Thematic Bible
Thematic Bible
Blindness » Spiritual, inflicted (judicial)
“Make the heart of this people insensitive,
Their ears dull,
And their eyes dim,
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
Hear with their ears,
Understand with their hearts,
And return and be healed.”
For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep.
He has closed your eyes, [you who are] the prophets;
And He has covered your heads, [you who are] the seers.
“He has blinded their eyes and He hardened their heart, to keep them from seeing with their eyes and understanding with their heart and being converted; otherwise, I [their God] would heal them.”
Verse Concepts
I do not want you, believers, to be unaware of this mystery [God’s previously hidden plan]—so that you will not be wise in your own opinion—that a partial hardening has [temporarily] happened to Israel [to last] until the full number of the Gentiles has come in;
Verse Concepts
spiritual Blindness » Judicially inflicted
For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep.
He has closed your eyes, [you who are] the prophets;
And He has covered your heads, [you who are] the seers.
May their eyes be dimmed so that they cannot see,
And make their loins shake continually [in terror and weakness].
They do not know, nor do they understand, for God has muddied their eyes so that they cannot see, and their hearts (minds) as well so that they cannot understand.
Verse Concepts
This is the reason that I speak to them in parables: because having the power of seeing, they do not see; and having the power of hearing, they do not hear, nor do they grasp and understand. In them indeed is the process of fulfillment of the prophecy of Isaiah, which says: You shall indeed hear and hear but never grasp and understand; and you shall indeed look and look but never see and perceive.
spiritual Blindness » The effect of sin
For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep.
He has closed your eyes, [you who are] the prophets;
And He has covered your heads, [you who are] the seers.
The [basis of the] judgment (indictment, the test by which men are judged, the ground for the sentence) lies in this: the Light has come into the world, and people have loved the darkness rather than and more than the Light, for their works (deeds) were evil. For every wrongdoer hates (loathes, detests) the Light, and will not come out into the Light but shrinks from it, lest his works (his deeds, his activities, his conduct) be exposed and reproved.
Isaiah » Prophecies, reproofs, and exhortations of » Denounces the hypocrisy of the jews
Stop and wonder [at this prophecy, if you choose, whether you understand it or not; soon you will witness the actual event] and be confounded [reluctantly]! Blind yourselves [now, if you choose; take your pleasure] and then be blinded [at the actual occurrence]. They are drunk, but not from wine; they stagger, but not from strong drink [but from spiritual stupor]. For the Lord has poured out on you the spirit of deep sleep. And He has closed your eyes, the prophets; and your heads, the seers, He has covered and muffled. And the vision of all this has become for you like the words of a book that is sealed. When men give it to one who can read, saying, Read this, I pray you, he says, I cannot, for it is sealed. read more.
And when the book is given to him who is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray you, he says, I cannot read. And the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth and honor Me with their lips but remove their hearts and minds far from Me, and their fear and reverence for Me are a commandment of men that is learned by repetition [without any thought as to the meaning], Therefore, behold! I will again do marvelous things with this people, marvelous and astonishing things; and the wisdom of their wise men will perish, and the understanding of their discerning men will vanish or be hidden. Woe to those who [seek to] hide deep from the Lord their counsel, whose deeds are in the dark, and who say, Who sees us? Who knows us? [Oh, your perversity!] You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be considered of no more account than the clay? Shall the thing that is made say of its maker, He did not make me; or the thing that is formed say of him who formed it, He has no understanding? Is it not yet a very little while until Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field and the fruitful field esteemed as a forest?
And when the book is given to him who is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray you, he says, I cannot read. And the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near Me with their mouth and honor Me with their lips but remove their hearts and minds far from Me, and their fear and reverence for Me are a commandment of men that is learned by repetition [without any thought as to the meaning], Therefore, behold! I will again do marvelous things with this people, marvelous and astonishing things; and the wisdom of their wise men will perish, and the understanding of their discerning men will vanish or be hidden. Woe to those who [seek to] hide deep from the Lord their counsel, whose deeds are in the dark, and who say, Who sees us? Who knows us? [Oh, your perversity!] You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be considered of no more account than the clay? Shall the thing that is made say of its maker, He did not make me; or the thing that is formed say of him who formed it, He has no understanding? Is it not yet a very little while until Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field and the fruitful field esteemed as a forest?