Blind people who can see, but do not see

John 9

One of the formative books in my life is Blindness by Jose Saramago. It’s the story of a society that is stricken by a disease of white blindness. The first patients are sequestered in isolation until the time that the doctors and the guards and everybody else in the world goes blind. All that’s left is a woman, who we only know as the “doctor’s wife,” who can still see, though she keeps it from everybody but her husband. It’s a stunning book that won Saramago the Nobel prize for literature, but this isn’t a book review—it’s a sermon—so I should probably get around to the point. There are, in this book, a number of incredibly wise, pithy statements. Perhaps the most famous of these is: “If I’m sincere today, what does it matter if I regret it tomorrow?” But the quote that strikes me every time I read this story from John’s Gospel of Jesus healing a blind man is the one that goes like this. Saramago writes, “I don't think we did go blind, I think we are blind, Blind but seeing, Blind people who can see, but do not see.”

            Whenever I read this quote it baffles me that Saramago was an atheist, because in this passage he seems to be quoting Jesus in his own way. Jesus says, “If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, "We see,' your sin remains.”

            Jesus, like the quote from Blindness, is talking about an inner blindness that we all have. That blindness has nothing to do with our eyes but everything to do with the way we look at the world. The reason I love that book is that, having removed sight from the world, we begin to “see” the world as it truly is. There is both way more darkness and way more light than we imagine when the lights go out.

            Here’s what I think I mean by this: Have you ever seen a movie try to depict heaven? There’s this Robin Williams movie called What Dreams May Come that tries to capture it; there are scenes in countless other movies that give it a shot as well. Heck, even Harry Potter has its own heaven scene. I think we all know that what they show on the screen is a poor representation of eternity. How could they do it? How could you possibly hope to capture a thing that exists apart from the senses we have down here? If heaven looks like anything I can film then it’s not good enough.

Well, here’s the radical thing that Jesus seems to be saying in today’s reading: This life that you’re living? It’s exactly like your imaginations about heaven. You think that seeing is understanding, but it is exactly the opposite. Your senses betray you; you do not—cannot—understand this world with your senses. You only see a shadow. Come, follow Jesus, and he’ll take you into the light. Things are way darker and way lighter than you know.

             Every religion that I know of has some understanding that things are not quite as they seem, and part of our responsibility as people of faith is to delve into the part of us that we do not understand. This requires acknowledging our blindness. For Christians, this is confession—pure and simple. It’s saying that I don’t see the world as I ought; I am blinded by my desire for self-preservation. This is why Jesus tells us to pick up our crosses and follow and why Bonhoeffer said, “When Jesus calls a disciple he bids him come and die.” It’s why we talk so fervently about death in baptism, because sin keeps us from seeing life as it actually is, and there is a better way. The deeper reality that we are blind to is a better reality, but you have to die to yourself to see it.

            This is the Pharisees’ problem. “Surely, we are not blind, are we?” they say. The Pharisees are so clever; they are such smart alecks. They are doing the whole: “Yeah, Jesus. We’re soooo blind…. Where’s my hand, Jesus? I can’t see it!” thing. I read this as them being morons, intentionally, but Jesus sifts through the stupidity and boils it down to its simplest point. He says, “If you were blind…” you would have no problems. If you were blind, then you would understand that none of what you are obsessing over matters. If you were blind, you would understand how dependent you are. If you were blind, you would know that just as you cannot create new eyes so you cannot save yourself. Those eyes—that sight—was given to you as a gift, but that sight is also limited and fragile. And since you are so obsessed with your wisdom, since you insist on showing how much you can see, so it will be that you continue to not understand. You will continue to live in the shadow. You will be blind by virtue of touting your ability to see.

            All of this is wrapped up in what Jesus is saying. So many times we read scripture that can mean a bunch of different things, but this text is both very deep and VERY clear. If you take pride in the things that have been given to you, and if you believe you know it all based on those senses—that you neither created nor earned—then you already have your reward. Admit your blindness and then you will see. That’s actually one confession of what it means to be Christian. Admit you are blind and you will see, because the only light of the world is Jesus himself. All else is just shadow. Christ is the light.