John 4:4-26

Conversation With a Samaritan Woman

4:4 But he had ¹  to pass through Samaria. ²  4:5 Now he came to a Samaritan town ³  called Sychar, ⁴  near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁵  4:6 Jacob’s well was there, so Jesus, since he was tired from the journey, sat right down beside ⁶  the well. It was about noon. ⁷ 

4:7 A Samaritan woman ⁸  came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me some water ⁹  to drink.” 4:8 (For his disciples had gone off into the town to buy supplies. ¹⁰ ) ¹¹  4:9 So the Samaritan woman said to him, “How can you – a Jew ¹²  – ask me, a Samaritan woman, for water ¹³  to drink?” (For Jews use nothing in common ¹⁴  with Samaritans.) ¹⁵ 

4:10 Jesus answered ¹⁶  her, “If you had known ¹⁷  the gift of God and who it is who said to you, ‘Give me some water ¹⁸  to drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” ¹⁹  4:11 “Sir,” ²⁰  the woman ²¹  said to him, “you have no bucket and the well ²²  is deep; where then do you get this ²³  living water? ²⁴  4:12 Surely you’re not greater than our ancestor ²⁵  Jacob, are you? For he gave us this well and drank from it himself, along with his sons and his livestock.” ²⁶ 

4:13 Jesus replied, ²⁷  “Everyone who drinks some of this water will be thirsty ²⁸  again. 4:14 But whoever drinks some of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again, ²⁹  but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain ³⁰  of water springing up ³¹  to eternal life.” 4:15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw ³²  water.” ³³  4:16 He ³⁴  said to her, “Go call your husband and come back here.” ³⁵  4:17 The woman replied, ³⁶  “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “Right you are when you said, ³⁷  ‘I have no husband,’ ³⁸  4:18 for you have had five husbands, and the man you are living with ³⁹  now is not your husband. This you said truthfully!”

4:19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I see ⁴⁰  that you are a prophet. 4:20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, ⁴¹  and you people ⁴²  say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.” ⁴³  4:21 Jesus said to her, “Believe me, woman, ⁴⁴  a time ⁴⁵  is coming when you will worship ⁴⁶  the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 4:22 You people ⁴⁷  worship what you do not know. We worship what we know, because salvation is from the Jews. ⁴⁸  4:23 But a time ⁴⁹  is coming – and now is here ⁵⁰  – when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks ⁵¹  such people to be ⁵²  his worshipers. ⁵³  4:24 God is spirit, ⁵⁴  and the people who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 4:25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (the one called Christ); ⁵⁵  “whenever he ⁵⁶  comes, he will tell ⁵⁷  us everything.” ⁵⁸  4:26 Jesus said to her, “I, the one speaking to you, am he.”

¹ sn Travel through Samaria was not geographically necessary; the normal route for Jews ran up the east side of the Jordan River (Transjordan). Although some take the impersonal verb had to (δεῖ, dei) here to indicate logical necessity only, normally in John’s Gospel its use involves God’s will or plan (3:7, 3:14, 3:30, 4:4, 4:20, 4:24, 9:4, 10:16, 12:34, 20:9).

² sn Samaria. The Samaritans were descendants of 2 groups: (1) The remnant of native Israelites who were not deported after the fall of the Northern Kingdom in 722 b.c.; (2) Foreign colonists brought in from Babylonia and Media by the Assyrian conquerors to settle the land with inhabitants who would be loyal to Assyria. There was theological opposition between the Samaritans and the Jews because the former refused to worship in Jerusalem. After the exile the Samaritans put obstacles in the way of the Jewish restoration of Jerusalem, and in the 2nd century b.c. the Samaritans helped the Syrians in their wars against the Jews. In 128 b.c. the Jewish high priest retaliated and burned the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim.

³ tn Grk “town of Samaria.” The noun Σαμαρείας (Samareias) has been translated as an attributive genitive.

⁴ sn Sychar was somewhere in the vicinity of Shechem, possibly the village of Askar, 1.5 km northeast of Jacob’s well.

⁵ sn Perhaps referred to in Gen 48:22.

⁶ tn Grk “on (ἐπί, epi) the well.” There may have been a low stone rim encircling the well, or the reading of Ì⁶⁶ (“on the ground”) may be correct.

⁷ tn Grk “the sixth hour.”

⁸ tn Grk “a woman from Samaria.” According to BDAG 912 s.v. Σαμάρεια, the prepositional phrase is to be translated as a simple attributive: “γυνὴ ἐκ τῆς Σαμαρείας a Samaritan woman J 4:7.”

⁹ tn The phrase “some water” is supplied as the understood direct object of the infinitive πεῖν (pein).

¹⁰ tn Grk “buy food.”

¹¹ sn This is a parenthetical note by the author, indicating why Jesus asked the woman for a drink (for presumably his disciples also took the water bucket with them).

¹² tn Or “a Judean.” Here BDAG 478 s.v. ᾿Ιουδαίος 2.a states, “Judean (with respect to birth, nationality, or cult).” The same term occurs in the plural later in this verse. In one sense “Judean” would work very well in the translation here, since the contrast is between residents of the two geographical regions. However, since in the context of this chapter the discussion soon becomes a religious rather than a territorial one (cf. vv. 19-26), the translation “Jew” has been retained here and in v. 22.

¹³ tn “Water” is supplied as the understood direct object of the infinitive πεῖν (pein).

¹⁴ tn D. Daube (“Jesus and the Samaritan Woman: the Meaning of συγχράομαι [Jn 4:7ff],” JBL 69 [1950]: 137-47) suggests this meaning.

¹⁵ sn This is a parenthetical note by the author.

¹⁶ tn Grk “answered and said to her.”

¹⁷ tn Or “if you knew.”

¹⁸ tn The phrase “some water” is supplied as the understood direct object of the infinitive πεῖν (pein).

¹⁹ tn This is a second class conditional sentence in Greek.

²⁰ tn Or “Lord.” The Greek term κύριος (kurios) means both “Sir” and “Lord.” In this passage there is probably a gradual transition from one to the other as the woman’s respect for Jesus grows throughout the conversation (4:11, 15, 19).

²¹ tc ‡ Two early and important Greek mss along with two versional witnesses (Ì⁷⁵ B sy^s ac²) lack ἡ γυνή (Jh gunh, “the woman”) here; א* has ἐκείνη (ekeinh, “that one” or possibly “she”) instead of ἡ γυνή. It is possible that no explicit subject was in the original text and scribes added either ἡ γυνή or ἐκείνη to make the meaning clear. It is also possible that the archetype of Ì⁷⁵ א B expunged the subject because it was not altogether necessary, with the scribe of א later adding the pronoun. However, ἡ γυνή is not in doubt in any other introduction to the woman’s words in this chapter (cf. vv. 9, 15, 17, 19, 25), suggesting that intentional deletion was not the motive for the shorter reading in v. 11 (or else why would they delete the words only here?). Thus, the fact that virtually all witnesses (Ì⁶⁶ א² A C D L W^s Θ Ψ 050 083 086 Ë^1,13 Ï latt sy^c,p,h sa bo) have ἡ γυνή here may suggest that it is a motivated reading, conforming this verse to the rest of the pericope. Although a decision is difficult, it is probably best to regard the shorter reading as authentic. NA²⁷ has ἡ γυνή in brackets, indicating doubts as to their authenticity. For English stylistic reasons, the translation also includes “the woman” here.

²² tn The word for “well” has now shifted to φρέαρ (frear, “cistern”); earlier in the passage it was πηγή (phgh).

²³ tn The anaphoric article has been translated “this.”

²⁴ sn Where then do you get this living water? The woman’s reply is an example of the “misunderstood statement,” a technique appearing frequently in John’s Gospel. Jesus was speaking of living water which was spiritual (ultimately a Johannine figure for the Holy Spirit, see John 7:38-39), but the woman thought he was speaking of flowing (fresh drinkable) water. Her misunderstanding gave Jesus the opportunity to explain what he really meant.

²⁵ tn Or “our forefather”; Grk “our father.”

²⁶ tn Questions prefaced with μή (mh) in Greek anticipate a negative answer. This can sometimes be indicated by using a “tag” at the end. In this instance all of v. 12 is one question. It has been broken into two sentences for the sake of English style (instead of “for he” the Greek reads “who”).

²⁷ tn Grk “answered and said to her.”

²⁸ tn Grk “will thirst.”

²⁹ tn Grk “will never be thirsty forever.” The possibility of a later thirst is emphatically denied.

³⁰ tn Or “well.” “Fountain” is used as the translation for πηγή (phgh) here since the idea is that of an artesian well that flows freely, but the term “artesian well” is not common in contemporary English.

³¹ tn The verb ἁλλομένου (Jallomenou) is used of quick movement (like jumping) on the part of living beings. This is the only instance of its being applied to the action of water. However, in the LXX it is used to describe the “Spirit of God” as it falls on Samson and Saul. See Judg 14:6, 19; 15:14; 1 Kgdms 10:2, 10 LXX (= 1 Sam 10:6, 10 ET); and Isa 35:6 (note context).

³² tn Grk “or come here to draw.”

³³ tn The direct object of the infinitive ἀντλεῖν (antlein) is understood in Greek but supplied for clarity in the English translation.

³⁴ tc Most witnesses have “Jesus” here, either with the article (א^c C² D L W^s Ψ 086 Ï lat) or without (א* A Θ Ë^1,13 al), while several important and early witnesses lack the name (Ì^66,75 B C* 33^vid pc). It is unlikely that scribes would have deliberately expunged the name of Jesus from the text here, especially since it aids the reader with the flow of the dialogue. Further, that the name occurs both anarthrously and with the article suggests that it was a later addition. (For similar arguments, see the tc note on “woman” in 4:11).

³⁵ tn Grk “come here” (“back” is implied).

³⁶ tn Grk “answered and said to him.”

³⁷ tn Grk “Well have you said.”

³⁸ tn The word order in Jesus’ reply is reversed from the woman’s original statement. The word “husband” in Jesus’ reply is placed in an emphatic position.

³⁹ tn Grk “the one you have.”

⁴⁰ tn Grk “behold” or “perceive,” but these are not as common in contemporary English usage.

⁴¹ sn This mountain refers to Mount Gerizim, where the Samaritan shrine was located.

⁴² tn The word “people” is not in the Greek text, but is supplied to indicate that the Greek verb translated “say” is second person plural and thus refers to more than Jesus alone.

⁴³ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

⁴⁴ sn Woman was a polite form of address (see BDAG 208-9 s.v. γυνή 1), similar to “Madam” or “Ma’am” used in English in different regions.

⁴⁵ tn Grk “an hour.”

⁴⁶ tn The verb is plural.

⁴⁷ tn The word “people” is not in the Greek text, but is supplied to indicate that the Greek verb translated “worship” is second person plural and thus refers to more than the woman alone.

⁴⁸ tn Or “from the Judeans.” See the note on “Jew” in v. 9.

⁴⁹ tn Grk “an hour.”

⁵⁰ tn “Here” is not in the Greek text but is supplied to conform to contemporary English idiom.

⁵¹ sn See also John 4:27.

⁵² tn Or “as.” The object-complement construction implies either “as” or “to be.”

⁵³ tn This is a double accusative construction of object and complement with τοιούτους (toioutous) as the object and the participle προσκυνοῦντας (proskunounta") as the complement.

⁵⁴ tn Here πνεῦμα (pneuma) is understood as a qualitative predicate nominative while the articular θεός (qeos) is the subject.

⁵⁵ tn Both Greek “Christ” and Hebrew and Aramaic “Messiah” mean “the one who has been anointed.”

⁵⁶ tn Grk “that one.”

⁵⁷ tn Or “he will announce to us.”

⁵⁸ tn Grk “all things.”