John 9:36 - Exposition

He answered and said, £ And who is he, that ( ἵνα ) I may believe on him? The conjunction adds much to the eagerness of the reply. His faith was ready for full expression. He half suspected, as the Samaritan woman ( John 4:25 ) did, that Jesus was pointing to himself. The τίς ; rather than τί ; ("who?" rather than "what?") shows the intensity of the man's desire to find and hail and trust "the Son of God." The disposition, the posture, of his mind is that of faith. The adequate object for that faith has not been revealed to him. Apt symbol of many in their passage from darkness to light. When receptive, susceptible, conscious of need, with some notion, though an obscure one, of whom and of what they most of all need, many are disposed even now to utter the same importunate request.