“Then why is it closed? Why is that stone against the opening since there are no bodies inside to protect? Why would anyone bother to seal the tomb again after Lazarus came forth?”

The old man stood absolutely immobile. He was looking at me, but I knew he couldn’t see me. “I d-d-d-don’t know, Matthias, I don’t know …”

The meadow was so still that I could almost feel the silence as one feels the clinging moisture of a heavy fog. My left sandal accidentally dislodged a small rock. It rolled along the crusty limestone beneath our feet until its clatter reverberated off the stone wall. After several steps I was directly in front of the round paint-flecked stone. Was this the spot where Jesus had finally put his life on the line? If he failed to raise Lazarus after he had said he would, even his apostles would have probably deserted him. If he did raise Lazarus, those who hated him and feared his growing popularity among the masses would surely mark him for an early execution. Only a few weeks earlier he had escaped from those who tried to stone him in the Temple. Why had he returned to place himself in a situation from which there could be no retreat?

How had Jesus sounded when he issued his famous command to the dead man? Was his voice amplified by the natural acoustics of this place so that it carried beyond the cliff’s distant edge and washed back over the village of Bethany?

I cupped my hands around my mouth, drew a deep breath, and yelled as loudly as I could, “Lazarus, come forth!” The words rolled like charging thunder along the wall of stone. Once more I shouted, “Lazarus, come forth!” and there was another clap of thunder, chasing vainly after the first. “Lazarus, come forth!” I cried, again and again until I felt Joseph shaking me from behind.

“Stop, Matthias! Enough! Let us be gone from here.”

“No,” I bellowed, breaking loose from his grip and racing toward the branchless trunk of a small dead tree that had been propped against the cliff’s wall. Seizing the makeshift pole I plunged its fatter end beneath the base of the gravestone and pulled back with all my strength.

“Stop, Matthias! Please! You must not defile the grave!”