My amatuer exegesis on Matthew 9:27-31.

The Healing of the Two Blind Men (Matthew 9:27-31)

Theological Discoveries – Discoveries made about God and what God is about in the passage.

1. In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus’ healing ministries happened after The Sermon on the Mount. “The Messiah of the Word (the sermon) reveals himself as also the Messiah of the Deeds (the miracles)”. (The Gospel of Matthew by F.W. Beare, Harper & Row, 1981).

Jesus revealed himself as messiah in the Sermon on the Mount, and then followed up by revealing himself as a healer in performing miracles. God’s words are followed by actions.

2. When the two blind men acknowledged Jesus as “the son of David”, they acknowledged his lineage to David, and therefore to Abraham. “The promises made in ages past through the prophets have now been fulfilled in the person of Jesus, the long awaited ‘Messiah’, who is the born ‘son of David.”

Jesus is proof that God kept his promise to Abraham to send a “Messiah”.

3. In this healing, Jesus was fulfilling the prophecies of a Messiah who heals the blind in the Old Testament; Isaiah 29:18, Isaiah 35:5, Isaiah 42:7.

Jesus’ healing abilities fulfills the prophecies made in Isaiah about the “Messiah”.

4. In The Life of Jesus by Marcello Craveri (Grove Press, 1967), Craveri writes that “The most common diseases … were then (as they are still) those of the eyes caused by the dust and glaring sunlight”. Craveri also notes that “For all such diseases … the Hebrew people had a superstitious explanation: each one was really a kind of “uncleanness” incurred through the infraction of some ritual law. The idea of illness was therefore closely linked to punishment. Even death, according to Holy Scriptures, was an extreme consequence of sin. …Cure, therefore, was held to be possible only if God granted his pardon and remitted the penalty, and it was to be sought only through special rites of purification and through offerings to the Temple”.

Jesus’ healing of the two blind men was radical for the time. The blind men did not go through rites of purification, nor did they make offerings to the temple. The two blind men were healed because 1) they asked and 2) they believed in Jesus. Since blindness was considered a consequence of sin, Jesus’ healing says that through belief in him, the sins of these blind men were cleansed. And then later with the resurrection, Jesus again demonstrated that the extreme punishment of sin, death, can be conquered through belief in him, and belief in him alone.

5. The two blind men believed in Jesus and had faith in him, though they had not seen his earlier miracles. The two blind men’s faith was based solely on what they heard about Jesus through other people.

This passage is in contrast to what happened in John 20 with the disciple Thomas. “Jesus said to him (Thomas), ‘Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.’” (John 20:29)

Faith is essential to be a follower of Christ.

Central Thought

Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham to save his faithful people.

Application

Faith in Jesus Christ will open your eyes to a whole new world and a whole new way of seeing.