It is a familiar story, Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4.4-26). The pastor of my church recently preached on the passage, and I’d bet it hasn’t been too long since you’ve heard it preached as well. You’ve heard it said, “familiarity breeds contempt.” When it comes to the Bible, however, the worst familiarity can bring is boredom. What happens, however, when we forget all the assumptions we bring to the text and take a fresh look at the story? We often uncover interesting, exciting possibilities and, most importantly, we learn.

Jesus is alone at the well, a fact we’ll see later is important. In the middle of the day a Samaritan woman (it’s really too bad no one got her name) came to the well. Why the middle of the day, when the sun is burning down with intensity? Possibly to avoid others. Jesus, as always, wants to talk:

He said to her, “Go call your husband and come back here.” The woman replied, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “Right you are when you said, ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the man you are living with now is not your husband. This you said truthfully!”

The traditional explanation is that Jesus was having a conversation with a woman of ill repute. Even by Hollywood standards, five husbands is a lot. Add to the fact that she was living with a man appears to validate the assumption. I mean, what else could it be?

In the Book of Ruth we learn about the ancient Jewish custom of the “kinsman redeemer”. If a woman’s husband dies before they have children, she may be taken by the deceased’s closest male relative in order that children may be fathered to continue the family name. It also provides a home for the widow. This is mentioned in the New Testament as well, by a group of Sadducees trying to trap Jesus raise a situation where a woman ends up married to seven men without ever bearing children (Matthew 22. 23-33). It looks from the text that this is a hypothetical situation, but there is an older record that may indicate this is not pure fiction either. Consider this text (written in the second century BC) from the Jewish book of Tobit chapter three:

Sarah, the daughter of Raguel, was reproached by one of her father’s maids. For she had been married to seven husbands, and the wicked demon Asmodeus had killed each of them before they had been with her as is customary for wives. So the maid said to her, “You are the one who kills your husbands! See, you have already been married to seven husbands and have not borne the name of a single one of them. Why do you beat us? Because your husbands are dead? Go with them! May we never see a son or daughter of yours! "On that day she was grieved in spirit and wept… she intended to hang herself... At that same time, with hands outstretched toward the window, she prayed and said, “Blessed are you, merciful God! Blessed is your name forever; let all your works praise you forever. And now, Lord, I turn my face to you, and raise my eyes toward you. Command that I be released from the earth and not listen to such reproaches any more. You know, O Master, that I am innocent of any defilement with a man, and that I have not disgraced my name or the name of my father in the land of my exile. I am my father’s only child; he has no other child to be his heir; and he has no close relative or other kindred for whom I should keep myself as wife. Already seven husbands of mine have died. Why should I still live? But if it is not pleasing to you, O Lord, to take my life, hear me in my disgrace.

Is it possible, then, that the woman at the well had suffered misfortune rather than have been a worker of the sex trade? It is possible. After all, there were many ways to die in the first century AD.

There is another surprise in this story as well. We mentioned earlier that it was important the disciples were away and Jesus was alone with the Samaritan. Amazingly, the only time Jesus reveals he is the Messiah is here to this foreigner:

The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (the one called Christ); “whenever he comes, he will tell us everything.” Jesus said to her, “I, the one speaking to you, am he.”

When Jesus asked Peter, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered ‘The Christ [Messiah] of God.’ (Luke 9:20-21) Jesus then commanded Peter and the others present to tell no one. Mysterious? Indeed. In fact, Jesus never refered to himself as the “Messiah” during His entire Jewish ministry, preferring instead the title "Son of Man". Why? According to Jewish tradition, the Messiah would first be unrecognized, and only later would he be revealed to those who had not recognized him.

Hopefully this fresh look at a familiar event has inspired you to look again at John 4, and to do so with fresh eyes.