He needed to pass through Samaria. So he came to a city of Samaria, called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son, Joseph. Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being tired from his journey, sat down by the well. It was about the sixth hour. A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
The Samaritan woman therefore said to him, “How is it that you, being a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”
The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. So where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father, Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his children and his livestock?”
Jesus answered her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst again; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”
The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I don’t get thirsty, neither come all the way here to draw.”
Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”
The woman answered, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You said well, ‘I have no husband,’
for you have had five husbands; and he whom you now have is not your husband. This you have said truly.”
The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.”
Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour comes, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, will you worship the Father. You worship that which you don’t know. We worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such to be his worshipers. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah comes, he who is called Christ. When he has come, he will declare to us all things.”
Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who speaks to you.” At this, his disciples came. They marveled that he was speaking with a woman; yet no one said, “What are you looking for?” or, “Why do you speak with her?” So the woman left her water pot, went away into the city, and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything that I did. Can this be the Christ?”
They went out of the city, and were coming to him. In the meanwhile, the disciples urged him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.”
But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you don’t know about.”
The disciples therefore said to one another, “Has anyone brought him something to eat?”
Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Don’t you say, ‘There are yet four months until the harvest?’ Behold, I tell you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, that they are white for harvest already. He who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit to eternal life; that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this the saying is true, ‘One sows, and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you haven’t labored. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”
From that city many of the Samaritans believed in him because of the word of the woman, who testified, “He told me everything that I did.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they begged him to stay with them. He stayed there two days. Many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of your speaking; for we have heard for ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39, 41, 42 44. For Jesus himself testified. The apparent contradiction which…
44. For Jesus himself testified. The apparent contradiction which strikes us here at first sight, has given rise to various interpretations. There is an excess of subtlety in the explanation given by Augustine, that Christ was without honor among his own countrymen, because he had done more good among the Samaritans in two days only than he had done, in a long time, among the Galileans; and because, without miracles, he gained more disciples in Samaria than a great number of miracles had gained him in Galilee. Nor am I satisfied with the view of Chrysostom, who understands Christ’s country to be Capernaum, because he dwelt there more frequently than in any other place. I rather agree with Cyril, who says that he left the city of Nazareth, and departed into a different part of Galilee; for the other three Evangelists mention Nazareth, when they relate this testimony of Christ. The meaning might indeed be that, while the time of full manifestation was not yet come, he chose to remain concealed in his native country, as in a more obscure retreat. Some, too, explain it to mean, that he remained two days in Samaria, because there was no reason why he should hasten to go to a place where contempt awaited him. Others think that he went straight to Nazareth, and immediately left it; but, as John relates nothing of this sort, I do not venture to yield to that conjecture. A more correct view of it is, that when he saw himself despised in his native city Nazareth, he rather withdrew to another place. And, therefore, it immediately follows (verse 46) that he came into the town of Cana. What is next added — that the Galileans received him — was a token of reverence, not of contempt.
A Prophet hath no honour in his own country. I have no doubt that this saying was common, and had passed into a proverb; and we know that proverbs are intended to be a graceful expression of what commonly and most frequently (ἐπὶ τὸ πολὶ) happens. In such cases, therefore, it is not necessary that we should rigidly demand uniform accuracy, as if what is stated in a proverb were always true. It is certain that prophets are usually more admired elsewhere than in their own country. Sometimes, too, it may happen, and in reality does happen, that a prophet is not less honored by his countrymen than by strangers; but the proverb states what is common and ordinary, that prophets receive honor more readily in any other place than among their own countrymen.
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Now this proverb, and the meaning of it, may have a twofold origin; for it is a universal fault, that those whom we have heard crying in the cradle, and whom we have seen acting foolishly in their boyhood, are despised by us throughout their whole life, as if they had made no progress, since they were boys. To this is added another evil — envy, which prevails more among acquaintances. But I think it probable that the proverb arose from this circumstance, that Prophets were so ill-treated by their own nation; for good and holy men, when they perceived that there was in Judea so great ingratitude towards God, so great contempt of his word, so great obstinacy, might justly utter this complaint, that nowhere are the Prophets of God less honored than in their own country. If the former meaning be preferred, the name Prophet must be understood generally to denote any teacher, as Paul calls Epimenides a prophet of the Cretians, (Titus 1:12.)
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv5, 6, 9, 10, 20, 23, 24, 32, 35, 36, 37, 39 Gen. 33:19; Gen. 48:22; John 24:32
Gen. 33:19; Gen. 48:22; John 24:32
Christ leaving the proud Pharisees, communicateth the treasures of everlasting life with a poor sinful woman, and stranger, refelling the gross errors of the Samaritans, and defending the true service of God, which was delivered to the Jews, but yet so, that he calleth both of them back to himself as one whom only all the fathers, and also all the ceremonies of the Law did regard, and had a respect unto.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv4–42 4 And he must needs go through Samaria.
4 And he must needs go through Samaria.
Ver. 4. He must needs go] Happy for them that they lay in our Saviour’s way, to be looked upon; his feet drop fatness. Luther had rather be with Christ in hell than in heaven without him, Malim praesente Christo esse in inferno, quam absente eo in coelo. Luther in Gen 30:1-43.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv4–42 Josephus tells us that Samaria is seated between Judea…
Josephus tells us that Samaria is seated between Judea and Galilee, and begins at a town called Ginea: see Luk 9:51,52; 17:11. There were two passages from Judea into Galilee; the one was through the midst of Samaria, Luk 9:51; the other through the eastern parts, by the royal valley, by Jordan, in which it is said that Sichem was. By
Samaria must not be understood the city of Samaria, built by Omri, but the whole country so called, and possessed by the Assyrians, with a mixture of Jews amongst them. Some think that the evangelist addeth this, to excuse our Saviour for going amongst the Gentiles.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv4, 7, 10, 11, 15, 19, 21, 24, 25, 27, 31, 35, 39 Here observe, 1. How wonderfully the wisdom of God…
Here observe, 1. How wonderfully the wisdom of God overrules the malice of men for his own glory, and the good of others. The malice of the Pharisees in Judea drives Christ into Galilee, and in his passage through Samaria, the first fruits of the Gentiles are called, and particularly the woman of Samaria.
Observe, 2. How in every step of Christ’s way he was doing good to the souls of men. In his passage through Samaria into Galilee, a poor woman is brought to know him to be the true Messias.
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Observe, 3. Our holy Lord, in his journeying from place to place, did travel usually on foot; and the weakness of his body, upon travelling, shews him to truly and really man, and in all things like unto us, sin only excepted.
Our blessed Lord did not only take upon him our nature, but the infirmities of our nature also.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv4, 27 We have here an account of the good Christ…
We have here an account of the good Christ did in Samaria, when he passed through that country in his way to Galilee. The Samaritans, both in blood and religion, were mongrel Jews, the posterity of those colonies which the king of Assyria planted there after the captivity of the ten tribes, with whom the poor of the land that were left behind, and many other Jews afterwards, incorporated themselves. They worshipped the God of Israel only, to whom they erected a temple on mount Gerizim, in competition with that at Jerusalem. There was great enmity between them and the Jews; the Samaritans would not admit Christ, when they saw he was going to Jerusalem (Luk 9:53); the Jews thought they could not give him a worse name than to say, He is a Samaritan. When the Jews were in prosperity, the Samaritans claimed kindred to them (Ezr 4:2), but, when the Jews were in distress, they were Medes and Persians; see Joseph. Antiq. 11.340-341; 12.257. Now observe,
I. Christ's coming into Samaria. He charged his disciples not to enter into any city of the Samaritans (Mat 10:5), that is, not to preach the gospel, or work miracles; nor did he here preach publicly, or work any miracle, his eye being to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. What kindness he here did them was accidental; it was only a crumb of the children's bread that casually fell from the master's table.
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1. His road from Judea to Galilee lay through the country of Samaria (Joh 4:4): He must needs go through Samaria. There was no other way, unless he would have fetched a compass on the other side Jordan, a great way about. The wicked and profane are at present so intermixed with God's Israel that, unless we will go out of the world, we cannot avoid going through the company of such, Co1 5:10. We have therefore need of the armour or righteousness on the right hand and on the left, that we may neither give provocation to them nor contract pollution by them. We should not go into places of temptation but when we needs must; and then we should not reside in them, but hasten through them. Some think that Christ must needs go through Samaria because of the good work he had to do there; a poor woman to be converted, a lost sheep to be sought and saved. This was work his heart was upon, the therefore he must needs go this way. It was happy for Samaria that it lay in Christ's way, which gave him an opportunity of calling on them. When I passed by thee, I said unto thee, Live, Eze 16:6.
2. His baiting place happened to be at a city of Samaria. Now observe,
(1.) The place described. It was called Sychar; probably the same with Sichem, or Shechem, a place which we read much of in the Old Testament. Thus are the names of places commonly corrupted by tract of time. Shechem yielded the first proselyte that ever came into the church of Israel (Gen 34:24), and now it is the first place where the gospel is preached out of the commonwealth of Israel; so Dr. Lightfoot observes; as also that the valley of Achor, which was given for a door of hope, hope to the poor Gentiles, ran along by this city, Hos 2:15. Abimelech was made king here; it was Jeroboam's royal seat; but the evangelist, when he would give us the antiquities of the place, takes notice of Jacob's interest there, which was more its honour than its crowned heads. [1.] Here lay Jacob's ground, the parcel of ground which Jacob gave to his son Joseph, whose bones were buried in it, Gen 48:22; Jos 24:32. Probably this is mentioned to intimate that Christ, when he reposed himself hard by here, took occasion from the ground which Jacob gave Joseph to meditate on the good report which the elders by faith obtained. Jerome chose to live in the land of Canaan, that the sight of the places might affect him the more with scripture stories. [2.] Here was Jacob's well which he digged, or at least used, for himself and his family. We find no mention of this well in the Old Testament; but the tradition was that it was Jacob's well.
(2.) The posture of our Lord Jesus at this place: Being wearied with his journey, he sat thus on the well. We have here our Lord Jesus,
[1.] Labouring under the common fatigue of travellers. He was wearied with his journey. Though it was yet but the sixth hour, and he had performed but half his day's journey, yet he was weary; or, because it was the sixth hour, the time of the heat of the day, therefore he was weary. Here we see, First, That he was a true man, and subject to the common infirmities of the human nature. Toil came in with sin (Gen 3:19), and therefore Christ, having made himself a curse for us, submitted to it. Secondly, That he was a poor man, else he might have travelled on horseback or in a chariot. To this instance of meanness and mortification he humbled himself for us, that he went all his journeys on foot. When servants were on horses, princes walked as servants on the earth, Ecc 10:7. When we are carried easily, let us think on the weariness of our Master. Thirdly, It should seem that he was but a tender man, and not of a robust constitution; it should seem, his disciples were not tired, for they went into the town without any difficulty, when their Master sat down, and could not go a step further. Bodies of the finest mould are most sensible of fatigue, and can worst bear it.
[2.] We have him here betaking himself to the common relief of travellers; Being wearied, he sat thus on the well. First, He sat on the well, an uneasy place, cold and hard; he had no couch, no easy chair to repose himself in, but took to that which was next hand, to teach us not to be nice and curious in the conveniences of this life, but content with mean things. Secondly, He sat thus, in an uneasy posture; sat carelessly - incuriose et neglectim; or he sat so as people that are wearied with travelling are accustomed to sit.
II. His discourse with a Samaritan woman, which is here recorded at large, while Christ's dispute with the doctors, and his discourse with Moses and Elias on the mount, are buried in silence. This discourse is reducible to four heads: -
1. They discourse concerning the water, Joh 4:7-15.
(1.) Notice is taken of the circumstances that gave occasion to this discourse.
[1.] There comes a woman of Samaria to draw water. This intimates her poverty, she had no servant to be a drawer of water; and her industry, she would do it herself. See here, First, How God owns and approves of honest humble diligence in our places. Christ was made known to the shepherds when they were keeping their flock. Secondly, How the divine Providence brings about glorious purposes by events which seem to us fortuitous and accidental. This woman's meeting with Christ at the well may remind us of the stories of Rebekah, Rachel, and Jethro's daughter, who all met with husbands, good husbands, no worse than Isaac, Jacob, and Moses, when they came to the wells for water. Thirdly, How the preventing grace of God sometimes brings people unexpectedly under the means of conversion and salvation. He is found of them that sought him not.
[2.] His disciples were gone away into the city to buy meat. Hence learn a lesson, First, Of justice and honesty. The meat Christ ate, he bought and paid for, as Paul, Th2 3:8. Secondly, Of daily dependence upon Providence: Take no thought for the morrow. Christ did not go into the city to eat, but sent his disciples to fetch his meat thither; not because he scrupled eating in a Samaritan city, but, 1. Because he had a good work to do at that well, which might be done while they were catering. It is wisdom to fill up our vacant minutes with that which is good, that the fragments of time may not be lost. Peter, while his dinner was getting ready, fell into a trance, Act 10:10. 2. Because it was more private and retired, more cheap and homely, to have his dinner brought him hither, than to go into the town for it. Perhaps his purse was low, and he would teach us good husbandry, to spend according to what we have and not go beyond it. At least, he would teach us not to affect great things. Christ could eat his dinner as well upon a draw well as in the best inn in the town. Let us comport with our circumstances. Now this gave Christ an opportunity of discoursing with this woman about spiritual concerns, and he improved it; he often preached to multitudes that crowded after him for instruction, yet here he condescends to teach a single person, a woman, a poor woman, a stranger, a Samaritan, to teach his ministers to do likewise, as those that know what a glorious achievement it is to help to save, though but one soul, from death.
(2.) Let us observe the particulars of this discourse.
[1.] Jesus begins with a modest request for a draught of water: Give me to drink. He that for our sakes became poor here becomes a beggar, that those who are in want, and cannot dig, may not be ashamed to beg. Christ asked for it, not only because he needed it, and needed her help to come at it, but because he would draw on further discourse with her, and teach us to be willing to be beholden to the meanest when there is occasion. Christ is still begging in his poor members, and a cup of cold water, like this here, given to them in his name, shall not lose its reward.
[2.] The woman, though she does not deny his request, yet quarrels with him because he did not carry on the humour of his own nation (Joh 4:9): How is it? Observe, First, What a mortal feud there was between the Jews and the Samaritans: The Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans. The Samaritans were the adversaries of Judah (Ezr 4:1), were upon all occasions mischievous to them. The Jews were extremely malicious against the Samaritans, "looked upon them as having no part in the resurrection, excommunicated and cursed them by the sacred name of God, by the glorious writing of the tables, and by the curse of the upper and lower house of judgment, with this law, That no Israelite eat of any thing that is a Samaritan's, for it is as if he should eat swine's flesh." So Dr. Lightfoot, out of Rabbi Tanchum. Note, Quarrels about religion are usually the most implacable of all quarrels. Men were made to have dealing one with another; but if men, because one worships at one temple and another at another, will deny the offices of humanity, and charity, and common civility, will be morose and unnatural, scornful and censorious, and this under colour of zeal for religion, they plainly show that however their religion may be true they are not truly religious; but, pretending to stickle for religion, subvert the design of it. Secondly, How ready the woman was to upbraid Christ with the haughtiness and ill nature of the Jewish nation: How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me? By his dress or dialect, or both, she knew him to be a Jew, and thinks it strange that he runs not to the same excess of riot against the Samaritans with other Jews. Note, Moderate men of all sides are, like Joshua and his fellows (Zac 3:8), men wondered at. Two things this woman wonders at, 1. That he should ask this kindness; for it was the pride of the Jews that they would endure any hardship rather than be beholden to a Samaritan. It was part of Christ's humiliation that he was born of the Jewish nation, which was now not only in an ill state, subject to the Romans, but in an ill name among the nations. With what disdain did Pilate ask, Am I a Jew? Thus he made himself not only of no reputation, but of ill reputation; but herein he has set us an example of swimming against the stream of common corruptions. We must, like our master, put on goodness and kindness, though it should be ever so much the genius of our country, or the humour of our party, to be morose and ill-natured. This woman expected that Christ should be as other Jews were; but it is unjust to charge upon every individual person even the common faults of the community: no rule but has some exceptions. 2. She wonders that he should expect to receive this kindness from her that was a Samaritan: "You Jews could deny it to one of our nation, and why should we grant it to one of yours?" Thus quarrels are propagated endlessly by revenge and retaliation.
[3.] Christ takes this occasion to instruct her in divine things: If thou knewest the gift of God, thou wouldst have asked, Joh 4:10. Observe,
First, He waives her objection of the feud between the Jews and Samaritans, and takes no notice of it. Some differences are best healed by being slighted, and by avoiding all occasions of entering into dispute about them. Christ will convert this woman, not by showing her that the Samaritan worship was schismatical (though really it was so), but by showing her her own ignorance and immoralities, and her need of a Saviour.
Secondly, He fills her with an apprehension that she had now an opportunity (a fairer opportunity than she was aware of) of gaining that which would be of unspeakable advantage to her. She had not the helps that the Jews had to discern the signs of the times, and therefore Christ tells her expressly that she had now a season of grace; this was the day of her visitation.
a. He hints to her what she should know, but was ignorant of: If thou knewest the gift of God, that is, as the next words explain it, who it is that saith, Give me to drink. If thou knewest who I am. She saw him to be a Jew, a poor weary traveller; but he would have her know something more concerning him that did yet appear. Note, (a.) Jesus Christ is the gift of God, the richest token of God's love to us, and the richest treasure of all good for us; a gift, not a debt which we could demand from God; not a loan, which he will demand from us again, but a gift, a free gift, Joh 3:16. (b.) It is an unspeakable privilege to have this gift of God proposed and offered to us; to have an opportunity of embracing it: "He who is the gift of God is now set before thee, and addresses himself to thee; it is he that saith, Give me to drink; this gift comes a begging to thee." (c.) Though Christ is set before us, and sues to us in and by his gospel, yet there are multitudes that know him not. They know not who it is that speaks to them in the gospel, that saith, Give me to drink; they perceive not that it is the Lord that calls them.
b. He hopes concerning her, what she would have done if she had known him; to be sure she would not have given him such a rude and uncivil answer; nay, she would have been so far from affronting him that she would have made her addresses to him: Thou wouldest have asked. Note, (a.) Those that would have any benefit by Christ must ask for it, must be earnest in prayer to God for it. (b.) Those that have a right knowledge of Christ will seek to him, and if we do not seek unto him it is a sign that we do not know him, Psa 9:10. (c.) Christ knows what they that want the means of knowledge would have done if they had had them, Mat 11:21.
c. He assures her what he would have done for her if she had applied to him: "He would have given thee (and not have upbraided thee as thou doest me) living water." By this living water is meant the Spirit, who is not like the water in the bottom of the well, for some of which he asked, but like living or running water, which was much more valuable. Note, (a.) The Spirit of grace is as living water; see Joh 7:38. Under this similitude the blessings of the Messiah had been promised in the Old Testament, Isa 12:3; Isa 35:7; Isa 44:3; Isa 55:1; Zac 14:8. The graces of the Spirit, and his comforts, satisfy the thirsting soul, that knows its own nature and necessity. (b.) Jesus Christ can and will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him; for he received that he might give.
[4.] The woman objects against and cavils at the gracious intimation which Christ gave her (Joh 4:11, Joh 4:12): Thou hast nothing to draw with; and besides, Art thou greater than our father Jacob? What he spoke figuratively, she took literally; Nicodemus did so too. See what confused notions they have of spiritual things who are wholly taken up with the things that are sensible. Some respect she pays to this person, in calling him Sir, or Lord; but little respect to what he said, which she does but banter.
First, She does not think him capable of furnishing her with any water, no, not this in the well that is just at hand: Thou has nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. This she said, not knowing the power of Christ, for he who causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth needs nothing to draw. But there are those who will trust Christ no further than they can see him, and will not believe his promise, unless the means of the performance of it be visible; as if he were tied to our methods, and could not draw water without our buckets. She asks scornfully, "Whence hast thou this living water? I see not whence thou canst have it." Note, The springs of that living water which Christ has for those that come to him are secret and undiscovered. The fountain of life is hid with Christ. Christ has enough for us, though we see not whence he has it.
Secondly, She does not think it possible that he should furnish her with any better water than this which she could come at, but he could not: Art thou greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well?
a. We will suppose the tradition true, that Jacob himself, and his children, and cattle, did drink of this well. And we may observe from it, (a.) The power and providence of God, in the continuance of the fountains of water from generation to generation, by the constant circulation of the rivers, like the blood in the body (Ecc 1:7), to which circulation perhaps the flux and reflux of the sea, like the pulses of the heart, contribute. (b.) The plainness of the patriarch Jacob; his drink was water, and he and his children drank of the same well with his cattle.
b. Yet, allowing that to be true, she was out in several things; as, (a.) In calling Jacob father. What authority had the Samaritans to reckon themselves of the seed of Jacob? They were descended from that mixed multitude which the king of Assyria had placed in the cities of Samaria; what have they to do then with Jacob? Because they were the invaders of Israel's rights, and the unjust possessors of Israel's lands, were they therefore the inheritors of Israel's blood and honour? How absurd were those pretensions! (b.) She is out in claiming this well as Jacob's gift, whereas he did no more give it than Moses gave the manna, Joh 6:32. But thus we are apt to call the messengers of God's gifts the donors of them, and to look so much at the hands they pass through as to forget the hand they come from. Jacob gave it to his sons, not to them. Yet thus the church's enemies not only usurp, but monopolize, the church's privileges. (c.) She was out in speaking of Christ as not worthy to be compared with our father Jacob. An over-fond veneration for antiquity makes God's graces, in the good people of our own day, to be slighted.
[5.] Christ answers this cavil, and makes it out that the living water he had to give was far better than that of Jacob's well, Joh 4:13, Joh 4:14. Though she spoke perversely, Christ did not cast her off, but instructed and encouraged her. He shows her,
First, That the water of Jacob's well yielded but a transient satisfaction and supply: "Whoso drinketh of this water shall thirst again. It is no better than other water; it will quench the present thirst, but the thirst will return, and in a few hours a man will have as much need, and as much desire, of water as ever he had." This intimates, 1. The infirmities of our bodies in this present state; they are still necessitous, and ever craving. Life is a fire, a lamp, which will soon go out, without continual supplies of fuel and oil. The natural heat preys upon itself. 2. The imperfections of all our comforts in this world; they are not lasting, nor our satisfaction in them remaining. Whatever waters of comfort we drink of, we shall thirst again. Yesterday's meat and drink will not do today's work.
Secondly, That the living waters he would give should yield a lasting satisfaction and bliss, Joh 4:14. Christ's gifts appear most valuable when they come to be compared with the things of this world; for there will appear no comparison between them. Whoever partakes of the Spirit of grace, and the comforts of the everlasting gospel,
a. He shall never thirst, he shall never want that which will abundantly satisfy his soul's desires; they are longing, but not languishing. A desiring thirst he has, nothing more than God, still more and more of God; but not a despairing thirst.
b. Therefore he shall never thirst, because this water that Christ gives shall be in him a well of water. He can never be reduced to extremity that has in himself a fountain of supply and satisfaction. (a.) Ever ready, for it shall be in him. The principle of grace planted in him is the spring of his comfort; see Joh 7:38. A good man is satisfied from himself, for Christ dwells in his heart. The anointing abides in him; he needs not sneak to the world for comfort; the work and the witness of the Spirit in the heart furnish him with a firm foundation of hope and an overflowing fountain of joy. (b.) Never failing, for it shall be in him a well of water. He that has at hand only a bucket of water needs not thirst as long as this lasts, but it will soon be exhausted; but believers have in them a well of water, overflowing, ever flowing. The principles and affections which Christ's holy religion forms in the souls of those that are brought under the power of it are this well of water. [a.] It is springing up, ever in motion, which bespeaks the actings of grace strong and vigorous. If good truths stagnate in our souls, like standing water, they do not answer the end of our receiving them. If there be a good treasure in the heart, we must thence bring forth good things. [b.] It is springing up unto everlasting life; which intimates, First, The aims of gracious actings. A sanctified soul has its eye upon heaven, means this, designs this, does all for this, will take up with nothing short of this. Spiritual life springs up towards its own perfection in eternal life. Secondly, The constancy of those actings; it will continue springing up till it come to perfection. Thirdly, The crown of them, eternal life at last. The living water rises from heaven, and therefore rises towards heaven; see Ecc 1:7. And now is not this water better than that of Jacob's well?
[6.] The woman (whether in jest or earnest is hard to say) begs of him to give her some of this water (Joh 4:15): Give me this water, that I thirst not. First, Some think that she speaks tauntingly, and ridicules what Christ had said as mere stuff; and, in derision of it, not desires, but challenges him to give her some of this water: "A rare invention; it will save me a great deal of pains if I never come hither to draw." But, Secondly, Others think that it was a well-meant but weak and ignorant desire. She apprehended that he meant something very good and useful, and therefore saith Amen, at a venture. Whatever it be, let me have it; who will show me any good? Ease, or saving of labour, is a valuable good to poor labouring people. Note, 1. Even those that are weak and ignorant may yet have some faint and fluctuating desires towards Christ and his gifts, and some good wishes of grace and glory. 2. Carnal hearts, in their best wishes, look no higher than carnal ends. "Give it to me," saith she, "not that I may have everlasting life" (which Christ proposed), "but that I come not hither to draw."
2. The next subject of discourse with this woman in concerning her husband, Joh 4:16-18. It was not to let fall the discourse of the water of life that Christ started this, as many who will bring in any impertinence in conversation that they may drop a serious subject; but it was with a gracious design that Christ mentioned it. What he had said concerning his grace and eternal life he found had made little impression upon her, because she had not been convinced of sin: therefore, waiving the discourse about the living water, he sets himself to awaken her conscience, to open the wound of guilt, and then she would more easily apprehend the remedy by grace. And this is the method of dealing with souls; they must first be made weary and heavy-laden under the burden of sin, and then brought to Christ for rest; first pricked to the heart, and then healed. This is the course of spiritual physic; and if we proceed not in this order we begin at the wrong end.
Observe, (1.) How discreetly and decently Christ introduces this discourse (Joh 4:16): Go, call thy husband, and come hither. Now, [1.] The order Christ gave her had a very good colour: "Call thy husband, that he may teach thee, and help thee to understand these things, which thou art so ignorant of" The wives that will learn must ask their husbands (Co1 14:35), who must dwell with them as men of knowledge, Pe1 3:7. "Call thy husband, that he may learn with thee; that then you may be heirs together of the grace of life. Call thy husband, that he may be witness to what passes between us." Christ would thus teach us to provide things honest in the sight of all men, and to study that which is of good report. [2.] As it had a good colour, so it had a good design; for hence he would take occasion to call her sin to remembrance. There is need of art and prudence in giving reproofs; to fetch a compass, as the woman of Tekoa, Sa2 14:20.
(2.) How industriously the woman seeks to evade the conviction, and yet insensibly convicts herself, and, ere she is aware, owns her fault; she said, I have no husband. Her saying this intimated no more than that she did not care to have her husband spoken of, nor that matter mentioned any more. She would not have her husband come thither, lest, in further discourse, the truth of the matter should come out, to her shame; and therefore, "Pray go on to talk of something else, I have no husband;" she would be thought a maid or a widow, whereas, though she had no husband, she was neither. The carnal mind is very ingenious to shift off convictions, and to keep them from fastening, careful to cover the sin.
(3.) How closely our Lord Jesus brings home the conviction to her conscience. It is probable that he said more than is here recorded, for she thought that he told her all that ever she did (Joh 4:29), but that which is here recorded is concerning her husbands. Here is, [1.] A surprising narrative of her past conversation: Thou has had five husbands. Doubtless, it was not her affliction (the burying of so many husbands), but her sin, that Christ intended to upbraid her with; either she had eloped (as the law speaks), had run away from her husbands, and married others, or by her undutiful, unclean, disloyal conduct, had provoked them to divorce her, or by indirect means had, contrary to law, divorced them. Those who make light of such scandalous practices as these, as no more than nine days' wonder, and as if the guilt were over as soon as the talk is over, should remember that Christ keeps account of all. [2.] A severe reproof of her present state of life: He whom thou now hast is not thy husband. Either she was never married to him at all, or he had some other wife, or, which is most probable, her former husband or husbands were living: so that, in short, she lived in adultery. Yet observe how mildly Christ tells her of it; he doth not call her strumpet, but tells her, He with whom thou livest is not thy husband: and then leaves it to her own conscience to say the rest. Note, Reproofs are ordinarily most profitable when they are least provoking. [3.] Yet in this he puts a better construction than it would well bear upon what she said by way of shuffle and evasion: Thou has well said I have no husband; and again, In that saidst thou truly. What she intended as a denial of the fact (that she had none with whom she lived as a husband) he favourably interpreted, or at least turned upon her, as a confession of the fault. Note, Those who would win souls should make the best of them, whereby they may hope to work upon their good-nature; for, if they make the worst of them, they certainly exasperate their ill-nature.
3. The next subject of discourse with this woman is concerning the place of worship, Joh 4:19-24. Observe,
(1.) A case of conscience proposed to Christ by the woman, concerning the place of worship, Joh 4:19, Joh 4:20.
[1.] The inducement she had to put this case: Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. She does not deny the truth of what he had charged her with, but by her silence owns the justice of the reproof; nor is she put into a passion by it, as many are when they are touched in a sore place, does not impute his censure to the general disgust the Jews had to the Samaritans, but (which is a rare thing) can bear to be told of a fault. But this is not all; she goes further: First, She speaks respectfully to him, calls him Sir. Thus should we honour those that deal faithfully with us. This was the effect of Christ's meekness in reproving her; he gave her no ill language, and then she gave him none. Secondly, She acknowledges him to be a prophet, one that had a correspondence with Heaven. Note, The power of the word of Christ in searching the heart, and convincing the conscience of secret sins, is a great proof of its divine authority, Co1 14:24, Co1 14:25. Thirdly, She desires some further instruction from him. Many that are not angry at their reprovers, nor fly in their faces, yet are afraid of them and keep out of their way; but this woman was willing to have some more discourse with him that told her of her faults.
[2.] The case itself that she propounded concerning the place of religious worship in public. Some think that she started this to shift off further discourse concerning her sin. Controversies in religion often prove great prejudices to serious godliness; but, it should seem, she proposed it with a good design; she knew she must worship God, and desired to do it aright; and therefore, meeting with a prophet, begs his direction. Note, It is our wisdom to improve all opportunities of getting knowledge in the things of God. When we are in company with those that are fit to teach, let us be forward to learn, and have a good question ready to put to those who are able to give a good answer. It was agreed between the Jews and the Samaritans that God is to be worshipped (even those who were such fools as to worship false gods were not such brutes as to worship none), and that religious worship is an affair of great importance: men would not contend about it if they were not concerned about it. But the matter in variance was where they should worship God. Observe how she states the case: -
First, As for the Samaritans: Our fathers worshipped in this mountain, near to this city and this well; there the Samaritan temple was built by Sanballat, in favour of which she insinuates, 1. That whatever the temple was the place was holy; it was mount Gerizim, the mount in which the blessings were pronounced; and some think the same on which Abraham built his altar (Gen 12:6, Gen 12:7), and Jacob his, Gen 33:18-20. 2. That it might plead prescription: Our fathers worshipped here. She thinks they have antiquity, tradition, and succession, on their side. A vain conversation often supports itself with this, that it was received by tradition from our fathers. But she had little reason to boast of their fathers; for, when Antiochus persecuted the Jews, the Samaritans, for fear of sharing with them in their sufferings, not only renounced all relation to the Jews, but surrendered their temple to Antiochus, with a request that it might be dedicated to Jupiter Olympius, and called by his name. Joseph. Antiq. 12.257-264.
Secondly, As to the Jews: You say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. The Samaritans governed themselves by the five books of Moses, and (some think) received only them as canonical. Now, though they found frequent mention there of the place God would choose, yet they did not find it named there; and they saw the temple at Jerusalem stripped of many of its ancient glories, and therefore thought themselves at liberty to set up another place, altar against altar.
(2.) Christ's answer to this case of conscience, Joh 4:21, etc. Those that apply themselves to Christ for instruction shall find him meek, to teach the meek his way. Now here,
[1.] He puts a slight upon the question, as she had proposed it, concerning the place of worship (Joh 4:21): "Woman, believe me as a prophet, and mark what I say. Thou art expecting the hour to come when either by some divine
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv4–42 And he must needs go through Samaria. Not the…
And he must needs go through Samaria. Not the city, but the country of Samaria; for the way to Galilee from Judea, lay through the midst of Samaria; nor was there any other way, without going a great way about; see Luk 9:51; and which is also confirmed by Josephus (c): and this accounts for his going through Samaria, consistently with his forbidding his apostles going in the way of the Gentiles, or into any of the cities of the Samaritans; since here was a necessity for it, or otherwise he himself would not have gone, where he forbid his disciples; though the prohibition may be understood, not of barely going into a Samaritan city; for it was lawful for them, notwithstanding that, to go into one of them, as appears from Joh 4:8; but of going to preach there, Mat 10:5. And besides this necessity, there was another thing that lay upon him, and obliged him to take this tour, and that is, the calling and conversion of a certain woman, and other Samaritans, whom the Father had given to him, and he was to redeem by his blood; and the time of whose effectual calling was now come; and therefore he must needs go this way, and at this particular time. The Arabic and Persic versions represent it, as a purpose and determination in his mind to go this way.
(c) Antiqu. Jud. 50:20. c 5. & in vita sua, p. 1019.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 31, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 42 And he must needs go through Samaria - The…
And he must needs go through Samaria - The road lying directly through it.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39, 40, 42 Verse 4. And he must needs go through Samaria.]…
Verse 4. And he must needs go through Samaria.] Or, It was necessary for him to pass through Samaria: for this plain reason, and no other, because it was the only proper road. Samaria lay northward of Judea, and between the great sea, Galilee, and Jordan; and there was therefore no going from Galilee to Jerusalem but through this province. See Clarke on Lu 17:11. From Jerusalem to Galilee through Samaria, according to Josephus, was three days' journey. See his own life.
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Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv4, 7, 9, 10, 13, 16, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 31, 35, 37, 39, 41 Joh 4:4-6. And he must needs go through Samaria…
Joh 4:4-6. And he must needs go through Samaria — The road from Judea to Galilee lying directly through it. Then cometh he — In the progress of his journey; to a city of Samaria, called Sychar — The original name of the place was Sichem, or Shechem, but now the Jews called it Sychar, which name they used as a term of reproach, intimating thereby that it was the seat of drunkards, see Isa 28:1; near to the parcel of ground that Jacob — Having purchased it of the children of Hamor, Gen 33:19; gave to his son Joseph — By a particular grant. See Gen 48:22; Jos 24:32. The word χωριον, here rendered parcel, is translated by Dr. Campbell, heritage, as meaning, he observes, an estate in land; and that, since the estate here spoken of was given by the patriarch to his son Joseph, to be possessed by him and his posterity, it may be properly denominated heritage. Now Jacob’s well was there — A well so called, as having been used by Jacob and his family, while he dwelt in those parts. See Gen 33:18; Gen 35:4. Jesus, being wearied with his journey — For he was subject to all the innocent infirmities of human nature; sat thus — Weary as he was, on the side of the well; and it was about the sixth hour — Or just high noon: so that the heat co-operated with the fatigue of the journey to increase both his thirst and faintness. It must be observed, that in the latitude in which Judea lies, the weather is sometimes exceeding hot at noon, even in December, and on days when the cold has been very severe in the morning.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv4–39 And he must needs go through Samaria - Samaria…
And he must needs go through Samaria - Samaria was between Judea and Galilee. The direct and usual way was to pass through Samaria. Sometimes, however, the Jews took a circuitous route on the east side of the Jordan. See the notes at Mat 2:22.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv5, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 20, 22, 23, 25, 27, 29, 31, 34, 35, 38, 42 This is what Jacob gave to his son Joseph,…
This is what Jacob gave to his son Joseph, when calling him to him just before he died, he said: (Genesis xlviii. ver. 22.) I give thee a portion above thy brethren, which I took out of the hand of the Amorrhite, with my sword and bow. (Theophylactus) --- It was thirty-six miles from Jerusalem, and the same place as Sichem, (Genesis xxxiv.) the capital of Samaria, now called Neplosa.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 19, 21, 22, 23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40 must needs go through Samaria--for a geographical reason, no…
must needs go through Samaria--for a geographical reason, no doubt, as it lay straight in his way, but certainly not without a higher design.
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Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 42 4. Needs go through Samaria—As the province of Samaria…
4. Needs go through Samaria—As the province of Samaria spread its broad territories from Jordan to the Mediterranean sea, between Judea and Galilee, it was necessary to cross it, (see map, and note on Mat_2:1,) unless he would take a circuit around through Peraea on the east side of Jordan. It was, therefore, purely a geographical necessity.
Starting from Jerusalem, (at the present day he would pass through the Damascus gate,) our Lord, with his disciples, proceeds northward, and after a journey of nearly forty miles arrives near the very ancient city of Sychar, Shechem, or Nablous. “Well mounted Europeans,” says Tristam, “ride in one day from Nablous to Jerusalem; but their muleteers and baggage often occupy two days.” Our Lord’s route lay through historic ground. He passed doubtless through Gibeah, the ancient capital of the kingdom of Saul; through Bethel, where Jacob had his dream of the ladder and the angels; near Shiloh, the first dwelling-place of the tabernacle and the ark in Canaan, and the scene of the downfall of the house of Eli. At the terminus of this journey three objects of special interest occur in succession: Jacob’s well, Joseph’s tomb, and the ancient city of Shechem, between the mountains Gerizim and Ebal. (See cut of Shechem and Jacob’s Well.)
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 42 4. he must needs go through Samaria] There was…
4. he must needs go through Samaria] There was no other way, unless he crossed the Jordan and went round by Perea, as Jews sometimes did to avoid annoyance from the Samaritans (on the Samaritans, see note on Mat_10:5). As Christ was on his way from Jerusalem, and escaping from the ruling party there, He had less reason to fear molestation. Comp. Luk_9:53.
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Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv4–42 (4) He must needs go through Samaria—i.e., following the…
(4) He must needs go through Samaria—i.e., following the shortest and most usual road, and the one we find Him taking from Galilee to Jerusalem (Luk_9:52; see Note there). Josephus spoke of this as the customary way of the Galileans going up during the feasts at Jerusalem (Ant. xx. 6, § 1). The Pharisees, indeed, took the longer road through Peræa, to avoid contact with the country and people of Samaria, but it is within the purpose of His life and work (“needs go,” i.e., was necessary that He should go) to teach in Samaria, as in Judæa, the principles of true religion and worship, which would cut away the foundations of all local jealousies and feuds, and establish for all nations the spiritual service of the universal Father (Joh_4:21-24).
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42 And he must needs go through Samaria. There was…
And he must needs go through Samaria. There was no physical necessity about it. He might, as bigoted Jews were accustomed to do, have crossed the Jordan and passed through Peraea instead. There was no such animus in the heart of Jesus, and a Divine and providential monition was the occasion of his taking the direct road. Geikie has drawn a vivid picture of the difficulties to which Jewish travellers on the borders of Samaria were exposed, (see Hos_6:9; Josephus, "Ant.," 20:6. 1; "Bell. Jud:," 2:12:4; "Vit.," 52) and also of the physical features of the land. Samaria, as a name of the small district of central Palestine, arose from the name of the city "Samaria," built by Omri, and made the site of the kingdom of Israel, (1Ki_16:24) and that of the Baal- and of the calf-worship. Samaria suffered from the siege, and the city was depopulated by Shalmanezer (Sargon), and colonized with Assyrians under Esarhaddon. It was destroyed by Hyrcanus, and rebuilt in splendour by Herod the Great, and by him dedicated to Augustus, and called Sebaste after him. Though Shechem (equivalent to Sichem) was the more famous site, and overshadowed Herod"s city by its historical interest, yet "Samaria" was the name which has survived all others, and covered a larger space. Jesus was probably on the borders of Samaria, in the Judaean country, before he commenced his journey. Samaria was included in the tetrarchy of Archelaus, and formed part of the province under the pro-curatorship of Pontius Pilate; while Herod Antipas reigned over Galilee and Persia. The Lord was fulfilling the Divine will, in commencing his Galilaean ministry, in leaving Judaea proper for the present, and passing through Samaria. It is worthy of notice that John here attributes to "the Pharisees," rather than "the Jews," the opposition which indicated the wisdom or necessity of this course.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv9, 10, 11, 15, 16, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 35, 41, 42 How is it that Thou, being a Jew, askest…
Joh_4:9-10
How is it that Thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me?
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--It is remarkable that while the Samaritan woman here is taunting the Lord with being a Jew, the Jews, in a somewhat similar passage, charge Him with being a Samaritan (Joh_8:48). (G. J. Brown, M. A.)
Askest and saith
There is a singular decorum in the use of words here. The woman has said, not unnaturally, How is it that Thou askest of me? But αἰτε͂ιν is a word of petition as from an inferior to a superior, in this different from ἐρωτᾶν, which has more of equality in it. Christ therefore when He refers to that request of hers does not take up and allow her word. He says not, Who is it that asketh, but who it is that saith (λέγων) to thee; while the asking is described as the proper attitude for her, Thou wouldest have asked (ἤτησας) of Him. There lies often in such little details an implicit assertion of the unique dignity of His person, which it is very interesting and not unimportant to trace. (Abp. Trench.)
Dealings and gift of God
The former word seems to explain the first part of our Lords answer. She had come day by day to draw water at that well. Had she never known that that water was a gift of God? Had no thirst on a hot day or no failure of the spring taught her that? Was water a thing to traffic in? (F. D. Maurice.)
The significance of giving drink
Among us even an enemy might ask or receive a drink of water without fear of compromising himself or his opponent; but not so in the East. There, the giving and receiving of a drink of water is the seeking and the making of a covenant of hospitality, with all that that covenant implies. It is not, indeed, like a covenant of blood, or a covenant of salt--indissoluble; but it is like the covenant of bread-sharing, which makes a truce, for the time being, between deadliest enemies. Aboolfeda tells, for example, of the different receptions awarded by Saladeen to the king of the Franks on the one hand, and to Prince Arnald of Caracca on the other, when the two Christian leaders were received in his tent by the victorious Saracen after the battle of Hatteen. Saladeen seated the Christian king by his side, and gave him drink cooled with snow. When the king, having tasted it, offered it also to Prince Arnald, Saladeen protested, saying, This wretch shall not drink of the water with my permission; in which there would be safety to him; and then, rising up, he smote off the head of the prince with his own sword. Over against this we are told that when Hormozan, a Persian ruler, surrendered to the Khaleef Omar, the successor of Aboo Bekr, and was brought a prisoner into the presence of his captor, he asked at once for a drink. Omar asked him if he were thirsty. No, he said; I only wish to drink in your presence, so that I may be sure of my life. He was assured that he might rest perfectly secure; and that assurance was kept. (H. C. Trumbull, D. D.)
History of the Samaritans
After the Assyrian conquest colonies from the East were placed in the deserted cities. The country having been desolated by war wild beasts multiplied, and became the terror and scourge of the new inhabitants. The barren heights of Hermon and Lebanon are to this day infested with bears, panthers, wolves, and jackals. The strangers attributed the calamity to the anger of the local deity, of whose peculiar mode of worship they were ignorant. They therefore petitioned for Jewish priests to instruct them in religious rites; and after they had heard them they feared the Lord, and served their own gods (2Ki_17:24-41). In after times the Jews refused to acknowledge them in any way, and would not permit them to assist in building the second temple, though their refusal cost them many trials (Ezr_4:1-24.). Being cast off by the Jews, the Samaritans resolved to erect a temple of their own on Gerizim. The immediate occasion appears to have been the circumstances related by Nehemiah, that a sen of Joiada, the high priest, had become son-in-law to Sanballat, and had on this account been expelled from Jerusalem Neh_13:28). The date of the temple may thus be.fixed about
B.C. 420. Shechem now became the metropolis of the Samaritans as a sect, and an asylum for all apostate and lax Jews (Joseph. Antiq. 11:3-6). These things tended to foster enmity between the two nations, which resulted in the total destruction of the Temple of Gerizim by the Jews under John Hyrcanus. The very name Samaritan became a byword and a reproach among the Jews, just as the name Yehudy, Jew, is among modern Syrians; and some even supposed that the Jews nicknamed the city of Shechem Sychar, Falsehood, to mark their opinion of the pretended origin of its in- habitants. In our Saviours time the Samaritans retained their worship on Gerizim, though the temple was in ruins; and they had some vague expectations of a Messiah. During the reign of Vespasian Shechem was rebuilt, and renamed Neapolis, New City, an appellation which has run into the Arabic Nabulus--one of the very few instances in which the Greek has supplanted the Semitic name. The ancient Samaritans and modern Druses appear to have had very much in common both in character and origin. The ancient Samaritan was part heathen, part Jew; and the modern Druse of Mount Lebanon is part heathen, part Christian; and some have thought that the modern Druses derive their origin from the very same tribes as the ancient Samaritans. After the second captivity of Israel, Esarhaddon re-peopled the wasted strongholds of Samaria with the tribes whose names are given with so much particularity in Scripture (2Ki_17:24; and Ezr_4:9), races of fierce habit and degraded faith, whose heathen practices, engrafted on the corrupt Judaism which lingered amongst the earlier Samaritans, brought down on the new colonies the especial Nemesis of God. Of these fierce tribes there were some who, Cuthites in name, were of the family of the Royal Scythians, or Gordyans, from the Gordiaean mountains, whom in.subsequent times the Greeks knew by the name of Carduchi (Xen. Anab.), and with whom we are familiar as Koords. Some of these were settled in the Lebanon, and from them it has been said that the Druses spring, and draw the tenets of an ancient but unholy worship. (Lord Carnarvons Druses of the Lebanon.)
The hostility of the Samaritans towards the Jews
The Samaritan sought by every petty annoyance to irritate the Jew. Their country was the nearest road for the caravans of northern pilgrims going to the feasts in Jerusalem. The Samaritans churlishly refused these the poorest rites of hospitality, and compelled them often to avoid maltreament, by taking the circuitous and more fatiguing route by the Jordan Valley. Again, it was one of the few consolations enjoyed by the bands of exiled Jews in Babylon to have announced to them, by means of the only ancient telegraphic communication--beacons on the mountain-tops--the appearance of the paschal moon. The first beacon-fire was lit on the summit of Olivet, and thence caught up from mountain to mountain in luminous succession, until, within sight of the Euphrates, they could, for the moment at least, take down their harps from the willows as they remembered Zion and its holy solemnities. But the Samaritans indulged the mischievous delight of perplexing and putting them out of reckoning by the use of false signals. Another wicked and successful exploit is recorded; and occurring as it did under the government of Coponius only a few years previous to the gospel era, may have tended at this time to deepen these animosities. A band of Samaritans succeeded in stealing to the courts of the Temple of Jerusalem during the Passover season, and defiling the sacred precincts by scattering them with dead mens bones; thus incapacitating the Jews that year from celebrating the great feast of their nation. (J. R. Macduff, D. D.)
Samaritan churlishness
On asking drink from a woman near Nablus who was filling her pitcher, we were angrily refused--The Christian dogs might get it for themselves. (Canon Tristram.)
The hatred of the Jews for the Samaritans
The Jew was no way behind in his manifestation of malevolence. The son of Sirach says, There be two manner of nations which my heart abhorreth, and the third is no nation; they that sit upon the mountain of Samaria, and they that dwell among the Philistines, and that foolish people that dwell in Sichem. So that this false race dwelling at Sichem is more offensive to the pious Sirach than apostate Israel, with its worship of the golden calves on the mountains of Samaria (Sir_47:23-24), or even than the Philistines themselves, those hereditary enemies of Gods people. He abhors an Israel which demeans itself as if it were no Israel; he abhors the no-Israel which persists in its hostility and defiance to the true Israel; but most deeply of all does he abhor the no-Israel which demeans itself as if it were Israel, the heathen wearing the mask of Israelite. To eat with them was for a Jew as if he did eat swines flesh. He denounced the Samaritan as a base time-server who would not hesitate to purchase immunity from pains and penalties by forswearing Jehovah and kissing the impious shrine of Baal or Jove. He regarded him as unclean as the evaded leper; to harbour him in his house would entail a heritage of judgments on his children. The name Samaritan became a byword of reproach. He was publicly cursed in the synagogue--cursed in the name of Jehovah, by the writing on the two tables of the law, by the curse of the upper and lower house of judgment. He was pronounced unworthy of eternal life--excommunicated alike from the Church on earth and the Church in heaven. The bitterest word of scorn the Jew could hurl at the Infinitely Pure One was this, Thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil. The yet untutored apostles shared the same exasperated feelings when they asked their Lord to call down fire from heaven on some Samaritan village. All worthy of remembrance is His gentle but sharp reproof, Ye know not what spirit ye are of. (Canon Tristram.)
The evils of national rivalry
I do not know anything more ludicrous among the self-deceptions of well-meaning people than their notion of patriotism, as requiring them to limit their efforts to the good of their own country--the notion that charity is a geographical virtue, and that what is holy and righteous to do for people on one bank of a river is quite improper and unnatural to do for people on the other. It will be a wonderful thing some day or other for the Christian world to remember that it went on thinking for two thousand years that neighbours were neighbours at Jerusalem, but not at Jericho; a wonderful thing for us English to reflect, in after years, how long it was before we Could shake hands with any one across that shallow salt wash which the very chalk dust of its two shores whitens from Folkestone to Ambletense. One magnificent attribute of the colouring of the late twelfth and the whole thirteenth and the early fourteenth century was the union of one colour with another by reciprocal interference, that is to say, if a mass of red is to be set beside a mass of blue, a piece of the red will be carried into the blue, and the reverse, sometimes in nearly equal proportions. And I call it a magnificent principle, for it is an eternal and universal one, not in act only, but in human life. It is the great principle of brotherhood, not by equality, nor by likeness, but by giving and receiving; the souls that are unlike, and the nations that are unlike, and the natures that are unlike, being bound into one noble whole, by each receiving something from and of the others gifts and the others glory. (John Ruskin.)
The evils of sectarian bigotry
The utter absence of real charity and love among men in the days when our Lord was upon earth ought not to be overlooked. Well would it be if men had never quarrelled about religion after He left the world! Quarrels among the crew of a sinking ship are not more hideous, unseemly, and irrational than the majority of quarrels among professors of religion. An historian might truly apply St. Johns words to many a period in Church history, and say, The Romanists have no dealings with the Protestants, or the Lutherans have no dealings with the Calvinists, or the Calvinists have no dealings with the Arminians, or the Episcopalians have no dealings with the Presbyterians, or the Baptists have no dealings with those who baptize infants, or the Plymouth Brethren have no dealings with anybody who does not join their company. These things ought not so to be. They are the scandal of Christianity, the joy of the devil, and the greatest stumbling-block to the spread of the gospel. (Bp. Ryle.)
The Jews and Samaritans
Josephus writeth that at Samaria was a sanctuary opened by Sanballat for all renegade Jews, etc. The Jews therefore hated the presence, the fire, the fashion, the books of a Samaritan. Neither was there any hatred lost on the Samaritans part, for if he had but touched a Jew he would have thrown himself into the nearest water, clothes and all. (J. Trapp.)
The forbearance of Christ
You may have gone along the road on a hot summer day, tired and thirsty, and have seen the gleam of a cottage in the distance. Suppose you went to the door and asked for a drink of water, exactly as our Lord did; but your speech betrayed you, and you were asked, How do you, being a Protestant, ask drink of me, a Roman Catholic; or, How do you, being Scotch, ask of me who am Irish, for the Scotch have no dealings with the Irish? You would have ground your heel on the gravel, and vowed never to give any one the chance of so speaking to you again. But insults are just as they are taken; and you cant insult a man who wont let you. Jesus bows His head, and lets your ignorant speeches fly past Him. (John McNeill.)
Christ cares not for classes or races, but for souls
People when they talk of the working classes think that they have described the whole thing with one touch. They imagine that, like the enter such and such a one in Shakespeares stage directions, when they have said the working classes, then everything by way of definition that is to be said, is said. They label the article, so to speak, and then expect you to understand all about it. How difficult it is indeed to bridge across the chasm between class and class I But more difficult it is to remember that the working class, or any class, is made up of individual souls. Our dear Lord did not speak to classes only. Jesus spoke to souls. He took men one by one, and each finite creature with his infinite future, each immortal being with his own history, his own work, his own sins, his own feelings, his own sorrows, was an object of tender interest to Jesus Christ. (Knox Little.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On vv17, 31 Chapter 10
Chapter 10
JESUS DECLARES HIMSELF.
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The woman answered and said unto Him, I have no husband. Jesus saith unto her, Thou saidst well, I have no husband: for thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband: this hast thou said truly. The woman saith unto Him, Sir, I perceive that Thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe Me, the hour cometh, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father. Ye worship that which ye know not: we worship that which we know: for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for such doth the Father seek to be His worshippers. God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and truth. The woman saith unto Him, I know that Messiah cometh (which is called Christ): when He is come, He will declare unto us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am He.- Joh_4:17-26.
In this conversation at Jacobs well the woman for some time, quite naturally, misses the point of what Jesus says. It does not occur to her that by water He means anything else than what she could carry in her pitcher. Even when He speaks of causing a well to spring up within herself, she still thinks merely of the domestic convenience of some such arrangement, and begs Him to give what would save Her the endless trouble of coming to draw water out of Jacobs well. This simplicity has its good side, as also has her obvious confidence in His words. Jesus sees in this child-like simplicity and directness a much more hopeful soil for His message than He had found even in a thoughtful man of education like Nicodemus. He seeks, therefore, to prepare the soil further by quickening within her a sense of spiritual want. This may best be effected by backing her into her actual life. Therefore He says, Go, call thy husband, and come hither. And in this simple way He leads the woman at once to recognise His prophetic insight into her condition, and to bring His offers into connection with her character and her life. And there was that in her manner of owning Him as a prophet, a frankness and a simplicity in uttering her mind and listening to His explanations, that prompted Him explicitly to say, I that speak unto thee am the Messiah.
To this unfortunate and ill-living alien woman, then, Jesus declared Himself as He had not declared Himself to the well-to-do, respectable Jewish rabbis. The reason of this difference in our Lords treatment of individuals arises from the different dispositions they manifest. Acknowledgment of His power to work miracles may seem at first sight as good a certificate for Christian discipleship as acknowledgment of His prophetic power. But it is not so; because such an acknowledgment of His prophetic insight as this woman made is an acknowledgment of His power over the human heart and life. He who is thus felt to penetrate to the hidden acts, and to lay His hand upon the deepest secrets of the heart, is recognised as in a personal connection with the individual; and this is the foundation on which Christ can build, this is the beginning of that vital connection with Him which gives newness of life. Those who are merely solving a problem when they are considering the claims of Christ, are not likely to have any personal revelation made to them. But to every one, who, like this woman, shows some desire to receive His gifts, and who is not above owning that life is a very poor affair without some such thing as He offers; to every one who is conscious of sin, and who looks to Him as able to deliver from all its foul entanglement, He does make Himself known. To such persons He will disclose Himself when He sees that they are ripe for the disclosure. To such the moment of moments will come, when to them He will say: I that speak unto thee am He.
This distinction between the chemist who analyses the living water, and the thirsting soul that uses it, runs very deep, and may be commended to the consideration of any who are apt to be carried away by the current of unbelief that characterizes much of our literature. I think it may be said that in writers distinguished by a lack of Christian belief there will commonly be found an absence of what is popularly and fitly called an awakened conscience. It will be found that they do not know what it is to look at Christ from the point of view of this woman, from the point of view of a shattered and wretched life, and a conscience that day by day is saying, It is I myself who have broken my life, and doing so I have become a transgressor, and need pardon, guidance, strength. Acute thought, an admirable faculty of explaining and enforcing what is thought, we find in abundance; but we certainly do not find a spirit humbled by a sense of sin and a conscience alive to the deepest obligations. So far as can be gathered from the writings of the most conspicuous unbelievers, they do not possess the first requisite for discerning a Saviour-namely, a sense of need. They lack the prime preparation for speaking on such a subject; they have never dealt fairly with their own sin. We do not consult a deaf man if we wish to ascertain whether the noise we have heard is thunder or the rumbling of a cart; neither can we expect that those will be the best teachers regarding God in whom the faculty by which we chiefly discern God-viz., the conscience-has been less exercised than any other. It is through the conscience God makes Himself most distinctly felt; it is in connection with the moral law we come most clearly in contact with Him; and convictions of Gods Being and connection with us root themselves in the soul that a sense of sin has ploughed.
I am far from saying that in deciding upon the claims of Christ the understanding is to have no voice. The understanding must have a voice here as elsewhere. But it is a strong presumption in Christs favour that He offers precisely what sinners need; and it is decisive in His favour when we find that He actually gives what sinners need. If it is practically found that He is the force that lifts thousands and thousands of human beings out of sin; if He has, in point of fact, brought light to those in deep darkness, comfort and courage to the desolate and heavily burdened, consecration and purity to the outcast and the corrupt, then, plainly, He is what He claims to be, and we owe Him our faith.
If God is to reveal Himself at all, the revelation must be made not solely or chiefly to the understanding, but to that part of us which determines character, and is capable of appreciating character. The revelation must be moral not intellectual. As our Lords ministry proceeded He recognised that it was always the simple who most readily accepted and trusted Him; and He recognised that this was a thing to be thankful for: I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. And every one who thinks of it sees that it must be so-that a mans destiny must be decided not by his understanding, but by his character and leanings; not by his ability or disability to believe this or that, or to prove that his belief is well grounded, but by his aspirations, by the real bent of his heart. We should feel that there was something very far wrong if our faith depended upon proofs that not every one could master, and if thus the clever man had an advantage over the humble and contrite. The evidence must be such that spiritual character shall be an element in the acceptance of it. And such we find it to be. The reality and the significance of the revelation of God in Christ are more readily apprehended by the spiritually than by the intellectually gifted. Persons who are either by nature humble and docile, or whom life has taught to be so, persons who feel their need of God, and deeply long for an eternal state of peace and purity, these are the persons to whom God finds it possible to make Himself known. And if it be thought that this circumstance, that simple and docile spirits are convinced while hard-headed men are unconvinced, throws some suspicion on the reality of the revelation, if it be thought that the God and the eternity they believe in are but fancies of their own, it may fairly be replied, that there is no more reason for such a thought than for supposing that the rapture of a trained musician is fanciful and self-created, and not excited by any corresponding reality, because it is not shared by those whose taste for music is unawakened.
Convinced that Jesus was a prophet, the woman proposes to Him the standing subject of debate between Jews and Samaritans. Her statement of it is abrupt, and offers some appearance of being intended to turn the conversation away from herself; but this does not harmonise with her simple and direct character, and it is quite possible that in the midst of her confused and disappointed life she had sometimes wondered whether all her misery did not arise from her being a Samaritan. She knew what the Jews said of the Samaritan worship. She knew that they mocked at the Temple which stood on the hill over against Jacobs well; and when she found how very little her worship had helped her, she may have begun to suspect that there was truth in the Jewish allegations. Evidently the aspect of the Messiah, which had chiefly struck her, was His power to lead men into all truth, to teach them all things. Persons in her station, and quite as much overborne by sin as she, often retain their hold upon religious teaching; and in the midst of much that is superstitious they have a spark of true hope and longing for redemption. Jesus shows by the gravity and importance of His answer that He considered the woman sincere in the statement of her difficulty, and anxious to know where God might really be found. Perplexed and bewildered by her earthly experience, as so many of us are, she suddenly awakes to the consciousness that here, before her, and conversing with her, is a prophet; and at once she utters to Him what had been burning in her heart, Where, where is God to be found?
And so in reply to the inquiry of one sincere woman Jesus makes that great announcement which has ever since stood as the manifesto of spiritual worship. Not in any particular and isolated place, He tells the woman, is God to be found, not in the temple at Jerusalem, nor in the rival structure on Gerizim, but in spirit. God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth. As our Lord intimates, this was a new kind of worship, essentially different from that to which Jews and Samaritans, and indeed all men, had hitherto been accustomed.
The magnitude of the contents of such sayings can as little be comprehended as their significance can be exhausted. We have first of all the central affirmation: God is a Spirit. To fill out this definition with intelligible ideas is difficult. It implies that He is a Personal Being, that He is self-conscious, possessed of intelligence and will; but although Personal His Personality transcends our conception. So far as regards the immediate application of the definition by our Lord at this time, it suffices to note its primary meaning that God has not a body, and consequently is subject to none of the limitations and conditions to which the possession of a body subjects human persons. He needs no local dwelling-place, no temple, no material offerings. In local worship there was an advantage while the world was young, and men could best be taught by symbols. A house in their midst, of which they might say, God is there, was undoubtedly an aid to faith. But it had its disadvantages. For the more a worshipper fixed his mind on the one local habitation, the less could he carry with him the consciousness of Gods presence in all places.
Very slowly do we learn that God is a Spirit. We think nothing is more surely believed among us. Alas! make almost any application of this radical truth, and we find how little it is believed. Take, for example, the appearances and voices by which intimations were made to godly men in Old Testament times. Why are many people reluctant to allow that these manifestations were inward and to conscience, that they came as convictions wrought by an unseen power, rather than as outward appearances or audible voices? Is it not because the truth that God is a Spirit is not adequately apprehended? Or why again do we so crave for signs, for clearer demonstrations of Gods being and of His presence? Ought we not to be satisfied if He responds to spiritual aspirations, and if we find that our craving for holiness is met and gratified?
The inference drawn by our Lord from the truth that God is a Spirit is one which needs still to be pressed. God seeks to be worshipped not by outward forms or elaborate ritual but in spirit. Ordinary teachers would have put in a saving clause to preserve some forms of worship; Christ puts in none. Let men worship God in spirit, and let forms take their chance. To worship God in spirit is to yield the unseen but motive powers within us to the unseen but Almighty influences which we recognise as Divine. It is to prostrate our spirit before the Divine Spirit. It is in our deepest being, in will and intention, to offer ourselves up to Him in whom goodness is personified. When a man is doing that, what does it matter what he says to God, or with what forms of worship he comes before Him? That alone is acceptable worship which consists in the devout approach of the human spirit to the Divine; and that is accomplished often as effectually in our business intercourse with men when tempted to injustice, or in our homes when tempted to anger or to laxity, as when we are in the house of God. Worship in the spirit needs no words, no appointed place, but only a human soul that bows inwardly before the goodness of God, and submits itself cordially to His sovereign and loving will.
This certainly is a strong argument for simplicity of worship. Why, it may indeed be said, why have any outward worship at all? Why have churches and why have Divine service? Well, it would have been better for the Church if there had been far less outward worship than there commonly has been. For by its elaborate services the Church has far too much identified religion with that worship which can only be rendered in church. No one can be surprised that in utter disgust at the disproportion between outward and spiritual worship, between the gorgeous and fussy services that profess so much, and the slender and rare devotion of the soul to God, discerning men should have turned their back on the whole business, and declined to be partakers in so huge and profane a farce. Milton in his later years attended no Church and belonged to no communion. This certainly is to run to the opposite extreme. No doubt that worship may be real and acceptable which is offered in the silence and solitude of a mans spirit; but we naturally utter what we feel, and by the utterance strengthen the feelings that are good, and rid ourselves of the bitterness and strain of those that are painful and full of sorrow. Besides, the Church is, before all else, a society. Our religion is meant to bring us together; and though it does so more effectually by inspiring us with kindliness and helpfulness in life than by a formal meeting together for no purposes of active charity, yet the one fellowship aids the other, as many of us well know.
While, then, we accept Christs statement in its fullest significance, and maintain that our reasonable service is the offering of ourselves as living sacrifices, that spiritual worship is offered not in church only or mainly, but in doing Gods will with a hearty good-will, we all the rather see how needful it is to utter ourselves to God as we do in our social worship; for as the wife would need some patience who was cared for indeed by her husband in the supply of her common wants, but had never a word of affection spoken to her, so our relations to God are not satisfactory unless we utter to Him our devotion as well as show it in our life. He was one of the wisest of English writers who said, I always thought fit to keep up some mechanical forms of good breeding (in my family), without which freedom ever destroys friendship. Precisely so, he who omits the outward and verbal expression of regard to God, will soon lose that regard itself.
But if the words of Christ were not intended to put an end to outward worship altogether, they do, as I have said, form a strong argument for simplicity of worship. No forms whatever are needed that our spirit may come into communion with God. Let us begin with this. As true and perfect worship may be rendered by the dying man, who cannot lift an eyelid or open his lips, as by the most ornate service that combines perfect liturgical forms with the richest music man has ever written. Rich music, striking combinations of colour and of architectural forms, are nothing to God so far as worship goes, except in so far as they bring the human spirit into fellowship with Him. Persons are differently constituted, and what is natural to one will be formal and artificial to another. Some worshippers will always feel that they get closer to God in private, in their own silent room, and with nothing but their own circumstances and wants to stimulate them; they feel that a service carefully arranged and abounding in musical effects does indeed move them, but does not make it easier for them to address themselves to God. Others, again, feel differently; they feel that they can best worship God in spirit when the forms of worship are expressive and significant. But in two points all will agree: first, that in external worship, while we strive to keep it simple we should also strive to make it good-the best possible of its kind. If we are to sing Gods praise at all, then let the singing be the best possible, the best music a congregation can join in, and executed with the utmost skill that care can develop. Music which cannot be sung save by persons of exceptional musical talent is unsuitable for congregational worship; but music which requires no consideration, and admits of no excellence, is hardly suitable for the worship of God. I do not know what idea of Gods worship is held by persons who never put themselves to the least trouble to improve it so far as they are concerned.
The other point in which all will agree, is that where the spirit is not engaged there is no worship at all. This goes without saying. And yet, subtract from our worship all that is merely formal, and how much do you leave? Worse still, there are those who do not even strive after the fit and decorous form, who do not bow their heads in prayer, who are not ashamed to be seen looking about them during the most solemn acts of worship, who show that they are indevout, thoughtless, profane.
The true worshippers shall worship the Father not only in spirit, but also in truth. The word truth here probably covers two ideas-the ideas of reality and of accuracy. It is opposed to symbolic worship and to ignorant worship. It does not mean that worship was now to be sincere, for that it had already been both among Samaritans and Jews. But among the Jews the worship of God had been symbolical, and among the Samaritans it had been ignorant.
The Jewish worship had been symbolical, every person and thing, every colour, gesture, movement, having a meaning for the initiated. The time for this, says our Lord, is past. We are to worship really. They need no longer take an animal to the temple to symbolise that they gave themselves to God; they were to spend their whole care on the real thing, on giving themselves to God; they were not to set candles about their altars to show that light was come into the world, they were themselves to shine as lights lit by Christ; they were not to swing censers to symbolise the sweet-smelling prayers of the saints, they were to offer prayers from humble hearts. In effect Christ said, You are grown up now, and can understand the realities; put away then these childish things. And those who continue to worship with various robes, and prescribed gesticulations and movements, and pictures, and altars, and everything to impress the senses, write themselves down children among grown-up people.
Truth is opposed also to error or misconception about the object of worship. Christ, by His presence, enables men to worship the Father in truth. He gives them the true idea of God. He makes God real, giving an actuality to our thought of God which we could not otherwise arrive at; and He shows us God as He truly is, connected with ourselves by love; holy, merciful, just.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 40, 41, 42 4. He must needs go through Samaria. Because it…
4. He must needs go through Samaria. Because it lay right between Judea and Galilee.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v27 Joh_4:27. Marvelled.—The disciples evidently thought that Jesus would conduct…
EXPLANATORY AND CRITICAL NOTES
Joh_4:27. Marvelled.—The disciples evidently thought that Jesus would conduct Himself outwardly as did the Jewish rabbis. Those teachers said: “Do not prolong conversation with a woman; let no one converse with a woman in the street, not even his own wife” (Lightfoot).
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Joh_4:29. Is not, etc.—Better, Can this be the Christ? or, as others, He is not however the Christ, is He? The μήτι, not however? suggests a negative reply. But the question was put to elicit, not a speculative, but a practical answer—to bring the people of Sychar to see Jesus.
Joh_4:30. The people “came on their way toward Him.”—She proved herself, at the first certainly, to be a greater evangelist than Nicodemus.
Joh_4:31-38. The disciples on their return, solicitous for His comfort, pressed Him to partake of the food they had brought. In reply He pointed them to what is far more important than material food, in view of which the want of food for the body is for the time forgotten.
Joh_4:34. Finish.—τελειώσω, to complete and perfect (comp. Joh_17:4).
Joh_4:39-42. The firstfruits of the spiritual harvest in Samaria were reaped at Sychar. Whilst the Jews rejected Christ, the men of Sychar received Him in simple faith as truly the Saviour of the world.
Joh_4:41-42. His word … thy speech (τὸν λόγον αὐτοῦ … τὴν σὴν λαλιάν).—The λόγος, teaching, of Jesus was more weighty than the saying, the report, of the woman.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Joh_4:27-42
Joh_4:27-34. Jesus’ spiritual meat.—The disciples found their Master, to their astonishment, talking with the Samaritan woman. It was a strange thing for a rabbi to engage publicly in conversation with a woman at all, but more especially with a Samaritan. They did not, however, express their astonishment openly, none saying, “What seekest Thou?”—i.e. What service dost Thou require from her? or, Art Thou indeed conversing with her as a teacher? Meanwhile, the woman, in the excitement of new thoughts and feelings, leaving her water-pot, hurried away to the city, and the disciples came forward with the food they had purchased, pressing their Master to eat, astonished that He had required to be asked to do so and at the apparent absence of weariness, and more astonished still at His answer; so that they said one to another, “Hath any man?” etc. (Joh_4:33). They then learned of that higher spiritual food which had cheered the Redeemer’s soul. We learn here:—
I. The true place of physical food in our life.—
1. It is essential, but is not the first essential, although too many make it so—living to eat, making their chief end the meat that perisheth in some of its varied forms. “What shall we eat? what shall we drink?” etc. Here is their chief anxiety.
2. Our Lord taught men that this lower must be subordinated to a higher, e.g. when He fasted in the wilderness (Mat_4:4).
3. Yet the Saviour did not neglect the claims of the body. He worked marvels to supply the people with bread. The various provisions of nature for man’s satisfaction are part of the divine plan of creation (Col_1:16-17).
4. Jesus also, as the incarnate Son, came under human conditions in regard to physical food. As He hungered and thirsted, so He satisfied hunger and thirst as we do, and did not despise the means of refreshing and strengthening the body (Mat_11:19).
II. There is a higher food for our life than that which is physical.—
1. Even the sustenance of intellectual life is, we are told, conducive to a vigorous existence more than is generally imagined.
2. But there is a higher interest than merely physical comfort and pleasure. The highest duty of man is not to attend to the body, it is to do the will of God; whilst the body is to be used, and therefore duly nourished, as the instrument of the soul in doing the divine will, and in finishing, perfecting, the Father’s work.
3. Jesus had, by Jacob’s well, been experiencing this satisfaction, which his soul hungered for more than for meat or drink (Luk_12:49-50; Luk_22:15). Whilst His disciples were in the city He had been enjoying a refreshment of spirit, which showed itself even in His physical frame—before wearied and fatigued, now glowing with inward spiritual energy.
III. In this also we are to follow our divine Example.—
1. This was not a trait of Christ’s divine nature merely, but of His nature as the representative man to whose image we are to conform.
2. The highest happiness and satisfaction of man’s nature is found in doing the divine will, etc. For this he was created (Psa_84:3). The traces of it still remain in our nature, though blurred by the Fall, e.g. intellectual work and enthusiasm lead to forgetfulness of the body’s wants (instance Kepler, Spinoza, etc.). Many an earnest student has been nurtured on scanty fare.
3. The same experience may be seen in devotion to spiritual things. See, e.g., the lives of great missionaries—St. Paul, Columba, Cuthbert, Xavier, Martyn, Judson, Livingstone, etc. The meat that perisheth is almost forgotten in the absorption of spiritual work, in doing the will of God. And this to spiritual men is the greatest joy. They eat even here of the hidden manna (Rev_2:17).
IV. Conclusion.—This should be the chief desire of all Christians, especially of all ministers of the word. Their greatest joy should be to do God’s will, and to see His work prospering. There is always a danger that when the Church becomes too absorbed in the outward and material, the spiritual life should languish.
Joh_4:35-38. The joy of the spiritual harvest.—There is nothing more interesting and delightful to contemplate at the beginning of our Lord’s public ministry than the manner in which those who received Him and passed from darkness to light became in turn centres of light and life for others. Andrew and John influenced their brothers. Philip brought Nathanael to the Redeemer. And no sooner had the poor erring Samaritan woman received enlightenment and quickening by Jacob’s well than she became an evangelist, a sower of heavenly truth. And this is the peculiarity in the harvest of humanity, which the natural figure fails to represent entirely. Not only does every good seed harvested and garnered contain the promise and potency of future fruitfulness; it may become in turn sower and reaper—as an instrument in the divine Sower’s hand. We consider now:—
I. The joy at the extent and ripeness of the harvest.—“Behold, the fields that they are white to the harvest already.”
1. Then the husbandman rejoices as he looks forth on the waving fields of grain, some of them “dead ripe,” as it might be said, waiting for the reaper’s toil. Many an anxious hour has passed since months agone the seed was committed to the soil. Would it come to maturity? Would the frost blight, a rainless sky wither, or some other unforeseen contingency blast the hopes of the fruitful year? But under the kindly influences of nature, ever guided by Providence, the fields of earth year by year, and with but few exceptions, offer the ripe grain to the reaper’s toil; and again and again to man is accorded the joy of harvest.
2. It was this general truth which led to these pregnant words of the Redeemer to His disciples at Jacob’s well. All around, under the genial midday sunshine, the fruitful fields of Samaria (Oba_1:19) lay decked with living green, promising in the course of the season an abundant harvest. Yet four months, and then those fields would ring with the joy of the reapers, and men’s hearts be glad in the bountiful gift of heaven.
3. This joy the Saviour was experiencing in marked measure. It lifted Him above the necessities of the body, and gave Him “meat to eat” that His disciples knew not of. In the Samaritans drawing near He saw the first ripe field of that spiritual harvest which His disciples would yet gather from out of every nation under heaven (Act_2:5; Isa_60:3). He saw before His vision all those kingdoms of the world which He had seen on the mount of temptation (Luk_4:6-8)—those various fields, which, being slowly brought into cultivation, shall yet yield a glorious harvest. In some the good seed will grow slowly; in some, as in Samaria, ripen as in an hour.
4. And all were “white unto the harvest.” The fulness of time, the hour of realisation, had come, and the reapers were called to go forth to their labour. And this brought joy to the Saviour’s heart.
5. Since those memorable words were spoken nearly nineteen centuries have passed away. Many a spiritual harvest has been reaped; and anew the seed has been sown, and has sprung up and brought forth fruit. But much has been wasted by the folly of man. In many a field the enemy has sown tares. And in many more the harvest has remained ungathered because the reapers have been few or careless. And all the while the field has become wider, the numbers of the human race have increased, until to-day the same voice speaks to us in tones of mingled reproach and entreaty, “Lift up your eyes, and behold the fields, that they are white to the harvest already.” Those eight hundred and fifty millions of heathen, “aliens from the commonwealth of Israel,” etc. (Ephesians 2), are waiting for the reaper’s toil; whilst around and in our very midst are many waiting to be gathered in. Vast and ready is the harvest. Are we doing our part in reaping it for “the Lord of the harvest”?
II. The joy in our fellow-labourers.—
1. To have been sharers and helpers in any great work carried out by men of eminence is a cause of joy to every noble worker. To have stood side by side with some great explorer or discoverer on a lofty mountain peak, from which eminence new countries were seen—lofty mountains, great lakes and rivers, and vast forest reaches; to have helped some great scientific explorer to unfold the wonders of the material universe, and to have one’s name handed down with his in however humble a place; to have participated in the labours of a world-renowned social reformer and benefactor of his kind,—these, e.g., are privileges that bring a joy of the highest sort to all noble minds.
2. Such is the joy given in the highest degree to the Christian labourers. “One is the sower, and another the reaper. I sent you to reap that whereon ye have bestowed no labour; others have laboured, and ye are entered into their labours.” They enter into and follow up the activity of a long and illustrious roll of predecessors and witnesses to the truth—prophets and righteous men, who were the salt of the earth, and whose living influence is felt among us in these later days; for they “being dead, yet speak.” They sowed the golden seed of righteousness and truth, which we in Christian lands are reaping in a harvest of precious privileges to-day. It is surely an unspeakable privilege and joy to be successors to the long line of apostles and prophets and holy men in gathering in the harvest of humanity.
3. But more than this:
“Behold a Witness nobler still, who trod affliction’s path—
Jesus, at once the Finisher and Author of our faith.”
Christ, though Himself the great Sower and Lord of the harvest, laboured while on earth as all His servants labour. And therefore we have also His example to cheer and encourage us as we go forth to do His work, and the joy of being “workers together with Him” (2Co_6:1).
4. And as we look abroad on the world now, and on those fields of the nations, “white to harvest already,” do we not discern a noble band of fellow-labourers, of various climes and races, united with us for this great work? And although it is strange that there is not that perfect union and fellowship which should attain among those working in the spiritual harvest, yet we can rejoice in each other’s success in the work, and recognise and realise that each is fulfilling in some fashion the divine purpose—that from this diversity God will in the end bring forth a higher unity.
5. And when our labours are ended, when we have “served our generation by the will of God” (Act_13:36), others will rise and enter into our labours, carrying on the line of succession of faithful workers—the truly universal apostolic succession—until sowers and reapers rejoice together eternally.
III. The joy in the reward of the harvest.—“He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal.”
1. The Lord Himself participated in this joy when He saw the crowds of Samaritans coming to Him and confessing their faith in Him. It is the joy of the soul-gatherer expressed by the apostle of the Gentiles. “What then is my reward? That, in preaching the gospel, I may make the gospel without charge.… Yea, being free from all men, yet made I myself servant of all, that I might gain the greater number” (1Co_9:18-19). It is ever a joy to men to see the fruit of their labours; and that which we shall view with most satisfaction when the end is reached will not be our gains material or even mental—not our possessions, not the pleasures life has yielded us, but the good we have been able to accomplish—the influence we have exerted in bringing men to God. This is indeed to “gather fruit unto life eternal.”
2. To save the life of another is a praiseworthy and honourable action. It brings with it, to well-constituted minds, a feeling of intense pleasure. How the physician rejoices to see the glow of health coming back to the cheeks of one whom he has guided, under Providence, back from the very gates of death! That is emphatically the true physician’s reward more than any material gain. The scientific discoverer (like Kepler, who lived on a miserable pittance whilst unveiling the laws of planetary motion) finds his joy in the demonstrated fact. And to the true follower of Christ there is no higher reward, nor greater joy, than to be the means of converting a sinner from the error of his ways, and thus saving a soul from death (Jas_5:20).
3. And this joy will be intensified eternally. When rescued and rescuer meet on earth their mutual joy expands. But it will do so perfectly and uninterruptedly in the eternal sphere. The Chief Sower and the reapers—those who are saved and those who were the instruments of their salvation—shall rejoice together.
Is this harvest joy ours?
1. Do we realise the honour and privilege accorded to us of being fellow-workers with Christ in His harvest? or is it a matter of indifference to us whether we do His work or not? Are we rejoicing in being called to enter on the labours of all the great and good who have gone before us? or are we content to pass through life leaving the harvest of the fields of humanity to whiten in vain so far as we are concerned? Apparent indifference and want of interest in this work may often be set down to unreflecting modesty, which shrinks from supposing itself called to or worthy of such an honour, and imagines such a work far above it. It is a fatal error. The humblest labourer is called and welcomed, and for such also the reward is sure; and if all Christians, inspired with Christlike earnestness and zeal, were to bring but one other as the result of their reaping, speedily and grandly would the kingdom of God advance.
2. Do we realise and seek to grasp the promised reward?—To have been able to place but one stone in the eternal spiritual building, founded on the sure foundation, to have brought but one sheaf from the spiritual harvest fields, will give more joy to a true man than the highest of earthly honours and rewards. And by divine grace to each of us this joy may be given. If the desire exists, then even to the humblest will the way be opened; and to them will be given here the joy of being workers together with God, and hereafter that eternal gladness when sower and reaper rejoice together.
Joh_4:28-30; Joh_4:39-42. A spiritual harvest at Sychar.—It must have been a joyful experience to our Saviour to meet with one so docile and teachable as this woman by Jacob’s well. The evil in her life, encouraged most likely by training and surroundings, had not wholly quenched the good. There had been in her heart thoughts of, perhaps longings for, a better life, a better guidance. And it was, it may be, with a sigh that the woman said, “I know that Messias cometh … when He shall come, He will tell us all things” (Joh_4:25). Here was a belief more simple and less material than the Jewish expectation. It was imperfect, very imperfect, but in the right direction. And therefore our Lord gave to this Samaritan a full revelation of His Messiaship, knowing that the “good seed” would not fall on barren soil. The first step, then, toward this spiritual harvest was—
I. Christ’s revelation of Himself.—
1. Jesus saw that this woman’s heart was ready for the reception of this great truth, the most blessed of all truths that had yet been proclaimed. He perceived that in her soul the grey dawn had risen. Dim and uncertain as yet were her conceptions of higher truth; but the moment need not be delayed when the full light of truth should flash in on her soul, dispelling the darkness for ever.
2. Therefore He spoke those words so full of divine consciousness and dignity: “I that speak unto thee am He.” What a moment that must have been to this Samaritan!—a moment like that which the man born blind experienced when Jesus stood before him, speaking of the Son of God, and then added, “Thou hast both seen Him, and He that talketh with thee is He”; or that which Saul of Tarsus experienced as a voice spoke to him and said, “I am Jesus, whom thou persecutest,” etc. So with this woman. Her highest hopes were fulfilled—the long-promised Messiah stood before her. The voice of awakened faith in her heart told her that it was He in reality.
II. The woman’s witness to Christ in Sychar.—
1. Like all who truly have come to know Christ, this woman must needs make Him known. In her joy and excitement she quite forgot her errand to the well, and leaving her water-pot hurried to the town, not bearing water from the well, but intelligence of the wonderful fountain of living water, etc. (Joh_4:14).
2. No doubt a very abbreviated version of her message is given. She would most likely give the chief points of her interview with Jesus; but it was His power to read heart and life that appealed to her, and which she was convinced would impress others with the truth of Christ’s claims.
3. Her confession showed humility and earnestness. It was no light thing to recall to the memory of her fellow-townsmen her past smirched and unlovely life. But it showed the Saviour’s power, and therefore must be done.
4. Her testimony was effectual. From occupation and rest the dwellers of Sychar hastened to Jesus, who saw them approaching, and pointed His disciples to them as indications of the coming spiritual harvest of humanity.
III. The harvest at Sychar reaped.—
1. The woman’s testimony awakened faith in the hearts of many (Joh_4:39), so that they entreated Jesus to remain with them.
2. This He did to the strengthening of their faith (Joh_4:42). Sychar was won, and the way was prepared for the entrance of the messengers of the cross a few years later, etc. (Act_8:5-25).
HOMILETIC NOTES
Joh_4:35. Four months to the harvest.—In this conversation a note of time is given us in Joh_4:35, which has given rise to a considerable amount of controversy. Some eminent scholars (Tholuck, etc.) have considered the words, “Say ye not, There are four months, and then cometh harvest?” as a proverbial expression meaning the time which elapses between sowing and reaping. They would make our Lord’s reference to the spiritual harvest to coincide with the state of the fields around Sychar. But there seems to be no need for this interpretation of the words, especially when it is remembered that more than four months elapse between sowing and reaping in Palestine. The plain meaning of the phrase is, that the grain in the smiling fields of Samaria was still in a green, immature stage, and that the disciples had been remarking to one another that four months would still elapse ere the harvest would begin. This fixes the date of the incident at about the end of December or beginning of January in the first year of our Lord’s ministry, as harvest began in those regions some time about the end of April or beginning of May. Thus we gather that our Lord seems to have spent a considerable time in Jerusalem after the first passover of His public ministry, probably five or six months, before He left for the country regions of Judæa (Joh_3:22), whence He came to Samaria. And it is of pathetic interest to notice that whilst the Jewish leaders and rulers did not receive Christ’s testimony (Joh_3:32), in semi-heathen Samaria hearts were open to receive His word.
Joh_4:36. Sower and reaper.—To whom does our Lord refer when He speaks of sower and reaper, of others who have laboured, on whose labours the disciples had entered? It is clear, from Joh_4:38, “I sent you to reap that whereon ye have bestowed no labour,” etc., that our Lord in the first instance intended to designate the disciples as the reapers; and from this it follows, as Godet and others point out, that our Lord intended to refer primarily to the circumstances of the moment. Whilst the disciples were absent He had been sowing the good seed, which had taken such speedy root and sprung up so quickly that the harvest was at hand, a fact testified to by the multitudes coming to Him from Sychar with hearts prepared to receive the good seed, with promise of speedy fruitfulness. And here on earth the Saviour tasted, as He did not always do during His ministry, the joy of the reaper—“saw of the travail of His soul, and was satisfied.” Thus He was able on earth to participate in the joys of His servants in pentecostal days. But surely it is not necessary to restrict the application of our Lord’s words to this single incident? The spiritual fields of Samaria, we may be certain, did not limit His vision, which extended over the field of humanity. He was sent to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel”; but in the midst of that semi-heathen community He looked forward with joy to the time when His disciples, entering into the labours of those who had gone before them, would rejoice, “bringing in the sheaves.” Thus also we must not limit the contents of the phrase “others have laboured” to our Lord Himself and John the Baptist. It is to be taken as referring (Westcott, etc.) to all God’s true labourers in Old Testament times. Our Lord is the supreme Sower, no doubt; but He was the inspirer of those Old Testament labourers. Touched by His Spirit it was His word they sowed. But few of them saw the fruits of their labours to any great extent. Slowly and imperfectly did the fruit advance toward maturity under the oftentimes unfavourable conditions, the dimmer light and chillier atmosphere of pre-advent times. But now that the “Light of men” had arisen on the world, and the quickening and vivifying influences of His baptism with the Holy Ghost and with fire were beginning to shoot from heart to heart, then the seed, which had been germinating and springing up, though slowly in past ages, would come more speedily to maturity, and the disciples would begin to reap largely in joy. Here our Lord foresaw not only the harvest reaped in Samaria soon after His ascension (Act_8:1-17), but the universal harvest to be reaped in all succeeding ages until the end of time.
Joh_4:37. The success of the gospel husbandmen.—And these words might be taken as not only conveying promises of success to the disciples in their labours; they were also fitted to give consolation in times of apparent failure. The disciples in pentecostal times would be both sowers and reapers. They would see and rejoice in the fruits of their labours. But not always. Sometimes it would seem as if they had laboured in vain. Yet it would not be so. As they had entered into the labours of others, so others would enter into their labours. And as the reaping progresses age after age, so will the joy increase in the heart of the supreme Sower, and among the bright inhabitants of heaven, until, when at last the harvest fields of time have been fully reaped, sowers and reapers shall rejoice together when the sheaves have been all brought in.
ILLUSTRATIONS
Joh_4:31-32.—Brain work and vitality.—You may kill a man with anxiety very quickly; but it is difficult to kill him with work, especially if he retains the power, which most men of intellectual occupations more or less possess, of sleeping nearly at will and without torpor. The man who has used his brain all his life, say for six hours a day, has, in fact, trained his nerve-power and placed it beyond the reach of early decay, or that kind of feebleness which makes so many apparently healthy men succumb so readily to attacks of disease. Doctors know the differences among men in this respect quite well, and many of them acknowledge that the “habit of surviving” which they find in their best patients arises from two causes—one, which used to be always pleaded, being that soundness of physical constitution which some men enjoy by hereditary right, and the other, some recondite form of brain-power, seldom exhibited, except under strong excitement, by any but those who throughout life have been compelled to think and, so to speak, use their thoughts as other men use their ligaments and muscles. If such a man is tired of life, medicine will not save him; but as a rule his will, consciously or unconsciously, compels the trained nerve-power to struggle on. Whether the brain can actually give power to the muscles is not certain, though the enormous strength sometimes developed in a last rally looks very like it; but that it can materially affect vitality is quite certain, and has been acknowledged by the experienced in all ages.—“The Speaker.”
Joh_4:35. Glorious harvest fields.—O glorious field of labour which presents itself to the Church of Christ to-day! “Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes,” etc. Behold, Christendom, all that extent of the vast heathen world which sighs for redemption from its miserable servitude! This is thy harvest field. Many a beautiful stretch of the field is already reaped; many weary reapers have already succumbed at their labour under sultry skies; many sheaves of ripened grain have been stored, amid songs of rejoicing throughout Christendom, in the barns of the Lord: but still the field stretches before us immeasurable; still millionfold the stalks bend to meet the reaper; still is prayer needed, and gifts, and labourers from the heart of Christendom for the wide harvest field. The harvest is great, and few are the labourers. But not alone without, over land and sea, but here in our own neighbourhood, is a harvest field for the Lord’s labourers. When we ministers of the gospel look from your fields and from your hills upon your cities, beneath whose roofs lurk so much sorrow and sin, yet also where dwell so many pious hearts, so many souls thirsting for salvation; or when here in the holy place we see gathered around us a believing congregation, then also it is as if we heard the Lord saying, “Behold your field, for it is white already to the harvest.” When among us a father and mother look on their children, then we say, “O parents, behold your harvest field!” And even although your circle of influence is limited, though it should be a narrow and a lonely chamber, though a widow’s small room should be your kingdom and your world, yet even there a rich harvest field may open before you, daily rich in resignation, in duty, and daily rich in blessing, if so be that you have but an open eye and a willing heart for the Lord’s work. “Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look!” It is necessary only to lift up the eyes and look, and each one among you will find in his or her circle opportunity, calls, powers, and gifts sufficient for the work of the Lord, for labour in truth and love. “Say not ye, There are yet four months,” etc. It is needful only to perceive the opportunity, to redeem the time, and every day will be for you a harvest day, every hour you can do some good, every evening you can bring home a sheaf of labour done in God, or at least an ear or two gathered for the heavenly garners. Let no one say, beloved: I would willingly endeavour to be useful, but I cannot do anything. I would willingly engage in good work, but I have no means, no opportunity, no field for effort. See, a true worker’s heart, a heart rich in love to the brethren, and burning with zeal for the Lord, will find ever for itself a field of labour, and will like a sunbeam find everywhere a door of entrance, an opening, a chink, through which to press in with its gracious light. The pious pastor Hiller, when he had for ever lost, through heavy sickness, his voice, formerly so beautiful and powerful, by which he had called so many souls to the Lord, and when he could no more occupy his beloved pulpit, and when it might have seemed that the voiceless pastor was now useless for the work of the Lord, sat day after day in his little room, or in his arbour, and composed to the harp, with a heart like David’s, bruised and anguished, and wrote the many hundreds of sacred songs which he gathered together in his “Jewel Box,” and through which he still preaches to-day to many thousands of hearts. Thus a true servant of God will at all times find a field of labour, and when one door is closed to him another will be opened. And what need we of further witness? Behold the Great Servant of God in our Gospel. Who prompted Him to preach a sermon at Jacob’s well? Who appointed Him to be a minister of truth to the Samaritans? Who had assigned to Him the field of Samaria, that strange and hostile land, to be His harvest field? Who had opened the gates of Sychar to Him, a Jew according to the flesh? His own heart alone—His heart burning with zeal for the Father’s honour, and glowing lovingly with desire for the salvation of His brethren. To you Christians I will not say, “Go and do likewise,” for who could do like as He, the Only Begotten, did? But from Jacob’s well the Lord calls to us also: “Lift up your eyes, and look on the field, your field of labour, which is ripe unto the harvest.” And Hiller also calls to us, and says, “Brethren, let as still do good, and in well-doing not be weary.” None need want a field of labour. Therefore
“Rise—to worldwide harvests speed!
The whitening fields stretch on and on.
Few the labourers are indeed,
But great the work that must be done.”
Translated from Karl Gerok.
Joh_4:36. Reaping after many days in joy.—On the eastern shore of Virginia there stands to-day one of the few beautiful old homesteads of the past. Its fences are in repair. Its beautiful lawn, shaded by magnificent trees, is in perfect order. It bears still the name given by its founder. Its broad acres remain intact in the hands of the same family to-day that held it in the past century. The neighbours are proud of its name and beauty, and they love to tell the story of its founder. They say he was a man of noted character in his day. In a certain year there was a great famine in the whole country. Corn sold at three and four dollars a bushel, and was difficult to get at that price. The great barns of this farm groaned beneath the burden of an unusually large crop from the previous year. What did the owner of these great barns and broad acres do in this crisis of the people? Did he put his men to work, dig vaults, hide his grain, and then stand at the gate with a sad smile, and swear by heaven and earth that he didn’t have a nubbin? No! He placed his men at the doors of his barns with this instruction: “If a rich man comes to buy my corn with money, do not sell him a grain, no matter what price he may offer. When a poor man comes who has no money, let him have as much as he needs at last year’s price, and take promise to pay!” Merchants offered him fabulous prices for his store that they might speculate in the necessities of their fellows. He would not sell them a peck. He sold to the poor for their promise to pay, and his children’s children are not done reaping the golden harvest. As the old inhabitant passes the gate that leads to the great clump of trees that marks this garden spot of humanity, it is no wonder that he tells you the story with moist eyes, and adds with evident satisfaction, “It’s still the handsomest place in the county.” Such places will always be garden spots. Such men have always been and ever will be the salt of the earth.—Rev. T. Dixon in the “Christian.”
Joh_4:38. Self-denying labour for Christ’s harvest.—About a year ago an old resident in a hospital, who had, about ten years previously, bought for himself, for a fixed sum, an asylum in a poor-house, came to a Saxon clergyman and told him that, feeling his end was near, he now wished to carry out to completion what he had for long contemplated, and of which no one knew anything. He had no near relatives, and it had long been his desire to contribute something toward the upbuilding of God’s kingdom. He had therefore lived as sparingly as possible, had curtailed his wants as much as he could, and by laying aside even the smallest coins, had gradually gathered a little sum, which he had intended to devote to the East India Mission. Finally he desired the minister to draw out his declaration formally in writing, and enter it on the last page of his savings-bank book which the minister did, the pensioner subscribing to it in his own hand. This man had been in former years a simple workman, and was known to the pastor as a pious Christian and a regular attender at divine worship. Shortly before his death he once more sent for the clergyman to visit him, and handed over to him his savings-bank book, requesting that it should be forwarded to the proper address, which was done. At the same time the pastor wrote: “It is touching to think how this one thought occupied and moved him during long years, and how he had laboured with this one aim in view until his end, as is evidently the case from an inspection of his savings-bank book.” The donation amounts to 1,760 marks. In the last will and testament of the man, who soon thereafter peacefully “fell on sleep,” which was written on the last page of the bank book, the following sentences occur: “It is a heartfelt joy to me to be able to do something for my Saviour, since He has done all things for me—redeemed me, made me a child of God, brought me to a lively hope in life and in death. I hold that the highest duty of a Christian man is to spread abroad His kingdom; for Christianity alone can bring salvation to the world.
‘Peace ne’er shall reign o’er all the world
Till Jesus’ love gain victory meet,
And, ’neath the gospel flag unfurled,
All men shall bow down at His feet.’
In my estimation far too little is done for the noblest of all works of love—for mission work. I would earnestly seek to prove that even a plain man without personal means can certainly contribute something toward the upbuilding of God’s kingdom, if only the will to do so exists. For this purpose I have laboured, laid up, saved for many years. My name is not to be made known. I seek not my own honour, but that of Christ. May He graciously accept the thankoffering which I bring to Him, and in the end deliver me from all evil, and bring me safe into His heavenly kingdom.” So far the simple but heart-touching testament of this departed brother. It is like the odour of the precious Indian nard which was poured out on Jesus’ feet and filled all the house. Who does not, on reading it, feel deeply ashamed? What say you to yourself, dear reader?—From the “Evangel. Luther. Missionsblatt.”
Joh_4:47-49. Men should make their requests known directly to God.—It is related that a Scottish Roman Catholic nobleman had on his estate a Protestant tenant, who, in a season of depression, was in arrears for a considerable sum. He felt himself obliged to turn for help first to one of the under-officials of the nobleman, asking him to plead with the latter for some alleviation. The official promised, but did not perform. Thereupon he went to a higher official with the same request, who also promised, but did as little as the other. Finally, the twice-deceived peasant summoned courage to approach the proprietor personally. The latter remitted the whole amount of the debt, and accompanied his tenant, as he was departing, through the great hall of the castle, on the side walls of which were hung the pictures of martyrs and saints. “Do you know,” said the nobleman, “what those paintings represent?” “No,” said the peasant. “They are pictures of the saints whom I pray to, so that they may make request for me before the Lord for the forgiveness of my sins,” was the answer. “But why do you not go to the Lord of all Himself with your requests?” said the peasant simply. “Oh,” replied the nobleman, “that would be to take too much on myself! It is far better to have mediators like the saints between God and men.” “I don’t think so,” replied the other; “and I’ll show you why. In my distress I turned first to your under-official. It was of no avail. Next I went to the higher official, who promised to do something, and did nothing. In the end I came to yon personally, and you have remitted all my debt.”
Joh_4:49. Earnest prayer answered.—We read of Princess Louisa Augusta Magdalene of Darmstadt, that in the year 1741, falling into a grievous illness, she herself, like all about her, was entirely doubtful as to her recovery. As she was told that she could hardly survive over the night, she called the pious minister Fresenius to her bedside, spoke with him concerning the condition of her soul, and declared she would willingly depart hence, but that she had not yet made her peace with God, and felt in her heart no assurance of His grace and the forgiveness of her sins. Therefore, and on this account only, she desired to live a little longer. And since the Lord heard Hezekiah, such a prayer must not be displeasing to Him. Fresenius was convinced of this also, and prayed with her to the Lord that her life might be spared until she had received the witness of the Spirit in her heart, of grace and pardon. In these petitions the members of Fresenius’ household and other pious friends joined together. Their prayers were graciously answered. In a few hours the physician was able to give assurance that the crisis was past; the next day the improvement was much more marked, and the patient was full of praise to God for His grace and help. Her life was spared until the following year, when she passed into the presence of the Lord, saved and assured of her reconciliation.—J. J. Weigel.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv6, 7, 10, 14, 26, 32 Joh 4:6, Joh 4:32.
John
THE WEARIED CHRIST
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Joh 4:6, Joh 4:32.
Two pictures result from these two verses, each striking in itself, and gaining additional emphasis by the contrast. It was during a long hot day’s march that the tired band of pedestrians turned into the fertile valley. There, whilst the disciples went into the little hill-village to purchase, if they could, some food from the despised inhabitants, Jesus, apparently too exhausted to accompany them, ‘sat thus on the well.’ That little word thus seems to have a force difficult to reproduce in English. It is apparently intended to enhance the idea of utter weariness, either because the word ‘wearied’ is in thought to be supplied, ‘sat, being thus wearied, on the well’; or because it conveys the notion which might be expressed by our ‘just as He was’; as a tired man flings Himself down anywhere and anyhow, without any kind of preparation beforehand, and not much caring where it is that he rests.
Thus, utterly worn out, Jesus Christ sits on the well, whilst the western sun lengthens out the shadows on the plain. The disciples come back, and what a change they find. Hunger gone, exhaustion ended, fresh vigour in their wearied Master. What had made the difference? The woman’s repentance and joy. And He unveils the secret of His reinvigoration when He says, ‘I have meat to eat that ye know not of’-the hidden manna. ‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.’
Now, I think if we take just three points of view, we shall gain the lessons of this remarkable contrast. Note, then, the wearied Christ; the devoted Christ; the reinvigorated Christ.
I. The wearied Christ.
How precious it is to us that this Gospel, which has the loftiest things to say about the manifest divinity of our Lord, and the glory that dwelt in Him, is always careful to emphasise also the manifest limitations and weaknesses of the Manhood. John never forgets either term of his great sentence in which all the gospel is condensed, ‘the Word became flesh.’ Ever he shows us ‘the Word’; ever ‘the flesh.’ Thus it is he only who records the saying on the Cross, ‘I thirst.’ It is he who tells us how Jesus Christ, not merely for the sake of getting a convenient opening of a conversation, or to conciliate prejudices, but because He needed what He asked, said to the woman of Samaria, ‘Give Me to drink.’ So the weariness of the Master stands forth for us as pathetic proof that it was no shadowy investiture with an apparent Manhood to which He stooped, but a real participation in our limitations and weaknesses, so that work to Him was fatigue, even though in Him dwelt the manifest glory of that divine nature which ‘fainteth not, neither is weary.’
Not only does this pathetic incident teach us for our firmer faith, and more sympathetic and closer apprehension, the reality of the Manhood of Jesus Christ, but it supplies likewise some imperfect measure of His love, and reveals to us one condition of His power. Ah! if He had not Himself known weariness He never could have said, ‘Come unto Me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.’ It was because Himself ‘took our infirmities,’ and amongst these the weakness of tired muscles and exhausted frame, that ‘He giveth power to the faint, and to them that have no might He increaseth strength.’ The Creator must have no share in the infirmities of the creature. It must be His unwearied power that calls them all by their names; and because He is great in might ‘not one’ of the creatures of His hand can ‘fail.’ But the Redeemer must participate in that from which He redeems; and the condition of His strength being ‘made perfect in our weakness’ is that our weakness shall have cast a shadow upon the glory of His strength. The measure of His love is seen in that, long before Calvary, He entered into the humiliation and sufferings and sorrows of humanity; a condition of His power is seen in that, forasmuch as the ‘children were partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same,’ not only that ‘through death He might deliver’ from death, but that in life He might redeem from the ills and sorrows of life.
Nor does that exhausted Figure, reclining on Jacob’s Well, preach to us only what He was. It proclaims to us likewise what we should be. For if His work was carried on to the edge of His capacity, and if He shrank not from service because it involved toil, what about the professing followers of Jesus Christ, who think that they are exempted from any form of service because they can plead that it will weary them? What about those who say that they tread in His footsteps, and have never known what it was to yield up one comfort, one moment of leisure, one thrill of enjoyment, or to encounter one sacrifice, one act of self-denial, one aching of weariness for the sake of the Lord who bore all for them? The wearied Christ proclaims His manhood, proclaims His divinity and His love, and rebukes us who consent to ‘walk in the way of His commandments’ only on condition that it can be done without dust or heat; and who are ready to run the race that is set before us, only if we can come to the goal without perspiration or turning a hair. ‘Jesus, being wearied with His journey, sat thus on the well.’
II. Still further, notice here the devoted Christ.
It is not often that He lets us have a glimpse into the innermost chambers of His heart, in so far as the impelling motives of His course are concerned. But here He lays them bare. ‘My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.’
Now, it is no mere piece of grammatical pedantry when I ask you to notice that the language of the original is so constructed as to give prominence to the idea that the aim of Christ’s life was the doing of the Father’s will; and that it is the aim rather than the actual performance and realisation of the aim which is pointed at by our Lord. The words would be literally rendered ‘My meat is that I may do the will of Him that sent Me and finish His work’-that is to say, the very nourishment and refreshment of Christ was found in making the accomplishment of the Father’s commandment His ever-impelling motive, His ever-pursued goal. The expression carries us into the inmost heart of Jesus, dealing, as it does, with the one all-pervading motive rather than with the resulting actions, fair and holy as these were.
Brethren, the secret of our lives, if they are at all to be worthy and noble, must be the same-the recognition, not only as they say now, that we have a mission, but that there is a Sender; which is a wholly different view of our position, and that He who sends is the loving Father, who has spoken to us in that dear Son, who Himself made it His aim thus to obey, in order that it might be possible for us to re-echo His voice, and to repeat His aim. The recognition of the Sender, the absolute submission of our wills to His, must run through all the life. You may do your daily work, whatever it be, with this for its motto, ‘the will of the Lord be done’; and they who thus can look at their trade, or profession, and see the trivialities and monotonies of their daily occupations, in the transfiguring light of that great thought, will never need to complain that life is small, ignoble, wearisome, insignificant. As with pebbles in some clear brook with the sunshine on it, the water in which they are sunk glorifies and magnifies them. If you lift them out, they are but bits of dull stone; lying beneath the sunlit ripples they are jewels. Plunge the prose of your life, and all its trivialities, into that great stream, and it will magnify and glorify the smallest and the homeliest. Absolute submission to the divine will, and the ever-present thrilling consciousness of doing it, were the secret of Christ’s life, and ought to be the secret of ours.
Note the distinction between doing the will and perfecting the work. That implies that Jesus Christ, like us, reached forward, in each successive act of obedience to the successive manifestations of the Father’s will, to something still undone. The work will never be perfected or finished except on condition of continual fulfilment, moment by moment, of the separate behests of that divine will. For the Lord, as for His servants, this was the manner of obedience, that He ‘pressed towards the mark,’ and by individual acts of conformity secured that at last the whole ‘work’ should have been so completely accomplished that He might be able to say upon the Cross, ‘It is finished.’ If we have any right to call ourselves His, we too have thus to live.
III. Lastly, notice the reinvigorated Christ.
I have already pointed out the lovely contrast between the two pictures, the beginning and the end of this incident; so I need not dwell upon that. The disciples wondered when they found that Christ desired and needed none of the homely sustenance that they had brought to Him. And when He answered their sympathy rather than their curiosity-for they did not ask Him any questions, but they said to Him, ‘Master, eat’-with ‘I have meat to eat that ye know not of,’ they, in their blind, blundering fashion, could only imagine that some one had brought Him something. So they gave occasion for the great words upon which we have been touching.
Notice, however, that Christ here sets forth the lofty aim at conformity to the divine will and fulfilment of the divine Work as being the meat of the soul. It is the true food for us all. The spirit which feeds upon such food will grow and be nourished. And the soul which feeds upon its own will and fancies, and not upon the plain brown bread of obedience, which is wholesome, though it be often bitter, will feed upon ashes, which will grate upon the teeth and hurt the palate. Such a soul will be like those wretched infants that are discovered sometimes at ‘baby-farms,’ starved and stunted, and not grown to half their right size. If you would have your spirits strong, robust, well nourished, live by obedience, and let the will of God be the food of your souls, and all will be well.
Souls thus fed can do without a good deal that others need. Why, enthusiasm for anything lifts a man above physical necessities and lower desires, even in its poorest forms. A regiment of soldiers making a forced march, or an athlete trying to break the record, will tramp, tramp on, not needing food, or rest, or sleep, until they have achieved their purpose, poor and ignoble though it may be. In all regions of life, enthusiasm and lofty aims make the soul lord of the body and of the world.
And in the Christian life we shall be thus lords, exactly in proportion to the depth and earnestness of our desires to do the will of God. They who thus are fed can afford ‘to scorn delights and live laborious days.’ They who thus are fed can afford to do with plain living, if there be high impulses as well as high thinking. And sure I am that nothing is more certain to stamp out the enthusiasm of obedience which ought to mark the Christian life than the luxurious fashion of living which is getting so common to-day amongst professing Christians.
It is not in vain that we read the old story about the Jewish boys whose faces were radiant and whose flesh was firmer when they were fed on pulse and water than on all the wine and dainties of the Babylonish court. ‘Set a knife to thy throat if thou be a man given to appetite,’ and let us remember that the less we use, and the less we feel that we need, of outward goods, the nearer do we approach to the condition in which holy desires and lofty aims will visit our spirits.
I commend to you, brethren, the story of our text, in its most literal application, as well as in the loftier spiritual lessons that may be drawn from it. To be near Christ, and to desire to live for Him, delivers us from dependence upon earthly things; and in those who thus do live the old word shall be fulfilled, ‘Better is a little that a righteous man hath, than the abundance of many wicked.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On v5 J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [XXVI. B. At…
J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [XXVI. B. At Jacob's Well].
XXVI. JESUS SETS OUT FROM JUDÆA FOR GALILEE. Subdivision B. AT JACOB'S WELL, AND AT SYCHAR. dJOHN IV. 5-42.
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d5 So he cometh to a city of Samaria, called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6 and Jacob's well was there. [Commentators long made the mistake of supposing that Shechem, now called Nablous, was the town here called Sychar. Sheckem lies a mile and a half west of Jacob's well, while the real Sychar, now called 'Askar, lies scarcely half a mile north of the well. It was a small town, loosely called a city, and adjoined the land which Jacob gave to Joseph ( Gen_33:19, Gen_47:22, Jos_24:32), Joseph's tomb being about one hundred yards east of it. The mummy of Joseph, carried out of Egypt at the time of the Exodus, was buried in this parcel of ground, and there is but little doubt that it really rests in the place indicated by the tomb; and though the name Sychar may be derived from the words "liar" or "drunkard," it is more likely that it means "town of the sepulchre," referring to this tomb. The Old Testament is silent as to when or why Jacob dug this well. It lies on the southern side of the valley of Shechem, where it opens upon [141] the plain of Moreh (now called el-Mukhnah), about a hundred yards south of the foot of Mt. Gerizim. It is one of the few Biblical sites about which there is no dispute, and probably the only place on earth where one can draw a circle of a few feet, and say confidently that the feet of Christ have stood within the circumference. Maundrell, who visited it in 1697, said that it was 105 feet deep, and had in it fifteen feet of water. But travelers have thrown stones into it to sound its depth, until at present it is only sixty-six feet deep, and has no water in it except in very wet winters. It is seven and half feet in diameter, and is walled with masonry to a depth of about ten feet, below which it is cut through the solid rock. It lies 400 nearly due south from Joseph's tomb. As the neighborhood abounds in springs, the well would hardly have been dug save by one who wished to be independent of his neighbors--as Jacob did.] Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus by the well. [John gives us important items as to the humanity of Jesus. He tells us how he sat as a wayworn traveler, hungry and thirsty, at Jacob's well; and he alone records the words, "I thirst," spoken on the cross ( Joh_19:28). The top of the well is arched over like a cistern, and a round opening is left about twenty inches in diameter. On this arch or curbing Jesus sat. We should note the perpetuity of blessings which springs from a good deed. Gutenberg did not foresee the newspaper when he invented printing; Columbus did not anticipate the land of the free when he led discoverers to our shore, nor is it likely that the prophetic eye of Jacob ever saw the wearied Christ resting upon the well-curb which he was building.] It was about the sixth hour. [That is, twelve o'clock, if we reckon by Jewish time, or six o'clock in the evening, if we reckon by the Roman method. We prefer the latter method.] 7 There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water [She was not of the city of Samaria (which was then called Sebaste--the Greek word for Augustus--in honor of Augustus Cæsar, who had given it to Herod the Great), but a woman of the province of Samaria, which [142] lay between Judæa and Galilee, and reached from the Jordan on the east to the Mediterranean on the west, comprising the country formerly occupied by the tribe of Ephraim and the half tribe of Manasseh]: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. 8 For his disciples were gone away into the city to buy food. [Had the disciples been present they would have bargained with the woman for the use of her rope and pitcher; but in their absence Jesus himself asked her for a drink. He met her on the ground of a common humanity, and conceded to her the power of conferring a favor. Women have been immemorially the water-carriers in the East ( Gen_24:13, Gen_24:14, Exo_2:16). Palestine is in summer a parched land, inducing intense thirst, and the people usually comply cheerfully with the request for water; it was probably so in Jesus' day ( Mat_10:42). Mohammed commanded that water should never be refused.] 9 The Samaritan woman therefore saith unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew [as his language and dress declared], askest drink of me, whom am a Samaritan woman? (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) [It is not likely that she meant to refuse his request, but she yielded to the temptation to banter one who she thought despised her, and whose necessities now caused him for a moment to forget his pride. The ancestors of the Samaritans were introduced into the land of Israel by the king of Assyria, after he led the ten tribes into captivity ( 2Ki_17:24-41). When the Jews returned from their captivity in Babylon and began to rebuild their temple, the Samaritans asked permission to build with them, and when this was refused, an enmity arose between the two people which never died out ( Ezr_4:1-5, Neh_2:10, Neh_2:19, Neh_4:1-3). We must, however, restrict the word "dealings" to social intercourse. Race antipathy did not ordinarily interfere with trade or other matters involving money, as is shown by Joh_3:16, 2Co_9:15). But she knew not that God had bestowed a special Gift, and much less that the one to whom she spoke was that Gift. Had she known she would have understood that though physically Jesus was the object of her charity, spiritually their cases were reversed, and she was the needy one, as Jesus intimates. Living water would mean literally "running" or "spring water," as contrasted with still or cistern water ( Gen_26:19, Lev_14:5). Jesus here uses it in the spiritual sense. He fills us with his grace and truth ( Joh_1:14) and grants unto us continual, untold refreshing ( Rev_7:17). The reviving and regenerating effects of the Holy Spirit are likewise called living water ( Joh_7:37-39).] 11 The woman saith unto him, Sir [the word "Sir" is elsewhere translated "Lord"], thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: whence then hast thou that living water? [She understood his words literally, and was puzzled by them; but, won by the courtesy which suggested an exchange of gifts, she answered respectfully, though incredulously.] 12 Art thou greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his sons, and his cattle? [We should note three points in this verse: 1. The greatness of Jesus. The woman had just called him "Lord." The man at Bethesda, though he knew not Jesus, afterwards did the same ( Joh_5:7). People felt the majesty and dignity of Jesus. When he offered to give a greater blessing than that given by Jacob, the woman at once contrasted him with Jacob--Jacob with sons and cattle and wealth--and wondered if this lonely [144] stranger could really imagine himself greater than the illustrious patriarch. 2. She claimed descent from Jacob; it was a false claim. Jesus classed the Samaritans with Gentiles ( Mat_10:5), and spoke of them as strangers or aliens ( Luk_17:18). 3. She spoke of the well as given by Jacob. She meant that it had been given to Joseph ( Gen_48:22), and that her people had inherited it as descendants of Joseph.] 13 Jesus answered and said unto her, Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst again: 14 but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst [Jesus here draws a contrast between earthly and heavenly blessings. No worldly joy gives lasting satisfaction, but Jesus is the bread and water of life to his disciples ( Joh_6:35) their unfailing satisfaction]; but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springing up unto eternal life. [A beautiful figure of the joy in Christ. In heat, in cold; in drought, in shower; in prosperity, in adversity; it still springs up, cheering and refreshing the soul, and this unto all eternity-- Rev_7:17, Rev_21:6.] 15 The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come all the way hither to draw. [She but dimly comprehended the nature of Christ's offer, but was persuaded of two things: 1. The wonderful water was to be desired. 2. Jesus was able and willing to give it. When she spoke of coming "to draw" her words suggested the household to which it was her duty to minister, and prepared the way for the command of Jesus to bring the head of the household.] 16 Jesus saith unto her, Go, call thy husband, and come hither. [She had asked Jesus for the water of God's grace, but she needed to be made conscious of how much she needed it--conscious (if we follow the figure) of her dormant thirst. Jesus, therefore, gave command to call her husband, that by so doing he might reveal her life and waken her to repentance.] 17 The woman answered and said unto him, I have no husband. Jesus saith unto her, Thou saidst well, I have no husband: 18 for [145] thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now has is not thy husband: this hast thou said truly. [The divine wisdom of Jesus brought to light a sad state of affairs. During the period of five marriages the woman's life had at least some outward show of respectability, but now it was professedly unclean. The number of marriages reflects somewhat upon the character of the woman, and hints that some of them may have been dissolved by her own fault, though the loose divorce law of that age permitted a man to dissolve the marriage ties on very slight provocation. Among the Jews the great Hillel is reported to have said that a man might properly divorce his wife if she burnt his dinner while cooking. It is not likely that any higher ideals of matrimony obtained among the Samaritans.] 19 The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. [She had heard of the miraculous knowledge of the Jewish prophets, and this evidence given her by Jesus persuaded her that he was one of them, as a like evidence had persuaded Nathanael ( Joh_1:48, Joh_1:49). By thus calling him a prophet she virtually confessed the truth as to all the things concerning which he had accused her.] 20 Our fathers worshipped in this mountain [i. e., Mt. Gerizim]; and ye [ye Jews] say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. [Though a desire to divert the conversation from her own sins may have, in some slight measure, prompted the woman to bring up this question about places of worship, yet her main motive must have been far higher. If we ourselves stood in the presence of one whom we felt assured to be fully inspired of God, how hastily would we propound to him some of the vexed questions which befog the religion of our time! Prompted by such a feeling, this woman sought to have the great dispute between Jew and Samaritan decided. Solomon's temple in Jerusalem was soon after its erection confronted by those who denied its claims to be exclusively the place set apart for divine worship. Jeroboam, the rebellious servant of Solomon, taught the people that Bethel and Dan were as acceptable for worship as Jerusalem. But [146] Jerusalem, as the site of the first great temple, held precedence above all rivals until its claims were discredited in popular estimation by the fact that it was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. When, after many years, the returning captives rebuilt its walls, it lacked the sanction of age, and it had lost many of the features of divine recognition, which contributed to the sacredness and grandeur of the first structure. Soon after its erection in the days of Nehemiah, Manasseh, son of the high priest Joiada, and brother of the high priest Jonathan ( Neh_12:10, Neh_12:11, Neh_13:28), married to the daughter of Sanballat, Persian governor of Samaria. Refusing to dissolve this marriage at the decree of the governor of Jerusalem, Manasseh was chased by Nehemiah from Jerusalem, and his father-in-law made him high priest of the Samaritans, and undertook to build for him the temple which afterwards crowned the summit of Mt. Gerizim. Manasseh left Jerusalem about B. C. 332. The temple built for him was destroyed by John Hyrcanus about B. C. 129, but the place where it stood was still the sacred center of Samaritan worship, as it is to this day. Mt. Gerizim, and its supporting city of Shechem, had many grounds on which to base their claims to be a sacred locality: 1, Here God appeared to Abraham for the first time after his entering Canaan ( Gen_12:6, Gen_12:7); 2, here Jacob first dwelt ( Gen_33:18); 3, here Joseph came seeking his brethren ( Gen_37:12, Gen_37:13); 4, here was a city of refuge ( Jos_20:7-9); 5, here Joshua read the blessings and cursings ( Jos_8:33); 6, here also he gave his last address ( Jos_24:1); 7, here were buried the bones of Joseph ( Jos_24:32), and the neighborhood was prominent at the time of the division of the ten tribes ( 1Ki_12:1, 1Ki_12:25). If we may consider Samaritan traditions of that day as similar to those of the present, they had added greatly to the real importance of the neighborhood, for they now contend that 1, Paradise was on the summit of Gerizim; 2, Adam was formed of the dust of Gerizim; 3, on Gerizim Adam reared his first altar; 4, Seth here reared his first altar; 5, Gerizim was the Ararat on which the Ark rested, and the only spot which the flood did [147] not overflow; and therefore the only place which escaped the defilement of dead bodies; 6, on it Noah reared his altar; 7, here Abraham attempted to offer Isaac; 8, here he met Melchizedek; 9, here was the real Bethel, where Jacob slept and saw his ladder vision. Backed by such high claims, the woman deemed it possible that this prophet might decide in favor of Samaria's holy place. We should note that the Samaritans worshiped in Mt. Gerizim because they could say, "Our fathers did so." Thus many errors are perpetuated to-day because our fathers practiced them; but our fathers had no more authority to alter or amend God's word than we have. The Jews worshiped in Jerusalem because it had been prophesied that God would select a spot as the peculiar place for his worship ( Deu_12:5-11), and because according to this prophecy God had selected Mt. Moriah in Jerusalem-- 1Ki_9:3, 2Ch_3:1, 2Ch_3:2.] 21 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father. [Jesus uses the word "hour" to indicate that the time was near at hand when all religious distinctions as to places would be abolished, and when every spot might be used for purposes of worship-- 1Ti_2:8.] 22 Ye worship that which ye know not: we worship that which we know. For salvation is from the Jews. [Jesus here speaks as a Jew, and draws a comparison between the intelligent worship of his people and the ignorant worship of the Samaritans. Though the Samaritans possessed the Pentateuch, they were without the revelation of God which the prophets of Israel had developed, and their worship was neither authorized nor accredited by God. Moreover, it led toward nothing; for salvation was evolved from the Jewish religion, and not from that of Samaria. Salvation proceeded from the Jews. From them, according to the flesh, Christ came, and from them came also the prophets, apostles, and inspired writers who have given us that full knowledge of salvation which we possess to-day. We must take the words of Jesus as referring rather to the two religions than to the [148] two peoples. Though as a body the Jews did not know whom they worshiped, and though their teachers were blind leaders of the blind, yet the fault was in their unbelief, and not in the revelation or religion in which they refused to believe. On the contrary, if the Samaritans had believed his religion to the full, it would hardly have been sufficient to have enabled him to know what he worshiped. Samaria was, in the days of idolatry of Israel, a chief seat of Baal worship, and in later days it was the home of magicians and sorcerers.] 23 But the hour cometh, and now is [the hour is really here, but the knowledge of it is not yet comprehended], When the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth: for such doth the Father seek to be his worshippers. [Jesus draws the mind of the woman from the place of worship to the Person or Being worshiped, and from the form to the spirit of worship. God seeks for genuine and not formal worshipers, and for those who worship him in truth; i. e., those who render him the obedience of faith with a filial spirit, and not those who render him the empty service of types and shadows, ceremonies and rites, which, through disbelief, have lost their meaning.] 24 God is a Spirit [These words contain one of the most simple, yet most profound, truths which ever fell upon mortal ear. Their truth is one of the great glories of revelation, and corrects the mistaken conclusion of human reason. They show that 1, God is absolutely free from all limitations of space and time, and is therefore not to be localized in temples ( Act_7:48); 2, that God is not material, as idolaters contend; 3, that he is not an abstract force, as scientists think, but a Being; 4, that he is lifted above all need of temples, sacrifices, etc., which are a benefit to man, but not to God ( Act_17:25). Spiritual excellence raises man above the beast, and spiritual excellence in turn raises God above man-- Isa_31:3]: and they that worship him must worship in spirit and truth. [That is, men must offer a worship corresponding with the nature and attributes of God.] 25 The woman saith unto him, I know that Messiah cometh (he [149] that is called Christ): when he is come, he will declare unto us all things. [The breadth and largeness of Jesus' teaching suggested to her the great Teacher who was to come, and caused her to yearn for him who could tell, as she thought, perhaps even larger things. The Samaritans justified their idea of a coming Benefactor by passages found in the Pentateuch, and got their name for him from the Jews. Relying on the prophecy found at Deu_18:18, modern Samaritans regard the Messiah as a returning Moses, calling him El-Mudy--the Guide. They contend that his name will begin with M, and that he will live to be 120 years old. This woman's idea of the Messiah was probably also very crude, but it was in part an improvement on the general Jewish conception, for it regarded him as a teacher rather than a world-conquering, earthly prince.] 26 Jesus saith unto her, I that speak to thee am i he. [This is the first recorded declaration of his Messiahship made by Jesus. He was not confessed to be Messiah by Simon Peter ( Mat_16:16) till the last year of his ministry. Jesus spoke more freely as to his office in Samaria than in Judæa or Galilee; for, 1, the Samaritans would make no effort to take him by force and make him a king ( Joh_6:15); 2, his short stay in Samaria justified an explicit and brief revelation.] 27 And upon this came his disciples; and they marvelled that he was speaking with a woman. [The spirit of the Rabbis is shown by their later precept; viz.: "Let no one talk with a woman in the street, no, not with his own wife." The estate of woman was then, and had been for a long time previous, very low. Socrates thanked the gods daily that he was born neither a slave nor a woman. Roman law gave the husband absolute authority over the wife, even to put her to death; and Jewish contempt for women is made apparent by the readiness with which the Jews divorced them]; yet no man said, What seekest thou? or, Why speakest thou with her? [So deep was their reverence and respect that they did not question, though they did not understand.] 28 So the woman left her waterpot [in the forgetfulness [150] of great joy, and as the unconscious pledge of her return], and went away into the city [Sychar], and saith to the people, 29 Come, see a man, who told me all things that i ever I did [To publish Christ is one of the first impulses of those who feel Christ's gracious power. Her invitation is like that given by Philip ( Joh_1:46). On second thought her statement is not so much of an exaggeration as it at first appears. Her five marriages and present state covered the whole period of her maturer life, and the way in which Jesus had disclosed it all convinced her that every detail of it was spread out before him]: can this be the Christ? [Her question does not imply that she herself had any doubts about the matter. She uses the interrogative form because she does not wish to be dogmatic, but prefers to let the people judge for themselves. Observe the woman's change of mind concerning Jesus. She first called him "Jew" ( Joh_4:9), then "Sir" ( Joh_4:11), then "prophet" ( Joh_4:19), and now she invites her city to come forth and see "the Christ."] 30 They went out of the city, and were coming to him. 31 In the meanwhile [the time between the departure of the woman and the arrival of her fellow-townsmen] the disciples prayed him, saying, Rabbi, eat. 32 But he said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of. 33 The disciples therefore said one to another, Hath any man brought him i aught to eat? [They understood his words literally, as a declaration that he had dined.] 34 Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to accomplish his work. [His delight at the woman's conversion, as a part of the work which his Father had given him to do, overcame for a time his desire for food. Food has several characteristics: 1. enjoyment; 2. satisfaction of desire; 3. refreshment and strength. God's work had these characteristics to Jesus, whose life fulfilled the principle that man shall not live by bread alone.] 35 Say not ye, There are yet four months, and i then cometh the harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields, that they are white [151] already unto harvest. [Jacob's well overlooked the luxuriant grainfields of the plain of Moreh. As the disciples looked abroad over its patches of varying green, they would say that it would yet be four months before these patches could be harvested. The harvests in the natural world are slow. But turning their eyes toward Sychar, the disciples could see the citizens of the town in their white garments pouring forth to see Jesus, and to be gathered by him as a harvest of disciples which had sprung up and ripened from the seeds of truth sown by the woman but a few moments before. Spiritual sowing brings speedy harvests. Some commentators look upon the words of Jesus as proverbial, but there is no proverb extant which places only four months between sowing and reaping. In Palestine this period covers six months. We must, therefore, take the words of Jesus as a plain statement as to the length of time between the date of his speaking and the date of harvest. Harvest begins about the middle of April, and counting back four months from that date we find that this visit to Sychar occurred somewhere about the middle of December.] 36 He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal: that he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. [Harvest times were seasons of great joy ( Deu_16:13-15, Psa_126:6, Isa_9:3). But the joy of joys shall come when God gathers his redeemed into the heavenly garner. In this present the humble teacher sows and the evangelist, or more gifted brother, reaps; but in that glad hour it shall matter little whether we have been a sower or a reaper, for we shall all rejoice together. Sower and reaper alike shall receive wages, a part of which shall be the "fruit" gathered--the souls saved. Jesus regarded gaining a brother as a large compensation, a great gain-- Mat_18:15.] 37 For herein is the saying true [see Isa_65:21, Isa_65:22, Lev_26:16, Job_31:8, Mic_6:15], One soweth, and another reapeth. 38 I sent you to reap [Christ, as Lord of the harvest, sent both sowers and reapers] that whereon ye have not labored: others have labored, and ye are entered into [152] their labor. [In earlier days many prophets and holy men had labored to prepare the people of Palestine, that they might be gathered of Christ as disciples. Later John the Baptist had wrought a mighty work toward this same end. Into a field thus sown and cultivated Jesus was now leading his apostles, that they might reap for him the ripened harvest. He bids them observe the speedy and easy reaping on this occasion as an encouraging example to them, that they may go forth with strong assurance and confidence. Even the minds of the Samaritans were prepared to receive him, and a quick harvest could be gathered among them.] 39 And from that city many of the Samaritans believed on him because of the word of the woman, who testified, He told me all things that i ever I did. [The Jews rejected the testimony of the prophets and holy men of God as recorded in the Scripture ( Joh_5:46, Joh_5:47), but the Samaritans accepted the testimony of this woman, and she was a sinner.] 40 So when the Samaritans came unto him, they besought him to abide with them: and he abode there two days. ["His own" received him not, but these "strangers" welcomed him. The stay was brief, but long enough to prepare the way for a future church among the Samaritans in the neighboring city of Samaria ( Act_8:5-8). From the nearer town of Shechem came Justin Martyr, one of the greatest Christian writers of the second century.] 41 And many more believed because of his word: 42 and they said to the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy speaking: for we have heard for ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world. [Only such ready hearers could arrive at so great a truth in so short a time. Wealth of revelation and blessing had made the Jews selfish, and their conception of the Messiah was so perverted by this selfishness that they could not conceive of him as being a world Saviour. Thus wealth often dwarfs where it should rather enlarge the heart. The incident comprised in this section presents the expansiveness of Christianity in a threefold aspect; viz.: 1, we see it [153] breaking down the walls of racial prejudice; 2, we observe it elevating woman, and certifying her fitness to receive the very highest spiritual instruction; 3, we behold it lifting up the degraded and sinful, and supplying them from the fountains of grace. Such is real Christianity--the Christianity of Christ.]
[FFG 141-154]
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv22, 23, 24, 27, 42 (See Scofield "Rom 1:16")
salvation
(See Scofield "Rom 1:16")
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv7, 11, 16, 19, 25, 31, 39 The beginning of the conversation:
The beginning of the conversation:
v. 7. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus saith unto her, Give Me to drink.
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v. 8. (For His disciples were gone away unto the city to buy meat.)
v. 9. Then saith the woman of Samaria unto Him, How is it that Thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? For the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.
v. 10. Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give Me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of Him, and He would have given thee living water.
While Jesus was sitting there, exhausted, hungry, and thirsty, there came a Samaritan woman out of the city to draw water from the well, the work of the Oriental women to this day. Here was an opportunity to do work in the interest of saving a soul, and Jesus took good care to make use of the chance. He deliberately began a conversation with the woman, by asking her for a drink of water. Time and occasion were auspicious, since they were undisturbed, the disciples, as the evangelist notes, having gone to the city to buy food for the little company. The woman was surprised at the request of Jesus. In her astonishment she asks how it came about that He, of whom she could tell that He was a Jew, yet asked this favor of her who was a Samaritan. The evangelist explains this by saying that there was no communication between Jews and Samaritans, the hostility going so far as to exclude even all courtesies by the way. See Luk 9:53. But Jesus has no time for racial prejudices when there is a chance to speak of the heavenly wisdom. Instead of being surprised at the question, the woman should have turned right around and, on her own part, made a request. If she had any idea of the fact that the gift of God in the person and work of Jesus is free for all men; if she had an inkling of the beauty and glory of that gift; if she were aware of the identity of Him that had spoken to her, she would waste no time in idle. questions as to proprieties. She would have begged Him at once most urgently and eagerly, and He could and would have given her living water. Jesus here testifies of Himself, of His own person. Living water, in the spiritual sense, from Him, the fountain of life, a water to refresh the soul, a water that gives life. Christ’s Word and His salvation, which are given freely according to the grace and mercy of God, were here offered to the woman of Samaria. Incidentally, Jesus challenged the curiosity of the woman by emphasizing living water. The pool before them was probably rainwater, gathered here from the surrounding hills. But the water which He had in mind was far from being stagnant: it had life and strength in fullness.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv4, 6, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25, 27, 28, 31, 34, 37, 39, 41
translationWords
Samaria
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Jacob
Joseph (OT)
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv4, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 19, 20, 21, 24, 26, 27, 32, 35, 38, 39, 42 4:4-6 In going north to Galilee, Jesus took the…
4:4-6 In going north to Galilee, Jesus took the less-preferred route through Samaria. Samaria had a long history of tension with Judea (see 2 Kgs 17:24-41; Ezra 4:1-5; Neh 4; 6:1-19). In Jesus’ day, harsh racial and cultural conflict existed between Jews and Samaritans. Jews normally avoided Samaria by first going east to Jericho, then following the Jordan Valley north. • Sychar was probably in the region of Shechem. Jesus had come to Jacob’s well; Jacob had owned land near Shechem (Gen 33:18-19).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.