John. Jey J. Kanagaraj
having” is deliberate to indicate that she was not living with a legally married person. In conformity with the oriental view on morality, the Samaritans also must have considered frequent remarriages as dishonorable and illegitimate.7 Jesus touched the core of her life because he wished to give eternal life to the marginalized woman and admit her into God’s new community.
The woman took Jesus’ disclosure of her private life positively and saw Jesus in a new light and said, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet” (4:19). She came to recognize Jesus as a prophet who had divine knowledge and words, for in Samaritan tradition prophecy was closely connected with the power to know what had happened in the past and what was still to come.8
The woman’s initiation to discuss about worship on Mount Gerizim confirms her understanding of Jesus as a taheb, the “coming one,” for the Samaritans believed that the taheb will come to restore true worship by purifying Mount Gerizim from all defilement caused by the Jews. For them, Mount Gerizim was the most holy of all mountains (cf. Ant. 18.4.1).9 Her statement “our fathers worshipped on this mountain” (4:20) may imply the OT patriarchs and those who started worshipping on Mount Gerizim, where the Samaritans built the temple ca. 388 BCE (cf. Deut 11:29; 27:12–13). However, the Jews regarded Jerusalem as the holy site where one should worship (Deut 12:4–7, 21; 14:22–26; 1 Kgs 14:21; 2 Chr 12:13). The long-time conflict between Jews and Samaritans on the place of worship is visible in the woman’s statement, “And you [i.e., the Jews] say that in Jerusalem is the place where one must worship” (4:20b).
In response, by politely calling her “O woman” (cf. 2:4; 19:26), Jesus invites her to believe him and his message (4:21a). Jesus calls her first to listen to his message and then mentions the importance of how and whom one should worship rather than where one should worship. The phrase “an hour is coming,” in which “hour” is used without the definite article, means that this coming hour will see a change in the worship of God, with both Gerizim and Jerusalem losing significance after “the hour,” the time set by God for Jesus to suffer, die, rise from the dead and finally to ascend to the Father.10 Jesus’ cross, which will bring a revival in worship, is anticipated here.
Jesus’ reveals that the object of worship is God the Father (4:21b). In the coming hour, after Jesus’ death and resurrection, true worship will be offered to the Father in “spirit and truth” (4:23–24). The Samaritans worshipped Yahweh alongside foreign gods, and never as the Father with whom believers can relate as children. As God is spirit (4:24), he cannot be limited to any building or place. Jesus challenges that the Samaritans (plural “you”) do not experience an intimacy with God as Father, whereas the believing Jews (“we”) experience an intimate relationship with God by the salvation they received in Jesus (4:22). By the neuter “what we know” (4:22), Jesus means the believers’ intimate relationship with God as Father. Salvation came to all human beings in Jesus, a Jew, born in the tribe of Judah and in the line of David (T. Dan 5:10; T. Naph. 8:2; T. Gad 8:1). In this sense, salvation is from the Jews (cf. Ps 76:1; Isa 2:3; Rom 9:4–5). Thus, Jesus links worship with God’s work in Israel’s history, especially with the incarnation of Christ. The place of worship has no significance, but it is the worshippers’ personal relationship with the Father that matters.
Jesus explains the manner of worship by using the word “an hour” that is coming and by adding the phrase “and now is” (4:23). He means that the opportune time to worship God, expected to happen at the end-time, has already come by virtue of his death, resurrection, and ascension. The eschatological worship can now be offered only in the church, God’s new community, which knows God as Father. This community is constituted by “true worshippers” who will worship the Father in “spirit and truth.” God is looking for such people as those who worship him. The word “spirit” denotes not the human spirit,11 but the Holy Spirit, and this is clear from the phrase “God is spirit” (4:24). The believing community is a worshipping community that is comprised of members who are born of the Spirit, and their new birth enables them to rise above the earthly level and worship God with right attitude.12 The God who is spirit can be seen and worshipped only in the spiritual realm. The word “truth” is knit together with “spirit” by a single preposition, “in.” The OT concept of truth denotes God’s faithfulness to his covenant relationship, and in John it was revealed in Jesus (1:14). Thus, true worship happens when the worshipper lives in the spiritual realm and accepts the faithfulness of God to his covenant revealed in Jesus.
The woman, who had believed in the coming Messiah, now speaks of the Messiah, who will come and declare everything related to the temple and worship (4:25). The Samaritans believed that the coming Messiah, the taheb, as the spokesman for God, would reveal the truth by declaring the divine will.13 As Jesus was declaring the things connected with worship, the belief dawned within her that Jesus could perhaps be that Messiah. As Jesus perceived her inner mind and also foreknew that his dialogue with her was reaching its culmination, he eventually revealed himself to her as the Messiah by saying, “I, I am, the one who is speaking to you” (4:26).
In John the word “I am,” used by Jesus for himself, indicates that he is the Christ, the revelation of the one God who is “I am that I am” (Exod 3:13–14). The prophet Isaiah uses this name to affirm both the uniqueness of Yahweh in relation to all other gods of Babylon and his relationship with his people as their God (Isa 41:4; 42:8; 43:10, 11, 13, 15, 25). By saying, “I am he,” Jesus expresses his uniqueness in comparison with other deities of the Samaritans, as the Messiah in whom the only God revealed himself. Jesus, the bearer of God’s presence, is the place where one can worship God. Jesus, as the new Temple, replaces the Jewish temple in Jerusalem and also the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim.14 Although the woman’s perception of Jesus attains its climax now, at first she had only a tentative belief in his messiahship.
Jesus’ injunction on his disciples’ mission (4:27–38)
While Jesus was revealing his identity as the Christ, his disciples came back to him with food. When they saw their teacher talking alone with a woman, they were astonished, but no one had the courage to question Jesus about why he was conversing with a Samaritan woman or what his needs were (4:27). Jewish custom prohibited rabbis from talking with women, even with their own wives, in public places (m. Nid. 4:1). At this time the woman dramatically goes away from the scene. In her extreme enthusiasm of having met with the Messiah, she forgot all about the earthly water and left her water jar at the well to go to her people in the city (4:28). She went away to call her people to come and see whether or not the man who supernaturally disclosed her life history could be the Messiah (4:29).
The woman’s encounter with Christ gave her courage to invite others to come to Jesus. In Greek her question, “Can this be the Christ?,” begins with a negative particle mēti, expecting the answer “no.” However, this particle, in 4:29, “puts a suggestion in the most tentative and hesitating way.”15 Before she believes in Jesus fully along with other Samaritans (4:42), she wanted them to ensure whether Jesus could be the long-awaited Christ. The fact that many of them came to believe in Jesus through the woman’s word of testimony (4:39) shows that her faith in Jesus was genuine.
While the Samaritans were coming to Jesus (4:30), the disciples were persuading him to eat the food they had brought (4:31). Just like Jesus did not drink the earthly water from the woman, so also he did not eat the earthly food. In conformity with the non-understanding of Nicodemus and of the Samaritan, his disciples too did not understand the spiritual truth in Jesus’ statement, “I have food to eat of which you do not know” (4:32). They understood it at the human level and therefore questioned among themselves, “Did anyone bring him food to eat?” (4:33). John’s literary pattern where Jesus makes a statement, which is misunderstood, prompting him to speak further for clarification, becomes visible again.16 Jesus now clarifies by saying, “My food is that I may do the will of him who sent me and may accomplish his work” (4:34). His source of life was in the accomplishment of the Father’s work.
The sending of the Son by the Father into the world is a familiar theme in John. The Father sent his Son (cf. 3:17, 34; 6:38; 7:18; 9:4). That is, the Son was sent from heaven (6:38) to save the world. However, John particularizes Jesus’ suffering and death on the cross as the means by which he accomplished the work of the Father (cf. 5:36; 17:4; 19:28, 30). Just like food