John 9:22

Because they feared the Jews.

The parents were non-committal concerning how their son was cured from fear of those same official classes who were now questioning them. We learn that an agreement had already been reached that any one confessing that Jesus was the Christ should be excommunicated. Though Jesus had not openly proclaimed himself as the Christ this decision of the rulers shows that the people were considering that very question and that the opinion that he was the Christ was gaining credence. The terror of the parents shows that to be "put out of the synagogue" was. punishment of great severity to. Jew. There were, according to Rabbinical writers, various degrees of excommunication, the mildest of thirty days duration. The effect of even the mildest grade was to render the offender. heathen, to cut him off from religious privileges, from association with his Jewish friends and neighbors, and even from his own family. If, at the end of thirty days, the offence was not repented of,. severer punishment was administered. This resolution to expel all confessors of Christ from the synagogue became. fixed rule after the crucifixion, when the gospel began to be preached with such success. Christ predicts it in Matthew 10:17.