John 9:2

Verse 2. Master, who did sin? &c. It was a universal opinion among the Jews that calamities of all kinds were the effects of sin. See Barnes "Lu 13:1-4". The case, however, of this man was that of one that was blind from his birth, and it was a question which the disciples could not determine whether it was his fault or that of his parents. Many of the Jews, as it appears from their writings (see Lightfoot), believed in the doctrine of the transmigration, of souls; or that the soul of a man, in consequence of sin, might be compelled to pass into other bodies, and be punished there.