The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: S. John
From this passage S. Cyprian ( Ep . lxiv. and lxxx.) and the Donatists who followed his teaching inferred that Baptism by an heretical minister was invalid, and ought to be repeated ; because a heretic is a great sinner whom God hears not. But quite wrongly. For in like manner, Baptism administered by a Catholic Priest living in sin would be void, and would require to be repeated. I say therefore that the efficacy of the Sacrament is one thing, the efficacy of prayer is another. For a sacrament derives its efficacy ex opere operato, but prayer ex opere operantis , from the sanctity and character of him who prays. And therefore if a sinner (a heretic, e.g.) baptizes, this sacrament is valid, and derives its efficacy from the institution of Christ, who confers grace by the Sacrament. For Christ is the original author of Baptism, who baptizes by His ministers as by instruments. Besides, though God hears not the prayers of a sinner, as a private person, yet He hears the prayers of the same person, in his public capacity, because he is a minister of the Church. For the Church is holy, as having Christ as its holy Head, and as having many faithful and holy members, to whose prayers God hearkens.
Ver. 32. — Since the world began, &c. Granted that Moses and the Prophets wrought many miracles, yet they never restored sight to one who was born blind. Jesus who has restored my sight must needs be a greater Prophet than they. He retorted the words of the Pharisees on themselves, “ Ye prefer Moses to Christ, but I prefer Christ. Ye choose to be Moses’ disciples, I am Christ’s.”
Ver. 33. — If this man were not of God, He could do nothing, i.e., for curing my blindness. “ He says this freely, stedfastly, and truly” (S. Augustine), “for to enlighten the blind is supernatural work, and specially belongs to God.”
Ver. 34. — They answered, &c., in sins, both in mind and body, for thou wast born blind by reason of thy sin. For they held the tenet of Pythagoras that the soul existed before the body, and that it was in consequence of its sins thrust down into a deformed (i.e., a blind) body. So Cyril, Leontius, and others. Maldonatus explains, “ Thou hast done nothing but sin from thy birth.” So S. Chrysostom and Theophylact. And dost thou teach us? Thou blind sinner, wilt thou teach us who have our sight, and are wise and righteous ?
And they cast him out of the private house in which they were, as not deserving to be disputed with by such just teachers, says Maldonatus. Or out of the temple, as says S. Chrysostom, and consequently out of the synagogue, adds Leontius. That is, they excommunicated him. “ But the Lord of the temple found him,” says Chrysostom, “ and took him up.” Both statements are credible : that they drove him out of the house, and also excommunicated him, for this latter they had decided to do. As if they said, “ Begone, thou apostate, and go to thine own Jesus.” But this leads us to suppose that all this took place in the House of Judgment, a public place (see on verse 31). And that he was expelled from the synagogue appears more plainly from our Lord’s own words in the next chapter, I am the door.
Ver. 35 .—Jesus heard that they had cast him out , &c. Christ received him kindly, and rewards his constancy. Having given sight to his body, He now enlightens his mind. In giving him bodily sight, He had cast in some scattered seeds of faith, which He now particularly forms into perfect shape: so as to make him believe, that He whom he looked upon as a mere prophet, for having given him sight, was God also, and the Son of God. The Gloss says, “ The blind man had already a heart prepared to believe, but knew not in whom he had to believe.” This, in answer to his question, he learns from Christ.
Christ took trouble to find him in the place, where He knew he was. It is the part of a good shepherd to seek for a wandering sheep, who cannot by itself come back into the right way. “ They expel,” says S. Augustine (in loc .), “ the Lord receives, and he becomes a Christian, even the more because he was expelled.”
Believest thou ? Christ did not demand faith from the blind man for the healing of his body, but He does for the healing of his soul : for, as S. Augustine says (Serm. xv. de Verb. Apost .), “ He who made thee without thyself, doth not justify thee without thyself: He made thee without thy knowledge, He justifies thee through thy will.”
Ver. 37 .—And Jesus said, &c. Thou seest him now for the first time, for he had been healed in the pool of Siloam, when Christ was not there. Christ therefore points out to him that it was He who restored his sight. He recalls his healing to his remembrance, says Theophylact, and that he had received the gift of sight from Him, so as to make him believe that He was not only the Son of man, but the Son of God.
Ver. 38. — And he said, Lord, I believe. And he worshipped Him , as the Son of God, and very God, to be worshipped as God with the worship due to Him (latria). Moreover, the blind man, inwardly enlightened (and moved to it by Christ), by saying, “ I believe,” put forth acts of hope, contrition, charity, devotion, and adoration towards Christ, and was by them cleansed from his sins and justified. He consequently became a holy and apostolic man. He was said to have been one of the seventy disciples, and to have become Bishop of Aix, in Provence, where he died and was buried by the side of Maximinus, to whom he had been coadjutor (see Peter de Natalis in Cat. Sanctorum , lib. v. cap. 102).
Ver. 39. — And Jesus said (not to him but to the Pharisees), For judgment , &c. “ That is for condemnation,” says S. Cyril, “ to convict and condemn the proud and worldly Pharisees of blindness who seem in their own sight to be wise.”
But others explain it better, not of condemnation, but of inquiry and discrimination. I have come into the world to discriminate and separate believers from unbelievers, good from evil, godly from ungodly ; in order that the people, who before had lived in ignorance of God and of salvation, and in darkness of mind, like this blind man, might by believing in Me be enlightened with the knowledge of God, and of things which concern their salvation ; and that I might suffer the proud who refuse to believe in Me (like the Pharisees who are puffed up by their knowledge of the law) to be blinded, and might convict them of their blindness.
(2.) But judgment might possibly here mean the secret counsel and mysterious decree of God, determined and fixed by His righteous decree, whereby God ordained that the Gentiles who knew not God, and consequently were blind, might behold the Light of Faith in Christ, and humbly and eagerly accept it; while the Scribes and Pharisees and wise men of the world, puffed up by their own knowledge , might become darkened in unbelief, and reject the faith and enlightenment of Christ. Humility, therefore, enlightened by faith the unlearned Gentiles, who submitted themselves to Christ, while pride darkened with unbelief the learned Scribes who rejected Him. So S. Cyril, or rather Clictoveus, who filled up what was wanting in his commentary. (See Rom. xi. 33.) “ His judgments are a great deep.” Theodoret applies this to Paul and Judas. For S. Paul having been blind received his sight, and Judas, after seeing, became blind. The words “that,” “therefore,” &c., frequently signify not the cause, but the result or consequence. For Christ came not in order that the Scribes should be made blind ; but their blindness was a result of Christ’s preaching, not from anything on His part, but from their own pride and fault. So Cyril and others.
Ver. 40 . — And some of the Pharisees , &c. The Pharisees felt themselves sharply touched by our Lord’s words, which they understood to speak not of the blindness of the body, but of the mind. They knew that they were not bodily blind, and therefore if He had said this, they would have hooted Him down as a fool. They said, Are we blind also ? Hast thou come to give sight to those who are blind in body, and to make out that we who spiritually see, and are doctors of the law, are blind and foolish ? Show us our blindness and foolishness.
Ver. 41 .—Jesus said to them , &c. (1.) S. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Euthymius explain this of bodily blindness ; meaning, If ye were blind in your bodies, ye would be less proud and sinful. For bodily blindness would humble your mind. (2.) S. Augustine (in loc.) is more to the point. If ye were blind in your own opinion, if ye would acknowledge yourselves to be blind (i.e., ignorant and foolish) in things which concern your salvation, ye would not have sin, for ye would seek a remedy for it, and would obtain it from Me.
(3.) Accurately and scholastically, If ye were blind through ignorance of Scripture and the law of nature, ye would not have sin, by acting according to this ignorance and not acknowledging Me as your Messiah. That is to say, If your ignorance were clearly without blame and invincible, ye would have some sin, but one which was less serious, and more excusable, and therefore ye might easily be enlightened and cured by Me, since My doctrine would dispel your ignorance. But now ye say to yourselves, “ We see,” that is, ye think ye see, and are so wise as to be excellent judges of Christ’s advent and person. And therefore ye from your arrogant and evil thoughts continue in the sin of unbelief against Me ; ye obstinately set your mind against Me, and thus refuse to believe in Me as the Messiah, though I have demonstrated that I am by very many signs and miracles. And therefore, ye cannot by any possibility be enlightened and healed by Me, because ye obstinately refuse to hear Me. So Jansen and others.