Ferus, a Romanist, says that this verse should teach the lead- ers of Churches not to be hasty in excommunicating people, lest they commit as great mistake as the Pharisees.
Barradius, a Portuguese Romanist, makes strong remarks here on the great sin of unjust excommunication. He quotes the text in Samuel which says that the sons of Eli made men " abhor the offering of the Lord; " and applies to the same point the text in Cauticles where the bride complains that the keeper and watchmen, who ought to have helped, " smote and wounded
her."
•
Quesnel remarks that wicked pastors are always impatient that any one should remind them of their duty.
Lightfoot observes that this man was the first confessor who / suffered for Christ's sake, as John the Baptist was the first martyr.
Trench observes that the Pharisees in their rage forgot " that the two charges, — one, that the man had not been born blind and was an impostor ; the other, that he bore the mark of God's anger in blindness reaching back to his birth, — will not agree together."
35.— [Jesus heard... cast him out.~\ An interval of time most prob- ably elapsed between the last verse and the present one. Where our Lord was, at Jerusalem or elsewhere, and what He was doing during the interval, we are not told. We can hardly suppose that the events related in the present and following verses, and the former part of the tenth chapter, took place on the same day that the blind man was cured. There must have been a break. Moreover the very expression before us shows that the excommunication had had time to be reported and known in Jerusalem. Making every allowance for the public notoriety of everything done by the Sanhedrim, we can hardly suppose that in a day when there was no newspaper, the treat- ment of the blind man would be public news and reported with- out some interval of time.
As God, our Lord doubtless knew all that happened to the sufferer, but He did nothing till his excommunication was pub- licly reported.
Burkitt observes :" O happy man! Having lost the syna- gogue, he finds heaven."
Wordsworth observes : " If those who sit in Moses' seat teach things contrary to the law of Moses, and proceed to impose their false doctrines as terms of communion ; if they will not receive Him of whom Moses wrote, and threaten with excom- munication those who confess Jesus to be the Christ, then no desire of unity, no love of enemies, no fear of separation from parents, and spiritual superiors, no dread of spiritual censures and penalties, must deter the disciples of Christ from confess-