Commentary on John 1 part 51/94

'I myself,' he says, 'who was blind even in the birth-pangs, who was diseased in the embryo and the womb, having been smeared with clay have been healed, and I see'—that is, I do not merely show an eye that is open, hiding darkness in its depth, but I truly behold.

I now have before my sight the things that formerly were in bare hearing.

Behold, the bright light of the sun flashes round about me;

behold, the beauty of strange sights encompasses my eye.

Only now, and scarcely, have I come to know Jerusalem, and I behold in it the divine temple flashing round about, and I see in its midst the truly august altar;

and should I be found beyond the gate, I will gaze round about upon all Judaea in a circle, and I will recognize what is a mountain and what is a plant.

And when the time changes toward evening, no longer will the beauty of the wonders on high escape my eye—neither the translucent choir of the stars, nor even the all-golden radiance of the moon.

So then, as far as breadth of contemplations and elegance in words is concerned, such a power the saying travails to bring forth—both the very 'I see' and the 'He made clay and anointed my eyes.'

For the graceful element in contemplations is not thrust out, nor is it rejected as spurious by the reasoning that is among us—that is, the ecclesiastical reasoning.

Therefore, keeping the power of the one who healed truly free from slander, so far as it lay in him, he speaks such things—he who, since he had received mercy from Christ, was being judged before the priests.

Some of the Pharisees therefore said, 'This man is not from God, because he does not keep the Sabbath.'

They say, talking nonsense, that He is not from God to whom it belongs to be able to work the works of God; and, though they see the Son crowned with a measure of glory equal to the Father who is able to do all things, they are not ashamed to cast upon Him irrationally the reproach of impiety; and, thrusting aside the outcry that arises from the marvel, they set their own envy against the wonder-worker, and accuse Him without restraint as having transgressed—Him who knew no sin.

And they senselessly believe that the whole Law has been undone by the movement of a single finger dared on the Sabbath—and yet they themselves loose the ox from the manger and lead it away to water; nay, even if a sheep should fall into a pit, according to what is written, they raise it up with much eagerness.

Therefore they strain out the gnat, according to the word of the Savior;

for this was much a custom among them;

But very foolishly and most desperately, not rendering the marvel to Christ, nor even from the good deed enduring henceforth to acknowledge who He might be, they cavil on account of the Sabbath; and, as though every virtue were accomplished by them through merely being idle on the Sabbath, they cast Him wholly out from intimacy with God, saying that He is not from God—although rather they ought to have understood that the One who has authority over His own laws was now present, and that it is dear and chosen to God even on the Sabbath to do good and not to send away empty of hope the one in need of mercy.

For when would anyone not praise the worker of good deeds? Or what season shall play the tyrant over virtue? But they, though they marvel at that ancient Jesus who took Jericho on the Sabbath and ordained for their fathers to do the things customary to conquerors, and reckoned as nothing at all the requirement to be idle on the Sabbath, fasten upon Christ; and, so far as their own ill-will is concerned, they are eager not only to thrust Him out from the glory befitting God, but they also rob Him of the honor becoming to the saints.

And being persuaded to talk idly, exceedingly through their own malice alone, they pour out the sentence of impiety against Him who justifies the world, and who for this cause has come to us from the Father.

But others said, 'How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?' And there was a division among them.

they grant it, and, now setting the demonstration that comes from the divine sign above the idleness according to the Sabbath, they appear as upright judges in better things.

For to remove altogether from transgression, and to place outside of sin, the one who does not shrink from doing something even on the Sabbath when it is fitting—how is this not exceedingly opposed to the things defined concerning the Sabbath? And proceeding by a reasoning that is, as is likely, necessary and possessing much good sense in itself, toward being thus disposed, they say such things.

For it is plain and beyond all dispute acknowledged, that upon those who disregard the divine law and set at naught the things determined by the decree from above, God would never bestow the power to accomplish any of those things worthy of wonder.

But, as the Jews suppose, He gave this to Christ, even though He had grieved the law concerning the Sabbath.

It is not then the doing of anything on the Sabbath that avails unto sin; nor indeed could anyone dispute that working at good deeds is far better than the idleness kept on that day.

And so, as the Saviour Himself somewhere says again, the Levites are permitted to perform priestly service on the Sabbath, and they incur no penalty for their diligence in this; rather, one might rather find fault with idleness as not being without penalty.

For who would blame them if they chose to offer sacrifices of oxen on the Sabbath, or to carry out the manner of the other sacrifices? Rather one might with more reason reproach them if they did not do the things they ought, and what was owed to the laws of divine service.

When therefore the things consecrated according to the law for the salvation of certain persons ascend without hindrance, even on the Sabbath, unto the divine altar, how should not the grace shown toward a man be accomplished all the more fittingly, on whose account the wonder was acceptable even on the Sabbath? By fitting reasoning, then, some of the Jews who were called to judge most excellently, having scarcely dispersed from the eyes of their understanding the mist of the ignorance that attends their nation, marvel at the glory of the Saviour, though not yet very rightly;

for they speak of Him more meagrely than they ought, yet they separate themselves from those who readily condemn Him.

For those who impiously assign victory to envy rather than to fitting reason, receive even that which by nature is in no way liable to accusation as a ground for lawlessness;

but those who rightly look into the nature of the matter condemn the folly of the former.

And it is likely, I suppose, that they chose to say something else also that was well judged, namely: How can a man that is a sinner do such signs? For they hasten, so to speak, to strive altogether in accord with the ordinance of the saints.

For if, they say, we shall altogether grant that it is permitted even for those accustomed to transgress to boast of things beyond reason, and to be seen as workers of wonders, what will any longer appear to hinder the fault-finders from accusing the multitude of the prophets, or even from thereafter assailing the blessed Moses himself, and holding in no account one so venerable, even though he is attested by the best deeds of all men? Therefore they too plead for the glory of the fathers on account of Christ, receiving what pertains to Him as it were as a pretext for love toward those men.

They say therefore again to the blind man: What sayest thou of Him, that He opened thine eyes? They think that those who are eager to judge just things are raving;

but they seem to me to have wholly forgotten Him who says, Judge righteous judgment; and being preoccupied as it were with the bonds of envy, they cannot endure at all to hear a voice honouring Christ, but as though excusing themselves from one wishing to speak in favour of the marvellous deeds, as from one most hostile to them, and taking little thought for their own head, they arrogantly divert their words to the man who had been healed, and ask again what had often been heard, having already called wicked and a sinner the one who had done something on the Sabbath;

and supposing that by this they would together with themselves condemn the blind man too, and that he would follow their voices, throwing off the prayers of thanksgiving for deliverance from his affliction, and dreading and shuddering at their wrath, and would easily accuse Him as having outraged the law on account of the Sabbath.

For what harm could the voice of one ungrateful man do to the power of the marvellous deed? Or how would Christ not appear in glory befitting God, even if the blind man had been overcome by fear of some chance thing, and, avoiding the enduring of anything of the customary grievances, had denied the grace? But envy is terrible at persuading those who travail with it to hasten hotly to do something, even though it involves much being justly laughed at;

but the mind freed from such things leaps over senseless reasonings, and ever preserving its own beauty undefiled, moves straight toward what is fitting, and does not depart from the bounds of the truth.

Wretched therefore and arrogant are the Pharisees, deeming that those who chose both to think and to speak rightly are raving, and compelling them to say even what it is not lawful to say concerning Him who marvellously called into things beyond hope the man who was ready for thanksgiving and had already, through the wonder, been brought near to bright recognition.

And he said, He is a prophet.

A sharp arrow do those receive into their heart who do not admit the right and just reasoning, but are eager to hunt after only what seems good to envy;

for the deceitful shall not catch his prey, according to that which is written.

For their endeavour is turned against their intention, and they were unexpectedly cheated of much of their hope on hearing, He is a prophet.

For the man who had been healed agrees, and does most excellently, with the others.

For the former, having not without understanding considered the nature of the matter, declare that a sinful man can do none of such things;

and he, upon whom the wonder had been accomplished, all but tracking out the judgment among those men, says that He is a prophet—not yet having learned accurately who He is according to the truth, but following a matter well-worn among the Jews.

For it was their custom to call those who worked wonders prophets, as being for this reason attested by God for their holiness.

In the very manner, then, in which those men, acting rightly, do not dishonour the greatness of the divine sign out of reverence for the Sabbath, and on this account also declare the worker to be wholly free from blame of sin;

in the same manner, I think, this man too, thrusting aside the pettiness concerning the Sabbath, assigns the glory that pertains to better things to Him who granted him sight, and placing Him also in the rank of the saints, calls Him a prophet.

And it seems to me, moreover, that he does not very much lay claim to the legal ordinances.

For he would not have marvelled at Him so greatly, nor would he have received the physician into the rank of a prophet, even though He seemed to loose the ordinance concerning the Sabbath.

Having therefore been benefited by the wonder, and having already passed over into a state better than that of the Jews, he assigns to the wonder-worker that He ought to prevail, since He was working the transgression—which is wholly free from blame—for the sake of good things, over the legal observance.

The Jews therefore did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and had received sight, until they called the parents of him that had received sight, and asked them, saying: Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? How then doth he now see? The sharp envy against Him who had healed, being in them, does not permit that which is confessed by all to be believed; and being tyrannized by the sting of madness, they take very little thought of the truth, and, both speaking falsely against Christ, they first tried to force the blind man himself, and none the less now they are caught vainly labouring against his parents also, the matter having turned out wholly to the contrary.

And they put a most superfluous question to those who had begotten the man, and they seem to me, out of measureless ill counsel, to dishonour even the law which was held in reverence by them and most strongly pleaded on their behalf.

For the neighbours, as it is written, brought the man who had once been blind, and having set him before those who were now inquiring these things, they surely also reported that he had been born blind, and testified that he now had received sight.

But the law is nothing to them, whenever they are eager to accomplish something for their own pleasures.

For since the wonder, being now testified even by unwilling witnesses—both through the neighbours and through the voice of the man who had been healed—put them to shame, they expected that they could persuade those questioned to make nothing of the truth, but rather to say the things according to their own mind.

For see how, questioning them somewhat more sternly, they say: Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? For they all but insist upon doing the most dreadful things against them, and with immeasurable terror they intimidate them, calling them as though by necessity and force to that which they wished to hear.

And this was: He was not born blind.

For there was one impious aim in them, to break down the estimation of the multitudes concerning Christ, and to overturn the ungrudging faith of those who had already marvelled.

And in the very manner in which those who are eager to take some most prosperous city run round about it on every side, and besiege it by all manner of devices—now hastening to dig under its foundations, now setting the blows from the siege-engines upon its towers;

so also the all-daring Pharisees besiege the wonder with their own perversities, and leave out no manner of impiety.

But it was not possible to beat back as stale that which was recognized by all, nor to overturn into a more obscure estimation that which had already been marvelled at by many.

His parents answered and said: We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind;

but how he now sees we know not, or who opened his eyes we know not;

ask him; he is of age, he is able to speak concerning himself.

They confess as true that which is nowhere doubtful, and concerning which it was likely that they would endure nothing of the things they did not wish;

for they affirm that they know their own offspring, and do not deny the genuineness of the birth-pang, and they say plainly that he was born together with the affliction;

yet they draw back from the explanation of the wonder, entrusting this to the nature of the matter to cry aloud, and firmly affirming that it is somehow more fitting that their own offspring should tell in what manner he had been healed;

and fear at danger is somehow terrible at removing one from what is fitting.

Wherefore indeed, shuddering at the cruelty of the Pharisees, they did not keep well that which was somewhere well said: Strive for the truth unto death. And it is likely that they suffered yet something else;

for the poor man is everywhere timid, and, being deprived through lack of means of the ability to look others in the face, he often shrinks away into unwilling silence and into forbearance forced by necessity.

For as one already sufficiently crushed by the burden of poverty, he grows numb at being laden with other evils also.

One must suppose that the parents of the blind man suffered some such thing, even though their words proceed with very great consistency indeed.

For that they should know the one born of themselves, one would surely rather assign altogether to them and not to the one begotten, as more fitting; but that they should know the physician does not by all means belong to those who begot him, but would rather be more suitable to the one who through experience has the grace that comes from the wonder.

Therefore they plainly confess what they know, inasmuch as they are also called to this by what is fitting;

but that which it was more true for that man to tell, as having the more accurate knowledge, this they invite him to teach.

And it does not seem to me without God that they added to their own words the phrase: He is of age.

For this too somehow accuses the impiety of the Pharisees.

For if he who was called to receive sight has, both from his age and maturity, the ability to think, then whenever he tells the wonder, and what manner of thing came upon him, he will not speak from a boyish mind, but from a mind already well established, and strong to plead for whatever he might happen to wish.

It will therefore follow of necessity that from this the disobedience of the Pharisees is seen to be most shameless.

not slipping down, but being of an age that furnishes him with not being ignorant of the natures of things.

These things his parents said, because they feared the Jews;

for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Him to be the Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue.

Well and fittingly does our Lord Jesus Christ bring upon the heads of the Pharisees the woe;

For woe unto you, ye lawyers, because ye took away the key of knowledge;

ye yourselves entered not in, and them that were entering ye hindered. For let the God-loving man once more observe whether the beauty that comes from the truth does not follow upon the things that have been said.

For Christ could never speak falsely.

For behold, in addition to being eager that no one should teach the word concerning His sojourn among men, they also intimidate with implacable fear those who are able to understand from the brightness of the deeds accomplished, and, laying a harsh necessity that comes from their own savagery, they prevent it from being confessed that the man who was not too weak was seen to be from among the very number of the marvellous.

For making the well-disposed man to be put out of the synagogue, and on this account inclined to belief, the wretches are not ashamed, but in a manner alienating from God the one who cleaves to God by authority, and persuading even Him who is Lord of all to become of their party in the madness that is in them against all men.

The wonderful Evangelist, however, makes a defence, and says that those questioned were overcome by fear, and on this account were unwilling to say that Christ had healed the one born of them, in order that, having stripped bare the greatness of the Jews' senselessness, he might make it manifest also to those who come after them.

For what could be more inhuman than such men, who even define punishments for the well-disposed, and lead to needing chastisement those who at all understand Him who is proclaimed through the law and the prophets?

But that the unholy design of the Jews was not unknown to the holy prophets, we shall discover from the sacred writings.

For through Isaiah He who searches hearts and reins declares—He who pierces even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of the joints and marrow, who is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, to whom all things are naked and laid open: 'Woe to you, apostate children, says the Lord; you have made a plan, but not by Me, and covenants, but not through My Spirit, that you might add sin upon sin.' For he who says that Jesus is Lord will assuredly say it in the Holy Spirit, according to the word of Paul.

But whoever practices the contrary does not do so in the Holy Spirit.

Whence then? Rather he will speak in Beelzebul.

Therefore the covenants of the Jews were not through the Holy Spirit, for they were adding sins upon sins—first of all drawing down upon their own heads the ruin that comes of disobedience, and transmitting it also to others by hindering them from confessing Christ.

For their enterprise was truly full of the uttermost impiety; yet the Psalmist mocks them for perilously persisting in a fruitless endeavour, saying: 'Lord, in Your anger You shall confound them, and fire shall devour them; their fruit You shall destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the sons of men.'

'For they intended evil against You; they devised a plan which they shall by no means be able to establish.' For in no way did they prevail to make firm their God-fighting counsel, though they often attempted by countless devices to blot out the glory of Christ.

'We know that this man is a sinner.'

Feigning to be pious in this, and moreover to be disposed together with them,

they command that these men also be believed—even though, laying hold of the very highest of all impieties, they call Him a sinner who came to sojourn among us for the destruction of sin.

And of this slanderous charge they bring forward absolutely no proof whatsoever; but priding themselves and thinking of themselves as something great and extraordinary, for this reason alone—that they are regarded as leaders of the people—they enjoin that faith be granted them on account of the eminence of their persons, and that it be deposited, as it were, in the order of a debt owed.

For that 'We know' will be convicted of incomparable arrogance and disdain, at least by those who scrutinize their own hidden mind.

But from this also one may marvel not a little at the stupefied mind of the Jews.

For while they enjoin that the glory for the marvel be ascribed to God, as being the sole worker of such things, they condemn Him who by His own power wrought the works of God; and not content that they alone, the wretches, should do so, they compel others also to agree with them.

But assigning to their own knowledge alone the clear understanding that Christ is a sinner, they do not perceive how they are marking down the worst of things against their own head.

For being accustomed to boast greatly in their knowledge of the Law, and bearing themselves insufferably haughty over the sacred writings, they shall assuredly pay a greater penalty, inasmuch as it was possible to know the mystery concerning Christ, manifoldly foreshadowed and proclaimed through both the Law and the prophets—yet through much great sloth they seized upon a self-invited ignorance; or else, knowing it accurately, they were never willing to do what they ought, and that with all readiness.

For they ought to have guided the mind of the common people toward the comprehension of the mysteries concerning Christ, and rather to have attempted to lead the rest to the recognition of what they ought to learn.

But those broad in speech and formidable in boasting, crying out 'We know' with exceedingly stiff necks, thrust aside the utterances of the Law, reckoning the sayings of Moses to be nothing; and the sayings of the prophets too seem to them but an idle crowd of words.

For they take no account at all of the things foretold through the prophet's voice as destined to come to pass at the time of the sojourning of our Saviour Christ.

'For then,' he says, 'the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear;'

'then shall the lame leap as a hart, and the tongue of the stammerers shall be clear.' For the paralytic at the pool of Bethesda was healed—he who, as it is written, had continued in his infirmity thirty and eight years—and by a single word of the Saviour he took up his little bed and sprang forth after the manner of a hart.

And whereas they ought to have marvelled at Jesus for that deed, they bewailed the loosing of the Sabbath, and insisting that the Law had been transgressed, they sophistically cavilled at the grace of the miracle.

And when a demon was once cast out, the deaf man spoke;

but they slipped into so grievous a folly that they gained not even the slightest benefit thereby.

The blind man received sight, the prophetic proclamation was fulfilled, the utterance given through the Spirit was brought to its accomplishment—and what then? Again over these things those men are diseased in mind: they condemn the wonder-worker, they mark down as sin the power of Him who was able to shine forth in a manner befitting God, and who was even now showing present that which from long ages before had been awaited as yet to come.

That man therefore answered: 'Whether He is a sinner I do not know;'

'one thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see.'

Together with the eyes of the body his mind too was in some way enlightened;

and while he possessed in his bodily eyes the brightness of the sun that is with us, he received within, and took into his heart, as it were the spiritual ray—I mean the illumination that comes through the Spirit.

For hear how, out of exceedingly great love for Christ, he stands against the abominations of the rulers, and all but rebukes gracefully those who are as it were drunk and beside themselves; yet weaving his speech with fitting reverence, and rendering what is due to the rank of their office, he says with modest character: 'Whether He is a sinner I do not know.'

And it was somehow fitting that he should cry out to them some such things as these.

For let him speak perhaps thus: 'Being unwillingly compelled to approve what I ought not, I will not endure to slander my benefactor, nor will I take my stand together with those who wish to dishonour Him to whom all honour is owed.'

'I will speak of Him who is so great a wonder-worker; I will not cast an evil vote against Him who is able to do the works of God. The wonder seen in me does not permit me to assent to your words;'

'I was blind and I see; I have not believed another's report of his deeds, nor am I simply swept away by strangers' narratives, nor does it occur to me to marvel at achievements wrought upon others.'

'I myself,' he says, 'am the demonstration of His power; I stand seeing, I who was long blind, an image as it were displaying the beauty of His loving-kindness, and flashing forth the greatness of His God-befitting authority.'

Such a meaning I suppose it fitting to attach to the words of him who received his sight.

For to say 'Whether He is a sinner I do not know,' and forthwith to link to this 'One thing I know, that whereas I was blind now I see,' introduces the surmise of no simple insight, but of one exceedingly wise.

They said to him therefore again: 'What did He do to you? How did He open your eyes?' Again they inquire and search out the manner of the divine sign, doing the thing not from a good disposition or love of learning, but—reckoning it a thing more shameful than every loss and beyond every evil that Christ should be praised by any of those that are—they rake over all these matters again, supposing somehow that the man would no longer say the same things, but would in some way fail in his account of the matter and say something contrary to his former words, so that, seizing on the discrepancy, they might declare him a fabricator and a liar.

For those puffed up over their exceedingly great sagacity reasoned that the power of the marvel was preserved in the bare words of the man, and not rather made manifest in the fact of its having been done.

And I think they endured something else of this kind as well: those who without cause do not cease from unjustly hating certain persons, whenever they learn something of what has been done to them, and then it seems not to have been justly done, are willing to hear it not once but many times from those who relate it, sharpening as it were toward keener motion their anger against that person, which somehow lags behind.

For conscience ever puts us to shame, convicting the things within us, and does not cease from accusing our injustice, even though from passion the doing of injustice may somehow appear sweet.

They stir him up, then, and against his will provoke him, so that the man who had been healed should once more go round again and pass through the very same words—all but nodding to one another and enjoining them to watch very closely whether anything had been done outside the Law by reason of the divine sign on the Sabbath.

For conscience chokes the beast-like reasoning that grows savage in them, bringing to bear as it were a bridle and, upon those unwilling, the conviction.

He answered them: 'I told you already, and you did not hear;'

'why do you wish to hear it again?' 'It seems now superfluous,' he says, 'to speak yet again into disobedient ears, and it is exceedingly pointless that you should question me many times about these things, you who profit absolutely nothing at all, even though you have learned and been persuaded; yet even now you command me to unroll the same words to no useful end, as experience cries aloud.'

For through these words the man who had been healed convicts the Pharisees as being utterly senseless, turning their hearing away from the truth, according to that which is written, and being angered without good reason over the loosing of the Law; and through these words also convicts them for bidding him who was willing to praise the worker of wonders to stand present in the rank of an accuser, or for supposing that this was a marvellous thing.

For this was truly the aim in them, since the transgression of the Law was to them a thing wholly indifferent and reckoned as of no account.