It was with the ignorant woman of Sychar, as it had been with the learned Master in Israel.' As Nicodemus had seen, and yet not seen, so this Samaritaness. In the birth of which Jesus spoke, he had failed to apprehend the from above' and of the Spirit;' she now the thought suggested by the contrast between the cistern in the limerock and the well of living water. The How can these things be?' of Nicodemus finds its parallel in the bewilderment of the woman. Jesus had nothing wherewith to draw from the deep well. Whence, then, the living water'? To outward appearance there was a physical impossibility. This was one aspect of it. And yet, as Nicodemus' question not only similarly pointed to a physical impossibility, but also indicated dim searching after higher meaning and spiritual reality, so that of the woman: No ! art Thou greater than our father Jacob?' who, at such labour, had dug this well, finding no other means than this of supplying his own wants and those of his descendants. Nor did the answer of Jesus now differ in spirit from that which He had given to the Rabbi of Jerusalem, though it lacked the rebuke, designed to show how thoroughly the religious system, of which Nicodemus was a teacher, failed in its highest object. But to this woman His answer must be much simpler and plainer than to the Rabbi. And yet, if it be Divine teaching, it cannot be quite plain, but must contain that which will point upward, and lead to further inquiry. And so the Divine Teacher explained, not only the difference between ordinary water and that of which He had spoken, but in a manner to bring her to the threshold of still higher truth. It was not water like that of Jacob's Well which He would give, but living water.' In the Old Testament a perennial spring had, in figurative language, been thus designated, [1978] in significant contrast to water accumulated in a cistern. [1979] But there was more than this: it was water which for ever quenched the thirst, by meeting all the inward wants of the soul; water also, which, in him who had drunk of it, became a well, not merely quenching the thirst on this side time, but springing up into everlasting life.' It was not only the meeting of wants felt, but a new life, and that not essentially different, but the same as that of the future, and merging in it.
The question has sometimes been asked, to what Jesus referred by that well of living water springing up into everlasting life. Of the various strange answers given, that, surely, is almost the worst, which would apply it to the doctrine of Jesus, supporting such explanation by a reference to Rabbinic sayings in which doctrine is compared to water.' This is one of those not unfrequent instances in which Rabbinic references mislead rather than lead, being insufficiently known, imperfectly understood, or misapplied. It is quite true, that in many passages the teaching of the Rabbis is compared to water, [1980] but never to a well of water springing up.' The difference is very great. For it is the boast of Rabbinism, that its disciples drink of the waters of their teachers; chief merit lies in receptiveness, not spontaneity, and higher praise cannot be given than that of being a well-plastered cistern, which lets not out a drop of water,' [1981] and in that sense to a spring whose waters ever grow stronger.' But this is quite the opposite of what our Lord teaches. For, it is only true of what man can give when we read this (in Ecclus. xxiv. 21): They that drink me shall yet be thirsty.' [1982] More closely related to the words of Christ is it, when we read [1983] of a fountain of wisdom;' while, in the Targum on Cant. iv. 14, the words of the Law' are likened unto a well of living waters.' The same idea was carried perhaps even further, when, at the Feast of Tabernacles, amidst universal rejoicing, water from Siloam was poured from a golden pitcher on the altar, as emblem of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost. [1984] But the saying of our Lord to the Samaritaness referred neither to His teaching, nor to the Holy Ghost, nor yet to faith, but to the gift of that new spiritual life in Him, of which faith is but the outcome.