² tn Grk “If blind leads blind.”

² tn Grk “who was blind.”

¹ tn Grk “the blind man.”

¹ tn Grk “who was formerly blind.”

¹ tn Heb “blinds the open-eyed.”

³ tn Grk “in order that he should be born blind.”

² tn Heb “Blind yourselves and be blind!” The Hitpalpel and Qal imperatival forms of שָׁעַע (shaʿaʿ, “be blind”) are combined to draw attention to the statement. The imperatives have the force of an emphatic assertion.

³ tn Grk “So he”; the referent (the blind man) is specified in the translation for clarity.

² tn Grk “his”; the referent (the blind man) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹ tn Grk “Blind guides who strain out a gnat yet who swallow a camel!”

² tn Heb “and out of gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind will see.”

¹ tn Heb “the Lord has mixed into her midst a spirit of blindness.”

¹ tn Grk “who opened the eyes of the blind man” (“opening the eyes” is an idiom referring to restoration of sight).

² tn Grk “open the eyes of the blind” (“opening the eyes” is an idiom referring to restoration of sight).

² tn Grk “ordered him”; the referent (the blind beggar, v. 35) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹ tn The verb ἀναβλέπω, though normally meaning “look up,” when used in conjunction with blindness means “regain sight.”

¹ tn Heb “You shall not curse a deaf [person] and before a blind [person] you shall not put a stumbling block.”

² tn Heb “Who is blind but my servant, and deaf like my messenger I send? Who is blind like my commissioned one, blind like the servant of the Lord?” The point of the rhetorical questions is that no one is as blind/deaf as this servant. In this context the Lord’s “servant” is exiled Israel (cf. 41:8-9), which is spiritually blind and deaf and has failed to fulfill God’s purpose for it. This servant stands in contrast to the ideal “Israel” of the servant songs.

¹ sn Apparently while in Damascus Paul had a subsequent vision in the midst of his blindness, fulfilling the prediction in 9:6.

² tn Grk “someone opening the eyes of a man born blind” (“opening the eyes” is an idiom referring to restoration of sight).