John 4:6

John 4:6. Now there was a fountain there, Jacob's fountain. The distinction between the natural spring and the artificial well is usually maintained with great care in the language of Scripture. Now and then, however (as is very natural), a well, fed as it is by springs, is itself called a spring or fountain. Thus ‘the angel of the Lord found' Hagar ‘by a fountain of water in the wilderness' (Genesis 16:7), and ‘the well was called Beer-lahai-roi' (John 4:14); and in the narrative of Genesis 24, where in the Authorised Version we find ‘well' three times (in Genesis 24:11; Genesis 24:13; Genesis 24:16), the original has first well, then spring or fountain twice. The country round Shechem was a place of ‘fountains and depths that spring out in valley and hill' (Deuteronomy 8:7); but it is not of such natural springs that we must here think. What in this verse is called a fountain is a ‘well' in John 4:11-12. Yet it may be worth noticing that the litter name is used by the woman of Samaria: to the Evangelist the well is a ‘fountain,' and his name implies far deeper and richer thoughts than hers. An almost continuous tradition fixes beyond doubt the position of this well, which lies very near the road by which our Lord would be travelling from Judea to Galilee; and amongst the inhabitants of the adjoining towns it is still known as the well of Jacob or the fountain of Jacob. When visited by Maundrell two hundred years ago the well was more than 100 feet deep, but the accumulation of rubbish has diminished the depth to 75 feet: the bore Isaiah 9 or 10 feet wide. That Jacob (if indeed this patriarch's name was rightly given to the well, and there is no reason for questioning the tradition) should have sunk this well, excavated out of the solid rock, in the immediate neighbourhood of abundant springs, is a striking proof of the insecurity of his position in the ‘land of promise,' and of his precarious relations with the people of the country.

Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus by the fountain. Shechem was one of the main halting-places on the route from Jerusalem to Galilee. Turning off a little from the road, Jesus reached the well, and (now alone, because His disciples had gone into Sychar to buy provisions) wearied with a long day's travel He ‘sat thus' sat, wearied as He was ‘by the fountain,' or on the low wall built round the well.

It was about the sixth hour. As in the other passages in which John mentions the ‘hour,' there has been great difference of opinion respecting the time intended. If the ordinary reckoning be adopted, as in the other Gospels, the sixth hour would fall in the morning, a little before noon. But for the reasons assigned in the note on chap. 39, it seems much more probable that a different computation is followed here, in which, as among ourselves, the hour is of fixed length (not a twelfth part of the variable interval between sunrise and sunset), and the time is reckoned from midnight and noon. By ‘sixth hour,' therefore, according to the usage of the ancients, we must understand either the hour between 5 and 6 A.M. or the hour between 5 and 6 P.M. On the whole, the latter seems more probable. If our Lord's journey through Samaria took place in the middle of December (see the note on John 4:35), 5 P.M. would be about the time of sunset, and the evening twilight would last until about half-past 6. This hour was the ordinary time at which women came forth to draw water at the public wells. No difficulty need be felt on account of the lateness of the hour, for very little time is really required for all that is here related up to the 38 th (John 4:38) verse (comp. Mark 1:32; Luke 4:40).