Journey
Holy Week: who was there
Walk from Bethany to the empty tomb through the people who stood nearest: friends, betrayers, officials, strangers and the women who stayed.
People in this journey
Opening stop: A pound of spikenard, John 12:1
Three hundred pence is three hundred days' wages, if a penny was a day's pay as in Matthew 20:2. The Song of Solomon has spikenard sending forth its smell while the king sits at his table (Song of Solomon 1:12). A good host anointed a guest's head (Luke 7:46), and Abigail offers to be a servant to wash feet (1 Samuel 25:41). Mary anoints the feet. John counts this as six days before Passover, and Jesus ties the gift to his burial, which will come within the week.
Then Jesus six days before the passover came to Bethany, where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom he raised from the dead.
King James Version
Six days before the passover Jesus comes to Bethany, where a supper is made, Martha serves and Lazarus sits at table. Mary anoints his feet with costly spikenard and wipes them with her hair. Judas Iscariot objects that the ointment might have been sold for the poor, and the narrator says he was a thief who carried the bag. Jesus says she has kept it against the day of his burying. Crowds come to see Lazarus as well, and the chief priests consider putting Lazarus to death. The next day people take palm branches and meet him crying Hosanna, and he sits on a young ass; the narrator says the disciples understood this only later. Certain Greeks ask Philip to see Jesus, and Jesus answers that the hour is come, speaks of a corn of wheat that must die, and says his soul is troubled. A voice from heaven is heard, and the crowd calls it thunder or an angel. He speaks of being lifted up, then hides himself. The narrator says they did not believe though they had seen many miracles, and quotes Esaias.
Continue the journey
This journey has 12 stops. The opening stop is free. Premium opens the rest of the guided path, and every Scripture chapter stays free to read.