Note 57 — Chapter VIII · EVENTS IN THE PUBLIC LIFE OF JESUS, EXCLUDING THE MIRACLES.

It has been attempted in a variety of ways to evade the farther difference as to the person of the host. As Matthew and Mark speak only of the house of Simon the leper, οἰκία Σίμωνος τοῦ λεπροῦ, some have distinguished the owner of the house, Simon, from the giver of the entertainment, who doubtless was Lazarus, and have supposed that hence, in both cases without error, the fourth Evangelist mentions the latter, the two first synoptists the former.57 But who would distinguish an entertainment by the name of the householder, if he were not in any way the giver of the entertainment? Again, since John does not expressly call Lazarus the host, but merely one of the συνανακειμένων (those sitting at the table), and since the inference that he was the host is drawn solely from the circumstance that his sister Martha served, διηκόνει; others have regarded Simon as the husband of Martha, either separated on account of his leprosy, or already deceased, and have supposed that Lazarus then resided with his widowed sister:58 an hypothesis which it is more easy to reconcile with the narratives than the former, but which is unsupported by any certain information.