13 They brought to the Pharisees the man who was formerly blind. 14 Now it was a Sabbath on the day when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. 15 Then the Pharisees also were asking him again how he received his sight. And he said to them, "He applied clay to my eyes, and I washed, and I see."
Why would this man’s neighbors bring him to the Pharisees? He has been healed from blindness and everyone should be rejoicing. Perhaps they are bringing him so that he can now be a full-fledged member of the synagogue. Leviticus 21:18 specified that no blind person could draw near to offer sacrifices to God. While this applied to the priests, I wouldn’t doubt that the Pharisees legalized this to the point that they limited the ability of a blind person to engage in worship even in the local community. If this is so, then they want to have their once blind neighbor become an equal in the community and they couldn’t do that without the Pharisees’ blessing.
Another option is that these people want to gain favor with the Pharisees. If they bring the blind man’s healing on the Sabbath to the Pharisees’ attention it would enable them to chalk up one more offense against Jesus. The neighbors would gain some brownie points.
This brings up a question about what we do when we have told someone about Jesus, and there is a salvific response. Do we bring them to our church rejoicing that someone is now in the kingdom? Do we bring them because they will make us look good in the eyes of others? Maybe we have mixed motivations. Hopefully we want them to grow and know the Lord more and more out of genuine concern for their spiritual life. Which also brings up a point that occurred when I was going to a church that wasn’t following biblical principles. I thought I might be able to make a difference there but was convicted that if I led someone to the Lord, I would have to advise them to go to a church that I didn’t attend.
16 Therefore some of the Pharisees were saying, "This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath." But others were saying, "How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?" And there was a division among them.
Judgementalism raises its ugly head again. Previously, we saw the disciples engaged in it and now we see the extreme in the Pharisees. While the disciples could be excused because they had poor teaching, the Pharisees were the ones that were supposed to be teaching correctly. Nicodemus was called the teacher of Israel, and this is the way people regarded the Pharisees. So, when they declare that Jesus isn’t from God for breaking the Sabbath you would think that everyone would fall in line.
From our viewpoint, they were basing their conclusion on what they believed was required on the Sabbath. Or I should say on what people couldn’t do on the Sabbath. It’s interesting to see that all their objections were prohibitions, not obligations. Regardless, they were not looking at God’s requirements but their own rules and regulations. We are no better than the Pharisees when we judge people based on our traditions, rule, and regulations that have no clear biblical incentive. We really need to avoid this kind of judgmentalism.
Some of the Pharisees were coming from the opposite direction as they observed what Jesus was doing and it puzzled them. They were calling him a sinner, but their theology didn’t allow miracles to be performed by a sinner. This was a crisis in their theology. When we observe something that contradicts our theology, we should stop and consider why we believe what we believe. We know that the Bible is true so we either have misunderstood it or we may have misunderstood what we saw. This is probably why we have such large divisions in our denominations today. Are we are resting our theology on a misunderstanding of the Bible? What do we do when what we see doesn’t make sense according to our theology? We need to admit we have a problem and dig deeper.
17 So they said to the blind man again, "What do you say about Him, since He opened your eyes?" And he said, "He is a prophet."
The Pharisees start digging deeper; however, they don’t go to the Word of God but to what they saw. Their logic said that Jesus was a sinner and therefore he couldn’t do miracles. Therefore, the apparent healing must have been a hoax. They were right to make sure that the healing was true, but their question wasn’t going to clarify anything.
The formerly blind man may have been a lot wiser than the “learned” Pharisees. His conclusion was biblical. Prophets performed miracles. Prophets were sinners just like everyone else. Jesus must be a prophet. Pure logic with no theological problems. In fact, Jesus is a prophet. That is one of his roles as Messiah. However, it isn’t all that Jesus is.
18 The Jews then did not believe it of him, that he had been blind and had received sight, until they called the parents of the very one who had received his sight, 19 and questioned them, saying, "Is this your son, who you say was born blind? Then how 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 how he now sees, we do not know; or who opened his eyes, we do not know. Ask him; he is of age, he will speak for himself." 22 His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone confessed Him to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue. 23 For this reason his parents said, "He is of age; ask him."
Still not believing that the man had been blind, they look for someone who could vouch for his previous condition. Who better than the man’s parents? In the face of this irrefutable evidence, the Pharisees are going to have to come up with some way to negate the effect of this miracle.
The parents’ reaction to the Pharisees’ question shows how much the common people feared the Pharisees. They had the power to excommunicate people from the synagogue which would be disastrous for their religious and social live. Nelson’s Bible Dictionary explains the importance:
In synagogues, on the other hand, the people took part in worship, reading of the Scriptures, and prayer. By New Testament times synagogues were very numerous and popular. They became centers of community activity, playing a number of roles.
Sometimes they were local courts of justice which could sentence the offender as well as inflict the punishment of scourging (Matt 10:17; 23:34). The synagogue was also an elementary school for teaching children to read. It was, no doubt, a center of social life for the Jewish community.[1]
Jesus’ popularity had become so great that the Pharisees had resorted to this threat of excommunication if anyone admitted he was their Messiah. We often have to weigh the threat to our social and economic situation for our faith in Christ. While it isn’t that much of a problem in the United States, it certainly is in other nations. The parents didn’t know who Jesus was, but they also didn’t want to get into trouble, so they worded their answer carefully. Their answer was wise in that they directed the Pharisees back to their son. There are times when we don’t need to make answers for other and this was one of them.
24 So a second time they called the man who had been blind, and said to him, "Give glory to God; we know that this man is a sinner." 25 He then answered, "Whether He is a sinner, I do not know; one thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see." 26 So they said to him, "What did He do to you? How did He open your eyes?" 27 He answered them, "I told you already and you did not listen; why do you want to hear it again? You do not want to become His disciples too, do you?"
I can only imagine that the wisdom of this man came from God. God used him to stand up to the Pharisees with simple logic. He told what he knew. He didn’t know anything about Jesus except that Jesus healed him. That is all he could say.
We too should be careful about what we say. Too often, we just keep our lips flapping and our tongue wagging when we should shut up after stating the facts. However, the Pharisees didn’t let up. They wanted more from him. They wanted something they could use against Jesus.
The blind man was not willing to put up with their nonsense and turned the tables on them. His question was a definite slap in the face. I think of Proverbs 26:5 when I read his answer, “Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his own eyes” (NIV). They wanted him to say something he couldn’t truthfully answer. But his answer made them questioning look foolish.
28 They reviled him and said, "You are His disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. 29 "We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where He is from."
It seems the Pharisees were very good at accusing people of things without any basis. The facts were simple. This guy was healed. He only knew that Jesus healed him. He knew next to nothing about Jesus. How ridiculous to accuse him of being Jesus’ disciple. But they aren’t working on logic or reason. They are working on hate. On top of that, they are absolute liars. They knew where Jesus was from, physically speaking. They also had a good idea that God had sent him because of the miracles. Their lie is obvious.
30 The man answered and said to them, "Well, here is an amazing thing, that you do not know where He is from, and yet He opened my eyes. 31 "We know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is God-fearing and does His will, He hears him. 32 "Since the beginning of time it has never been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. 33 "If this man were not from God, He could do nothing."
Their lie is so obvious that even this “uneducated” man could see through it. How did he know that God doesn’t hear sinners? The Lord revealed it to Isaiah “But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, And your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear” (Isa 59:2 NASU). Even though this man was blind, it doesn’t mean he didn’t know the Scriptures. As was mentioned above, the synagogue was where people were taught the Scriptures. He is simply using Scripture to show their foolishness.
Does God Hear Sinners?
Of course, God hears sinners. He is omniscient so that he hears and sees everything everywhere. The meaning of Isaiah 59:2 is not that God can’t hear sinners because of the separation of sin, it is that He will not pay attention to their prayers unless it is a prayer of repentance. It is dangerous for an unbeliever to pray and have that prayer “answered.” He may think that his relationship with God is good.
His conclusion is based on solid biblical theology and historical evidence. It is so obvious that you would think anyone would be able to follow it.
34 They answered him, "You were born entirely in sins, and are you teaching us?" So they put him out.
So, the only thing the Pharisees can do at this time is excommunicate the man born blind. They have no grounds because he has only told them the truth. However, they have been proven liars and that is more than they can tolerate.
[1]Herbert Lockyer, “Synagogue,” in Nelson's Illustrated Bible Dictionary(Nashville, TN: T. Nelson, 1986).
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