Two Lazaruses, One Beloved Saint

The San Lazaro of popular devotion is really two biblical figures grown together. The Gospel of John tells of Lazarus of Bethany, brother of Martha and Mary, whom Jesus raised after four days in the tomb, the sign that most directly foreshadows the Resurrection. The Gospel of Luke tells a different story, a parable of a nameless beggar also called Lazarus, his body covered in sores and licked by dogs as he lay at a rich man's gate, who is carried after death to Abraham's side while the rich man is tormented.

The Church keeps them distinct, honouring the raised Lazarus of Bethany as a saint, but centuries of folk piety have merged the two, and it is the suffering beggar, poor, wounded, leaning on crutches among his dogs, who fills the popular image. Under that image San Lazaro became one of the most fervently invoked patrons of the sick and the leprous across the Iberian and Caribbean worlds. In Cuba his shrine at El Rincon draws enormous pilgrimages each 17 December, many arriving on foot or on their knees in thanks for healing.