We drove this morning to Sychar in Samaria, the site of
Jacob’s Well where Jesus had the colloquy with the Samaritan woman in John’s
Gospel. You can never be confident of the historicity of events in John and
this story has a good deal of symbolism woven into it, but if it happened, this
would be the spot and the spot makes the point.
Yes, the well is there. And this would be the very well.
It’s the only well around. It is deep. You have to lower the bucket a long way
and it isn’t easy to hoist it back up. It’s a good picture of spiritual
practice. Praying is like dipping into the well of our soul to draw up God’s
grace. Drinking the water from that well felt like a connection to something
old and deep – as the well is old and deep.
Of course a church has been built around the well --- a
Greek Orthodox Church served by an elderly priest who paints icons. I bought
his Samaritan woman icon. Again, violence haunts this site. A few years ago, a
Jewish settler in the nearby Palestinian city of Nablus hacked the Orthodox
priest of this Church to death. The settler was deemed insane.
Then we went up Mt. Gerazim to a Samaritan synagogue. Who
knew there are still practitioners of the Samaritan faith? There are! 750 of
them. Their text is the Pentateuch. They reject the rest of Hebrew Scriptures. Their
holy place is Mt. Gerazim. They believe Mt. Gerazim, not Jerusalem, is the site
of Mt. Moriah, where Abraham almost sacrificed Isaac. They also believe that
Mt. Gerazim was the site of the central shrine of the 12 Tribes of Israel, the
resting place of the Ark of the Covenant, during the centuries after the
conquest of Canaan until David moved the Ark to Jerusalem. The First Book of
Samuel says the central shrine was further south at Shiloh. But the books of
Samuel are not in the Samaritan Bible. The Samaritans are also said to be
sorcerers. We received an engaging catechesis in Samaritanism from their old
priest.
There are several connections between Jesus and the
Samaritans. First, there is the story of Jesus’ friendly encounter with the
Samaritan woman and the general acceptance of his message in Sychar. Second,
there is his use of the Good Samaritan in a parable about neighborliness, a
zinger of a story since Jews held Samaritans in contempt on both racial and
religious grounds.
Third, Jesus’ critics spoke of him disparagingly by
calling him a Samaritan. John 8: 48. Once his accusers said his ability to cast
out demons came from Beelzebub. Matthew 12: 22-37. There are two major
mountains in this part of Samaria – Twin Peaks, if you will. Gerazim is the
holy mountain. Mt. Abel is the unholy mountain. Its name means flies. The demon
that reigns at Mt. Abel is Beelzebub, the Lord of the Flies. So Jesus’ accusers
were saying his power came from the Samaritan demon of Mt. Abel. And the
non-Biblical references to the crucifixion of Jesus call him a “sorcerer.” So those
accusations too associated Jesus with the Samaritans.
I don’t know what to make of any of that but as a Bible
nerd, I find it interesting.
Our next visit was to Bethany where we visited a Tomb of
Lazarus. I say “a” tomb of Lazarus because he actually has two tombs in Bethany
– one with an Orthodox Church on it, the other with a Franciscan Church on it. We
visited the Franciscan tomb. The Church was lovely and the caves below were
tomb-like. But what I found more interesting was being in Bethany, the home of
Mary and Martha, and (according to the 4th Gospel) Lazarus. This
family was close to Jesus and he probably stayed with them when visiting
Jerusalem. It is on the Mount of Olives in walking distance of Jerusalem, with
Gethsemane on the way from the city to the village.
A couple of side points of my own – not what I have learned
here: First, there is a credible minority opinion that Lazarus is the author of
the 4th Gospel. Second, the tradition that Mary Magdalene was a
prostitute is based on a conflation of several different Gospel texts,
including three set in Bethany. In Mark and Matthew an unnamed woman (probably
a prophet) anoints Jesus head with expensive perfume at the house of Simon the
Leper in Bethany. In Luke, Mary of Bethany (not Magdala) sat devotedly at
Jesus’ feet listening to him. Elsewhere in Luke, an unnamed sinner (prostitute)
washed Jesus feet with her tears, anointed them with myrrh, and dried them with
her hair. This happened in Galilee. John combined these stories to have Mary of
Bethany (not Magdala) anoint Jesus’ feet with nard and dry them with her hair.
Then misogynist translator, St. Jerome, got all this mixed up with poor Mary of
Magdala who had nothing to do with any of it, and called her a prostitute.
Actually all we know of Mary Magdalene is that she was once possessed by seven
demons, she was a devout follower of Jesus, and she may have been a major
leader in the first generation of Christianity.
Tonight we spent some time in shared reflections guided by
Brother Mark, an able spiritual director, then finished the day with a good
lecture on Islam by Dr. Mustafa.
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