I’ll be forgetting this book anytime soon.

[Elaine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book! I always wondered what happened to Lazarus after Jesus raised him from the dead, considering that he'd been dead 5 days in the heat of the Middle East. This book looks at what his life would have REALLY been like after being dead that long. He smells, flies buzz around him, he looks like a rotting corpose, yet he lives, and no one wants to be around him--and he was a young man. Jesus did him no favor by raising him from the dead if this was how he left him; what kind of life can he have in the state he's in? His beautiful new wife leaves him because of how repulsive she finds him. His life is one continual misery after another and he seeks only to find Jesus to beg him to either let him return to death or return him to how he was before he died. Then he meets a man on his journey who tells him a truth he is not prepared to hear. Excellent, thought provoking book. Read it a long time ago--and it always stuck with me. Now I can't find it anywhere.