When
he had said this, he spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, anointed the blind man’s eyes with the mud, and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means “Sent”). So he went away, washed, and came back seeing. The neighbors therefore, and those who saw that he was blind before, said, “Isn’t this he who sat and begged?” Others were saying, “It is he.” Still others were saying, “He looks like him.” He said, “I am he.” They therefore were asking him, “How were your eyes opened?” He answered, “A man called Jesus made mud, anointed my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash.’ So I went away and washed, and I received sight.” Then they asked him, “Where is he?” He said, “I don’t know.”
John 9:6-12
John 9 [1.] As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
John 9 [3.] Jesus answered, “Neither did this man sin, nor his parents; but, that the works of God might be revealed in him. I must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day. The night is coming, when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” When he had said this, he spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, anointed the blind man’s eyes with the mud, and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means “Sent”). So he went away, washed, and came back seeing. The neighbors therefore, and those who saw that he was blind before, said, “Isn’t this he who sat and begged?” Others were saying, “It is he.” Still others were saying, “He looks like him.”
He said, “I am he.” They therefore were asking him, “How were your eyes opened?”
John 9 [11.] He answered, “A man called Jesus made mud, anointed my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash.’ So I went away and washed, and I received sight.”
John 9 [12.] Then they asked him, “Where is he?”
He said, “I don’t know.”
John 9 [13.] They brought him who had been blind to the Pharisees. It was a Sabbath when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. Again therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he received his sight. He said to them, “He put mud on my eyes, I washed, and I see.”
Meaning:
Jesus has just told his disciples that this man’s blindness was not a punishment for sin but an opportunity “that the works of God might be revealed in him” (John 9:2-3), and he has declared, “While I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5). Now he turns words into action. A man who had never seen anything receives his sight, and the whole neighbourhood is thrown into confusion.
- The mud and the command:
“He spat on the ground, made mud with the saliva, anointed the blind man’s eyes with the mud.” Jesus could heal with a word, but here he chose a personal touch. Mark records a similar healing at Bethsaida, where Jesus “had spit on his eyes, and laid his hands on him” (Mark 8:22-23). Many have also seen in the mud an echo of the creation, when God formed man from the dust of the ground: the One through whom “all things were made” (John 1:3) was now shaping new eyes for a man born without sight.
The mud was only half of the healing. Jesus told him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam.” The man had to walk to the pool still blind, with mud on his face. His obedience recalls Naaman, who was told by Elisha, “Wash, and be clean,” and who was healed only when he “dipped himself seven times in the Jordan” (2 Kings 5:13-14).
- “Siloam” (which means “Sent”):
The pool of Siloam lay at the southern end of Jerusalem, fed by water channelled from the Gihon spring. John stops to translate the name because it carries a message. Jesus is the one sent by the Father; he has just said, “I must work the works of him who sent me” (John 9:4). The man is healed by washing in the waters of “Sent,” at the word of the One who was sent.
- “So he went away, washed, and came back seeing”:
John tells the miracle in one plain sentence, with no description of the moment of sight. Isaiah had promised that in the days of God’s salvation, “the eyes of the blind will be opened” (Isaiah 35:5), and when John the Baptist asked whether Jesus was the Coming One, Jesus pointed to this very sign: “the blind receive their sight” (Luke 7:22).
- The neighbours’ questions:
“Isn’t this he who sat and begged?” The man had been a familiar figure, sitting by the road and asking for alms, like Bartimaeus at Jericho (Mark 10:46). Now some say, “It is he,” others, “He looks like him.” He settles it himself: “I am he.”
Then comes the question that will be asked again and again in this chapter: “How were your eyes opened?” He answers simply with what he knows: “A man called Jesus made mud, anointed my eyes.” At this stage he knows Jesus only as “a man called Jesus.” Later he will call him “a prophet” (John 9:17), then a man “from God” (John 9:33), and finally he will worship him as Lord (John 9:38). His sight grows step by step, in body first and then in faith.
“Where is he?” “I don’t know.” He had never seen Jesus, who was gone when he came back. The questions now lead to the Pharisees, because the healing took place on a Sabbath (John 9:14).
The Significance of John 9:6-12
- Jesus meets us in our need:
The disciples saw this man as a theological puzzle; Jesus saw a person to be helped. He did not wait to be asked. The Lord still comes to people who have long been overlooked and gives them a new life that others can see.
- Obedience before sight:
The man went to Siloam trusting only the word of Jesus. Many steps of faith are like this: we are not shown the outcome first, but are invited to trust the One who sends us.
- A simple testimony:
The man did not have answers to every question; he told what had happened. You do not need to know everything to tell what the Lord has done for you.
Cross-References:
Mark 8:22-23: "When he had spit on his eyes, and laid his hands on him, he asked him if he saw anything." A similar healing of a blind man.
Isaiah 35:5: "Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped." The promised sign of God’s salvation.
2 Kings 5:14: "Then went he down, and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God" Naaman healed by washing in obedience.
John 9:5: "While I am in the world, I am the light of the world." The words this miracle illustrates.
Conclusion: A man born blind obeyed the strange command of Jesus, washed in the pool called “Sent,” and came back seeing. His neighbours could hardly believe it, and he could only say, “A man called Jesus made mud, anointed my eyes.” The healing shows Jesus as the light of the world sent by the Father, and it invites us to obey his word and to tell simply what he has done for us.
PIB Scriptures are derived from the World English Bible