John 4:9 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
John 4:9
Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.
a Samarite · noun — dative plural masculine, a people or place name
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Acts 10:28 And he said unto them, Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or come unto one of another nation;…
2 Kings 17:24-41 And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in th…
Matthew 10:5 These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye…
John 8:48 Then answered the Jews, and said unto him, Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil?
Luke 17:16-19 And fell down on his face at his feet, giving him thanks: and he was a Samaritan.
Acts 1:8 But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judæ…
Luke 10:33 But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him,
John 4:27 And upon this came his disciples, and marvelled that he talked with the woman: yet no man said, What seekest thou? or, Why talkest thou with…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on John 4:4-26
We have here an account of the good Christ did in Samaria, when he passed through that country in his way to Galilee. The Samaritans, both in blood and religion, were mongrel Jews, the posterity of those colonies which the king of Assyria planted there after the captivity of the ten tribes, with whom the poor of the land that were left behind, and many other Jews afterwards, incorporated themselves. They worshipped the God of Israel only, to whom they erected a temple on mount Gerizim, in competition with that at Jerusalem. There was great enmity between them and the Jews; the Samaritans would not admit Christ, when they saw he was going to Jerusalem (Luk 9:53); the Jews thought they could n…
How is it that thou--not altogether refusing, yet wondering at so unusual a request from a Jew, as His dress and dialect would at once discover Him to be, to a Samaritan.
for, &c.--It is this national antipathy that gives point to the parable of the good Samaritan (Luk 10:30-37), and the thankfulness of the Samaritan leper (Luk 17:16, Luk 17:18).
Adam Clarke on John 4:9
That thou, being a Jew - Probably the inhabitants of Judea distinguished themselves from those of Samaria by some peculiar mode of dress; and by this the Samaritan woman might have known Christ: but it is likely that our Lord spoke the Galilean dialect, by which we find, from Mar 14:70, a Jew of that district might easily be known.
The Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans - Perhaps better, Jews have no communion with Samaritans. These words appear to be added by the evangelist himself, in explanation of the woman's question. The original word, συγχρωνται, has been variously translated and understood. It comes from συν, together, and χραομαι, I use, or borrow: hence it has been understoo…
Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him,.... In a scoffing, jeering way,
how is it, that thou being a Jew; which she might know, by his language and his dress:
askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? not that the waters of Samaria were unlawful for a Jew to drink of; for as
"the land of the Cuthites (or Samaritans), was pure, or clean, so, "their collections of water", and their habitations, and their ways were clean (m),''
and might be used; but because the Jews used no familiarity with the Samaritans, nor would they receive any courtesy or kindness from them, as follows:
for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans: some take these to be the words of the evangelist, co…
The Church Fathers
(Tract. xiii) The Jews would not even use their vessels. So it would astonish the woman to hear a Jew ask to drink out of her vessel; a thing so contrary to Jewish rule.
What doth the woman? When she heard, "Give Me to drink," she very wisely makes the speech of Christ an occasion for a question, and saith, "How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a Samaritan? For the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans." And whence did she suppose Him to be a Jew? From His dress, perhaps, and from His dialect. Observe, I pray you, how considerate the woman was. If there was need of caution, Jesus needed it, not she. For she doth not say, "The Samaritans have no dealings with the Jews," but, "The Jews do not admit the Samaritans." Yet still, although free herself from blame, when she supposed that another was falling into it she would not even so hold her peace, but corrected, as she thought, what was done unlawfully.
And all this was, not of works of righteousness which we have done, nor because we loved Thee,-for our first earthly forefather, who was honourably entertained, in the delightful abode of Paradise, despised Thy divine and saving commandment, and was judged unworthy of that life-giving place, and mingling his seed with the bastard off-shoots of sin, he rendered it very weak;-but Thou, O Lord, of Thine own self, and of Thine ineffable love toward the creature of Thine hands, hast confirmed Thy mercy toward us, and, pitying our estrangement from Thee, hast moved Thyself at the sight of our degradation to take us into compassion. Hence, for the future, a joyous festival is established for us of the race of Adam, because the first Creator of Adam of His own free-will has become the Second Adam. And the brightness of the Lord our God hath come down to sojourn with us, so that we see God face to face, and are saved.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Crucifixion — A common mode of punishment among heathen nations in early times. It is not certain whether it was known among the ancient Jews; probably it was not. The modes of capital punishment according to the…
Eating — The ancient Hebrews would not eat with the Egyptians (Gen. 43:32). In the time of our Lord they would not eat with Samaritans (John 4:9), and were astonished that he ate with publicans and sinners…
Jacobs Well — a deep spring in the vicinity of Shechem (called Sychar in Christ’s time and Nablus at the present day). It was probably dug by Jacob whose name it bears. On the curb of the well Jesus sat and…
Samaritans — The name given to the new and mixed inhabitants whom Esarhaddon (B.C. 677), the king of Assyria, brought from Babylon and other places and settled in the cities of Samaria, instead of the original…
Bigotry · .Jews with regard to the Samaritans — .Jews with regard to the Samaritans
Jews, The · Held no intercourse with strangers — Held no intercourse with strangers
Samaria · .Jesus travels through — .Jesus travels through
Samaria, Modern · Inhabitants of: Had no intercourse or dealings with the Jews — Inhabitants of: Had no intercourse or dealings with the Jews
Shechem · .Jesus visits; disciples ma — .Jesus visits; disciples ma
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
John 4:1-9
1. When, therefore, the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John, (2. Though Jesus himself did not baptize, but his disciples,) 3. He left Judea, and departed again into Galilee. 4. And it was necessary that he should pass through Samaria. 5. He came, therefore, into the city of Samaria, which is called Sichar, near a field which Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6. And Jacob's well was there; and Jesus, fatigued by the journey, was thus sitting on the well, for it was about the sixth hour. 7. A woman came from Samaria to draw water. Jesus saith to her, Give me to drink. 8. For the disciples had gone into the city to buy food. 9. T…
The woman was surprised because social taboos would keep a Jewish teacher like Jesus from speaking to her (4:18). However, Jesus did not let social taboos constrain him from giving her what she truly needed.
