Someone said to Helen Keller, "What a pity you have no sight!" to which she replied, "Yes, but what a pity so many have sight but cannot see!"
A minister, a Boy Scout, and a computer expert were the only passengers on a small plane. The pilot came back to the cabin and said that the plane was going down but there were only three parachutes and four people. The pilot added, "I should have one of he parachutes because I have a wife and three small children." So he took one and jumped.
The computer whiz said, "I should have one of the parachutes because I am the smartest man in the world and everyone needs me." So he took one and jumped.
The minister turned to the Boy Scout and with a sad smile said, "You are young and I have lived a rich life, so you take the remaining parachute, and I’ll go down with the plane."
The boy Scout said, "Relax, Reverend, the smartest man in the world just picked up my knapsack and jumped out!
1 ¶ And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth.
2 And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?
Rather then compassion they have a topic of discussion and disgust, "who sinned?"
We ask, "Why did this happen? Rather than "How can I help?"
It’s called apathy, and it destroys Christian effectiveness.
One of the principle components of the theory of reincarnation is karma, the doctrine that everyone gets what he deserves. There is an impersonal force in the world that causes us to build future debits and credits based on our behavior.
The theory has many advantages. It may be applied to almost any problem and produce an explanation. The impersonal reign of karma metes out justice dispassionately; one may rest in the confidence that no evil will go unpunished and no good will be unrewarded.
Let’s think of the implications: here are several suffering children. One has leukemia, another is a cripple, and a third is dying of starvation. You want to help these children understand themselves better, so you say, "You are getting exactly what you deserve; you have these problems because you committed some great sins in a previous existence."
Here is another child, a four-year-old boy abused by an angry father with a lit cigarette. A six-year-old girl is beaten, her arms and legs broken by an angry and irrational mother. You say to them, "You were not the victims of injustice. You got exactly what you had coming to you because of sins you committed in a previous life—sins you cannot remember."
Gina Cerminara, says any birth abnormality "is probably of karmic origin."
Gina Cerminara gives some examples and explains:
In short, such cases would indicate that the infidelity of the mate sometimes occurs through karmic necessity. . . . John’s unfaithfulness to Mary may be due to the fact that Mary deserves this treatment because of her unfaithfulness to Claudius in ancient Rome, but on the other hand his philandering may stem from Mary’s failing in the present; the infidelity may be no more than a contemporary reaction to a contemporary instigation—a case of quick karma.
But to the question "Who is the administrator of this highly sophisticated procedure of reward and punishment?" The answer must be a remarkable, "No one"! There is no administrator per se, no infinite, personal God who oversees creation, but some impersonal process that in some remarkable way dispenses something akin to justice with all the efficiency of a computer, never making the mistake to punishing or rewarding the wrong person.
The best application of this theory can be seen in the caste system in which the weak must serve the strong. The lower exists for the benefit of the higher.
India is rigidly divided into four major castes. Those who are on the lowest end of the scale are so polluted that they cannot even belong to one of these four groups. They are called "untouchables"—outcasts. Each of the four castes has its own function, which reflects a rigid division of labor. Keep in mind the basic principle: the poor exist to serve the rich. The polluted keep the streets clean for the holy; the untouchables collect the filth to serve those who are further along in their journey to perfection. Although the lower always serve the lower. Why should the rich help the poor if the poor are only receiving what they have coming to them?
The highest caste is the Brahmin. He is considered sacred; the worst imaginable crime is to murder him. If you assault him, you must be put to death; if you slander him, your tongue is cut off. His property is so sacred that the king cannot tax it. The Brahmin is served by those beneath him.
The Brahmin is free, however, to assault a man who is of a lower caste. If the Brahmin is upbraided for it, it is because he has polluted himself by touching someone who is defiled. This explains why wealthy men are able to leave an opulent hotel and walk out on the streets, stepping over beggars and starving children without so much as a twinge of conscience or spark of compassion. In fact, if they were to alleviate the suffering of the poor, they just might be interfering with the delicate balance of justice administered by karma. Remember, everyone gets precisely what he or she deserves.
Ghandi, in his earlier days, steadfastly resisted any attempts to give the Untouchables recognition. In 1931, the British wanted to give the Untouchables representation in the Indian national legislature as a kind of affirmative action program. Ghandi was dead set against this move and almost starved himself to death to block such a humanitarian gesture. Needless to say, this scene was omitted from the motion picture Ghandi, a movie shrewdly designed to give him favorable publicity in the West.
3 Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.
His blindness was planned in heaven with a specific purpose in mind.
4 I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.
His blindness was timed by God to coincide with the Lord’s earthly ministry.
The Miracle
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 of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay,
7 And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing.
Nowhere in the passage does it say Jesus sent the man to be healed. He never promised this blind man that he would see again. He spat on the ground, made clay, stuck it in his eyes, and told the man to go wash his eyes. I wonder what the blind man thought about all of that? How would you have reacted? This man obeyed and was rewarded.
8 ¶ The neighbours therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind, said, Is not this he that sat and begged?
9 Some said, This is he: others said, He is like him: but he said, I am he.
The claim to a miraculous cure was viewed by some as spurious.
The first of 4 interrogations (9:10)
10 Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened?
11 He answered and said, A man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said unto me, Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash: and I went and washed, and I received sight.
12 Then said they unto him, Where is he? He said, I know not.
He had never seen Jesus because Jesus had sent him to Siloam to wash the clay from his eyes. All he knew was a name.
13 ¶ They brought to the Pharisees him that aforetime was blind.
14 And it was the sabbath day when Jesus made the clay, and opened his eyes.
15 Then again the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. He said unto them, He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see.
The Sabbath day was "holy." Strict guidelines had been drawn up to insure the sanctity of that seventh day of the week. For instance, if the wick of your lamp burned out on the Sabbath, you couldn’t replace it. You had to remain in the darkness. To cut your fingernails on the Sabbath was a violation of their regulations. A gray hair could not be pulled from your head without consequences. If you had a pair of sandals that had nails in them, you were not allowed to wear them on the Sabbath day. That "excess weight" was defined as carrying a burden, which was prohibited. It was a rigid system of don’t. . .don’t. . .don’t. . .don’t.
The problem that Jesus would soon face was that He had violated at least three Sabbath regulations.
First, when He spat on the ground and began to work that mud and clay between His fingers, He was technically "kneading."
Second, when He placed the substance on the man’s eyes, He was "anointing." That was not permitted on the Sabbath.
Third, of all things, He healed the man. That was illegal. You could keep someone from dying, but you could not help them. The Sabbath had been violated. The Pharisees were angered. A second inquisition begins.
"He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see." How is that for brief?
16 Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them.
The hardliners, "This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the Sabbath day." They disqualified Jesus from their religious "game" because He refused to play by their rules.
Others, "How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?"
There was a division, the extent of the problem is clearly seen in that this religious gathering addresses a theological question to a man who was a blind beggar, untrained in the law.
John Phillips,
"Some have seen in this difference of opinion among the Pharisees a reflection of the two popular rabbinic schools of the day. The followers of Shammai would argue from established principles: "A man who breaks the Sabbath is a sinner." The followers of Hillel would argue from evident facts: "A man who performs obvious good works is not a sinner."
17 They say unto the blind man again, What sayest thou of him, that he hath opened thine eyes? He said, He is a prophet.
In order to expose the imposture and prove the claim to be phony, the Pharisees ordered the man’s parents to appear before the council.
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 that had received his sight.
19 And they asked them, saying, Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? how then doth he now see?
They seem to be attempting to show that the man had never been blind.
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 seeth, we know not; or who hath opened his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him: he shall speak for himself.
22 These words spake his parents, because they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already, that if any man did confess that he was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue.
23 Therefore said his parents, He is of age; ask him.
They feared excommunication.
If this man truly had been blind and now could see, a notable miracle had been performed in their presence and the Pharisees could not deny this was of God. Attempting to deny that the man was actually blind, they summoned the parents of the blind man to question them. His parents were afraid to become involved in the conflict because "the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the synagogue" (v. 22). Edersheim describes what was involved:
For to persons so wretchedly poor as to allow their son to live by begging, the consequences of being "un-Synagogued:" or put outside the congregation-which was to be the punishment of any who confessed Jesus as the Messiah-would have been dreadful. Talmudic writings speak of two, or rather, we should say, of three, kinds of "excommunication," of which the two first were chiefly disciplinary, while the third was the real "casting out," "un-Synagoguing," "cutting off from the congregation." The general designation for "excommunication" was Shammatta, although, according to its literal meaning, the term would only apply to the severest form of it. The first and lightest degree was the so-called Neziphah or Heziphutha; properly, "a rebuke," an inveighing. Ordinarily, its duration extended over seven days; but, if pronounced by the Nasi, or Head of the Sanhedrin, it lasted for thirty days. In later times, however, it only rested for one day on the guilty person. Perhaps St. Paul referred to this "rebuke" in the expression which he used about an offending Elder. He certainly adopted the practice in Palestine, when he would not have an Elder "rebuked," although he went far beyond it when he would have such "entreated." In Palestine it was ordered, that an offending Rabbi should be scourged instead of being excommunicated. Yet another direction of St. Paul’s is evidently derived from these arrangements of the Synagogue, although applied in a far different spirit. When the Apostle wrote: " An heretic after the first and second admonition reject;" there must have been in his mind the second degree of Jewish excommunication, the so-called Niddui (from the verb to thrust, thrust out, cast out). This lasted for thirty days at the least, although among the Babylonians only for seven days. At the end of that term there was "a second admonition," which lasted another thirty days. If still unrepentant, the third, or real excommunication, was pronounced, which was called the Cherem, or ban, and of which the duration was indefinite. Any three persons, or even one duly authorised, could pronounce the lowest sentence. The greater excommunication (Niddui)—which, happily, could only be pronounced in an assembly of ten-must have been terrible, being accompanied by curses, and, at a later period, sometimes proclaimed with the blast of the horn. If the person so visited occupied an honourable position, it was the custom to intimate his sentence in a euphemistic manner, such as: "It seems to me that thy companions are separating themselves from thee." He who was so, or similarly addressed, would only too well understand its meaning. Henceforth he would sit on the ground, and bear himself like one in deep mourning. He would allow his beard and hair to grow wild and shaggy; he would not bathe, nor anoint himself; he would not be admitted into any assembly of ten men, neither to public prayer, nor to the Academy; though he might either teach, or be taught by, single individuals. Nay, as if he were a leper, people would keep at a distance of four cubits from him. If he died, stones were cast on his coffin, nor was he allowed the honour of the ordinary funeral, nor were they to mourn for him. Still more terrible was the final excommunication, or Cherem, when a ban of indefinite duration was laid on a man. Henceforth he was like one dead. He was not allowed to study with others, no intercourse was to be held with him, he was not even to be shown the road. He might, indeed, buy the necessaries of life, but it was forbidden to eat or drink with such an one.
24 Then again called they the man that was blind, and said unto him, Give God the praise: we know that this man is a sinner.
This could be a solemn charge to tell the whole truth or they are saying, "give God the praise not this Galilean peasant.
The word for "know" is the same one used by the man’s parents. "We know that this is our son" (9:20). Used by the Pharisees here, it is an arrogant claim to absolute knowledge. "It makes no difference what you say; we know that this man is a sinner."
We know and don’t confuse us with the facts.
25 He answered and said, Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not: one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see.
Leon Morris,
"no fine-spun web of airy theory can budge a man who is able to say with convictions ‘one thing I know.’" The pharisees had their theories about Jesus and what had taken place, but the healed man "knew" that something special, had taken place, but the healed man "knew" that something special, something miraculous had taken place in his life, and was not about to "bite the hand that healed Him." The facts could not be refuted. Fact one — he was blind. Fact two — he could see.
26 Then said they to him again, What did he to thee? how opened he thine eyes?
"Asked and answered" (10, 15, 19). This is getting monotonous.
27 He answered them, I have told you already, and ye did not hear: wherefore would ye hear it again? will ye also be his disciples?
28 Then they reviled him, and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are Moses’ disciples.
29 We know that God spake unto Moses: as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is.
30 The man answered and said unto them, Why herein is a marvellous thing, that ye know not from whence he is, and yet he hath opened mine eyes.
Every now and then I get the idea that the Pharisees moonlighted as undertakers, I say that because in verse twenty-nine they dig their own grave a little deeper. "We know that God spake unto Moses: as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is." The healed man may not have had an ounce of education, but he possessed a ton of logic. "The man answered, ’Now that is remarkable! You don’t know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes" (9:30). It’s as if he had said, "you guys know it all." Look back at verse twenty-four, "We know," and verse twenty-nine, "We know." But suddenly they admit, "We know not." "This is remarkable that you know-it-all Pharisees don’t know it all." Here was Jesus performing miracles, but the religious leaders had no clue as to His origin. But the way, the Pharisees
are contradicting themselves, In John 7:27 they said of Christ, "We know this man whence he is." But a short period later, they say they don’t know. A system of religion built upon opinion and tradition will find itself contradicting itself all the time because it is not built upon truth or absolutes.
31 Now we know that God heareth not sinners: but if any man be a worshipper of God, and doeth his will, him he heareth.
32 Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind.
33 If this man were not of God, he could do nothing.
C 31, "we know that God heareth not sinners." They had infered the same thing in verse 24.
C "but if any man be a worshipper of God, and doeth his will, him he heareth." Who could dispute that. If a man loves God, worships God, and serves God, he will have the ear of God. That’s logical.
C "Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind." This true.
C Conclusion: "If this man were not of God, he could do nothing!" If Jesus was a sinner as the pharisees claimed (v. 24), then there is no way God would answer His prayer and perform this miracle. But the fact was, the miracle had been done; therefore Jesus must be from God.
34 They answered and said unto him, Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out. {cast...: or, excommunicated him}
The truth hurts!
35 ¶ Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God?
36 He answered and said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him?
37 And Jesus said unto him, Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee.
38 And he said, Lord, I believe. And he worshipped him.
This is the second time the man receives sight. The Lord found out that he had been abandoned by "organized religion" and went to find him.
39 ¶ And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind.
40 And some of the Pharisees which were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind also?
The very question itself reveals their blindness. The Greek grammar is constructed in such a way as to expect Jesus to answer "No" to their query. They believed Jesus would say, "No, you religious people aren’t blind." But that was not the response. "Jesus said unto them, if ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth" (9:41). If they had admitted their blindness, Christ could have provided spiritual sight Yet because they self-righteously said, "We see," there was no help or hope for the truly "blind" men.
If their eyes had been truly opened, they would have been prostrate in the dust before Him, following the example of the man born blind.
The blindness of the nation of Israel toward Christ, epitomized by these Pharisees, was real. It led them to murder their messiah. It has persisted for nearly two thousand years. It led Paul, who had been on of them to say, "Blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in" (Romans 11:25).
They were blinded by the smoke of their own presumption and pride.
Proverb — "there is none so blind as he who will not see."
Nelson could not see the signal for suspending battle because he placed the glass to his blind eye, and man cannot see the truth as it is in Jesus because he has no mind to do so. Ungodly men are, as the country people say, "like the hogs in a harvest field," who will not come out for all your shouting. They cannot hear because they have no will to hear. Want of will causes paralysis of every faculty. In spiritual things man is utterly unable because resolvedly unwilling.
-- Charles Haddon Spurgeon, The Quotable Spurgeon, (Wheaton: Harold Shaw Publishers, Inc, 1990)
41 Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth.
In John 9 it is not so much that organized religion excommunicated a man in touch with Jesus. Rather, Jesus excommunicated organized religion out of touch with him.
A German lady during World War II was going to have a baby. When she was assigned a hospital room, she noticed upon the wall a picture of the crucified Saviour. Being a brainwashed Nazi, she screamed for the nurse: "Get the picture of that Jew off the wall!"
The nurse said, "I can’t. I have no authority to do that."
"Then get me the head man." Again she cried, "Get that Jew off the wall!"
He too informed her that he could not remove the picture.
The husband came to visit; and when he saw Jesus hanging on the cross, he too went to the authorities. "Get that Jew off the wall. I don’t want my baby’s eyes to see that Jew!"
The picture was removed. The baby was born. The baby was brought to the parents. No, the baby would never see the picture of that Jew; it was born blind.
