Passage

What Jesus meant by sleep

Source and translation

World English Bible, Protestant Edition · Public domain · en

View source

¹³Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he spoke of taking rest in sleep.

John 11:13World English Bible, Protestant Edition

The scene

The narrator explains that Jesus meant death when the disciples understood him to mean sleep.

To understand

The disciples had said that sleeping would lead to recovery. Jesus then states plainly that Lazarus is dead, correcting their reading of his earlier words.

A question

What expectation about recovery comes from the disciples’ misunderstanding of sleep?