The Samaritan Woman

The Samaritan Woman

from Praying with the Women of the Bible

by Bridget Mary Meehan

T he story of the Samaritan woman at the well records the

longest conversation between Jesus and anyone in the gospels. Jesus and his disciples were traveling through Samaria on their way from southern Judea to northern Galilee. He stopped to rest at the village of Sychar by the well of Jacob. The disciples left him there alone to buy food supplies. On this hot day, a Samaritan woman approached the well around noon to draw water. Jesus began the conversation by asking her for a drink. The woman was surprised by his request and answered: “You’re a Jew. How can you ask me, a Samaritan, for a drink?” (Jn 4:9).

The woman was startled by his question because she realized that this man was a Jew. The Jews and Samaritans despised each other ever since the ten tribes were driven from the land when the Assyrians defeated Israel in 722 BCE and exiled most of the people. Some Israelites remained and intermarried with the Assyrians. This racially mixed group built a temple and worshiped at Mount Gerizim instead of in Jerusalem. They became known as Samaritans. They believed that they were faithful to the Torah and looked forward to the coming of the messiah. The well where Jesus and the woman met was located near Mount Gerizim.

According to the story, the woman questions Jesus about how to procure a bucket for the living water and about where the Spirit of God resides. Mary Zimmer, author of Sister Images, thinks the woman’s process of questioning Jesus is significant:



The Samaritan woman has been judged as a cantankerous and stubborn person, but her persistent, even sarcastic questions, bring her to the realization that she is known by this man at the well. She finds her Messiah through her questions.1



Some scholars wonder whether the conversation between Jesus and the woman actually happened. This story is not mentioned in any other gospel. Mark’s Gospel makes no reference to Samaria. The Gospel of Luke contains the parable of the Good Samaritan (10:29–37) and the story of a Samaritan leper who gave thanks for his healing (17:11–19). In Matthew 10:5–6, Jesus instructs the Twelve to avoid Samaritan towns. Scholar Rose Sallberg Kam believes that whether the encounter took place or not is not the issue. She believes it represents the Johannine community’s faith in the authenticity of the Samaritan tradition. She points out that this story reflects





the esteem the Johannine community rendered its women leaders, an esteem evident also in the Johannine conversation between Jesus and Martha (Jn 11:20–27). The Samaritan woman’s true missionary status is established by Jesus’ implication that the technical verb “I send you” (apostellein) applies to her as well as to male disciples; the writer also says the townspeople believe “through her word.” This phrase recurs in Jesus’ prayer for the disciples gathered at the Last Supper: “I pray not only for them, but also for those who believe in me through their word” (17:20).2



The story of the Samaritan woman demonstrates that Christ is the “wellspring of love” that will fill us forever. Everyone is invited to drink the “living water” and belong to the community of faith. Jesus’ trademark is inclusiveness. As God’s reign breaks forth in our midst, everyone is welcome. There are no outsiders. All that is required is that we worship in spirit and truth. As Rachel Conrad Wahlberg, in her book Jesus According to a Woman, describes the significance of the Samaritan woman: “Her culturally assigned status gave way to her Jesus assigned status—one who is worthy to go and tell.”3

It is mind-blowing that Jesus confided his identity as Messiah and revealed who God is with an outsider, a foreigner, a woman living with a man who was not her husband, in fact a woman who had five husbands. According to biblical experts, the woman understood Jesus’ mention that “she…had no husband not as a call to true repentance, but as a call to true worship. In other words, the exchange about husbands is not biographical, but a highly symbolic element within the theological discussion.”4 In the encounter with the woman at the well, Jesus goes beyond the social and religious taboos of his times. Jesus shares his identity with a woman who doesn’t belong to the religious establishment and who is a foreigner and a divorced. For women, the Samaritan woman is an important role model. “It is impossible to believe that Jesus chose this bright, assertive messenger by chance,” comments Rose Sallberg Kam, “when he could so easily have chosen a man. Somehow, in spite of all the negatives of her situation, he saw in her exactly the person needed to bring the kingdom to Sychar.”

We might ask ourselves, what does this mean for us? Perhaps Jesus is calling women today to be leaders in the Church, proclaiming gospel freedom and equality in ways that will liberate and heal us from the bondage of sexism and patriarchy. Perhaps Jesus is reminding us that social acceptability and rule keeping is not what true religion is about. Jesus is assuring us that just as he filled the Samaritan woman with the “living water” of faith and joyful enthusiasm, he will do the same for us today. Like this gutsy woman, we don’t need religious ordination, a degree in theology, or an official appointment to share Christ’s love with people who are searching for God in our neighborhoods. All we need is faith in Christ and a heart willing to love and serve others. Maybe we should ask ourselves, what are we waiting for?

Now more than ever we need to proclaim by our words and lives that God is love, and that all people are loved and blessed by God. No one is excluded from the divine embrace. No matter how sinful, broken, or messed up our lives may be, God may be calling us to be messengers of divine love. Like the Samaritan woman with her checkered past, we don’t have to have our act together. We don’t need to be perfect—we need only to come to Jesus. This is what Christians for centuries have called prayer. Here we can argue with Jesus if we want. We can even ask questions, express our feelings or doubts, listen, or simply be with Jesus. Then, like the scene at the well, Jesus may converse with us, read





our hearts, minister to our hurts, or simply delight in us for a while. As the conversation evolved, the Samaritan woman understood the spiritual meaning of Jesus’ words. We too may grow more in love with Christ as we experience the depths of divine love flowing within us in our prayerful encounters. Like lake water sparkling in the sunshine, we will radiate Christ. We will become like a magnet—like Christ—to whom others will be drawn.

God calls each of us to share the love we have experienced with family, friends, strangers, and people we meet who are struggling, lonely, empty, confused, or alienated. If we say “yes,” nothing else will matter. We will be an evangelist like the Samaritan woman. Isn’t it time to leave our water jars behind?







Reflection



“Jesus, weary from the journey, came and sat by the well. It was around noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, ‘Give me a drink.’ The disciples had gone off to the town to buy provisions.

“The Samaritan woman replied, ‘You’re a Jew. How can you ask me, a Samaritan, for a drink?’—since Jews had nothing to do with Samaritans.

“Jesus answered, ‘If only you recognized God’s gift, and who it is that is asking you for a drink, you would have asked him for a drink instead, and he would have given you living water.’

“‘If you please,’ she challenged Jesus, ‘you don’t have a bucket and this well is deep. Where do you expect to get this living water? Surely you don’t pretend to be greater than our ancestors Leah and Rachel and Jacob, who gave us this well and drank from it with their descendants and flocks?’

“Jesus replied, ‘Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. But those who drink the water I give them will never be thirsty; no, the water I give will become fountains within them, springing up to provide eternal life.’

“The woman said to Jesus, ‘Give me this water, so that I won’t grow thirsty and have to keep coming all the way here to draw water.’

“Jesus said to her, ‘Go and call your husband and then come back here.’ “‘I don’t have a husband,’ replied the woman.

“‘You’re right—you don’t have a husband!’ Jesus exclaimed. ‘The fact is you’ve had five, and the man you’re living with now is not your husband. So what you’ve said is quite true.’

“‘I can see you’re a prophet,’ answered the woman. ‘Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you people claim that Jerusalem is the place where God ought to be worshiped.’

“Jesus told her, ‘Believe me, the hour is coming when you’ll worship Abba God neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You people worship what you don’t understand; we worship what we do understand—after all, salvation is from the Jewish people. Yet the hour is coming when real worshipers will worship Abba God in Spirit and truth. Indeed, it is just such worshipers whom Abba God seeks. God is Spirit, and those who worship God must worship in spirit and truth.’

“The woman said to Jesus, ‘I know that the Messiah—the Anointed One—is coming, and will tell us everything.’

“Jesus replied, ‘I who speak to you am the Messiah.’





“The disciples, returning at this point, were shocked to find Jesus having a private conversation with a woman. But no one dared to ask, ‘What do you want of him?’ or ‘Why are you talking to her?’

“The woman then left her water jar and went off into the town. She said to the people,

‘Come and see someone who told me everything I have ever done! Could this be the

Messiah?’ At that everyone set out from town to meet Jesus…

“Many Samaritans from that town believed in Jesus on the strength of the woman’s testimony—that ‘he told me everything I ever did.’ The result was that, when these Samaritans came to Jesus they begged him to stay with them awhile. So Jesus stayed there two days, and through his own spoken word many more came to faith. They told the woman, ‘No longer does our faith depend on your story. We’ve heard for ourselves and we know that this really is the savior of the world’” (Jn 4:6–30,39–42, The Inclusive New Testament).







Discussion Questions



1. Can we find God through our questions?

2. What is the significance for women in ministry today that according to biblical scholars this story reflects “the esteem the Johannine community rendered its women leaders”?

3. Why do you think that Jesus chose a woman, not a man, a foreigner, not a Jew, and a divorced woman living with a man to reveal his true identity to and to preach the Good News of the gospel to the whole town? Are women called to evangelize today, like the Samaritan woman? In what way(s) is the Samaritan woman a mentor for women today?

4. The Samaritan woman was an evangelist, one who spread the Good News. How can Christians today minister with faith, intelligence, and enthusiasm? What is the good news of God’s love in your life and in our world that you would want to share?







Prayer Experience



1. Take a few minutes of silence to become quiet and relaxed. Imagine that you are getting ready to dive off a cliff in the mountains into a beautiful waterfall below…. As you step of the cliff you float gracefully down into the depths of the water…. As you come up to the surface of the water, you float for a while on your back in the refreshing waters…. It feels so relaxing….

2. Now you decide to rest for a while, so you swim over to the edge of the water, get out and sit on a large log close to the water’s edge….

3. You listen to gurgling of the water as it flows gently over the rocks…and watch the large fluffy clouds float by…. Foamy froth develops on top of the water as it shimmies down the mountainside…. The birds are chirping and singing in the trees above you…. You feel the cool breeze across your shoulders…. You touch the soft green grass around you and admire the wildflowers nearby…. You notice rays of sun beaming down in a steam of light through the trees…. Everything feels peaceful…. You close your eyes and fall asleep….

4. You dream that you are a tree growing in the forest…. You bring forth beautiful blossoms




and delicious fruit…. You send your leaves with messages of love and freedom to people that you care about…people from whom you need to ask forgiveness…people whom you want to forgive…people whom you want to liberate….

5. Slowly and gently you awaken…. You open your eyes and see Jesus sitting beside you…. He is smiling at you and calls you by name….

6. You share with Jesus from the depths of your heart…. Jesus invites you to do something special—something only you can do…. You are the chosen one for this unique mission…. Jesus looks at you with love beyond all telling, places his hands on your head, and prays with you….

7. There is something you must leave behind…. You give it to Jesus and say good-bye….



Feel energy and joy expand in your heart as you go forth blessed for your important mission….