John 9:1-7

The “Sin of the World" – Illustrated

Dynamic of Exclusion

The incident that follows fits comfortably with the issues raised in the discussions between Jesus and the Jewish crowd during the Festival of Booths, and colourfully illustrates some of the arguments raised by Jesus. When precisely it took place is more difficult to determine. The narrative had located the previous discussion on the last day of the festival, the great day [7:37], though it had also made reference to a further day following on that [8:2]. When the episode took place was apparently not of great interest to the author. Its message was what mattered.

John 9:1-7     A Blind Man Gains his Physical Sight

1 As he was passing by, Jesus saw a man blind from birth.
2 His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned that he was born blind,
the man himself or his parents?"

The disciples’ question reflected a theory common at the time (and still, sometimes, today) that illness or disability was, somehow, the penalty of sin. In the culture, physical impairments were seen as somehow incompatible with sacredness and ritual purity. Physical impairments excluded from participation in the worship of Israel. The disciples’ question about sin clearly presented the context for the discussion that would ensue. Behind the assumption was a sense of God who arbitrarily excluded and who, in the process, was vindictive and violent. The incident would make clear that exclusion, vindictiveness and violence were precisely the real marks of sin. 

3 Jesus answered, "Neither he nor his parents sinned.  
This has come about so that the workings of God may be clearly seen in him.

Jesus’ response clearly insisted that there was no direct link between disability and sin. In this case, however, the man’s disability happened to be providential because, through it, the workings of God would become obvious. The significant and relevant exercise of God’s power would lie in the man’s inner conversion and achieving of insight, brought about by the on-going creative and life-giving energy of Jesus that would enable the man to see. Sin would be seen for what it truly was – the power behind moral blindness and choices to exclude. At the same time, the God who loves, as revealed in Jesus, would be seen as life-giving, creative and inclusive. Jesus’ freedom to do the work on a Sabbath [verse 14] reinforced his sense that his Father’s creative activity, rather than stop after the sixth day of creation, continued bountifully across time, and would reach beyond time into eternity.


Intuiting God at Work in Everything

In anything that happens, God is present. A created world is, by definition, limited and imperfect. In a limited world, the normal and necessary working out of cause and effect can produce consequences that have negative effects on people. The same thing that is good from one point of view can often be seen as evil from another. As well, God respects human freedom and the consequences of human ignorance, mistakes and bad-will – so evil happens.
 
God does not intend evil; evil is a human construct or the absence (or the other side) of good. Certainly, human suffering is not to be interpreted as the revenge of a vindictive God. Yet, even in situations of human suffering, God is present. That presence is manifested in more than the creative power that gives existence to everything and everyone. God is present always as life-giving and loving God. In anything that happens, God is present, enabling growth and calling to life. Experience shows how human growth in wisdom, warmth and compassion so often has blossomed from suffering, even profound suffering.
 
St Paul had understood this when he wrote: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God” [Romans 8:28] – not in the sense that God’s cooperating love is selective, but that God respects people’s free choices and does not impose growth or life on those who choose otherwise.
 
In the case of the man born blind, God’s works would be spectacularly revealed. The Christian journey encourages and enables believers to see that same God at work in all the experiences of life.
 

4  While it is still day,
We must do the works of the one who sent me.  
Night is coming when no one will be able to work.
5 While I am in the world,
I am the light of the world."

Due to technological ingenuity, the modern world has lost touch with the darkness of night and the consequent impossibility to work. The Gospel would make much of the symbolic contrast of night and day. It had already spoken of Nicodemus coming in from the night in order to dialogue with Jesus [3:2]. Night and darkness would figure again in the betrayal of Judas and the denials of Peter.

Jesus repeated his consistent claim to having been sent by his Father. The narrative had also raised the issue of Jesus’ doing the works of his Father, and identifying himself as the light of the world [8:12].

Jesus’ use of the plural: We must do the works ... would seem, somehow, to associate the disciples in his mission. After the supremely revelatory event of his death and resurrection, Jesus would commission them to continue the work on which he had been sent: As the Father has sent me, so I send you [20:21].

6 After he said this,
he spat on the ground and made clay with the spittle.  
Then he spread the clay over his eyes,

Jesus used sign language to communicate more forcefully with the blind man. In the culture, saliva was under stood to be a healing agent, as was dust. More importantly, the gesture alluded to God’s actions in creating the first human being:

the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground,
and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;
and the man became a living being [Genesis 2:7].

The man had been blind from birth; he had never had the capacity to see. His need was not healing, but new creation.

7 and told him,
"Go and wash in the pool of Siloam [which when translated means 'Sent'].”  So he went and washed,
and came back seeing.

The author connected the creating agency of the water of Siloam with the person of Jesus, the one whom he had just identified as sent by God. The topicality of Jesus’ direction was connected to the procession of priests and people to the pool of Siloam during the Festival of Booths. The liturgy remembered and celebrated how God, through the agency of Moses, had saved the Israelites from dying of thirst in the wilderness. In Jesus, the Christian community had someone greater than Moses: not only would Jesus give saving drink to the thirsty, he was the light of the world, giving sight to the blind and enabling them to do God’s works

In a masterly way, the narrative would record two contrasting movements. The blind man would move to clearer insight and faith; the Pharisees would descend into darker blindness.

Next >> John 9:8-38