and under these a large number of sick people were lying blind, lame, or paralyzed waiting for the movement of the water.

As he was walking along, he observed a man who had been blind from birth.

His disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that caused him to be born blind?"

So they brought to the Pharisees the man who had once been blind.

So they asked the formerly blind man again, "What do you say about him, since it was your eyes he healed?" He said, "He is a prophet."

The Jewish leaders did not believe that the man had been blind and had gained sight until they summoned his parents

and asked them, "Is this your son, the one you say was born blind? How does he now see?"

His parents replied, "We know that this is our son and that he was born blind.

The Jewish leaders summoned the man who had been blind a second time and told him, "Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner."

But he responded, "I don't know whether he is a sinner or not. The one thing I do know is that I used to be blind and now I can see!"

Ever since creation it has never been heard that anyone healed the eyes of a man who was born blind.

Then Jesus said, "I have come into this world to judge it, so that those who are blind may see and so that those who see may become blind."

Some of the Pharisees who were near him overheard this and asked him, "We aren't blind, too, are we?"

Jesus told them, "If you were blind, you would not have any sin. But now that you insist, "We see,' your sin still exists."

Others were saying, "These are not the words of a man who is demon-possessed. A demon cannot open the eyes of the blind, can it?"

But some of them said, "Surely the one who opened the eyes of the blind man could have kept this man from dying, couldn't he?"