《Lange’s Commentary on the Holy Scriptures – John (Ch. 4~Ch. 8》(Johann P. Lange) 04 Chapter 4

Near to the parcel of ground that Jacob, etc.—The basis of the tradition is Genesis 33:19. Jacob buys of the children of Hamor a field in Shechem on which to settle. The passage, Genesis 48:22, is to be regarded as a prophecy; he would give Joseph a portion above his brethren, which he (in his posterity) would win (not had won; see Knobel on the passage) from the hand of the Amorites with his sword and bow. Finally, in Joshua 24:32 it is said that the bones of Joseph were buried at Shechem in the parcel of ground which Jacob bought of the sons of Hamor, and the sons of Joseph received them (with the field) for an inheritance. The somewhat inaccurate version of the Sept. is of no importance at all to the estimate of the perfectly correct account (against Meyer).

John 4:6. Jacob’s Well.^[FN38]—The well which Jacob, according to the Israelitish tradition, dug; which by this tradition was made highly sacred. It is thirty-five minutes from the present Nablus, sunk in rock to the depth of a hundred and five feet [now only about seventy-five feet.—P. S.], with a diameter of nine. Maundrell found fifteen feet of water in it; Robinson and others found it dry.^[FN39] Probably it was not the well nearest the city. The woman, however, might have had occasion to avoid the conversation of other women at other wells; perhaps for the same reason she chose the unusual hour of noon (other possible reasons, from Robinson, in Leben Jesu, II:2, p526).

Sat thus [ἐκαθέζετο οὕ τως, a graphic touch].—Simply sat. Probably indicating the absence of all constraint and reserve.^[FN40] About the sixth hour.—According to the Jewish reckoning, noon. Meyer: “Never to be forgotten by John.”

[The hour is probably also mentioned to bring more vividly to our mind the weariness of our Saviour at the heat of the midday sun, the burden and toil He suffered for us at the very moment He opened a fountain of refreshment to this poor thirsty woman and to us all. On the dates of John, see note on John 1:39, p92 f. There are additional reasons for assuming that he reckoned hero in the Jewish manner from sunrise to sunset. Otherwise he would have noted whether it was six in the morning (as Rettig assumes), or six in the evening (as Ebrard and Wordsworth hold). The former is too early to account for the fatigue of the Lord, the latter leaves no time for what follows, as the night sets in with little or no intervening twilight in Eastern countries. The conversation must have lasted at least half an hour, then the woman goes away to the city, tells her experience to the men, and they come to the well of Jacob; and yet after all this it must have been still daylight, to account for the words of Jesus: “Lift up your eyes and look on the fields” ( John 4:35). Considering the oriental contempt for woman and the prejudice even of the disciples ( John 4:27), a conversation with a woman late in the evening would have been even more unseemly than at noon-day. The fact that the woman was alone sufficiently explains that she came so early to draw water, instead of the evening as usual. The time of the year—it was at the end of December—permitted travelling till towards noon. Porter, in his excellent Handbook for Travellers in Syria and Palestine, ii. p341, takes the same view. “Christ probably came up the plain of Mukhna, and about noon reached the well.” So also Macduff, p36.—P. S.]

John 4:7. A woman of Samaria.—That Isaiah, of the country. The city of Sebaste was two hours [six miles] distant.^[FN41] Tholuck remarks that the characteristic traits of this very highly individualized woman are indifference to higher interests and roguish frivolity.^[FN42] But these are hardly individual traits; and these traits form hardly the whole outline of a deeply fallen character, who shows, however, a considerable versatility of mind and great energy, besides a deeper susceptibility under the veil of a bright, resolute nature. A sort of Samaritan Magdalene. With good reason Tholuck insists on the individuality of the woman against Strauss and Weisse. The striking invalidation of Baur’s fiction respecting the design of this supposed fiction is likewise worthy of notice.

Give me to drink.—Points: (1) The truth, of Christ’s thirst; (2) the freedom of His intercourse,—with a Samaritan, and a woman; (3) the higher purpose of His words; (4) the mastery of the great Fisher of souls [ Luke 5:10], in having the earthly given to Him in order to give the heavenly.^[FN43]

John 4:8. For his disciples.—Immediate occasion: The disciples had gone to the city. Probably they also carried a vessel for drawing water (ἄντλημα, John 4:11) with them^[FN44] To buy food.—Meyer: “The later [Rabbinical] tradition^[FN45] would not have allowed this. But at that time the separation may not have been so rigid, especially for Galileans, whose route of pilgrimage passed through Samaria. Besides, Jesus was above the divisions of the people, Luke 9:52.”

John 4:9. How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest, etc.—She recognizes Him in particular by His Jewish dialect and pronunciation [perhaps also from His Jewish physiognomy and the dress of a Rabbi]. Tholuck: The Samaritan tongue is between the Hebrew and the Aramaic. As Jesus Himself spoke Aramaic, this is not quite clear, and probably a medium between Western and Eastern Aramaic is meant.^[FN46] More than one thing might surprise her: not only that a Jew spoke with her, and asked drink from her pitcher, but also that this distinguished Jew condescended to ask of her. In truth we might well suppose that she was moved with a feeling of her unworthiness in the dignified presence: He unconsciously defies Himself on my pitcher; at least she hints at the difference between the man and the always less regarded woman. Though the national enmity could hot wholly prevent her asking water in her turn (Tholuck), yet the breach was wide enough to make her feel the request of Jesus to be a great and free condescension. Then the expression of this feeling may easily have been accompanied or disguised by a certain humor giving vent to her national spirit, as she now, with her pitcher, seems to have the better of the stranger. The addition: The Jews have no dealings, etc., is commonly taken as an explanatory note of the Evangelist. But in that case we should expect: The Jews and the Samaritans have no dealings with one another. The disdain being here ascribed to the Jew alone, the words no doubt, belong to the woman’s reply.

[The question of the woman illustrates the intensity and bitterness of sectarian bigotry and hatred as it then prevailed, and sets in stronger contrast the marvellous freedom of Christ from existing prejudices.^[FN47] According to Dr. Robinson and others the ancient hatred is still kept up, and the remnant of Samaritans neither eat, nor drink, nor marry, nor associate with the Jews, but only trade with them. An experienced traveller says, apparently to the contrary: “Never yet, during many years’ residence in Syria, and many along day’s travel, have I been refused a draught of water by a single individual of any sect or race. The Bedawy in the desert has shared with me the last drop in his water-skin. Yet the only reply of the woman to the weary traveller was, ‘How is it that thou, being a Jew,’ ” etc. (Porter’s Handbook for Travellers in Syria and Palestine, P. II, p342.) But this courtesy to strangers is not inconsistent with Dr. Robinson’s statement, nor with our narrative, for the woman did not refuse a drink of water to Jesus, but only expressed her surprise at His asking her for it.—P. S]

John 4:10. If thou knewest the gift of God.—Tholuck: “This answer indicates that she, instead of hesitating, must have felt herself honored, and made haste.” More pertinently Meyer: “Unquestionably Jesus immediately perceived the susceptibility of the woman; hence His leaving His own want, and entering upon a conversation so striking as to arouse the whole interest of the sanguine woman.” She is surprised that Hebrews, the supposed haughty Jew, is the asker; the Lord brings out the opposite relation, that she is the needy one, He the possessor of the true fountain of satisfaction.

The gift of God: (1) The person of Jesus (Greek com, Erasmus). [Hengstenberg refers to John 3:16; “God gave His only begotten Song of Solomon,” and Isaiah 9:5 : “to us a Son is given,” as decisive proofs that Christ designated Himself “the gift of God.”] (2) The Holy Spirit [with reference to John 7:38-39] (Augustine, etc.) (3) Correctly: The singular grace of God in the golden opportunity of this moment (Grotius and others).^[FN48] [(4) Eternal life. So Lampe and Godet; John 4:13-14; comp. Romans 6:23 where eternal life is styled “the gift of God” (χάρισμα, but here we have δῶρον); Revelation 22:17. (5) Living water. in anticipation of what immediately follows: “He would have given thee living water,” So Stier and Trench. Alford regards this as the primary view, but combines with it the first three, like Dr. Yeomans in the preceding footnote.—P. S.] And who it is.—Unfolding the thought of the gift of God. Thou (σύ) wouldest (already) have asked (not: wouldest ask him, Luther) of him.—Expressing the greatness of her need, the greatness of His gift, the urgency her request would have; doubtless also her susceptibility. [Mark the difference between ὁ λέγων σοι which Christ uses of Himself, after the woman had naturally asked: πῶς σὺ παῤ ἐμοῦ αἰτεῖς ( John 4:9), and σὺ ἄν ᾕτησας, which assigns at once to the woman a position of inferiority and dependence on Him, the possessor and giver of that living water. “There lies often,” says Trench, “in little details like this an implicit assertion of the unique dignity of His person, which it is very interesting and not unimportant to trace.”—P. S.]

He would have given thee living water.—מַיִם הַיִים [Sept. ὕδωρ ζῶν] well-water.^[FN49] Expressing at once the greatness of the gift and the readiness of the giving, in a figure drawn from His own, request, but answering perfectly to her unsatisfied state of mind. The figures of Psalm 36:8; Jeremiah 2:13; Jeremiah 17:13. The sense of the words, living water, explained in John 4:14. Various interpretations: (1) Baptism (Justin, Cyril [Cyprian, Ambrose]. But the water of Baptism is not water for drinking, which becomes a fountain in him who drinks it. (2) The evangelic doctrine. Grotius, similarly Meyer: The truth.^[FN50] Shall a man then after that thirst no more? (3) Tarnow; Gratia justificans. Like most of the explanations, too dogmatically exclusive. (4) Institutio salutaris (Semler). (5) Lücke: Faith. (6) Olshausen: Life ( John 6:33). (7) The Holy Spirit, John 7:39 (Maldonatus, Bucer, [Webster and Wilkinson, Wordsworth] and others). The act of giving must no doubt be distinguished from the living water itself: The giving of the water is the gospel, the word of Christ; see John 4:26. The water itself, which quenches thirst, proves itself already operating when the woman sets her pitcher down, [ John 4:28]: it is evidently the inner-life as the operation of the life of Christ, conceived predominantly under the aspect of inward peace (no longer thirsting), developing into regeneration, life in the Holy Ghost (the water’s becoming a fountain) and perfection in blessedness (springing up into everlasting life). Tholuck: “The word of salvation the medium of a living power of the Spirit, John 7:38; John 11:26.” [Godet: Living water is the life eternal, which is Christ Himself living in the soul by the Holy Spirit. Donner l’eau vive, c’est pour lui se communiquer lui-même; car la vie est identifiée avec son principe.—P. S.]

John 4:11. Sirach, thou last nothing to draw with.—Sir. A title of respect usual even at that time among men, John 5:7; John 6:34, etc. Used in the ordinary sense.^[FN51] The spiritual conception was rendered difficult by the lack of the prophets among the Samaritans, and the want of knowledge of the prophetic metaphors (Tholuck). On this presumption the reply is not exactly “saucy” (Tholuck), but no doubt clearly thought, firm, savoring of national pride, exulting again in easy humor. Thou hast nothing. Exactly: Thou hast not even a vessel to draw with.^[FN52] She evidently distinguishes between the water itself standing in the well, and the spring at the bottom of it. Thou hast not even a bucket, i. e., thou canst not even reach down to the standing water. And the well is deep—That Isaiah, even with the bucket thou couldest not come to the living spring.^[FN53]

John 4:12. Art thou greater.—Σύ emphatic. Μείζων cannot mean nobler, of higher rank, as Meyer thinks; for noble lords, as such, are not exactly masters in water-drawing or well-digging. The question proceeds from a feeling that Jesus assumed some extraordinary character, that He claimed a spiritual power; perhaps claimed to be a prophet, like Moses, who could make a fountain of water by miracle. Than our father Jacob.—Expressing the national jealousy towards the Jew. The Samaritans traced their descent from Joseph [Joseph. Antiq, viii14, 3; xi8, 6].

Who gave us the well.—This was a simple inference from the tradition that Jacob dug the well and left it to his posterity. The sense is: The patriarch himself knew not what better to give, and this sufficed for all the wants of his entire nomadic establishment. Meyer: “The woman treats the enigmatical word of Christ at first as Nicodemus does, John 3:4, but more thoughtfully [considering the false conception of Nicodemus], and at the same time more pertly and with feminine readiness of speech.” In her last word: θρέμματα, cattle, she finishes her carnal misapprehension of His spiritual words. [The mention of the cattle (which does not necessarily include the slaves, as sometimes on inscriptions (see Meyer, p192), completes at the same time the picture of the nomadic life of the patriarch. Stier is wrong therefore in regarding it as a falling off in the lofty language of the woman to descend from Jacob’s sacred person to his cattle. There is in the question of the woman a slight resentment at the seeming intentional disregard of the venerable traditions and memorials of her people by which they connected themselves with the patriarchal history. She had evidently a considerable degree of self-respect, national pride and interest in religious questions, and was a brave upholder of patriarchal succession.—P. S.]

John 4:13. Shall thirst again.—[As Christ Himself did, physically, on this occasion, and when He exclaimed on the cross διψῶ.—P. S.]—The excellence of that well Jesus suffers to pass.^[FN54] But in His view of the spiritual water, that has the fundamental defect of every earthly satisfaction: the partaker thirsts again. So it was with all the woman’s enjoyment of life hitherto. [She had by successive draughts at the “broken cistern” of carnal lust only increased her thirst, and the sense of the utter vanity of all earthly pleasures]. Shall never thirst.—[Comp. John 6:35 : “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall not hunger; and he that balieveth in Me shall never thirst.” Revelation 7:16 : “They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more.” John 21:6 : “I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.” Old Test. passages: Isaiah 55:1; Isaiah 49:10.—P. S.] An opposite word: the sentence of Wisdom in [the apocryphal book of the son of] Sirach 24:21 : “Those who drink of me (the Wisdom) shall thirst again” (Οἱ πίνοντές με, ἕτι διψήσουσι). Meyer, not clearly: “This figure rests on another aspect of the drinking, as viewed in its particular moments, not in the continuity constituted by them.” Jesus Christ expresses the absolute satisfaction which is given in principle in the peace of the Christian life; Jesus Sirach describes the desire for further knowledge begotten by the first taste of wisdom. Not only is the object viewed on different sides; the object itself is in Sirach imperfectly conceived, with reference rather to quantity than quality. The Old Testament strives after life, the New strives in the life. What Sirach calls a thirsting again, Christ calls an everlasting springing up.^[FN55]

Shall be in him a fountain of water.^[FN56]—Not “after the negative operation the positive” (Meyer), for the quenching of the thirst is itself positive; but, after the elemental working of Christianity, coming point by point from without, as a means, its life as a principle continually reproducing and propagating itself as its own object. First water drunken, then water welling up: distinction of the catechumenate and the anointing of the Spirit. A fountain whose stream gushes into eternal life. The decisive word, spoken with the utmost confidence, stirring the soul of the hearer to its depths. The spiritual sense of the whole declaration of Christ appeared in every feature: (1) A water, after drinking which one thirsts no more; (2) a water drunken, which becomes a fountain; (3) a fountain which ever joyously flows (which can rarely be said of wells in the east); (4) a fountain which gushes into everlasting life. Here the spiritual sense was perfectly transparent. By the union of the divine Spirit with the human, the latter becomes an organ of the divine life, and therefore a self-supplying fountain of life. Calvin, in the interest of his doctrine, here emphasizes the thought that the life of the Spirit in the regenerate cannot dry up: Bengel, in the interest of his, that if a man thirst again, it lies not with the water, but with the man. [So also Alford.] Above this doctrinal antagonism stands the concrete unity of the life of faith sealed by the Spirit. Tholuck takes the thought that Christ assumes form in the believer; which does indeed describe the personal and objective side of spiritual life. He observes that some (Origen, Zwingle, and others) have been misled by the analogy of John 7:38 to think here also of a flowing for the quickening of others. The woman, at all events, does soon come to quickening others, though the fundamental thought here of course is satisfaction for one’s self.

In ἅλλεσθαι, applied to the fountain, are included (1) springing up from a hidden depth within; (2) incessant flow; (3) living, joyous, springing motion; (4) rhythmic life, continually increasing in a steady succession of living acts. That the fountain also, as a fountain, becomes more and more copious, is indicated by its streaming forth into eternal life. Comp. Sirach 24:31.

It is a question, how into everlasting life (εἱςζωὴναἰώνιον) is to be interpreted. (1) Up into the heavenly life, like a fountain (Origen, Grotius, and others).^[FN57] Tholuck objects that this substitutes οὐρανόν. (2) Redounding to eternal life; affording it (the word being referred to πηγή not to ἁλλομένου, Luthardt). This loses the figure. According to John 3:36, one might indeed take the sense to be, that the spiritual life passes into eternal life; as in Sirach 24:31 : My brook became a river, my river a sea.” But there, as in Ezekiel 47, the subject is the immeasurable objective unfolding of the revelation of salvation, or wisdom; here a subjective unfolding of saved life. Though this is eternal life, yet, to be complete, it must pour itself into the objective eternity (Olshausen: The eternal rests not, till it comes to eternity).^[FN58] In view of this, and in accordance with the figure, we understand by the words a flowing on of this well into the eternal life of perfect fellowship with God in the world to come. This eternal life is doubtless conceived in the figure as an ocean [into which all the rivers of life of individual believers empty at last]. The fountain leaps into eternal life (Meyer: ἅλλεσθαι εἰς, to leap into). The water drunk becomes a well, the well a fountain which incessantly flows into the ocean of eternal life.

As Jesus engages the stiffened Pharisaic spirit of Nicodemus by the free wind of the Spirit and its transforming power, so He enlists the restless, inconstant woman, whose thirst continually returned, by the offer of an endless satisfaction, which is at once an infinite tranquility and a perfect decision of effort, and soon passes into the enjoyment of the eternal life.

John 4:15. That I thirst not, neither come hither.—The sigh of a poor, weary woman, in whom neediness and the burden of toil seem to form a contradiction to spiritual claims, though the sigh is disguised by the air of good humor. The last words betray, to be sure, a misapprehension of the spiritual sense of the words of Jesus. But about her meaning there remains uncertainty.

(1) She means, in all earnest, a miraculous water, which might have the effect described by Jesus (Maier, Meyer). Not readily conceivable. Of such water no one would wish to drink.

(2) She asks the water, in order to get behind the mystery. Lampe: Tentare voluit audacula, quomodo præstita petitionis conditione, promissionem suam exsecutioni daturus esset. This is not ironical, as Tholuck thinks. At least it is only half so; according to Lücke’s interpretation: Her request is half sportive, half earnest.^[FN59] Such water is inconceivable to her, but yet she wishes for what has become to her a dim appearance of a toilless life.

(3) Ironical talk. Lightfoot: Verba irrisorie prolata longe apertius concipias, quam supplicatorie. So also Tholuck.

(4) The presentiment of something higher which might do her good is awakened in her (Baumgarten-Crusius and my Leben Jesu, II. p529).^[FN60] This is more probable, if we suppose that the woman had even journeyed to that sacred well in some sort of religious feeling under a troubled conscience, while there were other wells at least nearer the city of Sichem. Then, too, the third interpretation is accompanied with the view that Jesus breaks off, in order to take an entirely new method; and this involves the unintended, but hazardous presumption that the first method had failed. On the contrary, we suppose that the next word of the Lord was suggested by this request.

John 4:16. Call thy husband.—(1) The husband was to have part in the saving gift, and so she was to be brought indirectly to confession of sin (Chrysostom, etc.; Lücke). (2) Christ would in this way lead her indirectly to a consciousness of her guilt (Calov, Neander, Tholuck, Stier, Luthardt). (3) He intended to give her a sign of His prophetic knowledge in the lower sphere of life, to gain her confidence for disclosures from the higher (Cyril, Schweizer; similarly Meyer). (4) Conformity to custom and to the idea of the law. Hitherto Jesus had influenced her after the manner of a missionary, as man with man. In her last request, expressing spiritual susceptibility, the woman came to the position of a catechumen. But, as a proselyte, she must not act without the knowledge of her husband. Meyer objects: The husband was in truth a paramour. True, they were not legally united. But the highest, most delicate social law lies somewhat deeper; she had given that man the rights of husband. If there was still a moral spark in the immoral connection, Christ had an eye to detect it. Even Stier and Tholuck have not been able to appropriate this interpretation. But it is connected on the one hand with the moral principle, Matthew 3:15; on the other with the principles in Matthew 10:12; 1 Corinthians 7:15; 1 Corinthians 11:10, and with all those principles which distinguish the Evangelical church from the Roman Catholic in the manner of making proselytes.

[I must dissent from this interpretation as assuming a relation and a duty which did not exist. The words of Christ: Call thy husband, opened the wound at the tender spot where the cure was to begin, and were the first step in granting the woman’s request: Give me to drink. By a prophetic glance into her private life of shame, which, after five successive marriages, culminated in her present illegitimate relation, He at once effectually touched her conscience and challenged her faith in Him. Conviction of sin is the first indispensable condition of forgiveness, and is the beginning of conversion. She at once understood the intention, and her next word is a half confession of guilt, quickly followed by faith in the prophetic character of Christ.—P. S.]

John 4:17. I have no husband [Οὐκ ἕχω ἅνδρα].—She feels the effect of the sudden turn. She is living in a settled, to all appearance exclusive, but illegal relation; and this causes her to deny the correctness of the Lord’s address. This is the summit of her resistance,^[FN61] and the master-hand of Christ must prove itself over her. Call thy husband! This might be a word of conjecture. She supposes this, and so ventures the denial, half true, and half false. Her denial is untrue in that she denies a fact of which she is perfectly aware; true, in that she places herself on the ground of the law, and judges by that. Then in this might be already couched a confession of sin, or even the vow: I renounce him, if I may thereby share thy instruction and thy promise. At all events, we may be sure of this: If she had hitherto answered pertly and ironically in a vulgar way, she would now have departed with her pitcher filled, under an ironical promise to call her husband. If, on the contrary, she had taken Jesus for a magician, from whom she might receive a magical water of life, she would have called her husband, and permitted him to be recognized as such. Thus her denial itself proves (1) that she is bound up by the word of Christ; (2) that she for an instant looks on her relation with new eyes; (3) that she deceives herself in attempting to deceive the Lord; (4) that the confession of her guilt is already almost upon her lips. By some expositors the woman is made far too jovial, saucy, spiritually obtuse, and even vulgar.

Thou hast well^[FN62] said, husband I have not [ἅνδρα οὐκ ἕχω].—The emphasis is on husband, [Hence ἅνδρα here precedes, while, in the woman’s answer, it follows the verb,—P. S.] The saying is commended as proper. This is true of her saying in its strict sense, but it has an irony intended to drive out the reservatio mentalis, the untruth lurking behind the true saying; and this it does even by the emphatic placing of the word husband: Husband I have none.^[FN63]

John 4:18. For five husbands thou hast had.—Some have concluded from the confession in John 4:29, that those former connections also had been illegitimate. [So Meyer.] Against this is the antithesis: Five husbands, and: Whom thou now hast, etc. Five marriages, therefore, had preceded, “of which at least some had been dissolved through the wantonness of the woman.” Tholuck. Whether the fault lay in sensual wantonness (licentiousness in the narrower sense), or in an antinomian looseness of spirit, does not appear. With Magdalene the latter seems to have been the case; and it is to be considered, that in Samaria, as well as on the sea of Galilee, Greek views of the marriage relation might already have had an effect. “According to the Talmud, the Samaritans did not acknowledge the laws of divorce; probably referring not to the laxer Hillelian view current among the Jews, but only the more strictly Biblical view of Shammai, following Deuteronomy 24:1. Yet even according to this, it was not only adultery that divorced, but any כָּעוּר, as the Talmud calls it: uncovering of the arms, laying off the veil, and the like.” Tholuck. Meyer supposes that she had not been faithful in one or more of her marriages, and was now a widow living with a paramour. But she might have been a divorced woman.^[FN64]

The extraordinary disclosure of the Lord. Different explanations:

(1) The hypothesis that Jesus had learned the history of the woman from others (Paulus, von Ammon, etc.). Simply contrary to the text.

(2) The disciples added what they afterwards learned (Schweizer). The supposition of a forgery needs no refutation.

(3) The mythical hypothesis, with reference to the five heathen nations which came to Samaria ( 2 Kings 17:24 sqq.; Joseph. Antiq. XIX:14, John 3 : (πέντε ἕθνη—ἕκαστον ἵδιον θεὸν εἰς τὴν Σαμάρειαν κομίσαντες).^[FN65]

(4) A providentially ordered representation of the life of the Samaritan people by this woman: the woman is Samaria; the five husbands are five gods, etc.; Hengstenberg, Beiträge [zur Einl. in’s A. T., 3vols, 1831–’39] II. p 23 sqq.^[FN66]

To this Meyer objects that in this case the husbands must be six; and Heracleon actually read six. This is disposed of by a more attentive examination of Hengstenberg’s opinion. It may rather be observed that to the five nations, seven gods are reckoned, 2 Kings 17:30 sq. But the chief point is that an actual personal offence of the woman, as here described by the Lord, is the subject, and that the woman would assuredly have understood nothing of such a scholastic allusion of the Lord, if He had intended to make it; and of this there is not the slightest indication. At most, however, the woman would be only an accidental allegory of the history of her people, since the marriage law of the Samaritans was strict; and not at all an allegory in so far as Samaria had at the same time from five to seven gods, and these not merely instead of, but together with, Jehovah. [The woman had her five husbands in succession, and was not guilty of polygamy, consequently she could not represent the polytheism of the Samaritans.—P. S.]

(5) “Lange, Leben Jesu II:2, p531, strangely says, that the psychical effect of the five husbands upon the woman had forced out traces in her appearance which Jesus perceived.” So Meyer reports my view. This judgment might be expected from the author. Our reasons are still the same: 1. Every hair casts its shadow. Every marriage relation leaves its psychical mark; only in most cases our weak eyes do not see it2. There is a deep communicatio idiomatum in the life of the Lord. What He knew by His divine nature in a divine, immediate way, He at the same time knew in virtue of His human nature, in a human way through means. From the Christological point of view the old false scholastic alternative of merely divine or merely human is done away in reference to the life of Jesus.

[Dr. Lange here undoubtedly goes too far in the application of a true principle. It Isaiah, indeed, a fact that traits of character and habits, good and bad, especially pride, sensuality and intemperance, express themselves in the countenance and the eye, as the mirror of the soul.^[FN67] But this is very different from the assumption that particular events and relations of the past life, such as the five marriages, leave each a distinct mark on the face which may be read, as the forester reads the age of the tree in the number of its rings. Such details of private history even Christ could not know, except from report, or by special Revelation, or by His mysterious union with the divinity. The last is the only proper view we can take of the case in hand. Not that Christ was strictly omniscient in the state of humiliation (He Himself disclaimed this, Mark 13:32); but wherever it was needed for His mission of saving sinners and the interests of His Kingdom, He could, by an act of His will and in virtue of His vital and essential union with the omniscient Father, unlock the chambers of the past, or penetrate, by immediate intuition, to the inmost secrets of the human heart, and read the history which is indelibly recorded on the pages of memory (comp. John 2:25).—P. S.]

John 4:19. Sirach, I perceive that thou art a prophet.— 1 Samuel 9:9. She justly infers this from the miracle of knowledge. [The Samaritans regarded the Messiah mainly as a prophet, see below.] We must note the gradual growth of her respect: (1) Σύ, Ἰουδαῖος ὥν, John 4:9; (2) Κύριε, John 4:11; (3) Κύριε, δός μοι.—At the same time a concession of her guilt, yet skilfully veiled.

John 4:20. Our fathers worshipped.—The Caricaturing estimate of this personage represents her as everywhere frivolously bantering up to this point without intelligence or misgiving, and now also as putting this question to get away under its cover (De Wette and others, Schweizer, Ebrard, Tholuck). Christ would hardly have gone so far to no purpose with such worthlessness.^[FN68] It may be going too far, to find in this sentence an expression of strong personal religious interest, as if: She perceives in Christ the searcher of hearts, perceives her guilt, and wishes to go to the holy place of forgiveness (Zwingli, Luthardt [Besser], and others). According to Chrysostom, Neander and others, an interest in objective religion at least was awakened in her. The case is probably to be thus conceived: Having indirectly owned her guilt, she cannot treat of it much further with the stranger. The need of religious atonement comes home. But with it comes the question: Where is the right place of atonement? And this question takes its precedence probably not merely from an external, superficial spirit, but rather from the preponderance of a reflective turn. In other words, she turns, not hypocritically, in embarrassment or silliness, to religious controversy, but, under a spiritual bias over-ruling her simple womanly feeling, to reflection. Probably also she had, through the same disposition, lost caste in Samaria, like Magdalene in Galilee (a homeless nature in Sichem, as on the sea of Galilee). Furthermore, she might hasten with this question, (1) because the opportunity of asking a prophet concerning it might not occur again; (2) because she could not but wish to agree in reference to religion and the place of worship with the prophetic man who inspired her with reverence, and who was privy to her guilt.

On this mountain.—Pointing to Gerizim, which was near. On Gerizim comp5 Raumer, Palästina, p38; Winer, s. v.; and the books of travel.^[FN69] But she does not say: We worship here, ye there; the antithesis is of another sort: Our fathers worshipped, and ye say. A decline of the Samaritan system of worship, and a sense of the weight of the Jewish protest in favor of Jerusalem, are expressed in the carefully chosen terms. At the same time, her having the religion of her fathers in any case contained an apology for her position.

Our fathers.—Down from the first Samaritans who were rejected by the Jews, and who, from being excommunicate, had become schismatic by setting up a temple on Gerizim.^[FN70] Chrysostom, Kuinoel, and others, suppose she goes back in thought to Abraham and Jacob; but the antithetic ὑμεῖς contradicts this.^[FN71] Even after the destruction of the temple by John Hyrcanus, the pinnacle of the temple continued to be the seat of the Samaritan worship (Joseph. Antiq. XVIII:4, 1), and is so to this day (Robinson, III. p319). “Latterly the Turks have interposed hindrances.” Tholuck.

It is very expressive, that the woman merely states the issue, without making a question, which place of worship is the true one. By making a question, she would have somewhat compromised her system, and at the same time disparaged the prophet’s place of worship. Whether she meant anything by saying: In Jerusalem is the place, instead of: On Mount Zion, remains uncertain. She seems, at all events, proud of her holy mountain, as well as of her holy well. It might seem to favor the Samaritans, that Moses had designated Gerizim as the mountain of the benedictions of the law ( Deuteronomy 11:29); in fact he seemed to appoint it distinctly as the seat of worship, according to Deuteronomy 27:4, where the Samaritan Pentateuch reads Gerizim instead of Ebal. On the other hand, Jerusalem had now a mighty representative in this prophet, who gave her, moreover, a strong impression of the dignity of the Jewish prophetic office.

John 4:21. Woman, believe me, an hour is coming.—[Believe Me, not us. A more familiar and condescending phrase for Verily, verily, I say unto thee. Nowhere else used by Christ.—P. S.] "Εοχεται ὥρα, a Johannean phrase, John 5:28, &c.—Ye shall worship the Father: pointing to a new, more inward mode of worship. [Ye, says Christ, not we, as an ordinary prophet would have done. He refers not only to the future conversion of the Samaritans (Meyer), but to all Christian ages. The Father indicates, as Grotius remarks, suavitatem novi fœderis; for the fatherhood of God is fully known and felt only in Christ, the only begotten Song of Solomon, and the only Mediator between God and man.—P. S.] To speak of the “stupidity” of the woman on which Jesus wasted a sublime utterance, is utterly without foundation. The sublime utterance teaches the distinction between external and internal worship in a concrete form. The expression evidently contains primarily, in a gentle hint, a preferring of Jerusalem. The progressive grades of worship are: (1) Samaria, (2) Jerusalem, (3) Christianity. It cannot therefore be exactly asserted that Jesus evades a decision: still less that He puts Jews and Samaritans alike under mistake (Baumgarten-Crusius). But the greater prominence is given to the issue which puts Samaria and Jerusalem on one side, and the worship of God in spirit and in truth on the other. This is evident from the advent of Christianity in particular to the Samaritans. The negation of Samaria and Jerusalem only denies that prayer was to continue at all restricted to the places named; that Isaiah, it declares the abolition of external, legal cultus, both Samaritan and Jewish.^[FN72] At the same time it marks the woman’s question as one too little concerned with essential things.

John 4:22. Ye worship that which ye know not.—The question concerning the where of worship could be resolved only by the what, and this again by the how. The neuter instead of whom is significant. Just because God is not truly known to them, He is a ὅ rather than a ὅς, more impersonal than personal. Meyer supposes that the neuter denotes God in His essence and substance; Lücke, that it denotes τὰ τοῦ θεοῦ, which does not suit the term προσκυνεῖν. De Wette: “O refers to the act of προσκυνεῖν; ye worship, and therein do what ye know not. Brückner objects to the correctness of the sentence, that the Samaritans were monotheists. But there are different monotheisms. Tittmann and others explain: Pro vestra ignorantia. Tholuck (after Lücke): “The true knowledge is that which is shaped by the history of redemption; and the Samaritans who were limited to the Pentateuch for their sacred books, knew Jehovah, that Isaiah, the historical God of Israel, but partially.” As a whole, in a living growth of knowledge, they almost knew Him not. This accounts also for the ὅτι.