Endnote 7 – The Raising of Lazarus

Trans. Morton Smith, Clement of Alexandria, p. 447. This version of Lazarus’s raising may also explain a somewhat mysterious tradition of the ancient Egyptian church, which identified the sixth day of the sixth week of Lent as the day on which Jesus had baptized his apostle and Saint Mark had baptized his converts in Alexandria. Thomas Talley and other scholars have theorized that this tradition was based on the Secret Gospel’s statement that Jesus initiated Lazarus six days after he raised him. See Talley, “Liturgical Time in the Ancient Church: The State of Research,” Studia Liturgica 14 (1982), pp. 34–51, cited by John Dominic Crossan, The Historical Jesus, p. 330. A longer discussion may be found in Talley, The Origins of the Liturgical Year (New York: Pueblo Publishing Co., 1986).