EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)
11.
A man that is called Jesus] This looks as if he had heard little of the fame of Jesus. But the better reading gives, ‘The man that is called Jesus,’ which points the other way.
made clay] He does not say how, for this he had not seen. The rest he tells in order. Omit the words ‘the pool of.’
I received sight] The Greek may mean either ‘I looked up,’ as in
Mark 6:41;
Mark 7:34;
Mark 16:4, &c.; or ‘I recovered sight,’ as
Matthew 11:5;
Mark 10:51-52, &c. ‘I looked up’ does not suit
John 9:15;John 9:18, where the word occurs again: and though ‘I recovered sight’ is not strictly accurate of a man
born blind, yet it is admissible, as sight is natural to man.
Note the gradual development of faith in the man’s soul, and compare it with that of the Samaritan woman (see on
John 4:19) and of Martha (see on
John 11:21). Here he merely knows Jesus’ name and the miracle; in
John 9:17 he thinks Him ‘a Prophet;’ in
John 9:33 He is ‘of God;’ in
John 9:39 He is ‘the Son of God.’ What writer of fiction in the second century could have executed such a study in psychology?
John 9:11.
Ἄνθρωπος λεγόμενος Ἰησοῦς,
a man who is called Jesus) The article is not added, but the participle. Comp. ch.
John 11:54, “
Into a city called Ephraim,”
Ἐφραὶμ λεγομένην πόλιν. The blind man had not known the celebrity of Jesus.—
ἀνέβλεψα,
I received [or
recovered]
sight) He had not had the power of seeing ever before; but yet that power is natural to man; on this account he says,
I recovered sight [the strict sense of
ἀνέβλεψα].
Verse 11. -
He - the man there singled out -
answered (
and said),
The Man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed my eyes, and said to me, Go to theSiloam, and wash. So I went, and when I washed I received my sight. Nothing more as yet than the name of his Benefactor has broken upon him. The name is full of significance to him - the "Savior,': the "Healer;" but he knows nothing of his Messianic claims, nor of his Divine authority. He began, where all disciples must, with the
Man. The manner of man soon wakes within him loftier questionings and a better explanation. At present the process seems magical, altogether inexplicable. Clay and Siloam water do not cure birth-blindness, he is in a maze, as well he might be. The
ἀνέβλεψα should be rendered, according to Meyer, "I looked up" (see
Mark 16:4). It cannot be so translated in vers. 15 and 18. Doubtless it strictly means, "I received sight again;" but there is something in Grotius's explanation, "No one is incorrectly said to
receive that which, though he be deprived of it, belongs to human nature as a whole" (see Westcott). The eyes were there, but unused. Meyer quotes from Pausanias the similar use of
ἀναβλέπειν, in reference to the recovery or obtaining of sight by a man born blind. John 9:11
To the pool of Siloam
The best texts read simply, Go to Siloam.
Received sight (ἀνέβλεψα)
Originally, to look up, asMatthew 14:19;Mark 16:4, and so some render it here; but better, I recovered sight.
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