And asked them is literally “and they asked them saying.” Again the participle “saying” reflects Semitic structure. It is equivalent to quotation marks in modern English.

In Greek text Is this your son? You say that he was born blind is actually one sentence. New English Bible also translates by two sentences (“Is this your son? Do you say that he was born blind?”) while Revised Standard Version maintains the formal structure of the Greek: “Is this your son, who you say was born blind?” This shift into two questions is for stylistic reasons. Note New American Bible “ ‘Is this your son,’ they asked, ‘and if so, do you attest that he was blind at birth?’ ”

It may even be necessary in some languages to make this read as three questions, for example, “Is this your son? Do you say he was born blind? How is it that he now is able to see?” Since this series of questions presupposes a series of conditional answers, it may be necessary to link them on the basis of the conditions, for example, “Is this your son? And if he is, do you declare that he was born blind? And if that is so, how is it that he can now see?”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1980. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .