John 9 JOHN 9:1-12 Healing a Man Born Blind Now as Jesus was passing by, he saw a man who had been blind from birth. His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who committed the sin that caused him to be born blind, this man or his parents?" Jesus answered, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but he was born blind so that the acts of God may be revealed through what happens to him. We must perform the deeds of the one who sent me as long as it is daytime. Night is coming when no one can work.
As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world." Having said this, he spit on the ground and made some mud with the saliva. He smeared the mud on the blind man’s eyes and said to him, "Go wash in the pool of Siloam" (which is translated "sent"). So the blind man went away and washed, and came back seeing.
Then the neighbors and the people who had seen him previously as a beggar began saying, "Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?" Some people said, "This is the man!" while others said, "No, but he looks like him." The man himself kept insisting, "I am the one." So they asked him, "How then were you made to see?" He replied, "The man called Jesus made mud, smeared it on my eyes and told me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed, and was able to see." They said to him, "Where is that man?" He replied, "I don’t know." The chapter we now begin records one of the few great works of Christ which John has reported.
It tell us how our Lord gave sight to a man who had been "blind from his birth." Here, as elsewhere in this Gospel, we find the circumstances of the miracle narrated with peculiar fullness, minuteness, and particularity. Here too, as elsewhere, we find the narrative rich in spiritual lessons. We should observe, first, in this passage, how much sorrow sin has brought into the world. A sorrowful case is brought before us. We are told of a man "who was blind from his birth." A more serious affliction can hardly be conceived.
Of all the bodily crosses that can be laid on man, without taking away life, none perhaps is greater than the loss of sight. It cuts us off from some of the greatest enjoyments of life. It shuts us up within a narrow world of our own. It makes us painfully helpless and dependent on others. In fact, until men lose their eyesight, they never fully realize its value. Now blindness, like every other bodily infirmity, is one of the fruits of sin. If Adam had never fallen, we cannot doubt that people would never have been blind, or deaf, or mute.
The many ills that flesh is heir to, the countless pains, and diseases, and physical defects to which we are all liable, came in when the curse came upon the earth. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin." (Rom. 5:12.) Let us learn to hate sin with a godly hatred, as the root of more than half of our cares and sorrows. Let us fight against it, mortify it, crucify it, and abhor it both in ourselves and others. There cannot be a clearer proof that man is a fallen creature than the fact that he can love sin and take pleasure in it.
We should observe, secondly, in this passage, what a solemn lesson Christ gives us about the use of opportunities. He says to the disciples who asked Him about the blind man, "I must work while it is called today--the night comes, when no man can work." That saying was eminently true when applied to our Lord Himself. He knew well that his own earthly ministry would only last three years altogether, and knowing this He diligently redeemed the time. He let slip no opportunity of doing works of mercy, and attending to His Father's business.
Morning, noon, and night He was always carrying on the work which the Father gave Him to do. It was His food and drink to do His Father's will, and to finish His work. His whole life breathed one sentiment--"I must work--the night comes, when no man can work." The saying is one which should be remembered by all professing Christians. The life that we now live in the flesh is our day. Let us take care that we use it well, for the glory of God and the good of our souls. Let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling, while it is called today.
There is no work nor labor in the grave, toward which we are all fast hastening. Let us pray, and read, and keep our Sabbaths holy, and hear God's Word, and do good in our generation, like men who never forget that "the night is at hand." Our time is very short. Our daylight will soon be gone. Opportunities once lost can never be retrieved. A second lease of life is granted to no man. Then let us resist procrastination as we would resist the devil. Whatever our hand finds to do, let us do it with our might.
"The night comes, when no man can work." We should observe, thirdly, in this passage, what different means Christ used in working miracles on different occasions. In healing the blind man He might, if He had thought fit, have merely touched Him with his finger, or given command with His tongue. But He did not rest content with doing so. We are told that "He spit on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay." In all these means of course there was no inherent healing virtue. But for wise reasons the Lord was pleased to use them.
We need not doubt that in this, as in every other action of our Lord, there is an instructive lesson. It teaches us, we may well believe, that the Lord of heaven and earth will not be tied down to the use of any one means or instrumentality. In conferring blessings on man, He will work in His own way, and will allow no one to prescribe to Him. Above all, it should teach those who have received anything at Christ's hands, to be careful how they measure other men's experience by their own. Have we been healed by Christ, and made to see and live? Let us thank God for it, and be humbled.
But let us beware of saying that no other man has been healed, except he has been brought to spiritual life in precisely the same manner. The great question is--"Are the eyes of our understanding opened? Do we see? Have we spiritual life?"--Enough for us if the cure is effected and health restored. If it is, we must leave it to the great Physician to choose the instrument, the means, and the manner--the clay, the touch, or the command. We should observe, lastly, in this passage, the almighty power that Christ holds in His hands. We see Him doing that which in itself was impossible.
Without medicines He cures an incurable case. He actually gives eyesight to one who was born blind. Such a miracle as this is meant to teach an old truth, which we can never know too well. It shows us that Jesus the Savior of sinners "has all power in heaven--and earth." Such mighty works could never have been done by one that was merely man. In the cure of this blind man we see nothing less than the finger of God. Such a miracle, above all, is meant to make us hopeful about our own souls and the souls of others. Why should we despair of salvation while we have such a Savior?
Where is the spiritual disease that He cannot take away? He can open the eyes of the most sinful and ignorant, and make them see things they never saw before. He can send light into the darkest heart, and cause blindness and prejudice to pass away. Surely, if we are not saved, the fault will be all our own. There lives at God's right hand One who can heal us if we apply to Him.
Let us take heed lest those solemn words are found true of us--"Light has come into the world but men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." "You will not come to Me that you might have life." (John 3:19; 5:40) Technical Notes: 1. And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man who was blind from birth. 2. And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? 3. Jesus answered, Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. 4.
I must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; the night is coming when no man can work. 5. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. 6. When he had thus spoken he spat on the ground and made clay with the saliva; and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay. 7. And he said to him, Go wash in the pool of Siloam (which is translated, Sent). He went his way therefore and washed, and came seeing. 8. The neighbors therefore and those who previously had seen that he was blind said, Is not this he who sat and begged? 9. Some said, This is he.
Others said , He is like him. But he said, I am he. 10. Therefore they said to him, How were your eyes opened? 11. He answered and said, A man who is called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, Go to the pool of Siloam and wash. And I went and washed, and I received sight. 12. Then they said to him, Where is He? He said, I do not know. 1.--[ And as Jesus passed by. ] The Greek word rendered “passed by” is the same as the word so rendered in the preceding verse, at the end of the last chapter.
Some think from this repetition that the miracle recorded here took place immediately after the events of the last chapter without the least break or interruption, and that it was as our Lord was retiring from the temple after the attempt of the Jews to stone Him that He saw the blind man.
Others, however, think that an interval of time must have elapsed, partly because it seems improbable that our lord and His disciples would all be able to withdraw themselves quietly from an angry mob and calmly stand still near the scene of attempted violence to attend to a blind man, and partly because it is the manner of St. John’s Gospel to pass from one event to another, sometimes without intimating that there is any change of time or place. Thus, John v.19, vi.25,43,59, vii.28-33. The point, however, is not one of any practical importance.
Chemnitius holds strongly that an interval of two months comes in here, and that our Lord spent that time in a visitation of the towns and villages of Judea, as related in Luke xiii.22. He thinks that He thus occupied the two months after the feast of tabernacles and that He returned to Jerusalem shortly before the feast of dedication, in winter. The main objection to this theory seems to be that it is not the natural conclusion we should draw from the text.
Gualter, Ferus, Ecolampadius, and Musculus maintain, on the other hand, that there is a close and intentional connection between this chapter and the preceding one. They think that our Lord desired to show by deed as well as work that He was “the Light of the world.” (John viii.14.) Bucer says, “This chapter is a sermon in act and deed on the words ‘I am the Light of the world.’” In the miracle which occupies the whole of this chapter, the following special circumstances deserve notice: (1) It is only related by St. John. (2) Like each of the few miracles in St.
John, it is described with great minuteness and particularity. (3) It is one of the four miracles wrought in Judea, or near Jerusalem, mentioned in St. John.
He records eight great miracles altogether: four in Galilee—turning the water into wine, healing the nobleman’s son, feeding the multitude, and walking on the water (chap. ii,iv, and vi.), and four in Judea—purifying the temple, healing the impotent man, restoring sight to the blind, and raising Lazarus (chap. ii,v,vi, and ix). (4) It is one of those miracles which the Jews were especially taught to expect in Messiah’s time: “In that day shall the eyes of the blind see out of obscurity.” (Isa. xxix.18.) (5) It is one of those signs of Messiah having come, to which Jesus particularly directed John the Baptist’s attention: “The blind receive their sight.” (Matt. xi.5.) (6) It was a miracle worked in so public a place, and on a man so well known, that it was impossible for the Jerusalem Jews to deny it.
It is hardly necessary, perhaps, to bid any well-instructed Christian to observe the singularly instructive and typical character of each of the eight miracles which John was inspired to record. Each was a vivid picture of spiritual things.
Hengstenberg observes that three of the four great miracles wrought by Christ in Judea exactly represent the three classes of works referred to in Matt. xi.5: “The lame walk, the blind see, the dead are raised up.” (John v,ix, and xi.) [ He saw a man who was blind from birth. ] The man was probably sitting near the temple gateway to attract the notice of worshipers going to and fro, like the man described in Acts. (Acts iii.2.) Being blind, he would naturally be dependent on charity.
The Jewish law specifies the blind as peculiarly deserving of attention (Lev. xix.14, Deut. xxvii.18.) To give sight to one who had not lost the use of his eyes by disease or accident, but had never seen at all, was, of course, a mighty miracle. Let it be noted that our Lord “saw” the blind man and healed him of His own free will, unasked and unexpectedly. As in the case of the impotent man (John v.6), He did not wait to be entreated but was Himself the first to move. Let it however be noted at the same time, that if the man had not been by the wayside, our Lord would not have seen him.
Chrysostom observes that when the Jews “would not receive our Lord’s sayings and tried to kill Him, He went out of the temple and healed the blind, mitigating their rage by His absence, and by working a miracle both softening their hardness and proving His affections. And it is clear that He proceeded intentionally to this work on leaving the temple, for it was He who saw the blind man and not the blind man who came to Him.” Gualter observes that this passage shows how the eyes of the Lord are in every place and how He sees His own people even when they think not of Him.
Alford thinks it possible that the blind man was constantly proclaiming that he had been born blind, to excite pity. Burgon observes: “More of our Savior’s miracles are recorded as having been wrought on blindness than on any other form of human infirmity.
One deaf and dumb man is related to have had speech and hearing restored to him; one case of palsy and one of dropsy find special record; twice was leprosy and twice was fever expelled by the Savior’s word; three times were dead persons raised to life; but the records of His cures wrought on blindness are four in number at least, if not five.” (See Matt. xii.22.) Isaiah seems to foretell the recovery of sight by the blind as “an act of mercy specially symbolical of Messiah’s day.” (Isa. xxix.18, xxxii.3, xxxv.5, xlii.7.) 2.--[ And his disciples asked Him. ] This expression seems to show that our Lord was surrounded and accompanied by His usual followers, and favors the idea that there was some break or interval between the beginning of this chapter and the end of the last.
Though He by Divine power could hide Himself and go through the midst of His enemies, it is hardly reasonable to suppose that within a few minutes He would be surrounded again by His disciples. Yet it is, of course, possible. [ Master, who sinned...born blind? ] This curious question has given rise to much unprofitable discussion. It is repeatedly asked, “Why did the disciples ask this?
What put it into their minds to start the inquiry?” (a) Some think that the Jews had imbibed the common oriental notion of the pre-existence and transmigration of souls from one body to another, and that the disciples supposed that in some previous state of existence this blind man must have committed some great sin for which he was now punished. (b) Some think that the question refers to a strange notion current among some Jews that infants might sin before they were born.
In support of this view, they quote Gen. xxv.22 and Gen. xxxviii.28,29. (c) The most probable view is that the question arose from a misapplication of such passages of Scripture as the second Commandment where God speaks of “visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children” (Exod. xx.5), and from a forgetfulness of Ezek. xviii.20, etc. There are few notions that men seem to cling to so naturally as the notion that bodily sufferings and all afflictions are the direct consequences of sin, and that a diseased or afflicted person must necessarily be a very wicked man.
This was precisely the short-sighted view that Job’s three friends took up when they came to visit him, and against which Job contended. This was the idea of the people at Melita when Paul was bitten by a viper after the shipwreck: “This man is a murderer.” (Acts xxviii.4.) This appears to have been at the bottom of the question of the disciples: “There is suffering; then there must have been sin.
Whose sin was it?” Chrysostom thinks that the disciples remembered our Lord’s words to the paralytic whom He healed (chap. v.14), “You are made whole; sin no more,” and asked now to what sin this man’s blindness might be traced. This, however, seems very improbable considering the length of time between the two miracles. Hengstenberg observes that the fallacy of supposing that special afflictions are the result of some special sins, “commends itself to low and common spirits by its simplicity and palpableness. It has the advantage of rendering it needless to weep with them that weep.
It saves a man from the obligation, when he sees heavy affliction, of smiting on his breast and saying ‘God be merciful to me a sinner.’ It gives the natural man the comfortable feeling that he is so much the better than the sufferer, as he is more fortunate.” Those who wish to go more deeply into the subject will find it fully discussed by the great Dutch divine, Gomarus. It is worth notice that the word here rendered “Master” is the same that is rendered “Rabbi” in five other places in St.
John. (i.38,49, iii.2,26, and vi.25.) Why our translators did not observe uniformity in their translation of the word throughout this Gospel is not very clear. 3.--[ Jesus answered, Neither...sinned. ] This first part of our Lord’s answer is elliptical. The sense, of course, must be supplied from the context. Our Lord did not mean that neither this blind man nor his parents had committed any sin at all, but that it was not any special sin of his or theirs which had caused his blindness.
Nor yet did our Lord mean that the sins of parents could never entail disease on children, but that the case before Him, at any rate, was not such a case. Of course, He did not mean us to forget that sin is the great primeval cause of all the evils that are in the world. [ But that the works of God...manifest in him. ] The meaning of this must be that the man’s blindness was permitted and overruled by God in order that His works of mercy in healing him might be shown to men.
This blindness was allowed and ordained by God, not because the man was specially wicked, but in order to furnish a platform for the exhibition of a work of Divine mercy and power. A deep and instructive principle lies in these words. They surely throw some light on that great question of the origin of evil. God has thought fit to allow evil to exist in order that He may have a platform for showing His mercy, grace, and compassion. If man had never fallen, there would have been no opportunity of showing Divine mercy.
But by permitting evil, mysterious as it seems, God’s works of grace, mercy, and wisdom in saving sinners have been wonderfully manifested to all His creatures. The redeeming of the Church of elect sinners is the means of “showing to principalities and powers the manifold wisdom of God.” (Eph. iii.10.) Without the fall, we should have known nothing of the cross and the Gospel. Melancthon, on this verse, suggests no less than ten reasons why God permits evil to come on the Church, which contain much food for thought. Brentius and Chemnitius also say many excellent things on the same theme.
Bucer remarks that this verse should teach us to bear ills patiently and cheerfully, since all that happens to us tends, in some way, to the glory of God. Gualter remarks that even wicked men like Pharaoh subserve the glory of God (Rom. ix.17); much more may men’s afflictions and diseases. Ecolampadius remarks that God allows nothing whatever to happen without some good reason and cause. Henry observes: “The intention of Providence often does not appear till a great while after the event, perhaps many years after.
The sentences in the book of Providence are sometimes long, and you must read a great way before you understand the meaning.” Jones of Nayland, on this text, remarks: “The best way to answer the great question of the origin of evil is to consider the end of it—‘What good comes out of it?’ This makes the subject plain and useful. Why was this man born blind? That the works of God might appear and Christ might cure him. Why did man fall? That God might save him. Why is evil permitted in the world? That God may be glorified in removing it. Why does the body of man die?
That God may raise it up again. When we philosophize in this manner, we find light, certainty, and comfort. We have a memorable example of it in the case before us.” Barnes remarks that “Those who are afflicted with blindness, deafness, or any deformity, should be submissive to God. It is His appointment, and is right and best.
God does no wrong; and when all His works are seen, the universe will see and know that He is just.” 4.--[ I must work the works, etc. ] The connection between this verse and the preceding one seems to be in the word “works.” It is as though our Lord said: “Healing the blind man is one of the great ‘works’ which God has appointed for Me to do, and I must do it during the ‘day’ or short period of my ministry.
This blindness was ordained by my Father to be a means of showing forth my divine power.” The expressions “while it is day”, and “the night comes,” must probably be interpreted with special reference to our Lord’s ministry upon earth. While He was with His disciples speaking, teaching, and working miracles, it was comparatively “day.” His little Church basked in the full sunlight of His Divine presence, and saw and learned countless wonderful things.
When He ascended up on high it became comparatively “night.” Just as in night “no man can work,” so when Christ left the world the visible proof of His Divine mission which the disciples had so long enjoyed and seen could no longer be given. The proverbial saying “No man can work in the night” would be verified. These limits to the application of the figure must be carefully remembered.
Of course our Lord did not mean that the Church, after His ascension, would not enjoy far more spiritual light than it did before He came; nor yet that the disciples, after the day of Pentecost, would not see many truths far more clearly even than when Christ was with them. But the words “day and night” here have a special reference to our Lord’s bodily presence with His Church. As long as He was visibly with them, it was “day.” When He left them, it was “night.” It is well to remark that St. Paul uses the same figures when comparing time present with time to come, at the second advent.
He says, “The night is far spent, and the day is at hand.” (Rom. xiii.12.) There the night is Christ’s bodily absence and the day Christ’s bodily presence. Melancthon points out what an example Christ supplies to Christians in this place. The hatred, opposition, and persecution of the world, and the failures and infirmities of professing Christians, must not make us give way to despondency. Like our Master, we must work on.
Calvin observes: “From these words we may deduce the universal rule, that to every man the course of his life may be called his day.” Beza and others think that there is a primary prophecy here of the withdrawal of light and privilege from the Jews, which was in the mind of our Lord, as well as the general principle that to all men day is the time for work and not night. 5.--[ As long as I am in the world, etc. ] This verse seems to be a general broad assertion of our Lord’s purpose in coming into the world and His position while in it.
“I came into the world to be its Sun and spiritual Guide, and to deliver men from the natural darkness in which they are. And so long as I am in the world, I wish to be its Light in the fullest sense, the Deliverer of men’s souls and the Healer of men’s bodies.” Cocceius suggests that in these words our Lord had respect to the fact that He was going to work a work on the Sabbath and that it would be disapproved by the Jews as a breach of the Sabbath.
Foreseeing this, He defends what He is about to do by reminding His disciples that during the short time of His earthly ministry, He must seize every opportunity of doing good. Alford observes that just as Jesus said before He raised Lazarus, “I am the Resurrection and the Life,” so here, before giving sight to the blind, He said “I am the Light.” 6.--[When...spoken...made clay...anointed the eyes, etc. ] The action here used by our Lord is the same that we find used on two other occasions—once when He healed one deaf and dumb (Mark vii.33), and once when He healed a blind man (Mark viii.23).
The making of the “clay,” however, is quite peculiar to this miracle. The reason why our Lord used the action we cannot tell. There is, of course, no special virtue either in spittle or in clay made from spittle which could cure a man born blind. Why then did Jesus use this means? Why did He not heal the man with a word or a touch? The only answer to such inquiries is that our Lord would teach us, by His peculiar mode of proceeding here, that He is not tied to any one means of doing good, and that we may expect to find variety in His methods of dealing with souls as well as with bodies.
May He not also wish to teach us that He can, when He thinks fit, invest material things with an efficacy which is not inherent in them? We are not to despise Baptism and the Lord’s Supper because water, bread, and wine are mere material elements. To many who use them, no doubt they are nothing more than mere material things and never do them the slightest good. But to those who use the sacraments rightly, worthily, and with faith, Christ can make water, bread, and wine instruments of doing real good.
He who was pleased to use clay in healing a blind man may surely use material things, if He thinks fit, in His own ordinances. The water in Baptism and the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper, while they are not to be treated as idols, ought not to be treated with irreverence and contempt. It was, of course, not the clay that healed the blind man, but Christ’s word and power. Nevertheless the clay was used. So the brazen serpent in itself had no medicinal power to cure the bitten Israelites. But without it they were not cured.
The selection of clay for anointing the blind man’s eyes is thought by some to be significant and to contain a possible reference to the original formation of man out of the dust. He who formed man with all his bodily faculties out of the dust could easily restore one of those lost faculties, even sight, when He thought fit. He who healed these blind eyes with clay was the same Being who originally formed man out of the clay.
Ecolampadius thinks that the spittle was an emblem of Christ’s Divinity, and the clay of His humanity, and that the union of the two represented the union of the two natures in Christ’s person whereby healing came to a sinsick world. To say the least, this seems fanciful. Barradius suggests that our Lord actually formed new eyes for the man, as He at first formed man’s body out of the dust. This, however, seems needlessly improbable. Poole thinks that our Lord used spittle to make clay simply because there was no water nigh at hand to make it with.
Wordsworth observes that Christ’s manner of working the miracle was “tenderness to the Jews. They would see the clay on the man’s eyes and see him going to Siloam.” He also observes: “God loves to effect His greatest works by means tending under ordinary circumstances to produce the very opposite of what is to be done. God walls the sea with sand. God clears the air with storms. God warms the earth with snow. So in the world of grace, He brings water in the desert, not from the soft earth, but the flinty rock. He heals the sting of the serpent of fire by the serpent of brass.
He overthrows the wall of Jericho by ram’s horns. He slays a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass. He cures saltwater with salt. He fells the giant with a sling and stone. And thus does the Son of God work in the Gospel. He cures the blind man by that which seemed likely to increase his blindness—by anointing his eyes with clay.
He exalts us to heaven by the stumbling block of the cross.” 7.--[ And said...Go, etc. ] The direction here given to the blind man would remind any pious Jew of Elisha’s directions to Naaman, “Go wash in Jordan.” (2 Kings v.10.) The water of this pool had no inherent healing efficacy any more than other water. But the command was a test of faith, and in obeying, the blind man found what he wanted.
It is the great principle which runs through Scripture: “Believe and obey, and all will be right.” The pool of Siloam was a well-known reservoir, or artificial pond, in a valley close to Jerusalem, remarkable for a supply of water from an intermittent spring. It is pointed out in the present day, and there seems no reason to doubt that it is the same pool that was so called eighteen hundred years ago. It is first mentioned in Nehemiah iii.15 and afterwards in Isaiah viii.6.
Lightfoot asserts that the pool of Bethesda and the pool of Siloam were both supplied from one spring. [ Which is translated, Sent. ] There is undeniable difficulty about this sentence. It is naturally asked, Why is this parenthetical explanation inserted by St. John? Why are we specially told that the word Siloam means Sent, or He that was sent?
The most probable answer seems to be that the name of the fountain was meant to refer the blind man’s mind to the Messiah, whom God had “sent.” All pious Jews would understand the expression which so frequently occurs in John’s Gospel, “He whom God has sent,” to point to Messiah. When therefore Jesus said, “Go wash in Siloam,” the naming of that particular fountain would be a silent hint that He who gave the command was the Sent One of God, the great Healer of all diseases. St. John’s parenthesis would then mean, when expounded, “This was a most suitable and proper pool for Jesus to name.
It was fitting that He who was ‘Sent of God’ should work a miracle in the pool called ‘Sent.’” This is the view of Chrysostom and Augustine. It is impossible to help feeling that the clause looks very much like the insertion of some ignorant early copyist who wished to show his own knowledge of etymology, and perhaps found it in an old copy as a marginal gloss. The Syriac and Persian versions do not contain the clause. Yet it certainly is found in most manuscripts and versions.
Hutcheson thinks that John inserted this clause for no other end than to remind readers that this fountain was a special gift “sent” by God, among the hills near Jerusalem, for the benefit of the Jews.
Hengstenberg says, “As Jesus represents Himself and His Church as the real Pool of Bethesda, in chap. v., so here He declares Himself the real Sent One, or Siloam, the Fountain of blessings.” [ He went...washed...came seeing. ] The blind man, as is often the case with people born blind, was probably able to find his way about Jerusalem without trouble, and the road from the temple gate to the pool of Siloam was likely to be much frequented.
His implicit faith and obedience contrast favorably with the conduct of Naaman when told to go and wash in Jordan. (2 Kings v.14.) The word “came” must either mean “to his own home” or simply “came back to the temple gate.” The miracle of healing seems to have taken place in the act of washing in Siloam. Let us remember that the blind man’s conduct is meant to be a pattern to us. He did not stumble at Christ’s command, but simply obeyed, and in obeying he was healed. We must do likewise.
Melancthon thinks it likely that a crowd of curious and jeering spectators accompanied the man to Siloam to see the result of our Lord’s prescription. Scott remarks that the immediate power of using the eyes was no small part of the miracle. When people recover sight now after surgical operations, it requires a considerable time to learn the use of the newly-acquired sense. 8.--[ The neighbors. ] This would seem to show that he “came” to his own house as soon as he was healed of his blindness.
The word before us naturally means the people who lived near to him. [ Those who...had seen...blind. ] This expression includes all persons in Jerusalem who knew the blind man by sight, though they did not live near him but had often seen him near the temple and become familiar with his appearance. There are generally blind beggars in the chief thoroughfares of large cities and near large public buildings whom all residents know well by sight.
The slow, uncertain, feeble gait of a blind man always makes him conspicuous. [ Is not this he who sat and begged? ] This question seems to settle that the blind man was one of the poorest and humblest class of Jews.
None are so likely to come to poverty and be dependent on charity as the blind, who of course cannot work for their own support. 9.--[ Some said, This is he. ] This probably was the saying of the blind man’s neighbors, who naturally knew him best. [ Others said, He is like him. ] This was probably the saying of people living in Jerusalem, who knew the blind man by sight but did not live near him and were not, therefore, so familiar with his appearance. The difference between the look and demeanor of the man before and after his miraculous cure would necessarily be very great.
One can quite understand that some would hardly know him again. Augustine remarks, “The opened eyes had altered his looks.” Musculus observes how much the expression of a face depends on the eyes. [ He said, I am he. ] This was the saying of the man when he heard people doubting his identity and looking at him with hesitation.
“I assure you,” he says, “that I am he who used to sit at the temple gate and beg.” 10.--[ Therefore they said, etc. ] Those who asked this question appear to have been the people who came together round the blind man when he returned from the pool of Siloam with his sight restored. Some were his neighbors and others were inhabitants of Jerusalem, drawn together by the miracle. The inquiry was the natural one that such a wonderful cure would first call forth. 11.--[ He answered and said, etc. ] This verse is a simple unvarnished account of the facts of the cure.
How the blind man knew that our Lord’s name was “Jesus” does not appear. It is not unlikely that some of the bystanders, when our Lord first told him to go to the pool of Siloam, told him that Jesus of Nazareth, the person whose preaching was making such stir in Jerusalem, was the speaker. We cannot doubt that our Lord was well known by this time to all dwellers in Jerusalem. Yet there is no proof that the beggar recognized Him as anything more than “a man called Jesus.” The accuracy with which he recites all the facts of his cure is well worthy of notice.
“He first put clay on my eyes; then He bid me go and wash in Siloam. I went; I was cured.” 12.--[ Then they said...Where...do not know.] The desire to see the worker of this wonderful miracle was natural, but the question “Where is He?” was probably asked with a mischievous intention. Those who asked it wished to lay hands on our Lord and bring Him before the rulers. The man’s answer certainly seems to show that he did not return to the place where he had sat and begged, but to his house.
Had he gone back to the temple gate, he might have replied that Jesus was here only a short time before and was probably not far off. The questioners seem to suppose that the worker of such a miracle and the subject of it could not be far apart. They did not understand that our Lord always avoided, rather than courted, public notice. JOHN 9:13-25 The Pharisees’ Reaction to the Healing They brought the man who used to be blind to the Pharisees. (Now the day on which Jesus made the mud and caused him to see was a Sabbath.) So the Pharisees asked him again how he had gained his sight.
He replied, "He put mud on my eyes and I washed, and now I am able to see." Then some of the Pharisees began to say, "This man is not from God, because he does not observe the Sabbath." But others said, "How can a man who is a sinner perform such miraculous signs?" Thus there was a division among them. So again they asked the man who used to be blind, "What do you say about him, since he caused you to see?" "He is a prophet," the man replied.
Now the Jewish authorities refused to believe that he had really been blind and had gained his sight until at last they summoned the parents of the man who had become able to see. They asked the parents, "Is this your son, whom you say was born blind? Then how does he now see?" So his parents replied, "We know that this is our son and that he was born blind. But we do not know how he is now able to see, nor do we know who caused him to see. Ask him, he is a mature adult. He will speak for himself." (His parents said these things because they were afraid of the Jewish authorities.
For the Jewish authorities had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Christ would be put out of the synagogue. For this reason his parents said, "He is a mature adult, ask him.") Then they summoned the man who used to be blind a second time and said to him, "Promise before God to tell the truth. We know that this man is a sinner." He replied, "I do not know whether he is a sinner. I do know one thing--that although I was blind, now I can see." These verses show us how little the Jews of our Lord's time understood the right use of the Sabbath day.
We read that some of the Pharisees found fault because a blind man was miraculously healed on the Sabbath. They said, "This man is not of God, because He keeps not the Sabbath day." A good work had manifestly been done to a helpless fellow-creature. A heavy bodily infirmity had been removed. A mighty act of mercy had been performed. But the blind-hearted enemies of Christ could see no beauty in the act. They called it a breach of the Fourth Commandment! These would-be wise men completely mistook the intention of the Sabbath.
They did not see that it was "made for man," and meant for the good of man's body, mind, and soul. It was a day to be set apart from others, no doubt, and to be carefully sanctified and kept holy. But its sanctification was never intended to prevent works of necessity and acts of mercy. To heal a sick man was no breach of the Sabbath day. In finding fault with our Lord for so doing, the Jews only exposed their ignorance of their own law. They had forgotten that it is as great a sin to add to a commandment, as to take it away.
Here, as in other places, we must take care that we do not put a wrong meaning on our Lord's conduct. We must not for a moment suppose that the Sabbath is no longer binding on Christians, and that they have nothing to do with the Fourth Commandment. This is a great mistake, and the root of great evil. Not one of the ten commandments has ever been repealed or put aside. Our Lord never meant the Sabbath to become a day of pleasure, or a day of business, or a day of traveling and idle dissipation. He meant it to be "kept holy" as long as the world stands.
It is one thing to employ the Sabbath in works of mercy, in ministering to the sick, and doing good to the distressed. It is quite another thing to spend the day in visiting, feasting, and self-indulgence. Whatever men may please to say, the way in which we use the Sabbath a sure test of the state of our religion. By the Sabbath may be found out whether we love communion with God. By the Sabbath may be found out whether we are in tune for heaven. By the Sabbath, in short, the secrets of many hearts are revealed.
There are only too many of whom we may say with sorrow, "These men are not of God, because they keep not the Sabbath day." These verses show us, secondly, the desperate lengths to which prejudice will sometimes carry wicked men. We read that the "Jews agreed that if any man did confess that Jesus was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue." They were determined not to believe. They were resolved that no evidence should change their minds, and no proofs influence their will. They were like men who shut their eyes and tie a bandage over them, and refuse to have it untied.
Just as in after times they stopped their ears when Stephen preached, and refused to listen when Paul made his defense, so they behaved at this period of our Lord's ministry. Of all states of mind into which unconverted men can fall, this is by far the most dangerous to the soul. So long as a person is open, fair, and honest-minded, there is hope for him, however ignorant he may be. He may be much in the dark at present. But is he willing to follow the light, if set before him? He may be walking in the broad road with all his might.
But is he ready to listen to any one who will show him a more excellent way? In a word, is he teachable, childlike, and unfettered by prejudice? If these questions can be answered satisfactorily, we never need despair about the man's soul. The state of mind we should always desire to possess is that of the noble-minded Bereans. When they first heard the Apostle Paul preach, they listened with attention. They received the Word "with all readiness of mind." They "searched the Scriptures," and compared what they heard with God's Word.
"And therefore," we are told, "many of them believed." Happy are those who go and do likewise! (Acts 17:11, 12.) These verses show us, lastly, that nothing convinces a man so thoroughly as his own senses and feelings. We read that the unbelieving Jews tried in vain to persuade the blind man whom Jesus healed, that nothing had been done for him. They only got from him one plain answer--"One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see." How the miracle had been worked, he did not pretend to explain. Whether the person who had healed him was a sinner, he did not profess to know.
But that something had been done for him he stoutly maintained. He was not to be reasoned out of his senses. Whatever the Jews might think, there were two distinct facts of which he was conscious--"I was blind--now I see." There is no kind of evidence so satisfactory as this to the heart of a real Christian. His knowledge may be small. His faith may be feeble. His doctrinal views may be at present confused and indistinct. But if Christ has really wrought a work of grace in his heart by His Spirit, he feels within him something that you cannot overthrow. "I was dark, and now I have light.
I was afraid of God, and now I love Him. I was fond of sin, and now I hate it. I was blind, and now I see." Let us never rest until we know and feel within us some real work of the Holy Spirit. Let us not be content with the name and form of Christianity. Let us desire to have true experimental acquaintance with it. Feelings no doubt, are deceitful, and are not everything in religion. But if we have no inward feelings about spiritual matters, it is a very bad sign. The hungry man eats, and feels strengthened; the thirsty man drinks, and feels refreshed.
Surely the man who has within him the grace of God, ought to be able to say, "I feel its power." Technical Notes: 13. They brought to the Pharisees him who was formerly blind. 14. And it was the sabbath day when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. 15. Then the Pharisees also asked him again how he had received his sight. He said to them, He put clay on my eyes, and I washed and do see. 16. Therefore some of the Pharisees said, This man is not from God, because he does not keep the sabbath day. Others said, How can a man who is a sinner do such miracles?
And there was a division among them. 17. They said to the blind man again, What do you say about Him who has opened your eyes? He said, He is a prophet. 18. But the Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and received his sight, until they called the parents of him who had received his sight. 19. And they asked them saying, Is this your son, whom ye say was born blind? How then does he now see? 20.
His parents answered them and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; 21. but by what means he now sees, we do not know, or who has opened his eyes we do not know. He is of age; ask him. He shall speak for himself. 22. These words spoke his parents, because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if any man confessed that he was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. 23. Therefore his parents said, He is of age; ask him. 24. Then again they called the man who was blind and said to him, Give God the praise! We know that this man is a sinner. 25.
He answered and said, Whether he is a sinner or not , I do not know. One thing I know: that though I was blind, now I see. 13.--[ They brought...formerly blind. ] The prime movers in this matter seem to have been the neighbors of the blind man. They thought that so marvelous an event as this sudden cure demanded investigation. The “Pharisees” in this passage, if we may judge by the context, must have been the great council, or Sandehrim, of the Jewish nation—the same body before whom our Lord made His defense in the fifth chapter of this Gospel.
At any rate, we can hardly imagine any other body at Jerusalem “excommunicating” a man. (See verse 34.) Whitby observes hows wonderfully the providence of God ordered things that the Pharisees should be put to silence and open shame by a poor blind man! 14.--[ And it was the Sabbath day, etc. ] This seems specially mentioned by the Evangelist parenthetically for two reasons. (a) It proved our Lord’s unvarying readiness to do works of mercy on the Sabbath day. (b) It explains the bitter enmity of the Jews against our Lord in this chapter. They regarded Him as a breaker of the Sabbath.
Assuming that there was no interval of time between the end of the last chapter and the beginning of this, it is remarkable how much our Lord did and said on this Sabbath day. From the beginning of the eighth chapter down to the thirty-fifth verse of the ninth, the narrative at first sight seems to run on without a break. It certainly makes it rather doubtful whether there should not be a break or pause assumed at the end of the eighth chapter.
Burkitt remarks that one object of our Lord in working so many miracles on the Sabbath was “to instruct the Jews in the true doctrines and proper duties of the Sabbath, and to let them know that works of necessity and mercy are very consistent with the due sanctification of the Sabbath. It is hard to find any time wherein charity is unseasonable; for as it is the best of graces, so its works are fittest for the best of days.
Whitby thinks that our Lord frequently did miracles on the Sabbath to impress on believing Jews the folly of the superstitious observance of it, and to prevent the misery they would run into if they persisted in an extravagant scrupulosity about the Sabbath when days of vengeance came on Jerusalem. 15.--[ Then the Pharisees...sight. ] The question asked of the healed man by the council of Pharisees was precisely the same that had been asked by his neighbors: “Your eyes have been opened suddenly, though you were born blind.
Tell us how it was done.” It is worthy of remark that the Greek word which we render here and all through the chapter as “received sight” means literally no more than “looked up, or saw again.” This, of course, could not be precisely true and correct in the case of this man, as he had never seen or used his eyes at all and could not therefore see a second time. But it is useful to notice how here and elsewhere in Scripture the Holy Ghost uses the language which is most familiar and easily understood, even when it is not precisely and scientifically correct. And it is what we all do every day.
We talk of the sun “rising” though we know well that, strictly speaking, he does not rise, and that what we see is the effect of the earth moving round the sun. Barnes observes: “The proper question to have been asked was whether he had in fact been cured, and not in what way. The question about a sinner’s conversion is, whether in fact it has been done, and not about the mode or manner in which it has been effected.
Yet no small part of disputes among men are about the mode in which the Spirit renews the heart and not about the fact that it is done.” [ He said to them, etc. ] The answer of the healed man is an honest, bold, plain repetition of the same story he had told already. The only difference is that he does not name “Jesus” here but says “He” put clay, as if he knew his examiners would understand whom he meant. Or it may be that his mind was so full of his Benefactor that he omits to name Him and takes for granted that all would know who He was.
The simple straightforward boldness of this man, standing before the most formidable court of the Jews and telling out his story, is very noteworthy. It is, moreover, a complete statement of facts and consequences. “He put clay; I washed; I see.” 16.--[ Therefore some of the Pharisees said, etc. ] This verse brings forward prominently the existence of two classes among the Pharisees. The one was the great majority, consisting of hundreds of bigoted enemies of our Lord ready to catch at any pretext for injuring His reputation and damaging His character. They said, “This Man is not from God.
He is a wicked man because He does not keep the Sabbath day. A Prophet sent from God would not have done any work on the Sabbath.” This assertion, of course, was based on the false and groundless principle that works of mercy to the sick were a violation of the Fourth Commandment. According to Lightfoot, the Rabbins expressly forbid saliva to be applied to the eyelids on the Sabbath day. The other class, consisting of a small minority, raised the grave question, “How could a man not sent by God, a wicked man, work such an astonishing miracle as this?
If He were not commissioned and enabled by God, He could not possibly give sight to the blind. Surely He must be from God.” These must have been Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, Gamaliel, and others.
Their line of argument is precisely that of Nicodemus in the famous visit to our Lord by night, when he said “No man can do these miracles except God be with him.” (John iii.2.) Three times in John’s Gospel we find that expression, “There was a division among them.” (Here, vii.43, and x.19.) The hesitating manner in which the better class of the council raise the question here, “How can a man,” etc., is strongly indicative of a timid minority, who felt that the stream of feeling was all against them.
It strikingly resembles the question of Nicodemus (John vii.51), “Does our law judge any man,” etc. One might almost think it was Nicodemus speaking here. In large assemblies of men convened to consider ecclesiastical and religious questions, we may confidently assume that there are always some present whose hearts are right and who are willing to support the truth, even though they sit in bad company, and are for the present silenced and overawed. Gamaliel’s conduct, in Acts v.34, is an illustration of this.
There is no warrant for staying away from assemblies and councils merely because we happen to be in a minority. Chrysostom remarks how “none of the assembly dared say what he wished openly, or in the way of assertion, but only in the way of doubt. One party wanted to kill our Lord and the other to save Him.
Neither spoke out.” Bullinger observes that “all divisions are not necessarily evil, nor all concord and unity necessarily good.” 17.--[ They said to the blind man again. ] This division among the members of the council had at least this good affect: that they found it necessary to go into the whole case more fully and ask further questions. These very questions brought the reality of the miracle into fuller light than before. [ What do you say...opened your eyes? ] This question must evidently mean, “What do you think about this Person who, you say, has opened your eyes?
Whom do you believe Him to be seeing that He has wrought this cure?” The question is an inquiry not about the reality of the miracle, but about the Person who is said to have performed it. It looks, according to some, like an intention to entrap the poor man into saying something about Jesus for which they could condemn Him. On the other hand, Chrysostom, Ferus, and Toletus argue that those who made the inquiry of this text must have been the party which favored our Lord. [ He said, He is a prophet. ] This expression was the beginning of faith in the healed man.
It was a declaration of his own belief that the Person who had wrought such a great cure must be a Person specially raised by God to do great works, like Elijah or Elisha. We must not forget that in the present day we are apt to confine the word “prophet” to a man who foretells things to come. But the Bible use of the word is much wider. The “prophets” raised up in the Old Testament were by no means all foretellers of things to come. Preaching, warning, and miracle-working were the whole business of not a few.
In this sense the man seems to have called our Lord “a Prophet.” It was for what He had done rather than for what He had said. We should carefully note that the first idea about our Lord which the Jewish mind seemed ready to embrace was that He was a “Prophet.” Thus the multitude which escorted Him into Jerusalem said, “This is Jesus the Prophet of Nazareth” (Matt. xxi.11); and again, “The multitude took Him for a Prophet” (Matt. xxi.46); and again, “Others said it is a Prophet” (Mark vi.15); and again, “A great Prophet is risen up among us” (Luke vii.16).
Even the two disciples going to Emmaus were only positive on one point: that Jesus had been “a Prophet mighty in word and deed” (Luke xxiv.19). But it was a higher step of faith to say that Jesus was “the Prophet” promised by Moses—the Messiah. This the healed man did not yet say.
As yet he only got so far as “a Prophet,” not “the Prophet.” Chemnitius remarks on this poor man’s clear view of our Lord’s greatness, that “you will often find more solid theological piety among tailors and shoemakers than among cardinals, bishops, and abbots.” Adam Clarke says it was “a Jewish maxim that a prophet might dispense with the observance of the Sabbath.” If the healed man referred to this, his answer was a silencing one, and put the Pharisees in a dilemma.
Lampe also remarks that many things were allowed to prophets sent by God on an extraordinary mission, even about the observance of the ceremonial law, as we see in the history of David and Elijah. This gives great weight to the man’s reply, “He is a Prophet.” 18.--[ But the Jews did not believe, etc. ] Here, as elsewhere, we should mark the extraordinary unbelief of the Jewish people and their obstinate determination to shut their eyes against light. It teaches the folly of supposing that mere evidence alone will ever make men Christians.
It is the lack of will to believe and not the lack of reasons for believing that makes men infidels. “The Jews” here, as in other places in John’s Gospel, mean the teachers of the Jewish nation at Jerusalem, and especially the Pharisees. The expression “until they called” deserves special notice. We should remark that it does not mean that “after they called the man’s parents, they believed; that they were unbelieving up to the time that they called them and then began to believe.” On the contrary, the context shows that even after they had called them, they continued unbelieving.
Parkhurst observes that it is a form of speaking “signifying an interval, but not necessarily excluding the time following.” The expression throws light on Matt. i.25. That well-known text must not be pressed too far. It is no certain proof that Mary had other children after Jesus was born. Compare 1 Sam. xv.35, 2 Sam. vi.23, Job xxvii.5, Isa. xxii.14, Matt. v.26 and xviii.34. The word “called” probably implies the public call or summons of the man’s parents to appear before the council, just as witnesses are called aloud by name to appear in our courts of justice.
Gualter observes how close the resemblance was between the conduct of the Pharisees in this case and that of the Romish Inquisition. The pertinacious determined effort to condemn the innocent, and to deprive Christ of His glory, is painfully the same.
Besser quotes a saying of the infidel Voltaire: “If in the market of Paris, before the eyes of a thousand men and before my own eyes, a miracle should be performed, I would much rather disbelieve the two thousand eyes and my own two than believe it!” 19. -- [ They asked them, etc. ] The enemies of our Lord overreached themselves by their summoning the parents of the healed man. They brought publicly forward the two best possible witnesses as to the fact of the man’s identity, as to the fact that he was born blind, and as to the fact that he now had his sight.
So true is the saying, “He takes the wise in their own craftiness.” (1 Cor. iii.19.) Chrysostom thinks that the expression “whom ye say,” insinuated that they supposed the parents to be impostors, and that “they were acting deceitfully and plotting on behalf of Christ” by spreading a report that their son was born blind.
The language of the verse seems to show that the healed man and his parents were at first confronted, and that the Pharisees pointed to him and asked, “Is this your son?” 20.--[ His parents answered, etc. ] The father and mother of the blind man made a plain statement of facts that could not be contradicted. They placed it beyond a doubt that the man now standing before the Sanhedrim was one who, from the best possible evidence, they knew had been born blind.
The fact of having a blind child is one about which no parent could be mistaken. 21.--[But by what means...or who...we do not know. ] These words of the healed man’s parents were probably the simple truth. The time was so short since the cure was wrought that they might well be ignorant of the manner of it.
Hastily summoned before the Sanhedrim, they might well have had no opportunity of conversing with their son, and as yet may have known nothing of the miracle. [ He is of age, etc. ] These words show the determination of the parents to have nothing more to do with their son’s case than they could possibly help. They evidently regarded the council with the same undefined dread with which men at one time regarded the Inquisition in Spain.
The word “age” is the same Greek word that in Matt. vi.27 is translated “stature.” It is highly probable that in that text it would have been better rendered “age,” as here. The words “he,” “him,” and “himself” in this clause are all emphatic, and all might be rendered “himself.” A man was reckoned “of age” by the Jews when he was thirty. 22.--[ These words spoke...feared the Jews. ] This sentence must refer to the latter part of the preceding verse. Fear of the leading Jews in the council of Pharisees made the parents refer their inquirers to their son.
Four times in John’s Gospel we have special mention made of the “fear of the Jews.” Here, and vii.13, xii.42, and xix.38. [ The Jews had already agreed, etc. ] This is a striking example of the extreme littleness of unbelief and the lengths to which hatred of Christ will go. To resolve on such a decision as this shows a settled determination not to be convinced. The punishment of being “put out of the synagogue” was a heavy one to the Jew. It was equivalent to being cut off from all communion with other Jews and tantamount to excommunication.
Those only who do anything for evangelizing the Jews now can form any adequate idea of the trials which conversion to Christianity entails on them, and the dread in which they stand of being cut off from Israel.
Trench says: “We must not understand that the Sanhedrim had formally declared Jesus to be an impostor and a false Christ, but only that so long as the truth or falsehood of His claim to be the Messiah was not clear, and they, the great tribunal had not given a decision, none were to anticipate that decision, and the penalty of premature confession was to be excommunicated.” 23.--[ Therefore his parents said, etc. ] It was the fear of running the slightest risk of excommunication, or being even suspected of favoring the Healer of their son, that made the parents refer all inquiries to him and refuse to offer any opinion about the means of his cure, whatever they may have felt. 24.--[ Then again...blind. ] This was a second summons into court.
Very possibly the healed man had been carefully removed out of court while his parents were being examined.
But when nothing could be got out of them, there was no alternative but to submit him to a second process of crossexamination and intimidation. [And said...Give God the praise, etc. ] This sentence admits of two interpretations. (a) Some, as Calvin, Chemnitius, Gualter, Ecolampadius, Beza, Piscator, Diodati, Aretius, Ferus, Maldonatus, Jansenius, Rollock, Alford, and Trench, regard it as a solemn form of adjuration and think it parallel to Joshua’s words to Achan (Josh. vii.19): “You stand in God’s presence.
Give glory to Him by speaking the truth.” This, however, makes the clause that follows rather unmeaning and renders it necessary to supply a good deal to fill up the sense. (b) Others, as Chrysostom, Brentius, Musculus, Pellican, Vatablus, and Barradius, regard it as specially referring to the cure which had been performed. “Give God the honor and glory of your healing. He must have wrought the cure and not this man who anointed your eyes with clay. He could not have wrought this cure because he is a Sabbath-breaker, and therefore a sinner.
A sinner like him could not have healed you.” I rather prefer this view. Gualter and Musculus point out the odious affectation of zeal for God’s glory which characterizes the conduct of many wicked persons in every age. Even the Spanish Inquisition professed a zeal for God’s glory. This “we” here is emphatic in the Greek: “We, who are learned men, and ought to know best.” 25.--[ He answered...sinner or not, etc. ] The healed man’s answer is a very simple and yet very striking one. He tells his inquirers that the question whether Jesus is a sinner is one he knows nothing about.
But he does know the fact that he himself was blind up to that very day, and that now he can see. He carefully avoids at present saying a word about the character of his Healer. The one point he sticks to is the reality of the miracle. He must believe his own senses. His senses told him that he was cured. The expression in every age has been regarded as a happy illustration of a true Christian’s experience of the work of grace in his heart. There may be much about it that is mysterious and inexplicable to him and of which he knows nothing.
But the result of the Holy Ghost’s work he does know and feel. There is a change somewhere. He sees what he did not see before. He feels what he did not feel before. Of that he is quite certain. There is a common and true saying among true Christians of the lower orders: “You may silence me and beat me out of what I know; but you cannot beat me out of what I feel.” The English translation of the last clause rather misses the brevity and force of the Greek. It would be more literally rendered, “Being blind, now I see.”