Whether He is a sinner or not I do not know. One thing I know: that though I was blind, now I see

 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.  And they asked them, saying, "Is this your son, who you say was born blind?  How then does he now see?"  His parents answered them and said, "We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but by what means he now sees we do not know, or who opened his eyes we do not know.  He is of age; ask him.  He will speak for himself."  His parents said these things because they fears the Jews, for the Jews had agreed already that if anyone confessed that He was the Christ, he would be put out of the synagogue.  Therefore his parents said, "He is of age; ask him." 

So they again called the man who was blind, and said to him, "Give God the glory!  We know that this Man is a sinner."  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."  Then they said to him again, "What did He do to you?  How did He open your eyes?"  He answered them, "I told you already, and you did not listen.  Why do you want to hear it again?  Do you also want to become His disciples?"  Then they reviled him and said, "You are His disciple, but we are Moses' disciples.  We know that God spoke to Moses; as for this fellow, we do not know where He is from."  The man answered and said to them, "Why, this is a marvelous thing, that you do not know where He is from; yet He has opened my eyes!  Now we know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does His will, He hears him.  Since the world began it has been unheard of that anyone opened the eyes of one who was born blind.  If this Man were not from God, He could do nothing."  They answered and said to him, "You were completely born in sins, and are you teaching us?"  And they cast him out.

Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when He had found him, He said to him, "Do you believe in the Son of God?"  He answered and said, "Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?"  And Jesus said to him, "You have both seen Him and it is He who is talking with you."  Then he said, "Lord, I believe!"  And he worshiped Him.  And Jesus said, "For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may be made blind."  Then some of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these words, and said to Him, "Are we blind also?"  Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, you would have no sin; but now you say, 'We see.'  Therefore your sin remains."

- John 9:18-41

Our current readings are set during the Feast of Tabernacles at the temple in Jerusalem.  Events from this eight-day feast continued through chapters 7 and 8.  In yesterday's reading, Jesus had passed from the temple as the leadership took up stones to put Him to death for declaring Himself to be equal with God, referring to Himself as the I AM (see this reading).  Now as Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth.  And His disciples asked Him, saying, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"  Jesus answered, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him.  I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work.  As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world."  When He had said these things, He spat on the ground and made clay with the saliva; and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay.  And He said to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam" (which is translated, Sent).  So he went and washed, and came back seeing.  Therefore the neighbors and those who previously had seen that he was blind said, "Is not this he who sat and begged?"  Some said, "This is he."  Others said, "He is like him."  He said, "I am he."  Therefore they said to him, "How were your eyes opened?"  He answered and said, "A Man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, 'Go to the pool of Siloam and wash.'  So I went and washed, and I received sight."  Then they said to him, "Where is He?"  He said, "I do not know."  They brought him who formerly was blind to the Pharisees.  Now it was a Sabbath when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes.  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 I see."  Therefore some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath."  Others said, "How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?"  And there was a division among them.  They said to the blind man again, "What do you say about Him because He opened your eyes?"  He said, "He is a prophet."

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.  And they asked them, saying, "Is this your son, who you say was born blind?  How then does he now see?"  His parents answered them and said, "We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but by what means he now sees we do not know, or who opened his eyes we do not know.  He is of age; ask him.  He will speak for himself."  His parents said these things because they fears the Jews, for the Jews had agreed already that if anyone confessed that He was the Christ, he would be put out of the synagogue.  Therefore his parents said, "He is of age; ask him."    Yet again, we recall that the term the Jews is used in John's Gospel like a political affiliation; it refers to the leadership or possibly their followers.  At this time, so great is the fear of the leaders and their known antipathy to Jesus that the parents refuse to speak to the leaders.  Instead they refer them to their son, who has been healed by Christ.  In a sense, the lack of responsibility on the part of the parents is fitting in the context of the entire experience of the Church:  it is the believers who will testify.

So they again called the man who was blind, and said to him, "Give God the glory!  We know that this Man is a sinner."  The healed man is again called to be a witness (see yesterday's reading, above).  My study bible notes that with Jesus not present, the Pharisees call Him a sinner, while earlier Christ Himself asked them face to face, "Which of you convicts me of sin?" and they evaded the question (8:46-48).  Give God the glory! is an oath formula that was used before giving testimony.  My study bible comments that the healed man will truly do so; the more he is pressed, the more fervent his faith becomes, while the Pharisees move into deeper darkness.

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."  The healed man becomes a model of Christian witness here.  My study bible notes that many people do not bear witness to Christ as they fear they will be asked questions they can't answer.  But here the healed man gives the model testimony to people who are much more educated than he is.  He admits what he does not know, but he follows up with what he does know.  This is a foundational formula for witnessing about one's faith to others:  "That I don't know, but what I do know is this." 

Then they said to him again, "What did He do to you?  How did He open your eyes?"  He answered them, "I told you already, and you did not listen.  Why do you want to hear it again?  Do you also want to become His disciples?"  Then they reviled him and said, "You are His disciple, but we are Moses' disciples.  We know that God spoke to Moses; as for this fellow, we do not know where He is from."  The man answered and said to them, "Why, this is a marvelous thing, that you do not know where He is from; yet He has opened my eyes!  Now we know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does His will, He hears him.  Since the world began it has been unheard of that anyone opened the eyes of one who was born blind.  If this Man were not from God, He could do nothing."  They answered and said to him, "You were completely born in sins, and are you teaching us?"  And they cast him out.   The Pharisees once again respond with insults, as they did earlier to Christ (8:48); and finally the healed man is cast out.   Through the power of these leaders, he becomes excluded from community.  We notice how the illumination of his sight has also illumined his understanding about Christ.  My study bible points out that this man moves from knowing almost nothing about Christ to the conclusion that Jesus could not possibly be a sinner, through confessing that He must be from God.  My study bible adds that the unprecedented nature of opening the eyes of one who was born blind is a confirmation of the divinity of Christ.  This was prophesied as one of the signs of the coming Messiah (Isaiah 35:5; 42:7), and a prerogative which belonged solely to God (Psalm 146:8).

Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when He had found him, He said to him, "Do you believe in the Son of God?"  He answered and said, "Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?"  And Jesus said to him, "You have both seen Him and it is He who is talking with you."  Then he said, "Lord, I believe!"  And he worshiped Him.  And Jesus said, "For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may be made blind."  Then some of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these words, and said to Him, "Are we blind also?"  Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, you would have no sin; but now you say, 'We see.'  Therefore your sin remains."  My study bible suggests here that our Lord's coming brought judgment to the world, not because He came to judge (12:47-48), but rather because of humankind's accountability to Him.  Those who see and hear but do not believe are judged by their own faithlessness.

At the end of chapter 6, Jesus said, "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing.  The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.  But there are some of you who do not believe" (see this reading).  There is life in Christ's teaching; it is the power of the spiritual truth that He brings to us as He brings the presence of the Kingdom into the world.  In the healing miracle we're given in chapter 9, this sixth sign of seven in John's Gospel, there is also life, and it is an occasion for witnessing.  The man who is healed benefits and is grateful to God to the point that he bears witness although he is cast out of the community for doing so, and although his own parents will not testify on his behalf to the religious leaders because of their own fears of being cast out.  Truth is like that.  St. Paul writes, "For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12).  The healed man in today's reading follows the truth he knows to the fullness of its testimony about Christ.  He identifies completely with it and will not deny nor disavow what he knows, what his own experience of truth is.  The oath formula, "Give God the glory!" is key here.  So many of us benefit from our faith, from the teachings that have come before us, from Christ's words and mission into the world, but how many are willing to truly recognize the gifts they have been given?  How many realize how their experience of life has been shaped through the truth that Christ has given us?  Even the concept that God is love (1 John 4:8) is a gift from Christ's mission into the world, but how many people realize what a fundamental truth such as this one does to shape a society and its aims and goals?  Not too many, I suspect.  If "God is love" is a foundational truth to build on, then consider what the aims of a justice system becomes.  If the foundational faith of a society teaches that the one truly innocent Man born into the world was crucified under Roman and Jewish Law, then consider the impact of this understanding on our own concepts of how the innocent may suffer even under the most well-intentioned, enlightened, and sophisticated human systems of law.  But how many can be truly grateful for what we have been given?  The witness testimony of this man born blind must become the formula for each of us who have experienced God's grace in our lives.  There may be all kinds of things we don't know and cannot discuss with the more sophisticated or highly educated among us, but there will always be things that we do know.   This is the crucial impact and need we have not only for concepts and ideas but rather for the experience of our faith.  We can look back on and point to the times when it was the experience of God's love that pulled us through a difficult or seemingly impossible circumstance.   There are other times when an inspiration in prayer helped to guide us through something we didn't know we were equipped to handle.  There will always be naysayers, people who -- for their own reasons -- wish to tear down our witness and what we know of our own experience.  But testimony is testimony.  Just as Jesus speaks of His words as spirit and truth, so the living testimony of truth also has a power to it, simply because it reflect a spiritual truth.  It becomes something to build upon, and it also becomes a part of the judgment that has come into the world, simply because it is truth, and there is an inherent value to that truth.  It doesn't matter, in some sense, whether others believe or not, the truth has an impact -- just as Christ says it does.  It is not up to us to judge, but it is up to us to know our own truths, and, like the blind man, not to turn back from them but to be willing to go where Christ's truth takes us.  Witnessing, in the history of the Church, has been a dangerous and a risky business.  The word "martyr" means witness in Greek.  Let us then consider the importance of what we know and where it takes us, and the great value placed on it through the Gospel and the experience of the Church.  Let us remember His teaching, that His words are spirit and life.  What would you exchange for that?  Who would have a preference for a lie?