John 4:21

Ver. 21. “ Jesus says to her: Woman, believe me;the hour cometh when neither on this mountain nor at Jerusalem shall ye worship the Father. ”

The position of Jesus is a delicate one. He cannot deny the truth, and He must not repel this woman. His reply is admirable. He has just been called a prophet, and He prophesies. He announces a new economy in which the Samaritans, having become children of God, will be set free from that local sanctuary which the woman points out to Him on the summit of Gerizim, but without being compelled for this reason to go to Jerusalem. The filial character of this new worship will free it from all the external limitations by which all the old national worships were burdened. If the privilege of Gerizim passes away, it will not be that it may be assigned to Jerusalem. “You will not bring the Jews hither; but they shall no more force you to go to them. You shall meet each other, both parties alike, in the great family of the Father's worshipers.” What treasures cast to such a soul! What other desire than that of doing His Father's will could inspire in Jesus such condescension! The aorist πίστευσον in the T. R. signifies: “Perform an act of faith.” We can understand the prefixing of the apostrophe: woman, in this reading which makes such an earnest appeal to her will. The present πίστευε in the Alexandrian documents simply signifies: “Believe from this moment and for the future.” Both the readings may be sustained. This summons to faith answered to this woman's profession: “Thou art a prophet.” The subject you of shall worship might denote the Samaritans and Jews (Hilgenfeld), or men in general (so in my 2d ed.), in contrast to Jesus Himself or to Jesus and His own. But this woman could not regard herself as the representative either of humanity in general, or of the Samaritans and Jews together. The subject of you shall worship must rather be derived from those words of her question in John 4:20: Our fathers worshiped. It is the Samaritans only.