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The Samaritan Christ and the Samaritan Woman (Part 3).

 ·  ☕ 6 min read  ·  ✍️ Odunayo Rotimi

Snapshot

Key Text: John 4:4-43.
The Samaritan woman: The multiple-times married woman.
Jesus: Father of all, and mankind’s fellow sufferer.
Samaria: A part of Israel deemed occupied by proselyte Jews.
👀: Check here for part 1 and here for part 2.

From Part 1 & 2

Jesus, the Samaritan

In John chapter 4, we learn of a Samaritan woman who was privileged to meet the Messiah. Master Jesus coming back from a 3-day journey away from Judah, decided to do the uncommon: walkthrough Samaria to Galilee. The Jews Samaritans were viewed by Jews as a mixed-race – half-Jew, half-Gentiles. Thus, not only were they in social disparity with one another, but they also maintained religious distancing. For example, although boycotting Samaria was Father, travelling to Judea or Jerusalem, Jews will typically take the longer route to avoid contact with the Samaritans. If the average moral Jew observes this, I wonder what stricter measures their teachers of Mosaic laws will apply. I reckon that she will not get an audience. Condescending so low in this manner to seek and to save the lost fitted Jesus for no other narrative than the Samaritan He described in one of His parables (see Luke 10:25-37).

The Samaritan woman

This young gentle-looking man then opened his mouth and spoke to a Samaritan woman. It is worth noting that a woman coming to the well at noon alone to fetch water means she had no friend. And she may have been notorious but friendless and therefore lonely. This loneliness might have accounted for her frolicking around 5 men. Now this young man was also alone. And the opening line was, “Please give me a drink.” This shocked all her defences, and a fascinating story of salvation in a smooth flow of conversation ensued. In what follows, we shall observe the names and manners she addressed or approach the Master. As we shall see, she went from seeing Christ as a prospect, an imposter and finally a prophet. Finally in this three episode series, we shall focus on Jesus the prophet through a Samariatan eye something the so-called Jews were blind to.

Jesus the Prophet

It should be noted that the world will see how distinctly behaved the Christian man is. Still, it will ridicule such qualities in negative or doubtful expressions about such unreachable but admirable attributes. But the ones to whom we are sent, as were the unconsumed burning bush to Moses, will be attracted. They will get past the doubts and the ridicules to knowing who exactly we are as Christians. This was the case with this woman.

Jesus exhibited the strange but enviable character typical of true prophets recorded in the bible. He sustained His view and avowed it against her inhibition of first perceiving Him as a vulnerable prospect on whose naivety she could prey. And then she proceeded to accuse Him as an imposter who should be discouraged with such accusations.

Why did she call Jesus a prophet?

Essentially, not alone did the woman in question show significant tendencies for expertise in traditional and religious history but also the ability to captivate an audience with engaging conversation. For instance, she could tell the source of the well and knew the right questions to ask Jesus. She, however, met her match. Jesus emptied her vault of expertise and humbled her when He swung to a delicate section of their deliberation by saying, “Go, call your husband and come here.” She was sharp to respond, “I have no husband.” The statement showed no iota of decorum nor remorse. If anything, she might have been thinking her potential “new catch” was getting closer to the bait. Thanks to Jesus, who then caught her attention by first saying, “You have well said, I have no husband.” But did not stop there and instead went further to shatter her self-confidence by saying, “for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband.” Finally, he topped it up so she may know what He said was not a guess work, by saying, “in that you spoke truly.” As if Jesus meant: “You might have lied in some others things you spoke about. But in this very one, unlike your claim to be a daughter of Jacob, you said the truth.”

Having lost the debate to the source of words and all language variants, she conceded defeat, calling Jesus a prophet. Of course, now, her concession to Jesus as a prophet could not be held on its own. But it is more sublime to the heart in that it was the opening to the last lap of the conversation.

Astonished by the manner Jesus in few statements shattered her confidence, obviously finding Jesus as a prophet, she decided to explore further. “If He knows this much about me without prior interaction, then He must know much about rejection emanating from religious conflicts,” she must have retorted. Hence, she asked Jesus about a longstanding conflict in the religious notions held differently by the Jews and Samaritan, resulting in their coexistence. Historically, Jacob worshipped on that mountain with a well that has supplied them for up to 1000 years as evidence. However, tradition has it that the occupation of the northern kingdom of Israel was a measure taken by the Assyrians to preserve the land of Israel. This followed the defeat of this north kingdom belonging to the 10 tribes and its sacking. On sending people from Assyria to occupy Samaria, they took along their gods, resulting in the worship of Jehovah plus idols (2 Kings 17:24-41). This the Israelites see as an utter violation of the first of the ten commandments of Moses. Therefore, they will have nothing to do with the idolatrous Samaritan populace, not even as little as Galilean Jews passing through Samaria to Jerusalem. They will rather boycott Samaria though the alternative route was farther.

However, the Samaritans held on to the belief that history favours worship in Samaria instead of Jerusalem. The Jews, on the contrary, maintain that historical records can be discarded in favour of the preservation of the maintenance undefiled worship of Jehovah. So, the woman posed the question to Jesus. Jesus dissolved it again by reaching out for a long-anticipated future that not only accommodate Jews (genuine and naturalized) but also admits Gentiles into a commonwealth. She perhaps, saw a long-desired end coming to pass: a time ahead devoid of segregation based on religious or political affinity.

What more?

What is more to be said? All her questions have been answered. Noting Jesus as a prophet, she hid Jesus beneath one more layer of promotion. Though this man called Jesus has emptied and humbled her, she would still imagine that some other prophet was more incredible than Him. Thus, she said, “I know the Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”

Seeing her tenderness and her desperation, Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.” She must have concluded, no wonder! The next she would do was an acceptance substantiated by using her notoriety to draw men unto God.
Oh, to endure like Jesus! What wisdom is authored and packed in Him, who through bearing one feeble up, captures many! What about you 🤔?

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Odunayo Rotimi
WRITTEN BY
Odunayo Rotimi