The Feeding Five Thousand story.

Mark 6.38-44, Matthew 14.17-21, Luke 9.13-17.

This story also takes place in the gospel of John, but I tell John’s version of it elsewhere. Today I’m focusing on the way the synoptic gospels tell it. John’s emphasis, honestly, is on Jesus’s Bread of Life teachings later in the chapter. The synoptics… well, you’ll see.

The Feeding Five Thousand story is basically Jesus’s riff on a similar situation with Elisha ben Šafat.

2 Kings 4.1-7 NLT

1One day the widow of a member of the group of prophets came to Elisha and cried out, “My husband who served you is dead, and you know how he feared the LORD. But now a creditor has come, threatening to take my two sons as slaves.”

2“What can I do to help you?” Elisha asked. “Tell me, what do you have in the house?”

“Nothing at all, except a flask of olive oil,” she replied.

3And Elisha said, “Borrow as many empty jars as you can from your friends and neighbors. 4Then go into your house with your sons and shut the door behind you. Pour olive oil from your flask into the jars, setting each one aside when it is filled.”

5So she did as she was told. Her sons kept bringing jars to her, and she filled one after another. 6Soon every container was full to the brim!

“Bring me another jar,” she said to one of her sons.

“There aren’t any more!” he told her. And then the olive oil stopped flowing.

7When she told the man of God what had happened, he said to her, “Now sell the olive oil and pay your debts, and you and your sons can live on what is left over.”

God multiplied oil to bail out this prophet. God can likewise multiply food to feed the big crowd who’d accumulated to listen to Jesus’s teaching.

Often this story’s titled, “Jesus Feeds Five Thousand.” And yeah, I can understand how you’d get that idea if all you read was the John version. Now, pay closer attention to the text and you’ll notice something.

The Feeding Five Thousand story, in 𝘑𝘰𝘩𝘯.

John 6.8-13.

The way preachers tell this story, some boy volunteered his lunch, and Jesus multiplied it. I certainly hope the boy volunteered his lunch, because the text actually doesn’t say he did! The word for boy, παιδάριον/pedárion, is also slang for “slave,” and it’s entirely possible this was a slave’s lunch—and back then, people regularly forgot their manners with slaves, so it’s entirely possible one of Jesus’s students saw the lunch, said “Gimme that lunch!” and brought it to Jesus.

And yeah, we’d expect Jesus to respond to such behavior, “What is wrong with you? ‘Thou shalt not steal.’ We were just talking about that command last Tuesday. Go sit over there and think about what you’ve done. Son, I apologize for my student. Can I borrow your lunch? I promise I’ll give back even more.” But okay, let’s presume Jesus’s students knew better than to do any such thing.

The reason I translated ἄρτους/ártus, “breads,” as “pitas” is because that’s quite likely what they were: Flatbread. Smaller than naan or bagels, bigger than dinner rolls, but of course flat, ’cause of the way they were cooked on the side of a clay oven. Five was a small lunch—a child’s lunch, which is why it’s probably correct to say it came from a child instead of a slave. Made of barley instead of wheat; barley was cheaper, so this was likely a poor person’s lunch.

The synoptic gospels call the fish ἰχθύας/ikhthýas, “fishes,” which they were; but John identifies them as ὀψάρια/opsária, dried and salted fish, which you’d spread on the pitas if you didn’t only wanna eat bread. I translated them “anchovies,” which isn’t a precise translation, but it’s close enough. “Kippers” works too. You’ll notice in John, Jesus made the fish optional—if you wanted your pitas without fish, it’s fine. Even back then, not everybody liked anchovies!

Custom was for students to stand when the rabbi was talking. Now Jesus had them lie down, ’cause that’s how people ate in his culture.

John 6.8-13 KWL

8Simon Peter’s brother Andrew,

one of Jesus’s students, told him,

9“A boy is here who has five barley pitas and two anchovies,

but these things amount to what, for so many?”

10Jesus says, “Make the people recline.”

There’s a lot of grass on the ground, so the men recline.

Their number is like 5,000.

11So, taking the pitas and giving thanks to God,

Jesus distributes them to those reclining.

Likewise from the kippers—

as much as they want.

12Once they’re full, Jesus tells his students,

“Gather the overabundant scraps,

lest any of them perishes.”

13So they gather and fill 12 two-gallon baskets

with scraps of the five barley pitas

which exceeded what was eaten.

Preparing to feed the 5,000—in the synoptic gospels.

Mark 6.35-37, Matthew 14.15-16, Luke 9.12-13.

Though I’m going through John, and covering the Feeding Five Thousand Story from his POV, I pointed out all the gospels include this story: Both John, and the other three which we call synoptics, or synoptic gospels, ’cause they frequently share the same optics—they describe Jesus from the very same point of view. (Probably because Matthew and Luke are using Mark as source material. That’s the prevailing theory.)

John introduces the story with Jesus checking out the vast crowd, then asking his student Philip about buying bread for them Jn 6.5 —as a test, not because Jesus literally wanted him to buy bread, Jn 6.6 and to kinda give us an idea of the resources needed to feed such a crowd.

The other gospels approach it thisaway: It’s late, and the students think it’s high time Jesus’s audience went home.

Mark 6.35-37 KWL

35Since a late hour comes already,

Jesus’s students, coming to him, say,

“The place is wilderness

and it’s a late hour:

36Release them, so they go to the fields around, and villages;

they can buy themselves something they can eat.”

37AIn reply Jesus tells them,

“You give them something to eat.”

Matthew 14.15-16 KWL

15Becoming evening,

the students come to Jesus, saying,

“The place is wilderness

and the hour comes:

Release the crowd, so going to the villages

they can buy themselves food.”

16Jesus tells them, “They have no need to go.

“You give them something to eat.”

Luke 9.12-13 KWL

12The day begins to recline,

and the Twelve, coming up, tell Jesus,

“Release the crowd, so going to the villages around, and fields,

they can rest and can find provisions,

for here we are in a wilderness.”

13AJesus tells them,

“You give them something to eat.”

This differing point of view presents a minor bible difficulty: Is it Jesus’s students who notice the people getting hungry, and figure it’s time for them to leave and get food, or is it Jesus who notices, and decides it’s time to feed them? I say minor bible difficulty because it’s not at all hard to recognize both Jesus and his kids would realize it was time for dinner; and it’s not at all hard to imagine Jesus might talk to Philip about feeding them before he spoke to the rest of the Twelve.

Getting ready to feed 5,000.

John 6.1-7.

John didn’t write his gospel in chapters. Took a few centuries before some enterprising Christian divided the bible into chapters; took a bit longer before it was divided further into verses. But when John was divided into chapters, the editor largely did it right: In a lot of ’em, Jesus does a miracle, and there’s fallout as people argue over what this miracle means, and what it means about Jesus; and Jesus of course has to correct some of their wrong ideas. And today, popular Christian culture still pitches their theories about what these miracles and Jesus’s teachings mean, and the Holy Spirit of course has to correct some of our wrong ideas. Assuming we listen to him any.

So John 6 begins with the Feeding Five Thousand Story. All four gospels tell this story, ’cause it’s important: It reminds us God’s kingdom has unlimited resources. I’ll begin with the first part of the story.

John 6.1-7 KWL

1After these things, Jesus goes across the Galilean sea, Tiberias.

2A great crowd is following Jesus,

because they’re watching the signs

which he’s doing among the sick.

3Jesus goes up a hill with his students.

4It’s getting near the Judean feast of Passover.

5Jesus is lifting up his eyes,

seeing this great crowd come to him.

He tells Philip, “Where might we buy bread

so these people might eat?”

6Jesus is saying this test Philip,

for he already knew what he’s about to do.

7Philip is answering Jesus,

“The bread of 200 denarii isn’t enough for them!

—so each one might receive a little.”

The Galilean sea.

The 166km² freshwater lake in northern Israel—which we wouldn’t call a “sea,” but the ancient Galileans proudly did—was originally called כִּנְּרוֹת/Khinnerót, “harps,” although in modern Hebrew it means “violins.” Supposedly the name is because it’s harp-shaped. Meh; kinda. Considering that place names in the bible were regularly the result of something happening there, instead of what something kinda looked like, my bet is something involving multiple harps happened there—a contest, a festival, a popular harp-manufacturer; whatever. The origin is lost to history, of course.

Anyway, by Jesus’s day, Herod Antipas had renamed it Τιβεριάς/Tiveriás, “Tiberias,” after the city he’d founded on its southern bank, which he named to suck up to the Roman emperor, Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus. There’s no evidence Herod suppressed the original name—Luke still calls it “the lake of Genessaret,” Lk 5.1 ’cause Γεννησαρέτ/Ghennisarét is how Greek-speakers mangled the name Khinnerót. But Tiberias is how people outside Israel came to know it, which is why John used that name thrice.

We don’t know where the feeding took place. Some Christians have speculated it happened at Tiberias—that this is why the word Τιβεριάδος/Tiveriádos is in verse 1—but no; John was just using the proper name of the Galilean sea. We only know it didn’t happen at Bethsaida, ’cause Jesus goes there later.

Anyway. Crowds heard about Jesus curing people, so they wanted to check him out for themselves. And he did cure some of them. Mt 14.14, Lk 9.11 Then he climbs a hill, not to get away from them (although there is some of that), but so he can be seen, and maybe heard. The other gospels say he took advantage of the situation and taught ’em all day long. Mk 6.34-36 Maybe the Sermon on the Mount again; maybe something else. We don’t know.

Angry Jesus.

Some weeks ago I was speaking with someone about blogging on the gospel according to John. He expressed some excitement about it.

HE. “Oh yeah! You at the parts where Jesus really tears the Pharisees a new one?”

ME. “Getting there.”

HE. “I love that part.”

Doesn’t surprise me. He gets really, really angry at people whom he considers his political enemies, and loves to imagine himself tearing them a new one. Stands to reason he’d love seeing that same level of anger in Jesus.

And let’s be honest: Jesus does get angry sometimes! I’m not one of those interpreters who insist Jesus never did; that “God’s wrath” and “the day of wrath” are metaphors, or anthropomorphic euphemisms, for what’s really going on in God’s head, because God never really gets angry. Or insist, like the medieval scholastics used to argue, God can’t have legitimate human-type emotions, because that’d interfere with his immutable nature. (God does have an immutable, i.e. unchanging, nature. But the scholastics borrowed way too many ideas from Aristotle and the ancient Greeks, and went a bit wonky.)

Nope; sometimes God gets angry! We humans can legitimately piss him off. Whenever we openly defy him when we clearly know better; whenever we pretend to be righteous, but are hypocritically using our phony “righteousness” to stick it to others; whenever we take advantage of the weak and needy and marginalized, and assume we can easily get away with it because nobody’s watching. Human evil regularly enrages God.

It’s why the prophets and apostles kept pointing to a day when God would finally put things right—and called it “the day of the LORD’s wrath.” Ek 7.19, Zp 1.18, Ro 2.5, Rv 6.17 Because they expected, if not wanted, God to open up a can of whup-ass on humanity’s evildoers. (Presuming we’re not among them!)

But back to Jesus. Did Jesus get angry? Duh:

Mark 3.5 NLT

He looked around at them angrily and was deeply saddened by their hard hearts. Then he said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” So the man held out his hand, and it was restored!

In that story, Jesus was in synagogue, the people brought him a guy with a paralyzed hand, and accusers were watching Jesus to see whether he’d cure the guy, specifically so they could condemn him for “working” on Sabbath. Jesus rightly pointed out you can make exceptions for good deeds on Sabbath, Mk 3.4 but they didn’t wanna hear it. This was a setup; they weren’t interested in reason or God’s will; they just wanted to stick it to Jesus, and this guy with the messed-up hand was just a pawn in all this. Of course it made him angry. Shouldn’t it?

But I should also point out two things: This is the only place in the gospels where Jesus is said to be angry; and Jesus doesn’t act on his anger. At all. He cures the guy—which is something he’d have done either way, happy or angry. He doesn’t yell at the hypocrites; he doesn’t stop teaching and storm out of synagogue; he doesn’t make a whip out of rope and start flogging them.

Oh yeah; the story where Jesus makes a whip and drives the merchants and animals out of the temple. Christians constantly presume he’s angry in that story, ’cause flipping tables and cracking a whip sure sounds violent! But does the scripture say what his mood was when this happened? Raging like the Hulk in the comic books and movies? Or annoyed—“Aw nuts, this again”—and patiently moving their profit-making venture out of God’s sacred prayer space?

See, we’re projecting anger upon Jesus because we would get angry in these circumstances. We’re projecting anger upon Jesus whenever he condemns hypocrites, rebukes the thoughtless behavior of his students, or calls things as he sees ’em—and these things are pretty messed up! We would be angry.

And some of us don’t really give a wet crap about injustice and hypocrisy: We’re already angry. Injustice is just a convenient excuse to rage a bit, under the guise of “righteous anger.” But anger’s a work of the flesh, and we’re not following Jesus’s example and refusing to act upon it: We’re Hulking out.

Those accepting everyone and everything but Jesus.

John 5.41-47.

People regularly misunderstand this next bit because they regularly misdefine the word δόξα/dóxa, which Jesus uses throughout. The KJV translates it as “honour”—or as we Americans spell it thanks to Noah Webster, “honor.” And in American culture, “honor” means high respect. Great esteem. Reverence. Praises. Sometimes even worship… which makes some of us uncomfortable when people are getting honored like this, ’cause it can almost feel like idolatry. Honestly, sometimes it’s totally idolatry.

But dóxa doesn’t indicate a high opinion of someone; it just indicates one’s opinion. Good and respectable… or bad and infamous. It can go every which way. True, when Jesus is talking about the opinion people have of him, he rightly expects it should be a good one. He’s a good guy! He’s loving, kind, patient, generous, joyous; he exhibits all the Spirit’s fruit ’cause he’s loaded with the Holy Spirit. Jn 3.34 He never sins! Plus there’s the miracles—you remember this whole discourse was triggered by him curing someone who’d been disabled for decades. He’s done all sorts of good deeds like that. And let’s not forget he knows a ton about God and his kingdom.

Such a person should have the best reputation, whether it’s among devout religious people like himself, or among pagans who weren’t religious whatsoever, but who could nonetheless recognize a legitimately good, compassionate, and authentic guy when they saw him. Plenty of Christian ministers have just this kind of reputation: They’re well-known for their good character and good deeds, and everyone in their community respects ’em.

And then there’s Jesus among the people of Jerusalem. And they’re giving him crap because he cured the guy on Sabbath, and this must therefore mean he’s… evil? Wait, why’d they suddenly leap to that extreme? How messed-up is their thinking?

But lemme tell you: I run into plenty of people with the very same messed-up thinking. So have you. People who can’t fathom that a Christian minister is even Christian, simply because he’s a member of the wrong political party. Or because they don’t believe the Spirit does miracles anymore, and figure this person can’t possibly be doing miracles in the Spirit’s power; it’s gotta be the devil—and so they go straight to blaspheming the Spirit.

What’s their problem? It’s exactly the same diagnosis Jesus gives to his critics in Jerusalem: They don’t have God’s love within them. And without this particular fruit, no one can be trusted. No one can be loved. Jesus must be trying to deceive them for some reason, and no doubt they have plenty of paranoid, delusional guesses as to why. And since they imagine themselves devout, they’re pretty sure God gave them the power to discern just what he’s up to—and the power to ignore everything he says in his defense.

John 5.41-47 KWL

41“I don’t seek a reputation from people.

42But I knew you people:

You don’t have God’s love within yourselves.

43I came in my Father’s name

and you don’t accept me.

Another might come in their own name;

you’ll accept that person.

44How are you able to trust anyone?

You actually accept one another’s reputations?

You don’t seek the reputation which only comes from God?

45Don’t imagine I’ll accuse you before the Father:

Your accuser is Moses.

You once put your hope in him.

46For if you’re still trusting Moses,

it’s me you’re trusting,

for Moses writes about me!

47If you don’t trust those writings,

how will you trust my words?”

Proof in Jesus’s favor—if you’re willing to see it.

John 5.30-40.

You might recall the story where Jesus cures some guy at a pool in Jerusalem. He’d been disabled for decades; people should’ve been rejoicing at this, ’cause God has a prophet in Israel who can cure the sick!

But instead the Judeans pitched a fit: Jesus cured this guy on Sabbath. To hypocrites like these guys, it sets a bad precedent: If God empowers good deeds on Sabbath, now they might have to do good deeds on Sabbath! Hence all their ridiculous arguments about how Jesus can’t be of God; God would never. Exactly the same as hypocrites nowadays, when they don’t care to help the needy, and offer ridiculous objections about any Christians who do. “Oh those people are active, unrepentant sinners,” as if Jesus didn’t regularly eat with sinners. “Oh those people are breaking the law,” as if Jesus didn’t likewise interact with people who violated the laws of Israel and God. But I digress.

Jesus correctly points out he can cure on Sabbath because his Father authorized him to do so. Because he is the Son of Man. This, despite all the obvious evidence Jesus is exactly who he says he is, his Judean critics didn’t care to hear.

Now before we get to today’s passage, I need to explain some of the historical and biblical context so it makes sense. Otherwise you’re just gonna read it and go, “Hmm. Why does Jesus say his testimony isn’t true?”

Elsewhere in John’s gospel, certain Pharisees object to Jesus’s teachings on legal grounds. No they’re not in a courtroom; no they don’t need to follow courtroom proceedings! But if you’ve ever debated someone, you might notice how, every once in a while, they might try to base some of their arguments and defenses on legal procedure and precedent. As if we’re in a courtroom, or in Congress, which we’re not. It’s not actually a valid debate tactic, but they’ll try it out anyway, and hope you never call ’em on it.

John 8.13 NRSVue

Then the Pharisees said to him, “You are testifying on your own behalf; your testimony is not valid.”

Literally they said ἀληθής/alithís, “true,” but no they weren’t accusing Jesus of lying (like the NKJV and other translations have it). Historical context, folks. Testifying about yourself didn’t count in court. It wasn’t “true,” i.e. valid, unless you had a second witness to confirm you. Like Moses put it:

Deuteronomy 19.15 NRSVue

“A single witness shall not suffice to convict a person of any crime or wrongdoing in connection with any offense that may be committed. Only on the evidence of two or three witnesses shall a charge be sustained.”

I should point out some commentators claim Judeans wouldn’t accept anyone’s testimony about themselves: If you were ever put on trial, you had to be silent, because your testimony didn’t count. This is of course rubbish; if you’ve read your bible you know people regularly spoke up at their trials. Jesus, Peter and John, Stephen, and Paul all made statements at their trials; Stephen took up an entire chapter. Ac 7 Jesus was even sentenced to death on his testimony: Nobody else’s testimony was proven valid! Mk 14.56-59 But Jesus testified he’s Messiah, Mt 26.63-66 and his testimony was certainly valid. Self-testimony certainly could be. Jn 8.14 It’s just Jesus’s listeners, in this case and others, wanted more witnesses.

Now whenever Jesus made significant statements, he usually started ’em with “Amen,” which gets translated “Verily verily” in the KJV, and “Very truly I tell you” in the NIV and NRSVue. He did so before these statements too. Jn 5.19, 24, 25 It’s actually an oath: He swears what he’s saying is true. He is the Son of Man; he will judge the world on the Father’s behalf. But yeah, by legal standards, he only provided his own testimony, so it shouldn’t hold up in court.

Thing is, they weren’t in court! (Well, there’s the court of public opinion, but you know how lawless that can get.) But if you wanna challenge Jesus on a point of Law, you’re in for it: Jesus knows the Law better than anyone. Whom do you think gave it to Moses? Yes, the correct answer is “the LORD”—and that’s Jesus.

So he’ll play along. You demand a second testimony? Fine; he’s got witnesses.

How Jesus submits to his Father.

John 5.30.

After Jesus cured some guy, the Judeans objected because he did it on sabbath, so Jesus went into a teaching about how he works because his Father works—and he’s also gonna judge the world at the End.

He ends this declaration with this statement, which I figured I’d discuss on its own because it has to do with how Jesus submits to his Father. Submission is a loaded concept for certain Christians—especially since some of ’em are interpreting the idea in ways which wind up going heretic. So it’s turned this statement into a loaded one.

Statement first though.

John 5.30 KWL

“I can’t do anything on my own.

I judge just as I hear,

and my judgment is fair

because I don’t seek my own will,

but the will of the One who sends me.”

Just to remind you: Separation of powers is an American thing. Our executives don’t judge, and our judges don’t carry out their rulings but have cops and marshals who do that. But that’s obviously not how ancient kings work. Kings were the supreme rulers of their land, and were by themselves the supreme court—if a king ruled, there’s no overruling him.

Our ideas of plaintiffs and defendants, who got to argue their case before the judge; of laws and precedents the king was supposed to follow: Those are important. If the king actually follows those things, you’ll get a fair trial. But despots don’t care about any of those things, and do as they please. Rogue Supreme Courts ignore the Constitution and precedents, ignore the people who argued in front of them, rule according to their agendas, and make up ridiculous arguments to defend their rulings. Ancient and medieval kings didn’t even bother to defend themselves; they figured they had every right to rule as they pleased. Fairness? Fairness doesn’t matter.

In comparison, Jesus says he’s not a despot. He doesn’t judge on his own. He judges as he hears, meaning he listens to the plaintiffs and defendants before him. He follows a Law which defines good and evil. He takes God’s will into consideration; not his own.

As any good Israeli king should. As Solomon did. And of course, as Romans didn’t—they might be bothered to have fair trials when it was a fellow Roman on trial, like Paul, but if you didn’t have citizenship they’d simply torture you, as they almost did Paul. Ac 22.24-27 Or they’d delay your trial ’cause they wanted a bribe, likewise as they did with Paul. Ac 24.25 Right here, Jesus is contrasting his fair and righteous rule with that of Romans—and corrupt judges, like the senators who later sentenced him to death.

Because being a fair judge is what God wants. God cares about truth. God doesn’t want people unjustly punished and penalized. God doesn’t want the guilty to go free, the evildoer to unrepentantly get away with it. Corrupt judges look the other way because they favor the rich and powerful, and maybe want their wealthy friends to take ’em on vacations and help ’em buy RVs. Jesus in contrast will always rule fairly. Always.

But let’s be honest: Jesus totally has an agenda. He’s totally biased. He admits it. Ignore all those Christians who claim Jesus and God are the only unbiased judges in the universe; of course the LORD is biased. Fortunately for us, grace means he’s biased in our favor, which is why Jesus says in this very same passage, “I promise you the one who hears my word, and trusts the One who sends me, has life in the age to come and doesn’t go into judgment.” Jn 5.24 KWL Those who follow Jesus don’t get a trial! They go straight into the age to come. That’s the team we wanna be on.

So what other bias does Jesus confess to? He says it right there in today’s verse: “I don’t seek my own will, but the will of the One who sends me.” He’s not a despot who does whatever he wants; he only wants to do as the Father wants. The Father is a righteous judge; therefore the Son’s gonna be a righteous judge.

If you’re anxious Jesus is gonna be furious at sin, much like angry preachers are… well okay, he certainly hates sin. Especially when people exploit the poor and needy, and figure it’s okay because they went through all the proper religious motions to wipe out all their bad karma. The LORD already said, through Isaiah, he’s not listening to such people. Is 1.15 He wants ’em to repent!

Therefore he’s gonna be a righteous judge—who may be exorbitantly lenient on those who follow him, but judges everyone else fairly, on merit. And while there are many Christians who insist only the people who follow Jesus are gonna enter the age to come, I’m pretty sure Jesus is gonna extend grace to a lot more people than they’re expecting. People who honestly didn’t know any better; people who died before hearing the gospel, so they’re not penalized for rejecting it; babies who died before they could hear it, of course. Jesus is far more gracious than angry preachers. Or me!—there’s lots of people I wouldn’t let in, but thankfully I’m not the judge.

The implications of being the Son of Man.

John 5.24-29.

On occasion I’ll hear some Christian preacher claim that Jesus referring to God as “Father”—whether he’s talking about God as his Father, or God as our Father—was a wholly unique thing in history; that somehow the Jews had never before imagined God as their Father. It’s not true—

Deuteronomy 32.6 KJV

Do ye thus requite the LORD, O foolish people and unwise? is not he thy father that hath bought thee? hath he not made thee, and established thee?

Psalm 89.26 KJV

He shall cry unto me, Thou art my father, my God, and the rock of my salvation.

Isaiah 63.16 KJV

Doubtless thou art our father, though Abraham be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledge us not: thou, O LORD, art our father, our redeemer; thy name is from everlasting.

Isaiah 64.8 KJV

But now, O LORD, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.

Malachi 1.6 KJV

A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I be a father, where is mine honour? and if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the LORD of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name?

—but man do preachers like to claim it.

Anyway, Jesus regularly refers to God as our Father, and specifically his Father… but whereas we humans are just creations and adoptive children of our heavenly Father, Jesus is something significantly different. He’s the Son of God. And no, not just “Son of God” in the sense we see in Psalm 2, where the king of Israel is especially adopted by God as his son, and therefore “Son of God” is just a royal title like Messiah. Nope; in the trinity there’s a Father and Son, and the Son became human, and that’s Jesus of Nazareth. He’s fully God same as his Father is fully God.

In John chapter 5, Jesus explains some of that idea. And it’s a doozy of an idea. Pretty sure it broke the brains of most of the Judeans he said it to. Because Jesus is making some pretty cosmic declarations about himself. He already said in the last bit the Father shows the Son everything he does, Jn 5.20 the Son’s gonna raise the dead, Jn 5.21 the Son’s gonna judge the world, Jn 5.22 and you’d better recognize the Son’s authority if you respect the Father. Jn 5.23

Oh, and at the End, the coming in the clouds of the Son of Man? Da 7.13 That’s Jesus. He’s the Son of Man. Did you not notice he constantly calls himself “the Son of Man”? He doesn’t do it to remind people he’s human; anybody who looked at him could tell he was human. He does it to remind people he’s that guy. The guy who does all this:

John 5.24-29 KWL

24 “Amen amen! I promise you the one who hears my word,

and trusts the One who sends me,

has life in the age to come

and doesn’t go into judgment.

Instead they passed from death into life.

25 Amen amen! I promise you the hour comes, and it’s now,

when the dead will hear God’s Son’s voice,

and those who will hear it, will live.

26 For just as the Father has life in himself,

likewise he gives life to the Son to have in himself.

27 The Father gives the Son power to make judgments,

because he’s the Son of Man.

28 Don’t be amazed by this, because the hour comes

in which everyone in the sepulchers

will hear the Son of Man’s voice

29 and come out—

those who do good, into resurrection life;

those who do little, into resurrection judgment.”

You realize this discussion started because some people got bent out of shape over Jesus curing the sick on sabbath. And people think I go off on tangents. Jesus went from, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work” Jn 5.17 KJV to “Oh and just to remind you, I’m the Son of Man.”

It’s weird how various pagans will insist Jesus was only a great moral teacher and nothing more, when Jesus straight-up tells people he’s going to raise the dead, judge humanity, and rule the world. And people don’t dismiss him as a demonized madman and stone him to death, because he just cured a guy who was unable to walk for 38 years, and demonized guys can’t do that. The only ones who can do that, outside of hospitals, were empowered by God—and for all you know, might actually be the great End Times figure whose everlasting kingdom shall not be destroyed. Da 7.14

The implications of being God’s son.

John 5.17-23.

After Jesus cured some guy at a pool, the Judeans objected because he’d done so on sabbath. Now in the synoptic gospels, Jesus’s defense was usually along the lines of, “Curing the sick is a good deed, and doing good deeds on sabbath doesn’t violate the Law.” In John however, his defense is entirely different:

John 5.17-18 KWL

17 Jesus answers them, “Even today, my Father works.

And I work.”

18 So this is why the Judeans are seeking all the more to kill him:

Not only is Jesus loosening sabbath custom,

but he’s saying God is his own father,

making himself equal to God.

Y’see, there’s a really profound legal concept embedded in Jesus’s statement, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.” Jn 5.17 KJV It’s something you’re gonna miss if you don’t understand how adoption in the Roman Empire worked. Instead you’re gonna wind up making the foolish assumption many an Evangelical has: They think Jesus told the Judeans, “God’s not bound by your customs and Law, and neither am I.” Therefore he can break the Law. With impunity. Kinda like they do.

If Jesus is claiming he has the almighty prerogative to do as he pleases, including break whatever commands he wished, then Jesus could sin like crazy. It’s why lawless Christians love this interpretation—it gives them license to sin like crazy. Grace forgives everything, right? So let’s get nuts!

It turns Jesus into a major jerk—which is an obvious sign that’s not what he meant. If any interpretation of God violates his character, it’s wrong. It’s based on our bad attitudes, not his.

Jesus isn’t claiming he can do as he pleases. He’s claiming he does as the Father does. And the Father is benevolent, kind, generous, compassionate, forgiving. He does good deeds every day of the week, sabbath included. Ever been sick, and got well on a Saturday morning? Looks like God cured you on sabbath too.

Likewise Jesus is kind. His goal is always to demonstrate his Father’s love, and in so doing reveal who the Father is, and the sort of kingdom the Father’s given him to rule. Bear that in mind whenever you read the gospels.

Okay, on to what Jesus actually means. And why it outraged the Judeans.

“But you cured them on 𝘴𝘢𝘣𝘣𝘢𝘵𝘩.”

John 5.8-16, Luke 13.10-17.

So Jesus goes to Jerusalem and cures some guy at a pool. I’ll quote the pertinent part:

John 5.8-9 KWL

8 Jesus tells him, “Get up.

Pick up your bed and walk.”

9 At once the person becomes whole.

He picks up his bed and walks.

It’s the sabbath on that day.

In case you missed it, the last line of verse 9 points out that day was sabbath. That’d be Saturday, the seventh day of the week; the day on which the LORD told Israel he wanted ’em to not work. There’s a whole command about it:

Deuteronomy 5.12-14 KJV

12 Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee. 13 Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: 14 but the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. 15 And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the LORD thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the LORD thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.

Everybody got that? No worky. Not you, nor your kids, nor your employees, nor your animals, nor “shabbos goys”—which is what certain American Jews call their gentile friends who do things for ’em on sabbath so they won’t break the command. They might think having their gentile neighbor pick up a pizza for ’em isn’t suborning a commandment violation. But it totally is.

Pharisees got mighty specific about what constitutes rest. The Mishna has a whole section, or tractate, called Shabbát. It’s all about what you can and can’t do on sabbath. There are 39 specific Pharisee rules about what not to do. No planting, plowing, reaping, gathering, threshing, winnowing, etc. Picking up your bed broke the 39th rule: No moving something from one significant place to another.

Yet here was this guy, carrying his bed. Because Jesus, who cured him, told him to do it.

John 5.10-13 KWL

10 So the Judeans are telling the cured person, “It’s sabbath!

It’s not right for you to pick up your bed.”

11 The cured person answers them, “He who makes me whole—

that person tells me, ‘Pick up your bed and walk.’ ”

12 They question him, “Who is the person

who tells you, ‘Pick it up and walk’?”

13 The cured person didn’t know who Jesus is,

for Jesus slipped into the crowd in that place.

The man at the pool.

John 5.1-9.

There are two back-to-back stories of Jesus curing people in John, but because they’re in two different chapters, Christians tend not to nice they’re right by each other. On purpose. ’Cause they happen some time apart. The first, where Jesus cures a royal’s son, happens in western Galilee right after they got back from Jerusalem. The second, where Jesus cures a weak man at a pool, takes place back in Jerusalem—either at the next festival where they were expected to go to temple, or several festivals later; maybe even years later. We don’t know.

The situation is this: Jesus is back in Jerusalem, and in Jerusalem there’s a pool. The UBS and NA Greek New Testaments identify it as Βηθζαθά/Vithzathá, although most bibles go with the name given by the Textus Receptus, Βηθεσδά/Vithesdá (KJV “Bethesda”) and other ancient copies of John call it Βηθσαιδά/Vithsedá, Βηδσαιδά/Vidsedá, Βηδσαιδάν/Vidsedán, and Βελζεθά/Velzethá. All of these are attempts to transliterate the Aramaic name בית זיתא/Beit Cheytá, the name of a district in first-century Jerusalem which Josephus calls “the New City.” The district was next to the Roman fortress, Antonia, located on the NNW corner of the temple mount, and the pool was within this district. It was created around the 700s BC as a reservoir for rainwater, and around 200 BC the head priest, Simon bar Onias (also known as Simon 2), had a second pool created just south of it. Scholars figure it was so one pool could hold warm water, and the other cold, so you could bathe in whatever temperature you pleased.

Because it’s by the Sheep Gate, popular legend says the pool was created to wash sheep before their ritual sacrifice. Problem is, the pool is 13 meters deep, which is more appropriate for drowning sheep. So no, it’s likely not for washing animals. (That’s what they used Siloam for.) More likely this pool was mainly used for ritual washing. People had to get ritually clean before they could go to temple, so here’s where they did it.

The Israel Museum’s model of the “Pool of Bethesda” during the first century. Without the water of course. John describes it with five colonnades—the four around the whole complex, and one in the middle over the wall between the pools. [Wikimedia]

After the Romans destroyed Jerusalem, the pool was made part of a pagan temple to Asclepius and Serapis, the Roman and Egyptian gods of healing. When the Roman Empire became Christian, it was turned into the Church of the Sheep, which was destroyed in 614 by the Persians. The Crusaders rebuilt it as a smaller church, the Church of the Paralytic, which fell into disuse after the crusaders built the larger Church of St. Anne nearby. That church was renovated by the French in the 1800s, but the rest remained ruins, later to be excavated by German archaeologist Conrad Schick.

Today, the Sheep Gate is known as the Lion’s Gate (Hebrew שער האריות/shahar ha-Arayót), named for the leopard carvings in the stone above it, which get confused with lions. It’s the entrance to the Muslim quarter. The pool’s still there, as part of the St. Anne’s church complex.

But let’s get back to Jesus’s day. At that time, the pool was a healing pool: Sick people gathered round it, hoping for a miracle.

John 5.1-4 KWL

1 After these events there’s a Judean feast,

and Jesus goes up to Jerusalem.

2 A pool is in Jerusalem, by the Sheep Gate

—in Aramaic it’s called Beit Cheytá—

having five colonnades.

3 Under these colonnades lay a large number

of weak, blind, lame, shriveled people,

{waiting for the water to move.

4 For an angel comes down to the pool at times,

and agitates the water,

so the first who enters after the water is agitated

becomes whole from whatever ailment he has.}

Verses 3B–4 first appeared in fourth-century copies of John, and were of course added to the Textus Receptus. They provide kind of a backstory to why all these people were gathered round the pool: Whenever the water moved, they figured an angel was causing it, and hoped it’d heal them. My only problem with this theory is it sounds a lot like pagan superstition; like something the Greeks would claim. “Look, a lesser god is moving the water! Jump in!” But is that what people believed in the first century? Or what people believed in the fourth century, after a few centuries of Greco-Roman pagans had overseen the pool, and added their own superstitions to the pool’s history?

Now we do know the water was agitated, for that’s what the weak man says. Jn 5.7 But it didn’t have to be roiled up by an angel. It coulda happened whenever the water was replenished. Or when an attendant dumped a bunch of bath salts into it. Or when crowds of people came to town and needed ritual washing. Anything coulda moved the water—and people might figure, “Fresh water” or “Ritual washing” or “Fresh salts” or any of those things might somehow make the water holier, and therefore more likely to cure ’em.

But the angel story has been in bibles, including the Vulgate, for a mighty long time. And you know how people are with favorite traditions: They’re loath to give ’em up, no matter how wrong and misguided they might be.

Still, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if this was a myth these sick people believed. They wanted to get well, and healthcare didn’t exist back then. Their “physicians” were actually witch doctors, and had no real medical nor scientific training. Their faith healers might be legit—might actually have the Holy Spirit empowering them—but then again might not, or might be frauds. So what other options did you have? Well, there was a rumor if you got in the pool at just the right time, you’d get cured. So here they were.

If it all sounds hopeless to you—and it kinda does to me too—y’notice the people gathered round the pool had to have some small degree of hope, or they wouldn’t be there! (Or, which is just as likely, their family members wouldn’t carry them there, day after day, in the hopes something might happen.) Hey, what else are you gonna do? Who else are you gonna turn to?

So this is the depressing situation Jesus walked into one day… to bring somebody out of it.

The first time Jesus cured anyone.

John 4.46-54.

While Jesus and his students were staying in Cana (where they didn’t respect him as a prophet, so he didn’t have to deal with people seeking “Jesus the Prophet” all day), a certain royal showed up. Probably specifically to seek him out: Someone did respect Jesus the Prophet.

John 4.46 KWL

46 Jesus goes again to Cana of Galilee,

where he made the water wine.

A certain royal is there,

whose son in Capharnaum is sick.

John calls him a βασιλικὸς/vasilikós, “a royal.” Not a king, but someone in the royal family; debatably a servant in the royal household, but that’s far less likely. Could be someone who might actually become king himself someday, but if that’s so you’d think John woulda named names.

Both John Wycliffe and the Geneva Bible translated vasilikós as “little king.” But for some reason the King James translated it “nobleman,” and that concept has kinda stuck in translators’ heads ever since. You get “royal official” (Amplified, CSB, NASB, NET, NIV, NRSV), “government official” (ISV, GNB, and NLT), plain ’ol “official” (ESV), and of course “nobleman” (NKJV, MEV).

Regardless, he was a big deal—and word leaked to him Jesus might be the sort of person who could do miracles. And when you’re desperate, you’ll jump all over that sort of rumor. So this royal saddled up, rode 30 kilometers across the province, and called upon some obscure Nazarene rabbi.

John 4.47 KWL

Once this royal heard

Jesus comes from Judea to the Galilee,

he goes to Jesus

and asks whether Jesus might come down

and cure his son,

for he’s about to die.

Prophets get no respect back home.

John 4.43-45.

Right after Jesus spent two days with the Samaritans of Sykhár, sharing the gospel of God’s kingdom with ’em, he needed a break. So he returned to his homeland—the western side of the Roman province of the Galilee. More precisely Cana (today’s Kfar Kanna), 4 kilometers north of Nazareth, where he’d done the water-to-wine thingy.

Time to quote the gospel.

John 4.43-45 KWL

43 After the two days, Jesus comes out of Samaria,

and he goes into the Galilee.

44 For Jesus himself testifies that prophets,

in their own homeland, have no respect.

45 So when Jesus comes to the Galilee,

the Galileans receive him:

They saw everything he did in Jerusalem at the festival,

for they likewise went to the festival.

The part which tends to throw us Christians is Jesus’s comment “that a prophet hath no honour in his own country.” Jn 4.44 KJV Because in the synoptic gospels, Jesus says it like it’s a bad thing—

Mark 6.4 KWL

Jesus tells them this:

“A prophet isn’t really disrespected

till he’s in his homeland,

and with his relatives,

and in his own home.”

 

Matthew 13.57 KWL

They’re offended by him, and Jesus tells them,

“A prophet isn’t really disrespected

till he’s in his homeland,

and in his own home.”

 

Luke 4.24 KWL

Jesus says, “Amen! I promise you this:

A prophet never gets approval in his homeland.”

—because in those contexts, it was a bad thing. In each of these gospels, Jesus was teaching in the Nazareth synagogue, Lk 4.16 and his neighbors couldn’t handle the fact these teachings and revelations were coming out of him. Who’s he? What’s the handyman Mk 6.1 (or handyman’s son Mt 13.55) doing announcing God’s kingdom has arrived? In Luke they even tried to push him off a cliff. Lk 4.29

I don’t know whether the incident at the Nazareth synagogue took place before this John passage. It might have, but I don’t think so: One of the Nazarenes’ objections was they wanted Jesus to duplicate the miracles he’d done in Capharnaum, Lk 4.23 and in John he’s not even been to Capharnaum yet, and done no such miracles. Jn 4.54 But by that point it appears he already had made the quip that prophets get no respect back home.

Historically, Christians have interpreted this to mean familiarity breeds contempt. Jesus’s neighbors presumed they knew him—and “knew” he wasn’t anyone important. And took offense at the very idea he might be. Who’d he think he was? What, did he think he was better than them? How dare he.

Seeing Jesus for ourselves.

John 4.39-42.

After Jesus’s talk with the Samaritan at the well, she left her water jar, went to the nearby city of Sykhár, and told everyone there about him:

John 4.29 KWL

“Come! See a person who tells me everything I do.

Might this be the Christ?”

Well, it might be! So the Samaritans come to the well to see Jesus for themselves. And yeah, he’s not Samaritan, but he’s a prophet; he’s willing to talk God with them, and not shun them like Judeans typically do, and for all we know he cured a few sick people. (Yeah, John later describes “the second miracle that Jesus did,” Jn 4.54 but that’s the second miracle in the Galilee; John doesn’t bring up any miracles he did in Judea and Samaria.)

Anyway, everything Jesus says and does among the Samaritans convinces ’em.

John 4.39-42 KWL

39 Many of the Samaritans from this city believe in Jesus

because of the word of the woman,

testifying this: “He tells me everything I do.”

40 So when the Samaritans come to Jesus,

they ask him to stay with them.

He stays there two days,

41 and many more believe because of his word.

42 They’re saying this to the Samaritan woman:

“No longer do we believe because of your saying,

for we heard him

and knew this is truly {the Christ,} the one who saves the world.”

“The Christ” in braces isn’t in the original test of John; it was added in the fifth century, which is why it’s in the Majority Text and the Textus Receptus, and therefore the King James Version. Occasionally, paranoid Christians will insist present-day bibles are trying to make it sound like the Samaritans didn’t really believe Jesus is Messiah. But of course they did: They said he saves the world. Exactly as Messiah, or the Samaritans’ prophesied prophet-like-Moses whom they called the Tahéb (which, it turns out, is also Jesus), would do.

Most Christians commend the Samaritans for coming to check out Jesus for themselves. We like the idea it wasn’t enough for the Samaritans to only take the woman’s word for it—they needed to personally interact with Jesus, and base their belief in him on that. Not that the woman’s testimony is irrelevant!—it got ’em to the well. It’s just her testimony was now superseded by personal experience.

Funny thing, though: Even though we Christians go on and on about how good it was for the Samaritans to do this… many of us turn round and object when our fellow Christians try to get our own personal God-experiences. When we say, “Okay, I’ve heard other Christians’ testimonies; I’ve read the scriptures. But now I wanna hear the Holy Spirit’s voice myself. Now I wanna pray for sick people and watch ’em get cured. Now I want supernatural stuff to happen. If Jesus says these things will follow his followers, Mk 16.17-18 we should see ’em, right?”

I grew up hearing many a cessationist object strongly to this line of thinking: “Personal experience? No no no! Satan will trick you and lead you astray! Besides, personal experience is way too subjective, too insubstantial, too open to interpretation. We can’t base our faith on that. It’s gotta be the bible. Only the scriptures are concrete and safe. We can’t trust personal experience.”

You know… the opposite of what we commend the Samaritans for doing.

Jesus harvests the Samaritans.

John 4.31-38.

Gonna rewind a little to a verse I dealt with previously, in which Jesus’s students come back, see him talking to a Samaritan, and say nothing.

John 4.27 KWL

At this time, Jesus’s students come,

and are wondering why he’s speaking with a woman.

Yet no one says, “Whom do you seek?”

nor “Why do you speak with her?”

The Samaritan leaves, and tells the nearby town she’s encountered a prophet who might be Messiah—as Samaritans understood Messiah. They decide to have a look at Jesus for themselves. Meanwhile Jesus’s students now decide to question him.

John 4.31-34 KWL

31 Meanwhile the students question Jesus,

saying, “Rabbi, eat.”

32 Jesus tells them, “I have food to eat,

which you didn’t know about.”

33 So the students are saying to one another,

“No one brought him food, did they?”

34 Jesus tells them, “My food

is that I might do the will of the One who sends me,

and might complete the work for him.”

Most interpreters figure when ἠρώτων/iróton, “they question,” the students are asking Jesus to eat, but nah; they’re urging him to eat at the same time they’re asking him stuff. Rabbinic students back then were trained in the Socratic-style method of questioning your teacher what you wanted to learn. When the Samaritan was there, the students kept their mouths shut and asked nothing. Once she was gone, now the questions came.

And there are a few reasons why this might be so:

• POLITENESS. Jesus was busy talking with her; don’t interrupt your master. Listen to what he’s doing or saying. Ask your questions afterward.
• SHYNESS. Jesus was cool with them asking him absolutely anything, but they didn’t know nor trust her to not judge ’em for what they were gonna ask.
• SHAME. This one’s popular with certain commentators, who presume the students were embarrassed by Jesus once again ignoring Pharisee custom. I would think they’d’ve known their master by now.
• HUMILITY. Y’notice Pharisees would object to Jesus’s behavior whenever he interacted with “sinners.” Mk 2.16 Not to ask legit questions; frequently to accuse him of stuff, and rant about the things which personally offended them. But Jesus’s students knew him well enough to know he always had good reasons. And good character; he didn’t sin, He 4.15 so you never had to police him to make sure he wasn’t backsliding. They knew better than to presume he’d sin.
• PATIENCE. And because they knew their master, they knew whenever he violated Pharisee custom, he was trying to teach them something, and expected the kids to ask him about it afterward. So they took time to come up with questions.
• TIRED. This one’s also popular with certain commentators: They’d been walking, they were hungry, they didn’t wanna get another lesson right then. They wanted to sit, drink some water, eat some falafel, take a big fat nap till the heat died down, then get back on the road to Galilee. If they realized a lesson was coming, they possibly thought—as kids will—“If we just keep quiet, maybe he’ll drop it, and we’ll get out of it.” Yeah right.

Anyway, the questions began, and Jesus’s lesson followed.

The first time Jesus called himself Messiah.

John 4.25-30.

After meeting Jesus and realizing he’s a prophet, this Samaritan woman he met at Jacob’s well tried to get him to settle which temple was the correct one— the one at Shechem or the one at Jerusalem. Jn 4.20 Jesus pointed out it’s neither. Jn 4.21 God wants worshipers “in spirit and truth,” Jn 4.22-23 who can worship him anywhere. In temple, out of temple; in church, out of church.

But since Jesus didn’t give her the answer she was expecting, and kinda appeared to side with the Judeans, Jn 4.22 the Samaritan did the intellectual equivalent of shrugging her shoulders:

John 4.25 KWL

The woman tells Jesus, “I know Messiah” (i.e. Christ) “comes;

when this man comes, he’ll explain everything.”

“Yeah, you don’t know. But Messiah will know. And when he arrives, he’ll tell us which temple is the right one.”

As I’ve said previously, Samaritans didn’t believe in a Judean-style Messiah. Their bible only went up to Deuteronomy, so there were no actual Messianic prophecies. They believed in the Tahéb, a prophet-like-Moses Dt 18.15 who’d come at the End Times and sort everything out. And since the Tahéb was sorta anointed by God, the word “anointed” (ܡܫܺܝܚܳܐ/mešíkha in Aramaic/Syriac, χριστός/hristós in Greek) would be a valid synonym for Tahéb. Maybe the Samaritan did say Mešíkha, which is why John rendered it μεσσίας/messías, “Messiah.” Maybe she said Tahéb and John translated it. Doesn’t matter. After all, Jesus is the prophet-like-Moses; Ac 3.22-26 he is the Tahéb. So we’re fine either way.

Hence Jesus’s response to her apathetic statement. When Messiah arrives, he’ll tell you which temple is the right one? Well Messiah has arrived.

John 4.26 KWL

Jesus tells her, “I’m him.

I’m speaking to you.”

Mic drop.

Yeah, various skeptics insist Jesus never actually called himself Messiah. They insist Jesus never made any such claim about himself, never even hinted he might be Messiah; that it’s an idea added to Christianity decades later by overzealous apostles. Probably Paul. They really like to blame Paul for all the parts of Christianity they don’t like.

Thing is, Paul wrote his letters before his fellow apostles wrote the gospels. He wrote ’em in the 40s and 50s CE; the gospels were written in the 60s. The circulation of Paul’s teachings were simultaneous with the circulation of Jesus’s teachings; they still are, ’cause they usually get bound together in the New Testament. But when the ancient Christians first heard about Jesus, it was usually in the context of something Paul taught or wrote. Because they go together. It’s not “Jesus said this, but Paul said that”; it’s “Jesus said this, and here’s Paul’s commentary”—they uphold each other. Can’t have Christ without his Christians.

Okay yes, Jesus never literally says the words, “I’m Messiah” (or ἐγώ Μεσσίας, or ܐ݈ܢܳܐ ܡܫܝܚܐ) in the gospels. Largely because if he did say that, he could get arrested and killed for treason against Rome. But he functionally says the very same thing: “I’m him. I’m speaking to you.” It’s as close to “I’m Messiah” as we’re gonna get from Jesus, and the Samaritan clearly understood him—and ran with it.

Literally ran with it: She abandoned her water jar, went into the Samaritan city which she had been deliberately avoiding all this time, and told everyone.

Worship God in spirit and truth.

John 4.19-24.

Since Jesus is a prophet, the Samaritan at the well figured she’d grill him on a then-current Samaritan/Jewish controversy: Which temple is the real temple? Which religion is the true religion? Where’s the one-and-only-one place to serve God? ’Cause Judeans said Jerusalem, and Samaritans said Shechem. Can’t both be right. Right?

John 4.19-20 KWL

19 The woman tells Jesus, “Sir, I see you’re a prophet.

20 Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain.

You Judeans say in Jerusalem

is the place where we have to worship.”

You might remember the Judeans had a temple. Originally it was a tent, “the tabernacle,” the LORD’s sacred portable temple which traveled with the Hebrews after the Exodus, and stayed at a few different locations for nearly five centuries… till Solomon ben David built the LORD a permanent, gold-covered cedar shrine at some point round 1000BC. This remained standing till the neo-Babylonians burnt it to the ground in 586BC.

But it was rebuilt twice: First in 516BC under Babylonian governor (and descendant of Solomon) Zerubbabel bar Shealtiel; then renovated top to bottom by the Herod family during Jesus’s lifetime, from 20BC to 64CE. Completed just in time to be destroyed six years later by the Romans.

The Samaritans opposed Zerubbabel’s first rebuilding. Eventually they decided to build their own temple, round 432BC. They built it on Mt. Gerizim in Shechem, the hill where Moses had the Hebrews proclaim God’s blessings. Dt 11.29 Since God’s name was proclaimed from there, the Samaritans figured this was the perfect place for the LORD’s name to dwell. Not Moriah, where King David had originally purchased a threshing floor to put an altar. 1Ch 21.28, 22.1 David, the Samaritans figured, picked the wrong site. Moses had picked Gerizim, so Gerizim it was.

You might not know these weren’t the only temples of the LORD in the ancient world. Jeroboam ben Navat, after he became king of the 11 northern Israeli tribes, built two temples—one at Dan in the north, Bethel near the southernmost part of his kingdom. This was so his people wouldn’t visit the Jerusalem temple for worship… and maybe get swayed by the kings of Jerusalem, and become a political problem for him later. Nope; now northern Israel had temples, so they could worship at home! Problem was, Jeroboam also included gold calves to represent God, 1Ki 12.26-29 which you might recall is a huge no-no. Dt 5.8-10 As far as the scriptures are concerned, these temples were heretic, and ultimately destroyed when the Assyrians invaded.

And in Egypt, Israeli communities there also created temples to the LORD, in Elephantine and Leontopolis. Both Judeans and Samaritans knew of them, and Flavius Josephus wrote about ’em. But both considered these Egyptian temples heretic, insisting there’s only one place where God would establish his name. Dt 12.11 And they ran that one place. Or figured they did.

So… which temple was the right one? (Yep, you betcha this was an orthodoxy test. Better answer correctly, Jesus!)

John 4.21 KWL

Jesus tells her, “Trust me, ma’am, the hour is come

when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem

will you worship the Father.”

Wait, neither? Yep.

Jesus prophesies to the Samaritan.

John 4.13-19.

Back to Jesus talking with the Samaritan at the well. He tells her about the water of life, and since they’re at a literal well, it’s fair to say she might not wholly understand he’s speaking in metaphor, as he tends to do. Because her focus isn’t a future kingdom of God; it’s on the here and now, and right now she’s at the well fetching water.

John 4.13-15 KWL

13 In reply Jesus tells her, “All who drink of this water

will thirst again.

14 Whoever might drink of the water I give them,

will never thirst in the age to come,

but the water I’ll give them

will become a spring of water within them,

gushing with eternal life.”

15 The woman tells Jesus, “Sir, give me this water!—

so I might not thirst,

nor travel to this place to get water.”

A number of interpreters take this statement the Samaritan made—“Give me this water”—at face value. I don’t. You’ll see why in a moment. But at this point, she’s treating Jesus as if he’s some weirdo… because to her mind, he is some weirdo. Judeans never talk to Samaritans. Yet here’s some rogue Judean who’s talking to her about installing a spring inside her. “Uh-huh. Sure. Yeah, you have water. If you do, I’d like some; fetching water is a pain.”

Ironic answers aren’t actually honest answers, and Jesus realized she didn’t really believe him, and that’s why he decided to “read her mail,” as prophets call it nowadays.

John 4.16-19 KWL

16 {Jesus} tells her, “Go;

call for your man,

and come back to this place.”

17 In reply the Samaritan tells him, “I have no man.”

Jesus tells her, “Well said, ‘I have no man’;

18 you had five men,

and the one you now have isn’t your man.

You said this truthfully.”

19 The woman tells Jesus, “Sir, I see you’re a prophet.”

And now he has her attention. “I see you’re a prophet”? Well duh Jesus is a prophet.

Christian evangelists should be taking notes about now. Too often we try to share Jesus with skeptical people, who think all our claims about who Jesus is and what he does are ridiculous, and aren’t receptive to it whatsoever. Rocky soil. And too often, these evangelists will try platitude after platitude, proof text after proof text, and the person will shrug it all off like Superman does with bullets.

But tell them something we can’t possibly know about them, and suddenly they go, “Wait—who told you that?” The Holy Spirit. He’s real; he’s been getting you ready for this conversation your entire life; you finally wanna hear what he has to say?

So when you’re sharing Jesus, pay attention to the Spirit! He’ll tell you whether this person is receptive or not—and if he tells you something completely random, like “She’s had five men,” don’t just dismiss it as too weird to share: Tell her that, and watch the reaction. (Although, a word of advice? Don’t bring up her relationship history when other people are around. Be discreet like Jesus.)

Anyway that’s why I figure her previous statement, “Give me this water,” was ironic: It wasn’t a truthful response. “I have no man”—now that’s a truthful response.

And from here on out, you’ll notice the Samaritan takes Jesus seriously.

The Samaritan at the well.

John 4.1-14.

Just to remind you: Ancient Israelis (i.e. Judeans and Galileans) and Samaritans did not get along. Same as Israelis and Palestinians don’t get along; same as white nationalists and black nationalists don’t get along; same as cats and birds don’t get along. There was a lot of paranoia, fear, and dangerous old grudges between those two groups.

That’s why it was just dumbfounding for one Samaritan woman, one day, to find a man of Judean descent striking up a conversation with her. Asking her for water, of all things. As if he actually trusted her not to spit in it.

John 4.1-10 KWL

1 Once {the Lord} Jesus knows

the Pharisees hear Jesus makes and baptizes more students than John—

2 though Jesus himself isn’t baptizing,

but his students are—

3 Jesus leaves Judea,

and again goes off to the Galilee,

5 and he has to travel through Samaria.

So Jesus comes to a Samaritan city called Sychár,

which is near the field Jacob gave to his son Joseph.

6 Jacob’s spring is there.

Jesus, fatigued by his long walk, is therefore sitting at the spring.

It was about the sixth hour after sunrise [i.e. noon].

 

7 A woman from Samaria comes to get water.

Jesus tells her, “Give me some to drink”—

8 for his students went into the city

so they might buy food.

9 So the Samaritan woman tells Jesus,

“How can you even be near me, Judean, and ask for a drink?

—me being a Samaritan woman?

For Judeans have no interaction with Samaritans.”

10 In reply Jesus tells her, “If you knew God’s gift,

and knew who’s telling you, ‘Give me some to drink,’

you could ask him,

and he could give you living water.”

Most translations of John have “For Judeans have no interaction with Samaritans” not as something the Samaritan said, but as John’s commentary on the situation. The word συγχρῶνται/synchrónte also means “work together with,” or “have use of”—the two people-groups really did have nothing to do with one another. Each did their own thing… or, of course, fought.

Obviously this woman didn’t recognize Jesus’s accent, or she’d’ve known he was Galilean, not Judean. Not that it would make any difference. Samaritans and Galileans didn’t interact either.

But as we already know about Jesus, he does interact with Samaritans. He came to save everybody, y’know; not just the people of his homeland! Samaritans too. Jesus doesn’t do nationalism or racism, and those who claim to follow him should likewise have no interaction whatsoever with those things—even less interaction than Judeans had with Samaritans.