[378] Matt. 4:12.

CHAPTER 13.

HONORED BY STRANGERS, REJECTED BY HIS OWN.

JESUS AND THE SAMARITAN WOMAN.

The direct route from Judea to Galilee lay through Samaria; but many
Jews, particularly Galileans, chose to follow an indirect though longer
way rather than traverse the country of a people so despized by them as
were the Samaritans. The ill-feeling between Jews and Samaritans had
been growing for centuries, and at the time of our Lord's earthly
ministry had developed into most intense hatred.[379] The inhabitants of
Samaria were a mixed people, in whom the blood of Israel was mingled
with that of the Assyrians and other nations; and one cause of the
animosity existing between them and their neighbors both on the north
and the south was the Samaritans' claim for recognition as Israelites;
it was their boast that Jacob was their father; but this the Jews
denied. The Samaritans had a version of the Pentateuch, which they
revered as the law, but they rejected all the prophetical writings of
what is now the Old Testament, because they considered themselves
treated with insufficient respect therein.

To the orthodox Jew of the time a Samaritan was more unclean than a
Gentile of any other nationality. It is interesting to note the extreme
and even absurd restrictions then in force in the matter of regulating
unavoidable relations between the two peoples. The testimony of a
Samaritan could not be heard before a Jewish tribunal. For a Jew to eat
food prepared by a Samaritan was at one time regarded by rabbinical
authority as an offense as great as that of eating the flesh of swine.
While it was admitted that produce from a field in Samaria was not
unclean, inasmuch as it sprang directly from the soil, such produce
became unclean if subjected to any treatment at Samaritan hands. Thus,
grapes and grain might be purchased from Samaritans, but neither wine
nor flour manufactured therefrom by Samaritan labor. On one occasion the
epithet "Samaritan" was hurled at Christ as an intended insult. "Say we
not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil?"[380] The
Samaritan conception of the mission of the expected Messiah was somewhat
better founded than was that of the Jews, for the Samaritans gave
greater prominence to the spiritual kingdom the Messiah would establish,
and were less exclusive in their views as to whom the Messianic
blessings would be extended.

In His journey to Galilee Jesus took the shorte