Ver. 25. “ The woman says to him, I know that Messiah cometh (he who is called Christ); when he is come, he will declare unto us all things.

The woman's answer bears witness of a certain desire for light. Her Spirit yearns for the perfect revelation. This is the reason why we were not wrong in interpreting John 4:15; John 4:20 in a sense favorable to her character. According to modern accounts, the Samaritans actually expect a Messiah, to whom they give the name Assaef (from שׁוּב, H8740, to return); this word signifies, according to Gesenius, he who brings back, who converts; according to de Sacy and Hengstenberg, he who returns, in the sense that, as the expectation of the Samaritans was founded on Deuteronomy 18:18: “ God will raise up for you another prophet from among your brethren, like unto me,” the Messiah to their view is a Moses who returns. At the present day, they call him el-Muhdy. There is a striking contrast between the notion of the Messiah, as it is expressed by the mouth of this woman, and the earthly and political notions on this subject which Jesus encountered in Israel.

The Samaritan idea was imperfect, no doubt; the Messiah was a prophet, not a king. But it contained nothing false; and for this reason Jesus is able to appropriate it to Himself, and here declare Himself the Christ, which He did in Israel only at the last moment (John 17:3; Matthew 26:64). The translation ὁ λεγόμενος Χριστός, who is called Christ, belongs to the evangelist. He repeats this explanation, already given in John 1:42, unquestionably because of the complete strangeness of this word Μεσσίας to Greek readers. It has been said that the Jewish term Messiah could not have been ascribed by John to this foreign woman. But this popular name might easily have passed from the Jews to the Samaritans, especially in the region of Shechem, which was inhabited by Jewish fugitives (Joseph. Antiq. 11.8. 6). Perhaps, the very absence of the article before the word Μεσσίας, indicates that the woman uses this word as a proper name, as is done in the case of foreign words (comp. John 1:42). The word ἔρχεται (comes) is an echo of the two ἔρχεται of John 4:21; John 4:23; she surrenders herself to the impulse towards the new era which Jesus has impressed on her soul. The pronoun ἐκεῖνος, he, has, as ordinarily with John, an exclusive sense; it serves to place this revealer in contrast with all others; to that very one whom she had before her. The preposition in the verb ἀναγγελεῖ marks the perfect clearness, and the object, πάντα or ἅπαντα, the complete character of the Messiah's expected revelation.

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