John 9 - CSB Ancient Faith Study Bible

9:3 Theodore of Mopsuestia: The Lord taught the disciples that there are many reasons for all these events and that they are certainly secret and unexplainable. And so, we always complain about events whose causes we ignore, but then we also learn that nothing happens in vain. This knowledge will be given to us in the future world, because what is hidden now will be revealed to us. Commentary on John 4.9.3.

9:8-10 Ephrem the Syrian: Those who could see were clearly being drawn to the blind man, who saw inwardly. The blind man was being drawn secretly to those who could see but who were blind inwardly. [The blind man] washed away the clay from his eyes and appeared to himself. They washed the blindness from their hearts and gained approval for themselves. When our Lord opened up the eyes of one blind man clearly in that moment, he opened up [the eyes of] many blind people secretly. For that blind man was [surely] blind. He was like a source of profit for our Lord, for by him our Lord acquired many blind people [by healing them] from the blindness of their heart. Commentary on Tatian’s Diatessaron 16.30.

9:15 Cyril of Alexandria: Here, it is as though the man is saying: I will prove to you that the power of the Healer was not exerted in vain. I will not deny the favor I received, for I now possess what I formerly longed for. I who was blind from birth and afflicted from the womb, having been anointed with clay, am healed, and I see. That is, I do not merely show you my eye opened, concealing the darkness in its depth, but I really see. From now on I am able to look at things that formerly I could only hear about. Look! The bright light of the sun is shining around me. Look! The beauty of strange sights surrounds my eye. A short time ago I scarcely knew what Jerusalem was like. Now I see the temple of God glittering within it, and I behold in its midst the truly venerable altar. And if I stood outside the gate, I could look around on the country of Judea and recognize one thing as a hill and another as a tree. And when the time changes to evening, my eye will no longer fail to notice the beauty of the nighttime sky, the brilliant company of the stars and the golden light of the moon. When I do, I shall be amazed at the skill of him who made them “from the greatness and beauty of created things” [Wis 13:5, NRSV]. I as well as others shall acknowledge the great Creator. Commentary on the Gospel of John 6.1.

9:27 Chrysostom: Do you see how boldly the beggar speaks with the scribes and Pharisees? It shows how strong truth is and how weak falsehood is. Truth, though it grasps only ordinary people, makes them to appear glorious; falsehood, even when it is among the strong, shows them to be weak. What he says is like this: you do not pay attention to my words; therefore, I will no longer speak or answer you when you question me continually to no purpose. You do not want to hear in order to learn but so that you can lay insults over my words. Homilies on the Gospel of John 58.2.

9:35-38 Hilary of Poitiers: When the man was already healed and had suffered ejection from the synagogue, the Lord put to him the question, “Do you believe on the Son of God?” This was to save him from the thought that he had lost everything by being excluded from the synagogue. It gave him the certainty that confession of the true faith had restored him to immortality. When the man, his soul still unenlightened, answered, “Who is he, Lord, that I may believe on him?” the Lord’s reply was, “You have both seen him, and it is he that speaks with you.” For his goal was to remove the ignorance of the man whose sight he had restored and whom he was now enriching with the knowledge of so glorious a faith. Does the Lord demand from this man, as from others who entreated him to heal them, a confession of faith as the price of their recovery? Emphatically not! For the blind man could already see when he was thus addressed. The Lord asked the question in order to receive the answer, “Lord, I believe.” The faith that spoke in that answer was to receive not sight but life. On the Trinity 6.48.

9:40-41 Augustine: [These Pharisees] were obviously like the one who had gone up to the temple and was telling God [in Lk 18:11], “I thank you, because I am not like other people, unjust, adulterers, rapacious,” as though to say, “I thank you that I am not blind but can see, unlike other people of the same sort as this tax collector.” What did [these men] say? “We are not blind too, are we?” And the Lord answered them, “If you were blind, you would not have any sin. Now however, because you say ‘We can see,’ your sins remain.” He did not say “your sin occurs” but remains. You see, it was already there; because when you do not confess it, it is not taken away but “remains.” Sermon 136b.2.