The New Testament with Commentary John 4

Jesus and the Samaritans

1 Now when Jesus* knew that the Pharisees† had heard, “Jesus is making and baptizing more disciples than John” 2 (although Jesus Himself was not baptizing, but His disciples), 3 He left Judea and went away into Galilee.‡

4 Now He needed to go through Samaria;§ 5 so He comes to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of land that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.* 6 Now Jacob's well was there; so Jesus, being worn out from the journey, sat as He was by the well. It was about 6 p.m.†

The woman

7 A woman of Samaria comes to draw water. Jesus says to her, “Give me a drink.” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) 9 So the Samaritan woman says to Him, “How can you, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, being a Samaritan woman?” (for Jews do not associate with Samaritans). 10 Jesus answered and said to her: “If you knew the gift of God, and who is the one saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman says to Him: “Sir, you don't even have a bucket, and the well is deep; so where do you get this living water? 12 You aren't greater than our father Jacob, are you? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” 13 Jesus answered and said to her: “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never ever thirst;‡ rather, the water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water, welling up into eternal life.”§ 15 The woman says to Him, “Sir, give me this water! so that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.”

16 Jesus says to her, “Go, call your husband and come back here.” 17 The woman answered and said, “I don't have a husband.” Jesus says to her: “You stated correctly that you do not have a husband, 18 because you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is no husband of yours. You spoke the truth there!”* 19 The woman says to Him: “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, while you (pl) say that the place where one must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 Jesus says to her: “Woman, believe me, a time is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You [Samaritans] worship what you do not know; we [Jews] worship what we do know, because the salvation is from the Jews.† 23 But the time is coming, in fact now is, when the genuine worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. Really, because the Father is looking for such people to worship Him.‡ 24 God is Spirit,§ and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

25 The woman says to Him: “I know that Messiah is coming (who is called Christ). When He comes He will explain everything to us.” 26 Jesus says to her, “I am He, the one who is talking with you!”*

The disciples

27 At that point His disciples arrived, and they were amazed that He was talking with a woman; yet no one said, “What do you want?”† or “Why are You talking with her?” 28 So the woman left her water jar,‡ went her way into the town, and says to the men: 29 “Come see a man who told me everything I ever did! Could this be the Messiah?” 30 So out they went from the town and started toward Him.

31 Now in the meantime the disciples were urging Him saying, “Rabbi, eat.” 32 But He said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” 33 So the disciples started saying to one another, “Could someone have brought Him something to eat?” 34 Jesus says to them: “My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to complete His work.§ 35 Do you not say, ‘There are four months before the harvest comes?’ Well I say, Look! Lift your eyes and observe the fields; they are white for harvest already! 36 Now he who reaps receives pay and gathers fruit into eternal life,* so that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. 37 Now the saying, ‘One is the sower and another the reaper,’ is true in this: 38 I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored and you have entered into their labors.”†

The Samaritans

39 Now many of the Samaritans from that city believed into Him because of the word of the woman, testifying that “He told me everything I ever did!” 40 So when the Samaritans came to Him they urged Him to stay with them; and He did stay there two days. 41 Many more believed through His own word, 42 and they kept saying to the woman, “It is not just because of what you said that we believe, because we ourselves have heard Him,‡ and we know that this One is truly the Messiah,§ the Savior of the world!”*

Jesus in Galilee

43 So after the two days He departed from there and went on into Galilee. 44 (For Jesus Himself testified that a prophet does not have honor in his own country.)† 45 So when He came into Galilee the Galileans welcomed Him, having seen all the things that He did in Jerusalem, at the festival; for they too had gone to the festival.

Jesus heals at a distance

46 So Jesus went again to Cana of Galilee,‡ where He made the water wine. Now there was a certain royal official whose son was sick in Capernaum. 47 When this man heard that Jesus had come out of Judea into Galilee, he went to Him and implored Him to come down and heal his son,§ for he was about to die. 48 So Jesus said to him, “Unless you people see signs and wonders you will not believe!”* 49 The official says to Him, “Sir, come down before my child dies!” 50 Jesus says to him, “Go; your son lives.” Well the man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and off he went. 51 Now while he was still going down his slaves met him and reported saying, “Your son lives!” 52 So he inquired of them the hour in which he got better. And they said to him, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.”† 53 So the father knew that it was at the exact hour in which Jesus told him, “Your son lives.” Both he himself and his whole household believed. 54 Again, coming out of Judea into Galilee, Jesus performed this second miraculous sign.‡

* 4:1 I follow the best line of transmission in reading “Jesus”, rather than ‘the Lord’, albeit with only 21.7% of the Greek manuscripts. † 4:1 The ‘Judean’ in 3:25-26 was probably a Pharisee. ‡ 4:3 This was a tactical withdrawal. I take it that Matthew 4:12 refers to the same withdrawal. Between John 3:36 and 4:1 the Baptizer was imprisoned. If the Pharisees knew something it would not be long before Herod knew it. It was not part of the Plan for Jesus to have to deal with Herod at this juncture. § 4:4 He could have gone up the coast and avoided most of the mountains, but He “needed” to go through Samaria. Probably because the Father told Him to—it was harvest time in Sychar. * 4:5 See Joshua 24:32. † 4:6 Since John elsewhere always uses Roman time, I assume that he does so here as well. The Text has “the sixth hour”. Many versions put “noon”, which reflects Jewish time. But the Text says Jesus was worn out, which agrees better with a full day's walk than with a half day's walk. The distance between Salem and Sychar was probably about 35 miles, as the crow flies, but since the whole distance was over accidented terrain, the walking distance would be a good deal more. They had walked some 50 miles in twelve hours. Like the Text says, He was tired! And He was hot and thirsty. John emphasizes that as a human being He felt the full effects of the day. ‡ 4:14 Here again the Lord gives a double meaning to a word—in verse 13 He uses “thirst” in a physical sense, but in verse 14 the sense has to be spiritual, since Jesus Himself experienced physical thirst. In verse 15 the woman sees only the physical sense. I personally do not find the spiritual meaning to be transparent. I have been serving the Lord for many years, but still experience spiritual thirst. I have to keep drinking. However, the ‘water’ being the Holy Spirit, any thirst will not be for lack of ‘water’. § 4:14 That is what the Text says, “into eternal life”. Eternal life is a quality of life, more precisely a life in communion with the Father. The picture is not necessarily of a geyser, water spouting up, but there has to be a constant flow. As our capacity increases the flow should also increase. Of course the water must be shared with others, or we become stagnant. * 4:18 Dear me! Would you say that Jesus was making a special effort not to hurt her feelings? But He knew what He was doing, as verse 29 makes clear. So how about us? Are we prepared to hurt people's feelings? † 4:22 Quite so. The Lamb of God is a Jew, and the Old Testament canon came through the Jewish people (see Romans 3:2). For that matter, most (if not all—Luke [?]) of the New Testament was written by Jews as well. ‡ 4:23 The Father “is looking” for those who will worship Him in spirit and truth. It may be that we have here a window on the reason why God created a race such as ours—persons in His image with the capacity to choose. God “is looking” for something, which means He does not have it, at least not automatically, nor in sufficient quantity. I take it that He wants to be appreciated for who He is, but to have meaning such appreciation cannot come from robots—it has to be voluntary. So He created a type of being with that capacity, but He had to take the risk that such a being would choose not to appreciate Him. Unfortunately, most human beings make the negative choice, and with that negative choice come all sorts of negative consequences. Ever since Adam humans are born with an inclination toward sin, so for someone to choose to appreciate God is definitely not automatic, nor even easy. No one can reasonably accuse God of having ‘stacked the deck’ in His own favor, of ‘buying votes’—He seems to have done just the opposite. If a human being, against his natural inclination, chooses to appreciate God, then He receives what He is looking for. “In spirit and truth” presumably means that it cannot be faked, cannot be forced, cannot be merely physical, cannot be merely emotional (though both body and emotions can, and often will, be utilized). § 4:24 Again the lack of the definite article presents us with an ambiguity; the rendering ‘a spirit’ is possible. But as I indicate by the underlining, I understand that the quality inherent in the noun is being emphasized. * 4:26 As recorded in the four Gospels, this is the first time Jesus declares bluntly that He is the Messiah, and He does it to a woman, and a Samaritan one at that! That woman had had her ups and downs, but was no dummy; that the people of the town listened to her indicates that she had influence. Jesus knew what He was doing. † 4:27 A number of versions capitalize the ‘You’, as if the question would have been directed to Jesus, but it seems more likely to me that this first question would have been to the woman. ‡ 4:28 That was nice of her; they could get water while she was gone. (It was also a clear indication that she intended to return.) § 4:34 The Lord was totally committed to the Father's will and game plan; His daily life revolved around it (it was His ‘food’). In His excitement at seeing the plan for Sychar unfold He forgot His physical hunger. * 4:36 That is what the Text says, “into eternal life”. Surely, Jesus is talking about harvesting souls, gathering them into the Kingdom—when someone is born from Above everyone who participated in the process is glad. † 4:38 “I sent you to reap” must refer to activity in the past, so I take it that the Lord is stating a general principle. ‡ 4:42 As the italics indicate, “Him” is not in the Text; perhaps the addition confuses the picture. What do you suppose the disciples were doing during those two days? I bet the Samaritans were eager to hear all that they could about Jesus, what He had said and done—they kept the disciples busy! § 4:42 About 0.5% of the Greek manuscripts, of objectively inferior quality, omit “the Messiah” (as in NIV, NASB, LB, TEV, etc.). * 4:42 All right! They got the message! † 4:44 I believe that the episode recorded in Luke 4:16-30 took place between verses 43 and 45 here, and verse 44 is an echo of Luke 4:24. From Sychar Jesus went directly to Natsareth, was rejected there, and proceeded to Cana. Verse 45 is a summary statement, after the fact. [Of course He was born in Bethlehem, Judea, but I doubt that He is referring to it as ‘his own country’.] ‡ 4:46 I suspect that He had a brother-in-law living there. § 4:47 The man was asking Jesus to make an emergency hike of some 25 miles (unless he was mounted and had brought an extra horse for Jesus; but He probably wasn't used to riding). Evidently he figured that the healer had to be physically present. * 4:48 Again, Jesus is not exactly ‘polite’. † 4:52 It is virtually certain that the official and his slaves used Roman time, in which case the cure took place at 7 p.m. It could not be 7 a.m. because the man would have met his slaves before noon and they would have said ‘today’, not ‘yesterday’ (verse 52). It could not be Jewish time for a similar reason—if Jesus healed at 1 p.m. the man would have met his slaves before sundown and they would have said ‘today’. The man probably walked (unless he was mounted, but at night the horse would be held to a walk) during at least part of the night; the slaves would have started out at dawn; they probably met at a point much closer to Capernaum than to Cana. ‡ 4:54 That is, He healed at a distance, just by His thought. Curiously, He was in Cana for both of them.