John 9:18-23

“ The Jews therefore did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and had recovered his sight, until they had called the father and the mother of him who had recovered his sight; 19 and they asked them, saying, Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see? 20. The parents answered them and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; 21 but how he now sees, we know not; or who has opened his eyes, we know not; he is of age, ask him;he shall speak for himself. 22. The parents spoke thus, because they feared the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that if any one should acknowledge him as the Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. 23. Therefore said his parents, He is of age, ask him. ”

By the term οἱ᾿Ιουδαῖοι, the Jews, John does not mean to designate a group of new individuals. They are still the same; only he designates them now, no longer from the point of view of their position in Israel, but from that of their disposition towards Jesus.

The persons in question are the most hostile ones, those to whom John 9:16 a refers. They suspect a collusion between Jesus and the blind man, and for this reason they wish to make inquiry of his parents. Of the three questions which John 9:19 contains, the first two those which relate to the blindness from birth of their son and the identity of the man who is cured with this son are immediately answered by the parents affirmatively. There is something comical in the three αὐτός, he, by means of which they pass over from themselves to him the burden of answering the third. The term συνετέθεντο, they had agreed, John 9:22, denotes a decision formed, and not a mere project, as Meyer thinks; this follows from the word ἤδη, already, and from the knowledge which the parents have of this measure. The exclusion from the synagogue involved for the excommunicated person the breaking off of all social relations with those about him. The higher degree of excommunication would have had death as its result, if this penalty had been practicable under the Roman dominion. We find here a new landmark on the path of the hostile measures adopted with regard to Jesus; it is the transition between the sending of the officers (chap. 7) and the decree of death in chap. 11. The cowardice of the parents is, as it were, the prelude of that of the whole people.

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