When the Blind See and the Seeing are Blind
When the Blind See and the Seeing are Blind
Considering John 8 and 9 Together
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In the Fourth Gospel, things operate on multiple levels. A conversation about a temple being torn down and rebuilt can point to a greater temple that’s not made with hands. A conversation about a well can lead to a deeper understanding of thirst and water. A situation of blindness can result in an important lesson about spiritual understanding. After all, there’s more than one kind of seeing.
John 8:12–59 contains a bracing back-and-forth between Jesus and some Jews. Key to the conversation is the question of Jesus’s identity. Who is he really? Where is he from? Who authorized him to do what he’s doing?
Jesus told the group, “Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires” (John 8:44). These Jews could not hear the truth, nor could they see the truth. There was a spiritual deafness and blindness in their hearts and minds.
We can identify their spiritual blindness because of their response to the conversation. They “picked up stones to throw at him” (John 8:59), which meant they had concluded that Jesus was a blasphemer.
Leaving the temple, Jesus passed a blind man (John 8:59; 9:1), and this situation was a fitting illustration of what had just happened in John 8. Submitting to the touch and words of Christ, the blind man was healed (9:6–7). The Pharisees were upset that this miracle took place on the Sabbath day (9:14–16). But as further testimony came forth, the truth was that a man who had been blind from birth was now seeing.
Though the Pharisees would not affirm the divine authority and origin of Jesus’s ministry, the formerly blind man said, “Why, this is an amazing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. . . . Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind” (John 9:30, 32).
In a disappointing turn of events, the Pharisees cast the healed man out of the synagogue (John 9:22, 34). Jesus encountered the healed man and said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” (9:35). The man asked who such a person was so that he might believe in him (9:36). Jesus said, “You have seen him, and it is he who is speaking to you” (9:37). The man confessed faith in Jesus and worshiped him (9:38).
The confession of faith hadn’t been the response of the seeing Pharisees, but it had been the response of this seeing man. The Pharisees had physical sight but not spiritual sight. The formerly blind man, however, had both physical and spiritual sight—and the spiritual sight was the most important.
Playing on the notions of blindness and sight, Jesus said, “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind” (John 9:39).
A person’s spiritual perception—or lack thereof—is revealed in how they respond to Jesus. The man who confessed Jesus is the one who truly sees. And these Pharisees, these teachers and leaders in Israel, are blind.
When we read Jesus’s words in John 9:35–41, they confirm that the miracle in John 9 is not a standalone kind of thing. We need to read the miracle in the larger context of the questions about Jesus’s identity.
The religious leaders were blind and thus in the darkness. They needed to believe Jesus’s claim, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).
We need to believe that claim too. Our confession needs to echo that of the man who had been formerly blind. We need to confess our faith in Jesus and worship him. That response to Jesus will confirm we have spiritual eyes that truly see.