“And some of the Pharisees which were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind also?”
My Notes
What Does John 9:40 Mean?
Jesus has just said He came so the blind could see and those who see could become blind (verse 39). The Pharisees overhear and ask a pointed question: "Are we blind also?" They expect the answer to be no. Jesus' answer (verse 41) is devastating: if you were blind, you'd have no sin. But because you say "we see," your sin remains.
The question "are we blind also?" reveals their assumption: of course we're not blind. We're the Pharisees. We're the experts. We see everything. The question is rhetorical — they expect Jesus to exempt them from the category of the blind.
Jesus' response flips everything: the problem isn't blindness. It's the claim to sight. If they admitted they were blind, healing would be possible. But by insisting they can see — by claiming expertise, certainty, and clarity — they make themselves unreachable. The claim to sight is the blindness.
Reflection Questions
- 1.Where is your certainty about spiritual things actually preventing you from seeing something new?
- 2.How do you stay open to correction when you've studied, prayed, and are confident in your position?
- 3.What's the difference between genuine insight and the 'claim to sight' that Jesus says produces blindness?
- 4.Have you ever been the Pharisee in this story — so sure you could see that you missed what was right in front of you?
Devotional
"Are we blind also?" They asked it expecting a no. Jesus gave them the worst possible answer: your claim to see is the reason you can't.
The Pharisees were the experts. The scholars. The people who had studied Scripture for decades. If anyone could see, it was them. So when Jesus talked about the blind becoming sighted and the sighted becoming blind, they assumed they were safely in the sighted category.
Jesus says: that assumption is your disease. If you admitted blindness — if you said "I can't see, help me" — you'd be healed. But because you insist you already see, there's nothing to heal. Your certainty is your prison. Your expertise is your blindness.
This is the most dangerous position in the spiritual world: confident you can see when you can't. The person who knows they're blind can be led. The person who thinks they see walks off a cliff with full confidence in their navigation.
The Pharisees' tragedy isn't that they were wrong about everything. They knew Scripture brilliantly. They could parse Hebrew grammar and debate fine points of the Law. But their knowledge produced certainty, and their certainty produced blindness to the very God their knowledge was supposed to point them toward.
Are you sure you can see? Really sure? Because Jesus says that certainty might be the problem. The people He can heal are the ones who know they're blind. The ones who say "we see" are the ones who remain in the dark.
Commentary
Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.
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Cross References
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