Jesus Met the Woman at the Well

Holy Trinity/La Santisima Trinidad, Richmond; Good Shepherd 3/27/11

Reflections on John 4:5-42

The Rev. Este Gardner Cantor

In the Old Testament as well as the new, there is just something about women and wells. For the men, the thing seems to be the parting of waters. But for the women, it’s the wells.

All through the Old Testament, women received blessing, grace, and often husbands, at wells of water. Hagar, the slave of Abraham and Sarah had been cast out into the desert with her young son, and wandered along lost for some time. Her skin of water was empty, and she left her son under a bush and walked away so that she would not have to see him die. She wept loudly in her agony. God answered her by opening her eyes and allowing her to see that she was standing in front of a well of water. God assured her with a further blessing- that God would make a great nation of her son.

When it came time for Abraham to find a wife for his other son, Isaac, he sent a servant to search far and wide. He found Rebecca at a well. She proved that she was the chosen one by her kindness, giving water to the camels, and then agreeing to travel back home to marry Isaac.

Isaac’s son, Jacob, whose well is the one featured in today’s story, first met his favorite (but not his first) wife Rachel at a well. He watered her flock, kissed her and wept aloud. This was apparently enough to win her.

Finally, Ziporah and her sisters came to a well to water their flock. Moses drew water for them and defended them from the other shepherds. Zipporah later became the wife of Moses. And it was Moses who was the first, and the most famous of a series of water-parting male prophets. He raised his staff and parted the Red Sea so that the nation of Israel could be delivered to faith and freedom.

Then Joshua, his protégé, led his warriors through the River Jordan. As they marched behind the Arc of the Covenant, the waters rose up in a heap so that the soldiers could cross on dry land.

Also at the River Jordan, Elijah rode to glory in a flaming chariot, while his protégé, Elisha, watched in astonishment. Then Elisha struck the River Jordon with Elijah’s cloak, and sure enough, the waters parted.

I have heard it said that In the New Testament, Jesus transcends all these parting of the water stories, also at the River Jordan. He parts the waters ABOVE the firmament. At his baptism, the heavens part and the Holy Spirit comes down to pay a call on the New Creation, who was, himself, a well of living water.

The is was a place of pairings. And just as Jesus’ baptism brought the partings of the waters to a new level, Jesus’ meeting with the Samaritan woman at the well brings a new dimension to the pairing stories. This time at Jacob’s ancient well, it was not just a man and a woman who were paired. It was the pairing- the symbolic reconciliation- of two tribes who despised each other with a passion.
A pair of tribes possessed of seemingly irreconcilable differences. Their hatred is well illustrated by a quote from the Book of Sirach, which presents the Samaritans as sub-human:

Two nations my soul detests, and the third is not even a people: Those who live in Seir, and the Philistines, and those foolish ones who live in Shechem [of Samaria]

As a Jewish Rabbi, Jesus could not have chosen a less likely subject with whom to share water than the Samaritan woman. With his offering of living water, Jesus turns the age-old story of tribalism, of hating one’s enemy, one its head. You had only to look at the sky to see what time it was. The time was high noon, and that bright sun shone on a transcendental laying down of arms.

The Samaritan woman is almost an opposite entity to the person of Nicodemus, whom we heard about last week. Nicodemus was not only a Jew, but a respected religious leader, and, of course, a man. The Samaritan woman has so little status that she is not even given a name in our story. She is female, from a despised tribe, has a highly questionable marital history, and is now living unmarried with yet another man. I have read that the normal time of day for women to gather at the well and draw water was early morning- but this woman comes at noon when no one else is there, possibly to avoid their distain. But Jesus does not distain her- does not judge her for any of these things. And more amazingly, he proceeds to have the longest theological discussion with her of any in the New Testament. His conversation with her far surpasses his exchange with Nicodemus, which Jesus cuts short in apparent impatience. But with the Samaritan woman, Jesus blasts through their cultural differences to usher her into the Kingdom of God, which, as he says is not only coming soon, but is now here.

The story’s opening shocker is Jesus asking a foreign woman to lend him her unclean utensil to give him a drink of water. After she sputters her protest, he offers her, as he says, “living water.” She apparently takes this to mean running or flowing water, which would have been precious enough in the parched land of Samaria. Jewish renderings of the apocalypse are filled with lush gardens thick with rivers and streams. The Book of Zechariah describes the Day of the Lord like this: “On that day, living waters will flow out of Jerusalem.”

But Jesus will convince the Samaritan woman that he has replaced the Jerusalem Temple, and the Samaritan Temple. The living water now flows from him.

Even after Jesus offers her living water, the woman perceives Jesus only as a prophet. Since the only prophet recognized by the Samaritans was Moses, the giver of the Law, she asks Jesus a legal question- on the location of the Temple, which Samaritans believe to be on Mount Gerazin, not in Jerusalem.

This question puts the dispute between the Samaritans and the Temple Jews in center place, but Jesus does not take the bait. His response opens the door to salvation for both the Samaritans and the Jews- in fact, for everyone. He says that the location of the temple does not matter anymore. In the Kingdom of God, place is irrelevant. The hour is coming, and is now here, when people will worship the Father, not in any temple, but in Spirit and in Truth. When the woman says that she believes that the Messiah is coming, Jesus simply says,
“I am he.” This seems to be enough for her to believe. She walks away, transformed, and leaves her jar- after all, she certainly does not need it for the Water of Life. And Jesus transforms the Old Testament stories in terms of gender as well. It is he who waits passively at the well, and the Samaritan woman who becomes a leader of her people. Like all those water-parting prophets, she is clearing a path to bring her people to faith and freedom.

What was it like for this woman to have been accepted, taken seriously, to have been so respected by Jesus- to have been offered the water of life? What was it like for her? What is it like for those of us who can’t believe that Jesus would offer US the water of life? It is astonishing. It is confounding. How comforting it is for those of us who have, during our lives been wedded to at least five things that were supposed to make us happy and did not. Or for those of us who may have long worshipped at the wrong temple, and I don’t mean the one on Mount Gerazim.

But Jesus does come to us. And just as he scandalously requests a drink of water from the Samaritan woman, he asks something of us as well. Something that we, at least at first, may have no idea how to give him. We may believe, as the Samaritan woman did, that the obstacles are great, that societal conventions forbid us to answer his request. But Jesus breaks down all those barriers. He parts the waters and sweeps away mountains and leads us to the well. And when Jesus gives us this living water, then we have a pairing from which we need never part. We are like the Prodigal Son in the arms of his father, like the lost sheep in the arms of the shepherd, like the child who unquestionably owns the Kingdom of Heaven. Amen