And his disciples asked him, saying, Rabbi, who sinned, this [man] or his parents, that he should be born blind?
Jesus sees a man who has been blind since birth, and His disciples turn the sight into a debate. Their question assumes that someone must be to blame. It raises a deeper issue: does every affliction come from a particular sin?
Their either/or was not random. It grew out of a principle they already knew: God visits the sins of fathers on their children.
The question the disciples raised may seem strange to us, but it expressed thoughts that were common among the Jews. Those thoughts rested on Exodus 20:5, which speaks of God visiting the sin of the fathers on the children. The Lord's reply shows that affliction may come with no element of punishment in it at all. It may come simply so that God's work may be shown.
An affliction like this was usually put down to God's government — His hand dealing with sin here and now. But how could a man be blind from birth for a sin of his own?
People commonly blamed such an affliction on some governmental dealing by God. It might indeed be governmental dealing, because of the parents' offences (Ex. 34:7). But the teaching of the rabbis carried the matter further, and held that a person could sin while still in the womb. That idea, it is said, rested on Gen. 25:22, where we read that the two children struggled together in Rebekah's womb.
Commentators differ here. Another rules out any idea of a previous life, and finds no good reason to think the disciples held to sin before birth.
No such idea existed in Judea then as the one Pythagoras taught: that a man might have sinned in an earlier life on earth, and be punished for it in a later life on earth as well. Nor is there enough reason to accept the view of one devout and learned writer, that the disciples may have held the notion of sin before birth — the notion rabbis later drew from Gen. 25:22.
Reading every sorrow as a verdict feels natural. But this is not the time when God settles accounts, and the mistake costs the one who makes it.
When we see that God takes notice of everything and everyone here below, government is the natural thought. But it was not then, and it is not now, the time for His government of the world. Here lay the mistake of the disciples, and of Job's friends long before them. It is a mistake that leads people into harsh criticism and misjudgment. It also makes them forget their own sins and their need of repentance, while they busy themselves with what they count as God's vengeance on others.
The disciples want the case explained. Jesus refuses their way of looking at it and answers from God's side.
This question is so like the mind of man. Christ says, "I do not take it up in that light." He takes God's side, showing that sorrow and loss are linked in God's mind with some work of power not yet brought out. That this man was born blind was, as it were, a blemish in providence. Christ says, "I have come into a scene where everything is out of order, to gladden hearts and display the glory of God."
Ruling out a particular sin does not mean sin has nothing to do with it. The trouble runs wider than one man's record.
The man blind from his birth is no doubt a picture of Israel, and indeed of all mankind by nature. Of course the root of this is sin, but not, as the disciples supposed, some particular sin (v. 2)... But sin, the root of sins, has infected the very nature that we all have as children of Adam.
A man born blind was beyond any human remedy. That is exactly what made him the right subject.
God's ways are not man's ways, and what He reveals stands in contrast to the Jewish idea that God simply pays each person back. The reason lay deeper than what his parents deserved, or than God's foresight of the wrong the man himself would do... The inner, true and final reason — God's own reason, if we may use such a phrase — belonged to God's goodness: to give Christ an opportunity to work the works of God on the earth. How wonderfully grace acts in a hopeless case, and how it judges such a case! That it lay wholly outside the resources of man made it just the occasion for Jesus.
- Wrong question. The disciples ask who is to blame. Christ refuses that question. He answers from God's side, and treats the man's sorrow as the setting for a work of power not yet brought out.
- Wrong timing. Job's friends made the same mistake: reading present affliction as a present verdict. This is not the time of God's government of the world.
- Wrong target. Blame aimed outward makes people harsh. It also lets them forget their own sins and their need of repentance.
- Right root. Sin is behind the blindness — not a particular sin, but the nature every child of Adam inherits.
- Right result. The case lay wholly outside human resources. That is what made it the opportunity for Christ to work the works of God in free grace.
Jesus answered, Neither has this [man] sinned nor his parents, but that the works of God should be manifested in him.
The disciples looked at a man blind from birth and asked whose fault it was — his or his parents'. Jesus refuses both options. His answer raises the question every sufferer asks: is my trouble a punishment, or is God at work in it?
The disciples were not being cruel. They were working from a principle they had been taught about how God deals with His people on earth.
John 9 opens with the case of a man who prompts a question from the disciples about the government of God in Israel. Was it his parents' sin that brought this trouble on their child, following the principles God had given them in Exodus? Or was it his own sin, known to God though not seen by men, that had earned him this judgment? The Lord replies that the man's condition did not depend on God's government dealing with the sin of the man or of his parents. His case was simply the misery that made room for the mighty work of God in grace.
The Lord is not declaring this family innocent. He is saying that their sins do not explain this blindness.
God's ways are not like man's. When He makes them known, they stand against the Jewish idea that suffering pays back sin. The reason lay deeper than what his parents deserved, or than God's foresight of the wrong the man would do. It is not that the man and his parents were not sinners. But when Jesus looked at the man's blindness from birth, His eye saw beyond nature, law and government… The case was completely beyond human help, and that is just what made it the occasion for Jesus to do the works of God.
Trouble can come with no punishment in it. And God can show His work in two very different ways. One of them leaves the trouble in place.
The Lord's reply shows that suffering can come with no punishment in it at all. It can come only so that God may show His work. Here He showed it by delivering the man from the affliction completely. He can show it just as powerfully by delivering someone from the weight and depression of an affliction while the affliction itself stays; and that is often seen today… this blind man was a fit subject for the work of God, though he never asked for it, as far as the record goes.
The Lord looked at the same blindness and saw something else. Not a case to settle, but a place for grace to start.
The meaning of blindness from birth is too plain to need comment. But the Lord, dealing with the faithful remnant in Israel, did not count it as sin, nor treat it as a case of sin being charged to anyone. He treated it as an occasion for grace. This is how sovereign grace views such a case… the work done in him was definite and effective. It was grace that looked at his condition, and knew no cause but itself and the fruit it was going to produce.
Writers point out that this chapter follows a chapter of speech with a chapter of action, and that "the works of God" has a definite content.
The Lord treats it as a case that shows God's ways in grace rather than in government… It always comes back to this, if a person is to be happy before Him — to the works of God: the great atoning work of the cross for him, and the work of the Spirit of God in him. Let us hold on to the words of verse 3, "the works of God might be displayed in him" (older translations read "manifested in him"). This is not about merely saying you believe, and even less about man's works. It is about God's work, done and displayed in a man.
Commentators read the man's condition as more than a medical fact.
The man blind from birth is surely a picture of Israel, and indeed of all mankind by nature. The root of this is of course sin — but not, as the disciples supposed, one particular sin… Sin, the root of all sins, has infected the very nature we all share as children of Adam. That is the reason for all sickness, and for spiritual blindness from birth too.
- Wrong question. The disciples asked whose sin caused the blindness. The Lord answers that it did not come from the man's sin or his parents' sin at all.
- Not innocence. Jesus does not call the family sinless. He says the reason lay deeper than anything they deserved.
- Occasion, not verdict. The case was beyond all human help. That is what made it the moment for the works of God.
- Grace without a cause. The man never asked. Grace here knew no cause but itself, and the work done in him was definite and effective.
- Two ways it shows. God's work may show as full deliverance from the trouble. Or it may show as full deliverance from its weight while the trouble stays. In the end, the works of God are the cross for a person and the Spirit of God at work in him.