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The Twist family studies the Gospel of John
Wayne:
Now we switch to John the Baptist again; he has not yet been thrown in prison.
At this point Jesus (or perhaps more specifically his disciples) are also baptizing, and it seems everyone is going to him instead of John the Baptist.
John the Baptist says that's ok, Jesus is the real deal. "He must increase, I must decrease."
In fairness, we as readers will remember that the Mandaean version of the story would be the reverse.
And that's it for chapter 3. :)
Wayne:
Chapter 4 has just a couple of stories: The woman at the well, and the healing of the son of the man from Cana.
The authorities are getting annoyed that Jesus and his disciples are baptizing more people than even John the Baptist. To me these sound like small popular uprisings that the authorities just won't tolerate.
So Jesus heads back from Judea to Galilee. The usual route would be 120 miles, but he chooses the shortcut through Samaria. This make it about 90 miles. They are walking. And they make this trip fairly often. It sounds like Jesus walks to Jerusalem at least every year for Passover, and maybe other times as well.
Wayne:
According to Wikipedia, there are only 712 Samaritans left in Israel today. :-\
Here are some of them:
According to an old National Geographic, there were fewer than 150 Samaritans in Palestine in 1919. Here are some of them:
Wayne:
The Samaritans consider themselves to be the remnant of Jews who were left in Palestine in 712 BC when the Assyrians conquered the area.
The Jews considered the Samaritans to be the offspring of the Assyrians themselves. Perhaps it's some of both ... ???
Mainstream Jews at the time of Jesus were the descendants of those who had been exiled to Assyria, and then had been allowed to return in 538 BC. The Samaritans had their own temple on Mt Gerizim, and the Jews had theirs in Jerusalem. The Jews avoided the Samaritans, but the 2 provinces of the Jews (Judea and Galilee) were separated by Samaria.
So the quick way home for Jesus and his disciples took them through Samaria, where he met this woman at the well.
Wayne:
Jesus spells out a little of his theology here. He tells her "The time has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth... God is a Spirit, and those who worship him should worship in spirit and truth.
The woman says to him, "I known that the Messiah is to come, called Christ. When he comes, he will tell us all things."
Jesus says to her, "I am he, who am speaking to you."
The woman becomes convinced he is a prophet because he tells her private things she would not expect him to know about her life. She brings others from town and they become convinced as well.
He actually stays there in the Samaritan town for two days talking with people and many come to believe he is a prophet, or even the messiah.
This may be significant because his experience in Samaria is so much better than it had been in Judea.
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