John 9

What Is "Retribution Theology?"

• There is a Jewish proverb that says “There is no suffering without sin?”
  a. Psalm 32:3-5—The poet says that, as long as he ignored his sin, God’s “hand was heavy upon” him.
  b. What is the relationship between sin and suffering?
• Is there any validity to this theological concept?
  a. Does God punish people with suffering because of their sin or the sin of their family members?
  b. Sherwin describes this concept as an effort “to determine whether it is ‘cost effective’ to maintain us” (p. 65).

John 9:1-12

• 9:4-5—What is the symbolism here?
  a. “Day” is a symbol for the time allowed to work.
  b. “Night” is a symbol for death (also, suffering or distress; cf., Psalm 30:5).
• 9:7—Information on the Pool of Siloam.
  a. It is Greek for “sent” (cf., Hebrews 11:1).
  b. It is located on the southern end of the Lower City, near the Water Gate. It was fed by the Gihon spring that flowed through an underground tunnel built by Hezekiah (2 Kings 20:20).
• What are the connections between this “sign” and the “sign” in chapter 5?
  1. 9:7; cf., 5:2—Both are performed at a pool.
  2. 9:14; cf. 5:9—Both are performed on the Sabbath.
  3. 9:15; cf., 5:16—Both provoke the Pharisees.
• In describing this situation, Wright writes, "The chaos and misery of this present world is, it seems, the raw material out of which the loving, wise and just God is making his new creation. . . .A new chaos is on the way-the 'night', the darkness, when Jesus will be killed and the world will seem to plunge back into primal confusion. But at the moment he is establishing the new world of light and healing. After the chaos of Good Friday and Holy Saturday, he will bring the new creation itself into being with the light of the first Easter Day (John 20.1)" (p. 134-135).

John 9:13-23

• 9:22—The man’s parents are afraid that they will be “put out of the synagogue.”
  a. What this means is that they will be forbidden from worshipping in that synagogue. In the Jewish system, this means that they will no place in the community, that they will be outcasts.
  b. 9:34—The Jews “drove [the man] out.”
  i. In a sense, they excommunicated the man (Cullmann, 1978, p. 104-105).
  ii. Is this representative of what is occurring in John’s time of writing this Gospel?

John 9:24-34

• 9:24—Is there not a bit of irony in this question?
  a. “Give glory to God!” literally means “Promise before God that you will tell the truth” (cf., Joshua 7:19; Talbert, p. 165).
  b. There appears to be a real emphasis on the dichotomy between light (salvation) and darkness (sin) in this passage. The one who has been healed of his physical blindness (“enlightened”) becomes a missionary to those who are shackled with spiritual blindness (Brown, 1966, p. 379; Cullmann, 1978, p. 103).
• 9:27—By posing this question to the Pharisees, the man is declaring himself to be a disciple of Jesus (Morris, p. 437; Talbert, p. 165).
  a. The man was not expecting them to answer positively to his question.
  b. 9:28-29—They are speaking boastfully out of an assumption, thus further solidifying John’s point that they are in darkness.

John 9:35-41

• 9:35-38—Hearing that the man has been cast out of the synagogue, Jesus returns to him and “helps the process of the man’s faith along” (Talbert, p. 167).
  a. 9:36—It appears that the man is genuinely interested in knowing who healed him.
  b. 9:38—This is the only reference in John to anyone worshipping Jesus.
• 9:39-41—Jesus is condemning the Pharisees because they have the necessary knowledge yet are unwilling to use it (Morris, p. 442).

References

Raymond Brown, The Gospel According to John I-XII, Anchor Bible 29 (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1966).

Oscar Cullmann, Early Christian Worship, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1978).

Leon Morris, The Gospel According to John, rev. ed., New International Commentary on the New Testament 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995).

Byron L. Sherwin, Studies in Jewish Theology: Reflections in the Mirror of Tradition (Portland, OR: Vallentine Mitchell, 2007).

Charles H. Talbert, Reading John: A Literary and Theological Commentary on the Fourth Gospel and the Johannine Epistles, rev. ed., Reading the New Testament (Macon, GA: Smyth and Helwys, 2005).

N. T. Wright, John for Everyone, Part One (Chapters 1-10), 2nd ed., For Everyone Series (London/Louisville: SPCK/Westminster/John Knox Press, 2004).