John Chapter 9:35-41

In which we conclude the chapter. We have bee taught how it is “The Jews” whose eyes have yet to be opened.

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35 Ἤκουσεν Ἰησοῦς ὅτι ἐξέβαλον αὐτὸν ἔξω, καὶ εὑρὼν αὐτὸν εἶπεν, Σὺ πιστεύεις εἰς τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου;

36 ἀπεκρίθη ἐκεῖνος καὶ εἶπεν, Καὶ τίς ἐστιν, κύριε, ἵνα πιστεύσω εἰς αὐτόν;

37 εἶπεν αὐτῷ ὁ Ἰησοῦς, Καὶ ἑώρακας αὐτὸν καὶ ὁ λαλῶν μετὰ σοῦ ἐκεῖνός ἐστιν.

38 ὁ δὲ ἔφη, Πιστεύω, κύριε: καὶ προσεκύνησεν αὐτῷ.

Jesus heard that they had out-thrown him out, and finding him (the man) he (Jesus) said, “Do you believe in the son of man?” (36) He answered and said, “And who is he, lord, in order that I may have begun to believe in him?” (37) Jesus said to him, “And you have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he.” (38) And (the other) said, “I believe, lord,” and he prostrated himself.  

First, verb used is exo-ballein, the verb to “throw” augmented by the prefix for “out”. The fact of “out” which is then emphasized by the stand-alone preposition “out”. So the very clumsy English of “out thrown him out”. The Latin verb does not have the prefix, so it pretty much follows the same rule as English, simply “to throw” + stand-alone preposition “out”. Secondly, the verb for “believe” in Verse 36 is once again in the aorist subjunctive, so I’ve more or less fallen into a convention of treating the aorist, a single action, like a perfect, repeated action. So, “that I may have begun” to believe. The “may” captures the uncertainty, and the “have begun” the fact that it’s past tense. Literally, it should be “may began” to believe, but that makes no sense in English. Most modern translations simply render this as “that I may believe”, catching the uncertainty while ignoring the past tense. That it’s an aorist does change the meaning by conveying the sense that the beginning of belief has occurred already, so it’s an action in the past tense.

Then we get to “son of man”. John uses this term the fewest times in the Gospels, and Matthew uses it the most. A Google search of the question will return slightly different numbers, which, I suspect, is a function of how you count. Does use of the term twice in one verse, or in consecutive verses, count as one instance or two? Regardless, the total for John is in low double digits, 10 or 12 or so. It occurs twice as much the HS as it does in the NT; this, I suspect, includes use of the term as “a son of man”, which is to say “a person”. The term is problematic, largely because it’s enigmatic, but that is perhaps the point. It has been suggested that the term means nothing other than “person”, and that is hardly a ridiculous position. However, since John uses it so seldom, one’s (well, my) first reaction is that he has reserved it for a special purpose; however, upon further review, perhaps not. When the term “son of man” has been used to this point, it very obviously does not simply mean “person” or “human”. It refers to a being that is more than human, on whom angels ascend and descend, or who is in heaven, or who provides eternal life. In fact, this is the first time the term has been used where it does not clearly refer to an entity that is more than human, although it can certainly be argued that “believing in the son of man” implies an elevated being. When compared to the term “son of God”, there does not seem to be too much difference in the insinuations. As such, by this point it would seem that the term is something of a tradition, that it’s used in all the gospels so John uses it too. 

But let’s come back to that and dispense with the word I translated as “prostrated”. We’ve discussed this before, but it’s been a while so it may deserve to be revisited. The word in Greek is pros-kynesis. Literally it means something along the lines of “roll over and show your belly like a dog”; the second half of the word, kynesis, literally means something like “canine”, “dog”. It is in fact directly related to the Latin canis, as in canis familiaris, the domesticated dog. So the whole word means something like, “act like a dog in front (prefix pros-) of someone”. What dogs do to show submission is lay on their back to expose their belly, which is a vulnerable part of their anatomy. In the kingdoms of the ancient Near East, the standard practice for a lesser being coming into the presence of the king was to fall on one’s face, largely because the lesser being was not worthy to look at the face of the king. Moses did something similar in the presence of the burning bush. Anyway, the Greeks first came into contact with Near Eastern monarchs in the late 6th or early 5th Century BCE, mostly in the form of the Persians. They were the successors of the Near Eastern empires stretching back through Babylon and Assyria and beyond, and the Persians very much insisted that the custom of groveling on one’s belly before the Great King be maintained. The Greeks, OTOH, had no such custom, largely because they did not consider any one man to be innately superior–in the sense of divinity–to another. They found this Persian custom of falling on one’s face repulsive, and gave it the derogatory term of “acting like a dog before someone”; which is to say pros-kynesis. That is what the man did before Jesus. Just remember that when you see the expression “worshipped him”. The Latin is adoravit; the Latin lyrics to the refrain of “Oh Come All Ye Faithful” are “Venite adoremus…” “Come let us adore (him implied)” So, come, let us fall on our faces before him in worship; although, having said that, the Latin was written by an Englishman in the 1700s, so the idea of falling prostrate on one’s face was likely not intended.

Let’s get back to “son of man’ and the fuller implications of Jesus question. It has never occurred to me to ask what the term “son of man” would have meant to a First Century Jew. But that’s not entirely true, because I have read things in which possible interpretations of the phrase are discussed. The most common is the “human being” theory , based, I believe, on the passage in Daniel where someone is said to appear “as a son of man”; this to say your standard, garden-variety person. So why does the NT rely on it? And I should specify the gospels, since it apparently does not show up in Paul, although Romans 8:3 kinda sorta comes close. I came into this paragraph with the notion that I could or did have something to say, but it appears I was mistaken about this. The use of the term is very much an open question as far as I can tell. 

Regardless, however the man understood–if he did–the term, he was moved to worship Jesus. A quick look shows that the term appears a number of times; IOW, Jesus was worshipped numerous times. Upon arrival at Herod’s court, the Magoi want to worship the new king. The mother of the sons of Zebedee worships Jesus when she want to ask that her sons sit at Jesus’ right and left hand in the kingdom. I guess what we need to take from this is that the man had his eyes opened in more ways than one. There were his physical eyes, of course, but he also became aware of who Jesus was, so the eyes of his awareness were opened as well. This, also of course is in contrast to “The Jews” whose eyes remained closed. The Man Born Blind recognized that the healing was a sign, and this sign indicated that Jesus was a prophet (at least)–as he said in Verse 17. Actually, going back to the meaning or understanding of the phrase “son of man”, it’s worth noting that the man is a tad confused himself by the expression. While he recognized that Jesus performed a sign, he did not equate the performance as something that would be done by someone referred to as “the son of man”. That is, he did not recognize that “the son of man” was a prophet, let alone the anointed one. When this is pointed out to him, he accepts this readily. Again, in contrast to “The Jews”.

35 Audivit Iesus quia eiecerunt eum foras et, cum invenisset eum, dixit ei: “Tu credis in Filium hominis?”.
36 Respondit ille et dixit: “ Et quis est, Domine, ut credam in eum? ”.
37 Dixit ei Iesus: “ Et vidisti eum; et, qui loquitur tecum, ipse est ”.
38 At ille ait: “ Credo, Domine! ”; et adoravit eum.

39 καὶ εἶπεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς, Εἰς κρίμα ἐγὼ εἰς τὸν κόσμον τοῦτον ἦλθον, ἵνα οἱ μὴ βλέποντες βλέπωσιν καὶ οἱ βλέποντες τυφλοὶ γένωνται.

40 Ἤκουσαν ἐκ τῶν Φαρισαίων ταῦτα οἱ μετ’ αὐτοῦ ὄντες, καὶ εἶπον αὐτῷ, Μὴ καὶ ἡμεῖς τυφλοί ἐσμεν;

41 εἶπεν αὐτοῖς ὁ Ἰησοῦς, Εἰ τυφλοὶ ἦτε, οὐκ ἂν εἴχετε ἁμαρτίαν: νῦν δὲ λέγετε ὅτι Βλέπομεν: ἡ ἁμαρτία ὑμῶν μένει.

And Jesus said, “I came to judge this kosmos, so that those not seeing may see, and those seeing may become blind. (40) Those of the Pharisees being with him heard, and said to him, “But (surely) we are not also blind?” (41) Jesus said to them, “If you had been blind, you had not had sin; but now you say that ‘We see’. Your sin remains.”  

The verb tenses are a little funky in Verse 41. Or, rather, one of them is. Most modern translations render this as “If you. had been blind, you would not have had sin”. This makes sense in English, or from our perspective. We would put the “have” into the subjunctive–or at least the conditional–to get across that this is an hypothetical, an unreal set of circumstances. In fact, the Latin also puts this into the subjunctive, you would have had no sin. However, the Greek sees this differently; both verbs are imperfect, which is often used for an action completed prior to the main verb. Consider: “When the introductions had been made, the show began“. “Had been made” is imperfect, and this action finished prior to the show beginning, which is simple past tense. So having both verbs in the imperfect is a bit awkward for English, and perhaps even for Latin, explaining why the Vulgate modified the tense/mood in the same way as the modern translations do. One actually wonders if John–or a copyist–maybe just made a mistake. I point these things out just in case anyone reading this is working on their Greek. No, you did not make a mistake; it truly does make no sense. 

With all that out of the way, we can consider the import of the passage. Basically, this is John’s way of expressing the sentiment that Jews have been superseded, or supplanted. This time I did not use the scare quotes around “The Jews” because I am referring to all adherents of the religion. We saw events in the other gospels indicating that followers of Jesus had jumped to the front of the line. My favorite example of this is the story of the Wedding Guests: those invited–aka “the Chosen People”–decline to come to the feast, so the king sends his slaves out to round up whomever he can find and have them attend in the stead of those actually invited. This what we have here: those with sight–the aforementioned “Chosen People”–become blind while those formerly blind–everyone else–gain their sight. Not sure there’s much to say beyond that.

So we have a quick wrap-up to the chapter.

39 Et dixit Iesus: “In iudicium ego in hunc mundum veni, ut, qui non vident, videant, et, qui vident, caeci fiant”.
40 Audierunt haec ex pharisaeis, qui cum ipso erant, et dixerunt ei: “Numquid et nos caeci sumus?”.
41 Dixit eis Iesus: “Si caeci essetis, non haberetis peccatum. Nunc vero dicitis: “Videmus!”; peccatum vestrum manet”.

John Chapter 9:22-34

As with previous chapters, this one is a continuation, to some extent the entire chapter is a single story, or pericope, or–wait for it–logos. Note that “story” and “pericope” are not synonyms for “word”; one could, however, attempt to stretch and say that those two words could fit into verbum. This is the Man Born Blind logos. [Note: just because I can use logos in this way doesn’t mean I should, or that it’s the best translation, but it’s not wrong. And the computer keyboard has shown me how much I like italics for emphasis.]

This is actually fairly short.

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22 ταῦτα εἶπαν οἱ γονεῖς αὐτοῦ ὅτι ἐφοβοῦντο τοὺς Ἰουδαίους, ἤδη γὰρ συνετέθειντο οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι ἵνα ἐάν τις αὐτὸν ὁμολογήσῃ Χριστόν, ἀποσυνάγωγος γένηται.

23 διὰ τοῦτο οἱ γονεῖς αὐτοῦ εἶπαν ὅτι Ἡλικίαν ἔχει, αὐτὸν ἐπερωτήσατε.

His parents said these things because/due to fearing “The Jews”, for indeed, “The Jews” came to a conclusion so that if someone should have agreed (that he was) the messiah, that person would have become (someone having been) expelled from the synagogue. (23) It was on account of this that they said, “He is of age, ask him”. 

First, this verse really should have been included with the previous post. This line comes after the parents tell ‘the Jews” that their son is of age and can speak for himself. Verse 22 explains why they were less than direct in answering. Second, the verb for “to fear” is passive in Greek, but I can’t think of a way to twist my translation to account for both that and that “The Jews” is in the accusative as a direct object. Call me lazy, but close enough. Third, the last two verbs, should have agreed and would have become are two more examples of aorist subjunctive; that is, a past tense indicating uncertainty of some sort. In English, this really doesn’t work all that well since the uncertainty has usually been resolved by the time we’re talking about past tense. Fourth, note that the someone having been expelled from the synagogue is all included in one word, the adjective, ἀποσυνάγωγος; i.e., apo-synagogus, the prefix apo- indicating motion away from, so “from the synagogue”, the part about expelled from being understood from apo-. And note that, while technically an adjective–even Liddell & Scott categorize it as such–at base the word, or the form is that of a participle, that is, a verb. Fifth, this is the only known use of this word in all of the literature of ancient Greek. John may have coined the word, but it quite possibly existed in Jewish writings of the time.   

But it’s Verse 23 that is telling, because it explicitly states that the parents were afraid of “The Jews” who could negatively affect their standing in the synagogue. 

22 Haec dixerunt parentes eius, quia timebant Iudaeos; iam enim conspiraverant Iudaei, ut, si quis eum confiteretur Christum, extra synagogam fieret.
23 Propterea parentes eius dixerunt: “Aetatem habet; ipsum interrogate!”.

24 Ἐφώνησαν οὖν τὸν ἄνθρωπον ἐκ δευτέρου ὃς ἦν τυφλὸς καὶ εἶπαν αὐτῷ, Δὸς δόξαν τῷ θεῷ: ἡμεῖς οἴδαμεν ὅτι οὗτος ὁ ἄνθρωπος ἁμαρτωλός ἐστιν.

25 ἀπεκρίθη οὖν ἐκεῖνος, Εἰ ἁμαρτωλός ἐστιν οὐκ οἶδα: ἓν οἶδα, ὅτι τυφλὸς ὢν ἄρτι βλέπω.

26 εἶπον οὖν αὐτῷ, Τί ἐποίησέν σοι; πῶς ἤνοιξέν σου τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς;

27 ἀπεκρίθη αὐτοῖς, Εἶπον ὑμῖν ἤδη καὶ οὐκ ἠκούσατε: τί πάλιν θέλετε ἀκούειν; μὴ καὶ ὑμεῖς θέλετε αὐτοῦ μαθηταὶ γενέσθαι;

So they called the man a second time, the one who was blind, and said to him, “Give glory to God; we know that this man is a sinner.” (25) So he answered, “If he is a sinner I do not know. I know one (thing), that being blind I see again.” (26) They said to him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” (27) He answered them, “Indeed I told you already and you did not hear. Why do you wish to hear again? Unless you also wish to become his disciples?“

This is strictly a literary observation: There is an awful lot of repetition. This is, I believe, pretty clear indication that the gospel was meant to be heard rather than read. These sorts of almost call-and-response exchanges are the sort of mnemonics that help a listening audience keep up with the story line. When I did corporate training, the instruction for  was: in your intro, tell ’em what you’re going to tell ’em, then tell them, then in the conclusion tell ’em what you told ’em. That’s kind of how John is approaching this. I’m not sure what, if any, the implications of this might be; as far as teachings and beliefs, there are none, but they are significant as far as how the teachings and beliefs spread. That’s good historical information. It is, however, interesting to note that this did not launch John to be the most popular of the gospels; that honor likely falls to Matthew, with the birth narrative of Luke taking precedence. After all, the early church considered Matthew to be the primary gospel, which is why the NT is organized the way it is: Matthew-Mark rather than the proper chronological order. 

As for the contention between “The Jews” and the Man Born Blind, this falls into the category of additional emphasis that “The Jews” are at best clueless, at worst malign. Take your pick here; it’s a judgement call in the final analysis. The Man manages to disagree with his interlocutors without contradicting them–which is no mean feat–even if his reply is a bit snarky. “I told you already…” The zinger about them wanting to become Jesus’ disciples induces a wry smile as well.  

24 Vocaverunt ergo rursum hominem, qui fuerat caecus, et dixerunt ei: “Da gloriam Deo! Nos scimus quia hic homo peccator est”.
25 Respondit ergo ille: “Si peccator est nescio; unum scio quia, caecus cum essem, modo video”.
26 Dixerunt ergo illi: “Quid fecit tibi? Quomodo aperuit oculos tuos?”.
27 Respondit eis: “Dixi vobis iam, et non audistis; quid iterum vultis audire? Numquid et vos vultis discipuli eius fieri?”.

28 καὶ ἐλοιδόρησαν αὐτὸν καὶ εἶπον, Σὺ μαθητὴς εἶ ἐκείνου, ἡμεῖς δὲ τοῦ Μωϋσέως ἐσμὲν μαθηταί:

29 ἡμεῖς οἴδαμεν ὅτι Μωϋσεῖ λελάληκεν ὁ θεός, τοῦτον δὲ οὐκ οἴδαμεν πόθεν ἐστίν.

30 ἀπεκρίθη ὁ ἄνθρωπος καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς, Ἐν τούτῳ γὰρ τὸ θαυμαστόν ἐστιν ὅτι ὑμεῖς οὐκ οἴδατε πόθεν ἐστίν, καὶ ἤνοιξέν μου τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς.

31 οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἁμαρτωλῶν ὁ θεὸς οὐκ ἀκούει, ἀλλ’ ἐάν τις θεοσεβὴς ᾖ καὶ τὸ θέλημα αὐτοῦ ποιῇ τούτου ἀκούει.

32 ἐκ τοῦ αἰῶνος οὐκ ἠκούσθη ὅτι ἠνέῳξέν τις ὀφθαλμοὺς τυφλοῦ γεγεννημένου:

33 εἰ μὴ ἦν οὗτος παρὰ θεοῦ, οὐκ ἠδύνατο ποιεῖν οὐδέν.

34 ἀπεκρίθησαν καὶ εἶπαν αὐτῷ, Ἐν ἁμαρτίαις σὺ ἐγεννήθης ὅλος, καὶ σὺ διδάσκεις ἡμᾶς; καὶ ἐξέβαλον αὐτὸν ἔξω. 

And they reviled him and said, “If you are a disciple of his, we are disciples of Moses. (29) We know that God spoke to Moses, but we do not know whence (comes) this one.”  (30) The man answered and said to them, “For in this is the wonder that you do not know whence (he came) and he opened my eyes. (31) We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if someone may be a servant of God and may do his will, to this one (God) listens. (32) From the aions (eons, since forever) he did not hear that someone opened the eyes of one born blind. (33) If he is not with/from/(lit = beside) God, he is not able to do nothing” (double negative for emphasis). (34) They answered and said to him, “You were completely born in sin, and you teach us?” And they threw him out.  

Well, we know whose eyes were, and whose eyes were not opened. Of course this is an extended metaphor for the new…covenant, I suppose. “The Jews” cling to Moses and the old ways, having been born into them and they do not–cannot–see things differently because their eyes are not, or have not been opened. The Man was also born in the old ways; that is he was born in sin, as Jesus said back in Chapter 6, just as “The Jews” were, but his eyes have been opened, so he will not die in sin as “The Jews” will, according to that pronouncement back in Chapter 6. This is all very well done as an example of literary writing; however, perhaps the pièce de résistance comes in Verse 32, “from the aions/since forever” the eyes of no one born born blind have been opened. This hearkens back to the reference to Matthew/Luke and Isaiah that we mentioned in the previous post, that the blind see, the lame walk, etc. By stating that no one born blind has ever had their sight, John is declaring that Now Is The Time. This is John putting forth another reason, or perhaps the reason why “The Jews” got it wrong in his opinion.

28 Et maledixerunt ei et dixerunt: “Tu discipulus illius es, nos autem Moysis discipuli sumus.
29 Nos scimus quia Moysi locutus est Deus; hunc autem nescimus unde sit”.
30 Respondit homo et dixit eis: “In hoc enim mirabile est, quia vos nescitis unde sit, et aperuit meos oculos!
31 Scimus quia peccatores Deus non audit; sed, si quis Dei cultor est et voluntatem eius facit, hunc exaudit.
32 A saeculo non est auditum quia aperuit quis oculos caeci nati;
33 nisi esset hic a Deo, non poterat facere quidquam”.
34 Responderunt et dixerunt ei: “In peccatis tu natus es totus et tu doces nos?”. Et eiecerunt eum foras.

John chapter 9:8-21

Here we are going to run into another situation where there is no reasonable break for much of the chapter. As such, it will be necessary to create such a place in the narrative, which usually makes for an awkward transition that sacrifices continuity. My apologies in advance. We continue on with the story of the Man Born Blind.

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8 Οἱ οὖν γείτονες καὶ οἱ θεωροῦντες αὐτὸν τὸ πρότερον ὅτι προσαίτης ἦν ἔλεγον, Οὐχ οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ καθήμενος καὶ προσαιτῶν;

9 ἄλλοι ἔλεγον ὅτι Οὗτός ἐστιν: ἄλλοι ἔλεγον, Οὐχί, ἀλλὰ ὅμοιος αὐτῷ ἐστιν. ἐκεῖνος ἔλεγεν ὅτι Ἐγώ εἰμι.

10 ἔλεγον οὖν αὐτῷ, Πῶς [οὖν] ἠνεῴχθησάν σου οἱ ὀφθαλμοί;

11 ἀπεκρίθη ἐκεῖνος, Ὁ ἄνθρωπος ὁ λεγόμενος Ἰησοῦς πηλὸν ἐποίησεν καὶ ἐπέχρισέν μου τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς καὶ εἶπέν μοι ὅτι Υπαγε εἰς τὸν Σιλωὰμ καὶ νίψαι: ἀπελθὼν οὖν καὶ νιψάμενος ἀνέβλεψα.

So his neighbors and those seeing him who was a beggar said, “Is he not the one being seated and begging?” (9) Others said that, “He is (that man, eg)”. Others said “Nay, he is another similar to him.” He said, “I am (he)”. (10) They said to him, “How were your eyes opened?” (11) He answered, “The man who is being called Jesus made mud and smeared my eyes and said to me, ‘Get yourself to the (Pool) of Siloam and wash.’ So I having gone and washed I recovered my sight”.

This was a planned break, but the timing worked out–no thanks to any planning on my part. The last word of Verse 11 is the compound verb ana (up) – blepō (look) >> “to look up”. However, it also has the special and specific meaning of “to recover sight”. Even better, it is used in this manner by a pagan, and even a Classical author named Herodotus. For those unfamiliar, Herodotus is known as the “Father of History” because he wrote a rather long history of the war(s) between Greece as a whole–if abstract–and the the Persian Empire, the most powerful empire in the world at the time. Of course, Herodotus is famous for his digressions, which can often consume many pages, so we get so much more than a simple narrative of what could have been the account of the first Persian amphibious attack in 490 BCE, and then the full-scale invasion launched and led by the Persian king Xerxes himself. There is actually an entire book just on Egypt. Historians are forever grateful for his prolix nature, because he provided so much incidental information. I think of him as the older guy who comes to have dinner and then sits up most of the night telling his stories, but the hosts do not mind in the least so they invite him back the next night. The book is fascinating. So, the point is that “to recover one’s sight” is a legitimate, Classical translation.

Honestly, aside from that, there isn’t a lot of actual information in these four verses. It’s really just narrative to set up the story as a whole. I would wonder, or perhaps I would suspect that these four verses were not part of the original story as it was first told. Rather, I would suspect that these verses were added as the story was re-told. This is exactly the sort of incidental information that gets appended to the main body of the story for dramatic purposes. We all know someone like that: he tells a story, but it takes five minutes of really unnecessary set-up until we get to the actual guts of the story. Then, Herodotus is kind of like that, except he’s entertaining because he’s talking about stuff we don’t–and wouldn’t–otherwise know. But, this is how the narratives of legends grow over time. John wants to establish beyond a doubt that those who witnessed the event have their input to verify the circumstances. 

8 Itaque vicini et, qui videbant eum prius quia mendicus erat, dicebant: “Nonne hic est, qui sedebat et mendicabat”;
9 alii dicebant: “ Hic est! ”; alii dicebant: “ Nequaquam, sed similis est eius!”. Ille dicebat: “ Ego sum!”.
10 Dicebant ergo ei: “Quomodo igitur aperti sunt oculi tibi?”.
11 Respondit ille: “Homo, qui dicitur Iesus, lutum fecit et unxit oculos meos et dixit mihi: “’ ‘Vade ad Siloam et lava!’. Abii ergo et lavi et vidi”.

12 καὶ εἶπαν αὐτῷ, Ποῦ ἐστιν ἐκεῖνος; λέγει, Οὐκ οἶδα.

13 Ἄγουσιν αὐτὸν πρὸς τοὺς Φαρισαίους τόν ποτε τυφλόν.

14 ἦν δὲ σάββατον ἐν ἧ ἡμέρᾳ τὸν πηλὸν ἐποίησεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς καὶ ἀνέῳξεν αὐτοῦ τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς.

15 πάλιν οὖν ἠρώτων αὐτὸν καὶ οἱ Φαρισαῖοι πῶς ἀνέβλεψεν. ὁ δὲ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς, Πηλὸν ἐπέθηκέν μου ἐπὶ τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς, καὶ ἐνιψάμην, καὶ βλέπω.

16 ἔλεγον οὖν ἐκ τῶν Φαρισαίων τινές, Οὐκ ἔστιν οὗτος παρὰ θεοῦ ὁ ἄνθρωπος, ὅτι τὸ σάββατον οὐ τηρεῖ. ἄλλοι [δὲ] ἔλεγον, Πῶς δύναται ἄνθρωπος ἁμαρτωλὸς τοιαῦτα σημεῖα ποιεῖν; καὶ σχίσμα ἦν ἐν αὐτοῖς.

17 λέγουσιν οὖν τῷ τυφλῷ πάλιν, Τί σὺ λέγεις περὶ αὐτοῦ, ὅτι ἠνέῳξέν σου τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς; ὁ δὲ εἶπεν ὅτι Προφήτης ἐστίν.

And they said to him, “Where is he (Jesus)?” He (the man) said, “I don’t know.” (13) They led one previously blind to the Pharisees. (14) It was the Sabbath on the day Jesus made the mud and smeared it on his eyes. (15) So and again the Pharisees asked him how he saw. He said to them, “He put mud on my eyes, and I washed and I saw”. (16) Then some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not with God, that he does not keep the Sabbath”. [But] Others said, “How can a man make such a sign?” And there was a schism amongst them. (17) So they spoke again to the blind one, “Who is it you speak about, that opened your eyes?” And he said that “He is a prophet”. 

First, there is no verb in Verse 13 aside from “they led”. The sentence is rendered in various translations as “They led him/the one who was formerly blind”. It’s better English–I suppose– and it doesn’t affect the meaning of the text,  but it’s not in the Greek.

It is also interesting to note that the Pharisees do not play anywhere near the major role in John that they do in some of the other gospels. They get three one-off mentions in chapters 1-4 and they appear in a single story in Chapter 7, in which the word is used numerous times. There is another single usage in Chapter 8, they mentioned here appear here several times and, in another extended appearance in Chapter 11, twice in Chapter 12, and then they disappear until a single mention in Chapter 18. Why they have faded into the wallpaper here is a good question. It would seem most likely to indicate that the Pharisees themselves as a group had begun to fade from the scene at this point in the history of Judaism, but I would not take my word on that based on this inference of mine. I would not just accept this on my say-so, either. I want confirmation of this from someone who knows much more about the history of Judaism and/or of Judea/Palestine than I do. It’s rather a specialist’s field and not something amenable to speculation by a dilettante such as I.

Really though, there are two main things being put across here. The first is the repetition of the story about Jesus making mud. The magical practice is recounted in Verses 8-11 and then again here in 12-16. That is also worth asking why? As mentioned, I’ve been reading about magic in the Hellenistic world–which includes the history of Rome from about the 2nd Century BCE, after the conquest of the Greek east and its incorporation into the Empire before the beginning of the Common Era. While there were periods when it was generally ignored, it was always held somewhat in disrepute by the more respectable in society. If nothing else, it was low-class; it was common as the British would say with a sniff. It wasn’t something one wanted to emphasize. And yet here we have John repeating the story several times to remind us of Jesus’ reputation as a sorcerer. And Jesus did have this reputation, at least posthumously. We know that he was called such by the pagan Celsus, and that Eusebios disputed the charge and hurled it back at Apollonius of Tyana. I don’t have an answer. The Gnostics were not particularly fond of magic, so we can’t blame them. I just don’t know. 

The other thing is the keeping of the Sabbath. This charge against Jesus has cropped up a couple of times before. In fact, we could almost call it a recurring theme in the gospel at this point. Again we need to ask why this is important. Here I believe the answer is a bit more clear, or at least it’s easier to come up with what could pass for a reasonable explanation. In all instances, “The Jews”, or here The Pharisees condemn Jesus for performing beneficial acts of healing. The purpose here is pretty obvious, IMO. Having endured years of religious instruction at Maple Grove St Michael’s as a lad, I recognize that the teaching was meant to show Judaism at its worst. The Pharisees were more concerned about the Letter of the Law, and not at all with its spirit. John apparently sees the benefit of pointing this out repeatedly. Just as Jesus’ revelation of his identity, this seems to be a theme of the gospel.

I did not translate schism; I left it transliterated because this is another of those words that has taken on a very specific and almost exclusively religious connotation. I say “almost exclusively” because the word is encountered when discussing secular ideologies such as capitalism; in such discussions the term “heresy” also crops up from time to time, but the dichotomy of theology and ideology is largely a distinction without a difference. In English, there is a difference between a “schism” and a “division” outside of the religious/secular context. “Divisions” between opinions are mundane and a dime a dozen; a schism, OTOH, is much more serious, implying a degree of near permanence. So what about here? Should I have left the word untranslated? Or should I have followed suit with the professional translators? Being honest, leaving the term as “schism” in English probably paints too harsh a picture. There is a large-ish group of people and some of them disagree. There is no reason to assume this has hardened into an irreparable split between the groups. That being said, I believe it was worthwhile to have this discussion to demonstrate how words take on meaning in English that are not present in the Greek. Like angellos, or baptismo, or euangelia.  

Now finally we come to the matter of the sign. I teased that a sign was coming at the outset of the previous post; however, we’ve only just now gotten to the sign. I would say that only part of the crowd is calling the healing a sign, but I don’t think that is accurate. Recall that a sign is a step above a miracle, or a “mighty work” or “deed of power”. I often quote that “the sky hung low in the ancient world, and the traffic in both directions was heavy”. That may not be the exact quote, but it the point becomes clear when it is understood that the air and sky and heavens was full of powers of various sorts, generically called daimones, which, whether benign or malevolent were capable of effecting such deeds of power. So while a deed of power was impressive, or at least above ordinary, a sign was entirely a different matter. A sign means something more than the mere suspension of natural laws; bear in mind that natural laws were largely unknown, so their suspension wasn’t that far out of the grasp of most people. Who knows? Some deeds of power may have involved the invocation of unknown natural law rather than their suspension. Wonder workers were not all that uncommon; reading literary works of Rome or Greece we find the character of the wonder worker to be fairly common, a type that most people would recognize.

But a sign takes us to a different level of supernatural significance, largely because it was understood to be significant. It was from God, meant to manifest his will amongst his people. This is why the Jews were so insistent on a sign; The Jews ask for a sign and the Greeks seek wisdom, as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1:22. This is why the man whose sight was restored asks how a sinner can produce such a sign. For when the disciples of the Baptist asked Jesus if he were the one, the part of the latter’s response was that the blind see; of course this is a reference to Isaiah 35, which I saw labeled as the Joy of the Redeemed. So if Jesus is restoring sight, then that is a pretty clear indication that he is not a sinner. In fact, it’s a pretty clear indication that he is the Messiah, as foretold by Isaiah. So is the formerly blind man being a bit disingenuous when he says that Jesus is a prophet? Or is he afraid of speaking too boldly? 

12 Et dixerunt ei: “Ubi est ille?”. Ait: “Nescio”.
13 Adducunt eum ad pharisaeos, qui caec us fuerat.
14 Erat autem sabbatum, in qua die lutum fecit Iesus et aperuit oculos eius.
15 Iterum ergo interrogabant et eum pharisaei quomodo vidisset. Ille autem dixit eis: “Lutum posuit super oculos meos, et lavi et video”.
16 Dicebant ergo ex pharisaeis quidam: “Non est hic homo a Deo, quia sabbatum non custodit! ”; alii autem dicebant: “ Quomodo potest homo peccator haec signa facere?”. Et schisma erat in eis.

 18 Οὐκ ἐπίστευσαν οὖν οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι περὶ αὐτοῦ ὅτι ἦν τυφλὸς καὶ ἀνέβλεψεν, ἕως ὅτου ἐφώνησαν τοὺς γονεῖς αὐτοῦ τοῦ ἀναβλέψαντος

19 καὶ ἠρώτησαν αὐτοὺς λέγοντες, Οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ υἱὸς ὑμῶν, ὃν ὑμεῖς λέγετε ὅτι τυφλὸς ἐγεννήθη; πῶς οὖν βλέπει ἄρτι;

20 ἀπεκρίθησαν οὖν οἱ γονεῖς αὐτοῦ καὶ εἶπαν, Οἴδαμεν ὅτι οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ υἱὸς ἡμῶν καὶ ὅτι τυφλὸς ἐγεννήθη:

21 πῶς δὲ νῦν βλέπει οὐκ οἴδαμεν, ἢ τίς ἤνοιξεν αὐτοῦ τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς ἡμεῖς οὐκ οἴδαμεν: αὐτὸν ἐρωτήσατε, ἡλικίαν ἔχει, αὐτὸς περὶ ἑαυτοῦ λαλήσει. 

 So “the Jews” did not believe he who had been blind and whose sight was restored, until they heard the parents of him whose sight was restored (19) and they (“The Jews”) asked them (the parents), saying, “Is he your son, who you say was born blind? So how exactly does he see?” (20) So the parents of him answered and said, “We know that he is our son and that he was born blind. (21) How he now sees we do not know. Ask him. He has (requisite) age, he speaks for himself.”

At the end of the last section, I asked why the formerly blind man referred to Jesus as a prophet, rather than as the Messiah. It now occurs to me that I provided the quote about the blind seeing; it’s not part of the text, so the reference to Isaiah is only in my mind rather than in the story. We will assume John was fully aware of the reference, oblique as it may be. One suspects that this is why the report to the Baptist includes the phrase about the blind seeing in Matthew and Luke. Matthew likely would have been aware of Isaiah; would Q have known? There is a question that deserves to be asked. My hard copy Greek NT has the cross references in the margins, which is immensely helpful in cases like this. Matthew, being the HS scholar that he was, to the point of coming up with “He will be called a Nazarene” likely added the report to the Baptist about the blind regaining their sight as further demonstration of the foretelling of Jesus in the HS.

The question then becomes whether John expected his audience to catch the allusion made here. Naturally, this would require rather a high degree of proficiency and understanding of the Hebrew Scriptures. There is no overt repetition of the phrase regarding the blind. We have the stark account of the story. In his book Jesus Before the Gospels, Ehrman hypothesizes that the community of John the Evangelist consisted of people with a strong background in Judaism, even if not actually raised as Jews. This community had come to the point where they decided it was time to cut their ties with the Jewish religion and become fully Christians, rather than continue on as Jewish-Christians. It’s an interesting hypothesis and it really helps explain the degree of animosity John expresses towards “The Jews”. If true, one inference to be drawn is that the audience for this gospel probably did have a decent degree of knowledge about the HS in general, and perhaps of Isaiah in particular. We must realize that, as Christians, in some ways Isaiah is more significant for us than it is for Jews, who probably put more emphasis on Ezekiel. Of course, that is a horridly subjective statement on my part, but that has been my overall impression. BUT!! that impression is based on very little evidence, so take what I say with way more than a grain of salt. I cannot even begin to formulate an argument for my position; at best, it’s sort of a vague, hazy, inchoate feeling, not at all something even remotely suitable for a serious scholarly judgement.

The point here is that there is a decent chance that the audience may not have picked up on the reference to Isaiah. We would have to assess just how thoroughly familiar the “average Jew” of the early Second Century was with the HS. I don’t know. Observant Jews would have attended Temple at least some of the time, one would think, but based on the degree of knowledge a lot of the Catholics I grew up with had of the Bible, even regular attendance at church on Sunday was hardly sufficient to impart any deep knowledge. I don’t think I’m atypical of my peers, and there is even reason to think that maybe I got a little more than most; regardless, there have been numerous passages and stories that I had never heard before. And I’m just talking the NT; as for the so-called “Old Testament” as it was known in my youth, well, I got a sketchy outline of some of the major events in the first three books, a few stories here and there about Saul and David and Solomon, Jonah, the Dry Bones of Ezekiel, and the impression that Isaiah was very important. So based on my experience, I wouldn’t really be surprised if many people in John’s ekklesia did not catch the allusion. OTOH, perhaps this group was more robust in their belief and their practice than the standard American Catholic congregation. But then, my experience could have been atypical; perhaps most congregations were/are much more fervent in their learning than the rural parish in rural Michigan where I was raised. 

Because if the ekklesia was as clueless as I’m suggesting as possible, the whole point of the Sign would be lost. The question of the sign was apparently some of “The Jews”, who should be takem as more learned. They would get the allusion; indeed, it’s probably safe to say they did get the allusion since they consider the event before them to be a sign. 

But that was all relevant to the passage above; here the discussion focuses on the man’s parents. They are very cagey about their answers; they apparently understand that there are significant implications to the event, even if they maybe don’t grasp the full depth of the problem. Perhaps they do, which is why they’re so evasive. Or, at least, John is suggesting that they did because while the likelihood that these events transpired is not zero, the odds are very close to that. Given all the back and forth we’ve been hashing out, I think the reasonable conclusion is that John did expect his audience–at least the most learned segment of it–to grasp the idea of the sign as it related to the  “prophecy” of Isaiah. That is, after all, why this is a sign. 

17 Dicunt ergo caeco iterum: “Tu quid dicis de eo quia aperuit oculos tuos?”.  Ille autem dixit: “Propheta est!”.
18 Non crediderunt ergo Iudaei de illo quia caecus fuisset et vidisset, donec vocaverunt parentes eius, qui viderat.
19 Et interrogaverunt eos dicentes: “Hic est filius vester, quem vos dicitis quia caecus natus est? Quomodo ergo nunc videt?”.
20 Responderunt ergo parentes eius et dixerunt: “Scimus quia hic est filius noster et quia caecus natus est.
21 Quomodo autem nunc videat nescimus, aut quis eius aperuit oculos nos nescimus; ipsum interrogate. Aetatem habet; ipse de se loquetur!”.

John Chapter 9:1-7

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A thousand pardons for the length of time between posts. John is proving to be by far the most difficult of the gospels to provide commentary. Not only are there few logical breaks in the chapters themselves, but as I hope I pointed out in the summary to Chapter 8, the themes carry on between the chapters. A cursory glance ahead shows that we might be entering into a phase in which the topics are more episodic, but time will tell. We begin with a story about a Sign. As we do so, please remember that the word miracle* does not appear in the NT as written. Jesus is about to perform a sign.

Text

1 Καὶ παράγων εἶδεν ἄνθρωπον τυφλὸν ἐκ γενετῆς.

2 καὶ ἠρώτησαν αὐτὸν οἱ μαθηταὶ αὐτοῦ λέγοντες, Ῥαββί, τίς ἥμαρτεν, οὗτος ἢ οἱ γονεῖς αὐτοῦ, ἵνα τυφλὸς γεννηθῇ;

And proceeding along, he saw a man blind from birth. (2) And his disciples asked him saying about (the man), “Rabbi, who sinned? Was it he, or his parents, so that he was born blind?”  

Let’s start with the most obvious point here; it’s so obvious that it’s easy to overlook. “And (they were) proceeding along”. “Proceeding along…” where? At the end of the last chapter Jesus was going on the lam to escape the wrath of “The Jews” in the Temple. Is this part of that flight from justice–as imposed by Temple authorities? Are they still in Jerusalem? We don’t know. To call this intro “abrupt” is rather an understatement. 

However, that’s all beside the real point. To some degree, the question about sinning seems a bit off. It has the feel, almost, of an anachronism, as if this attitude that illness/disability = sin has become outdated by this time. But then, in the wider world, there are several pagan temples that functioned as sort of a combination of hospital and Lourdes, where the sick and afflicted gathered and prayed for a cure, often delivered in the form of a dream and taking the form of a sacrifice. So, while there is a very real difference between an illness/affliction being caused by sin, and offering a sacrifice in thanksgiving for a cure. It doesn’t matter. The point is that the idea of a physical affliction being caused by sin is hardly an odd one in the ancient world. BUT, this just feels a bit too…perfect. It’s a set-up for what comes next. In addition, if the man was blind from birth, how could the sin have been his? IIRC, the idea of the sins of the father being visited on the sons, or children, is part of Hebrew/Jewish/Canaanite tradition, so again this question is not surprising in any generalized cultural sense, but it does seem a bit…odd.

But now let us circle back to the first point, about the abrupt opening. The combination of that opening with the too-perfect question leads me to suspect that John encountered this story as a complete unit in one of his oral sources. Like Luke’s story of the Widow of Nain, it had developed amongst one or some of the groups that followed, or at least paid attention to Jesus. That is how the legends of Jesus developed, and it is how legends in general develop: stories sort of spring up organically. To say that they are concocted, or made up, or fictional is rather to miss the point. No, the stories did not occur in anything resembling factual reality, but that was not necessarily seen as a problem. Again, we’re talking Truth, not factual accuracy. The latter has nothing to do with the former. It was believed that it could have been accurate as well as True, and that was what mattered in the long run; it was the sort of thing that could have been True, just as Thucydides wrote speeches that were the sort of thing that woulda/coulda been said at the time and place and by the speaker in question. At the risk of offending, the word we’re looking for here is myth. If you read Joseph Campbell–which I cannot recommend highly enough–you will understand that myth does not mean “fairy tale”, or deliberate lie. It’s a story that illustrates a very essential aspect of our lived reality. So this is the sort of thing Jesus would have done, so it becomes True. 

1 Et praeteriens vidit hominem caecum a nativitate.
2 Et interro gaverunt eum discipuli sui dicentes: “Rabbi, quis peccavit, hic aut parentes eius, ut caecus nasceretur?”.

3 ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς, Οὔτε οὗτος ἥμαρτεν οὔτε οἱ γονεῖς αὐτοῦ, ἀλλ’ ἵνα φανερωθῇ τὰ ἔργα τοῦ θεοῦ ἐν αὐτῷ.

4 ἡμᾶς δεῖ ἐργάζεσθαι τὰ ἔργα τοῦ πέμψαντός με ἕως ἡμέρα ἐστίν: ἔρχεται νὺξ ὅτε οὐδεὶς δύναται ἐργάζεσθαι. 

5 ὅταν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ὦ, φῶς εἰμι τοῦ κόσμου.

Jesus answered, “Neither he nor his parents sinned, but (he was blind) so that the works of God may have been made manifest in/through him. (4) You must do the works of the one having sent me until it is day. Night comes that no one is able to work. (5) Whenever I may be in the kosmos, I am the light of the kosmos.   

Here is the real proof that we are in the realm of myth. The man is not blind due to sin, but so that he may make manifest the works of God. Think about that for a moment. It sort of takes us into the outer ambit of the moral realm of Predestination. This man was not born only to be damned upon his death, but he still spent a chunk of his life blind so that God could show mercy by making him whole. Now, the attitude I’ve just expressed is very much the attitude of an era much later than the time of Jesus. The horrors of life were much more obvious back then. As proof I offer the tombstones of 17th Century Boston. In the burying ground next to Old South Church on Tremont street are very grim tombstones, with carvings of skulls and skeletons that are depicted snuffing out the candle of life. As time progressed and some of the grim aspect of life had been ameliorated the skulls grew wings and morphed into angels, a much more positive image. So I suspect we feel the grim aspect of this man’s fate more keenly than he did. And even if this particular man is “fictional”, there were scores of others in the same or worse condition scattered throughout the towns of Judea. So here is where the myth aspect really comes into play: I doubt anyone hearing this story at any point prior to the Reformation thought of the man’s circumstances as I have. It was a story that imparted a Truth about life. People were born blind. But this man was actually fortunate to have encountered Jesus who (spoiler alert!) will restore his sight. He is one of the lucky ones, and we should rejoice in his good fortune. But these sorts of implications, many of them probably unforeseen by the authors of the NT, raised the sorts of questions that led to the development of theology as something apart from philosophy. Stories like this led to debates among churchmen, starting in the Second Century, proceeding through Augustine in the 4/5th Century and raging throughout the Middle Ages. And the questions that cropped up are still valid, even if we have come to some sort of consensus about them.

Finally there is Jesus’ pronouncement in Verse 6. “I am the light of the kosmos/world”. Having even rudimentary background in astronomy and Hermeticism and Gnosticism that I do, the choice of “world” really matters, and I wonder how someone in the Second Century would have understood the term kosmos, which is the word John used here. When we hear “light of the world” we think of our terrestrial home and its daystar, AKA the sun. And really, that is the image John means to evoke as he compares and contrasts against night, when no one is able to work since it is dark. Here is where one wonders how familiar John was with Matthew and the Sermon on the Mount. In particular I think of Mt 5:14 & 16, and 6:23. In Verse 5:14 Jesus tells his audience that “you are the light of the world”; in 5:16, they are admonished to let their light shine before men through their good example. Finally in 6:23 he says that if one’s eyes are evil their body will be full of darkness. Similar sorts of implications, but still distinct. Did John sort of remember his Matthew, more or less, but not quite get the nuances right? Or did he remember his Matthew and adapt to different circumstances? Did John develop the theme of light from the ideas of one of his predecessors?

It’s impossible to answer that question. Of course the light/dark dichotomy can be traced back to Paul in the NT, and all the way back to Zoroaster in Near Eastern thought. I mentioned Elaine Pagels’ The Gnostic Paul; light/dark was prominent in Gnostic belief, and I will suggest that the rise in the popularity of Gnosticism would have led to this theme to spill into the culture as a whole. It would have been something of a commonplace, at least in some circles. These circles would have been comprised of educated individuals, since this is the prime market for beliefs that value knowledge of any sort. John was educated, as is demonstrated by the fact that he could write. As such, I would suggest that John conceived the idea of the light of the world in some sort of semi-Gnostic understanding. Now, I have just unloaded a whole pile of unsubstantiated speculation, so don’t be too eager to quote me. With that caveat in mind, however, I believe my suggestion is eminently plausible given a certain amount of diffusion of Gnostic thinking and belief. In such a system, the idea of the Light of the Kosmos–not “the world” as we understand it–is well in keeping with the high claims John has made about who Jesus is. I am suggesting that if John is writing under Gnostic influence, he is likely not talking about the mundane, physical world of our common understanding. He is more concerned about the kosmos, the cosmic realm of all creation. Can I prove that? Of course not. All I can do is make the suggestion as a reminder that this gospel that we have been reading an commenting on for a couple of millennia is not a settled fact. It is a consensus–at best.  We need always to bear in mind that the NT was part of a much larger milieu, which is why I so vehemently insist that there is no such thing as “NT Greek”. It’s an artificial creation, a circumscribing, or a cordoning off of the authors of the NT from the wider world around them, and this will lead to an overly narrow understanding of the words they wrote. As such I fully believe that John could easily have had something well beyond what shows up on a globe when he had Jesus say, “I am the light of the world”.

But let’s reel this back in a bit. Or a lot. Even to be the “light of the world” as it fits on a globe is one heckuva claim to make. Jesus is the light that shines to show us eternal life, and this clim is the culmination of the train of thought first put forth in Matthew. We all know Matthew’s birth narrative; many of us probably heard it read in church in the past week or two (I write this on 1/2/24) We are all familiar with the Star of Bethlehem that was observed by astrologers in the East who came to pay homage to the Infant King. We call them “Three Kings of Orient”, but “kings” covers up the term “magi”, which is the Latinized form of magoi, which is the Greek word borrowed from the Persians that meant, among other things, “astrologer”, and is the root of “magic” and “magician”. They observed a star, a new star that announced the birth of the new King. Having had an interest in astronomy as a lad, I can assure you that a new star is A Big Deal. A Very Big Deal. In 1054 the light of a stellar explosion in the constellation Taurus reached the earth, and was recorded by Chinese astronomers and other observers. This was a “new star”, something that appeared in the sky where there had never been a star. Technically, this wasn’t a star, but a supernova, one of the most spectacular events in the heavens. The star appeared in July of 1054 and then disappeared from view by the naked eye in April 1056; however, it is still visible with the aid of a smallish telescope as the Crab Nebula. It is the first object in the Messier Catalogue, a listing of non-cometary celestial objects such as galaxies or nebulae. The French astronomer Charles Messier found it while looking for Halley’s Comet, and he mistook the nebula for the comet. To avoid confusion in the future, M Messier created the catalogue of such objects, and this catalogue–greatly expanded–is still used by astronomers. The objects are listed in the catalogue with the letter M (for Messier) and a number, which are sequential in order of discovery. The Crab Nebula is M 1 in the catalogue.  

All of this is meant to demonstrate just how much of a Big Deal a new star is. We have seen nothing of the sort since 1054, and I will let you do the math on that. Given that Jesus’ birth was marked by a new star, we can understand that Matthew saw this birth as an event of cosmic significance. That is the term I used when we read Matthew, but I did not fully understand the implications of what I said at the time. By introducing a New Star, Matthew was beating us over the head with implications of just how big a deal the birth of Jesus was; however, at this point, the Star of Bethlehem is just part of the wallpaper of Christmas, something mentioned in a song, or that decorates a creche. So when John says Jesus claimed to be the “light of the kosmos”, φῶς εἰμι τοῦ κόσμου, I think we need to sit back and take notice that John had something in mind that goes way beyond our humdrum earth, our globe. Betcha don’t find that in another commentary.

3 Respondit Iesus: “ Neque hic peccavit neque parentes eius, sed ut manifestentur opera Dei in illo.
4 Nos oportet operari opera eius, qui misit me, donec dies est; venit nox, quando nemo potest operari.
5 Quamdiu in mundo sum, lux sum mundi”.

6 ταῦτα εἰπὼν ἔπτυσεν χαμαὶ καὶ ἐποίησεν πηλὸν ἐκ τοῦ πτύσματος, καὶ ἐπέχρισεν αὐτοῦ τὸν πηλὸν ἐπὶ τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς

7 καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ, Υπαγε νίψαι εἰς τὴν κολυμβήθραν τοῦ Σιλωάμ {ὃ ἑρμηνεύεται Ἀπεσταλμένος}. ἀπῆλθεν οὖν καὶ ἐνίψατο, καὶ ἦλθεν βλέπων. 

Saying this Jesus spat on the ground and made mud from the spittle, and smeared mud upon his eyes. (7) And Jesus said to him (the blind man). “Withdraw, wash to the pool of Siloam {which translates as “Sent”}. So he went away and washed, and he came seeing. [Usually rendered as “he came back seeing”.]  

OK. A couple of things to get us started. First, the construction “he came seeing” is odd. Changing this to “came back seeing” makes sense in English, but it is not what the Greek–nor the Latin, for that matter–says. This doesn’t really affect the narrative, but one wonders at the clumsy nature of this. Second, the words in the {brackets} are almost certainly interpolated. Mark has a number of Aramaic expressions that he translates into Greek, but they are translated much more smoothly than what we get here. This just screams “Marginal Note!” In fact, it screams it so loudly that I wonder if the “he came back seeing” is not also an interpolation. After all, without it, we are not exactly informed that the cure occurred. But, in the grand scheme, the insertion of a couple of phrases is not a big deal one way or another. 

What is a big deal, in my opinion, is how we are thrown back into Mark, and the way Mark described what I termed the magical practices of Jesus. Twice in Mark we are told that Jesus used his saliva to cure people; the first time in 7:31-37, it was a man who could not hear or speak, the second time in 8:23-25 it was a man who was blind. These are the only three instances where the Greek word ptuō, “to spit” is used. (Ptuō is a wonderful example of onomatopoeia, IMO.) I have been paying attention to such things because I have a theory that Jesus may have been executed for practicing magic. This position is not a common one, but it’s not entirely unusual, either. It crops up more in discussions of pagan magical practice than in Christian writing, and it has been suggested more than once. It bears mention that Jesus’ name occurs in incantations of pagan magicians; Jesus is invoked as a magician of some power. And then Jesus’ later contemporary, Apollonius of Tyana, was also accused of sorcery. The comparison of the biographies of the two men provide some really interesting parallels, to the point that Christian writers up until, say, Augustine, would go apoplectic at the mention of Apollonius. If you have never heard of him, then you can appreciate how successful the Christians between John and Augustine were in extirpating the memory of Apollonius, but the latter’s memory survived in no small part to imperial patronage of his status. Back when we discussed Matthew and Luke, I made sure to point out how these two evangelists neatly omitted those parts of Mark in which these magical practices of Jesus were described. 

We will discuss this further as the chapter progresses. I would like to close this section with two comments. First, it’s amazing how long some of these can drag out. Until I got to it, the idea of explaining about the Crab Nebula had never occurred to me. Now, one hopes that this sort of context adds value. There are a lot of cross-currents swirling about in the First Century, just as there are in any period. And I do suspect that you will not run into this sort of explanation elsewhere. Or maybe you will. Second, this whole magic bit is curious, to say the least. Third, it appears that there is no mention of a “sign” in this chapter. That is also curious.

6 Haec cum dixisset, exspuit in terram et fecit lutum ex sputo et linivit lutum super oculos eius
7 et dixit ei: “ Vade, lava in natatoria Siloae! ” — quod interpretatur Missus —. Abiit ergo et lavit et venit videns.

*I published a post called Miracles back at the end of June explaining the etymology of “miracle”, which is a Latin word. As such, it does not appear in the Greek original; nor in the Vulgate, for that matter. The term was coined by later Christian writers.