Are you ready for some romance? In this article, we’ll explore how and why John’s story of the Woman at the Well is related to the ancient betrothal story of Rachel and Jacob. If you haven’t yet read Well Women Part 1: Biblical Banter, I recommend you do that first. It will all make ever so much more sense if you do.

Literary device of the day: the type-scene

Here’s an idea for your next party:  Divide everyone into groups and have them act out a bar brawl. Even if the groups work independently, you will notice elements common to their creations.  Changing their acting assignments to a duel or questioning a murder suspect will also generate shared characteristics.   That’s because these are type-scenes, recurring, extremely recognizable bits of narrative with predictable elements. 

Today’s story of Jacob and Rachel is an engagement or betrothal type-scene. Just like we know someone is getting a chair to the head in the bar brawl, when ancient listeners heard just the first few details of today’s story, they thought, “Jacob and Rachel, sitting in a tree! K-I-S-S-I-N-G!  First comes love!  Then comes marriage!” and well, you know the rest.  

Robert Alter first observed this betrothal type-scene in 6 stories of the Hebrew Bible (47-62). I recommend Michael W. Martin’s article, where he notes larger narrative patterns and builds on Alter’s work.  He adds six elements to the five Alter observed and renames the stories full-on “betrothal journey narratives” (505).  Martin also makes a point that gets my English major blood pumping:  the most compelling part of this narrative pattern is that each story somehow deviates from the design. It’s in the deviation that the crux of each story lies.  When my car hums along according to its expected pattern of behavior, I don’t think twice about it.  When there’s a new noise, I grip the wheel and pay attention.  It’s the same way with a good pattern-following story.  As they say in English Major School, “When the story veers, open your ears!”  

We’ve landed on today’s story because it’s another one John alludes to and patterns his gospel story after.  Clever John knew the betrothal journey narrative elements and included them in the woman at the well story so that, as Paul Duke puts it, “When Jesus ventures into foreign territory and meets a woman at a well, the properly conditioned reader will immediately assume some context or overtone of courtship and impending marriage” (101).  But why?  No worries, this is not the podcast that claims Jesus married anyone.  Let’s review Martin’s betrothal journey narrative elements in the story of Jacob and Rachel and their parallels in John’s gospel.  Maybe then we’ll see the point John is playfully making about Jesus.

Betrothal Journey Narrative Elements

Element 1: The groom enters foreign territory, compelled by family.

We find Jacob in Genesis 29:1, far away from home but in his mom’s hometown.  He has just stolen the birthright of his brother Esau and now tricky Jacob is fleeing for is life.  He’s also been sent away by his parents to find a wife, specifically one of the daughters of his Uncle Laban.

Jesus, likewise, leaves his home in Galilee to go to Judea in John chapter two.  Like Jacob,  Jesus journeys to a place filled with family, in this case, fellow Jews.  A deviation from the pattern is already beginning, though, because Jesus leaves the “family place,” Judea, for a third location, Samaria. Martin explains that Jesus leaves Judea after he angrily clears the Jewish temple of money-makers in chapter two and to avoid the Pharisees (vs 4:1) (521). Like Jacob, family conflict motivates Jesus to leave. Also, like Jacob, Jesus is sent by his parent.  Remember that he “had to” go through Samaria in John 4:4? Because that’s not geographically true, it seems Jesus is following the will of his heavenly GPS. He is compelled by his Jewish family and his heavenly father to leave Judea for an even more foreign third territory.

Element 2:  This one’s easy: they both meet a woman at a well!

Element 3:   A gift or service is performed. 

In verse 6, Jacob learns his beautiful cousin Rachel is the one who approaches with her flock, and he tries to send the other shepherds away for a bit of privacy. The shepherds need to water their sheep, though.  They explain that removing the rock covering the well requires the efforts of all the shepherds, and not everyone has arrived.   Rachel must be some kind of wonderful, because once Jacob spies her, he singlehandedly removes the rock. Do you remember that the Samaritan woman reponds to Jesus’ outlandish claims at the well by asking if he’s “greater than Jacob” in John 4:10? This is the part of Jacob’s story she’s referring to, as well as familiar first-century interpretations of the Hebrew bible.  These interpretations claim that for Jacob, “the well overflowed, and the water…continued to overflow all the time he was in Haran,” his mom’s hometown (qtd. in Neyrey p. 423).  Jacob, indeed, has a way with wells and is happy to serve Rachel with it.  But Jesus’ ways are even greater, as the gift he offers in fulfillment of this story element is Living Water.

Element 4:   Someone needs to draw water for someone else.  

Jacob draws water for Rachel’s flocks.  However, in John’s betrothal narrative, this detail is alluded to but doesn’t actually happen!  Listen up!  There’s clunking in the engine!  Jesus asks for a drink of water, but the Samaritan woman is wary because of their ethnic and religious differences.  In alluding to this element but not fulfilling it, John again highlights a primary point of the story: Jesus and the Samaritans are not of the same people. 

Element 5:  Revealed Identity.

In a dramatic moment filled with weeping and kissing, Jacob reveals to Rachel in Genesis 29:11-12 that he is the son of Rebekah, Laban’s sister.  Jacob has found the one he seeks!  Cue the music!  In the same striking fashion, the Samaritan woman realizes Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus then dramatically reveals himself as “I am,” using the exact phrase God takes as a name in the Hebrew scriptures.  Hence, Joel B. Green and his co-editors point out, Jesus is “applying the divine name of God - and God’s authoritative presence-to himself” (356).  Jesus frequently names himself this way in John’s gospel, and it tends to polarize folks, either leading to faith or accusations of blasphemy.  Either way, it is good climactic drama.

Element 6: The woman rushes home.

In Genesis 29:12, Rachel rushes home to tell her family who she’s discovered at the well.  In John 4:28 -29, the Samaritan woman returns to the city and does the same thing. That was quick! Five elements to go!

Element 7: The woman’s family rushes out to meet the groom.

In verse 29:14, Laban runs out to meet Jacob.  He covers his nephew in slobbery kisses and asks him to stay with them.  In verse 4:40, Samaritans from town come out to meet Jesus and also ask him to stay.

Element 8: A betrothal in conjunction with a meal.

Genesis 29:15-22 describes an extensive betrothal arrangement.  Jacob will work seven years to marry Rachel, and a marriage feast is mentioned in verse 22. The betrothal in John’s gospel isn’t literal, but we do see the split families of Israel coming together, especially in the following few elements.  John also alludes to a meal delivered to Jesus by the disciples.  

Element 9:  The groom stays with the family.  Children may result.

Here’s where Jacob’s story veers from the pattern.  Usually, the stay is for a short time, but Laban tricks Jacob into marrying Rachel’s sister first.  Jacob then agrees to stay another seven years so that he can marry the one he truly loves, Rachel.  The pattern shift here highlights that tricky Jacob is now tricked.  Jesus stays with the Samaritans for a more conventional two days but has no literal children.  John 4:40 tells us, however, that “Many more believed because of his word.”  We’re talking spiritual kiddos, here, people.  

Element 10: The groom returns home.

Jacob finally returns home with both wives, two concubines, and tons of kids in Genesis 31:28.  Jesus returns home, too, to Galilee in John 4:43.

Element 11: The groom is welcomed at home.

Jacob is welcomed by his brother Esau in Genesis 33, and Jesus is welcomed by the Galileans in John 4:45.

When the story veers…

So, where’s the pattern deviation in John’s betrothal narrative?  That’s the best part, right?  Well, though we think it’s kinda icky that Jacob marries his cousins, keeping it all in the family was crucial to the ancient Hebrews to avoid the temptation to follow other Gods (Deut. 7:3-4).  Remember, according to tradition, that’s the mistake the Samaritans made.  According to the narrative pattern, Jesus journeys from home to where his extended family lives. But when in Jerusalem, Jesus furiously clears the temple and tells the profiteers to “Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” in John 2:16. Then, to avoid opposition from the Pharisees in 4:1 he heads back home toward Galilee.  Clunking engine!  He can’t head home without a betrothal!  Pay attention here: Jesus is compelled to head the Samaritan way home, and everything we expect to happen in Jewish territory happens in Samaria. Martin summarizes, “Hence, the boundaries of Jesus' family are extended to encompass Jew, Samaritan and Gentile.  Recognizing this innovation to the pattern is, as with other betrothal journey narratives, the key to ‘getting the story’” (523).

Here are a few more clues that John has created a betrothal journey narrative.  First, we’ve already noted references to Jacob in the gospel story.  John is jogging the memories of his early readers.  Another clue is the Samaritan woman’s marital history. Jerome Neyrey writes her situation is “calculated to evoke echoes of courtship meetings,” exactly like Jacob and Rachel’s (436).  It’s a bit tragic that some commentators have used her history as a lesson against  “loose” women when the point is actually about how Jesus is the figurative bridegroom, calling the Samaritan people, and all of us, back to our true love.  John has been building this theme for a while now.  In John 2, Jesus is at a wedding in Cana.  In a horrible insult to first-century hospitality, the wine runs out.  Jesus steps in and turns water in six Jewish purification jars into the best wine at the party.   Mary L. Coloe points out that the literal bridegroom then gets credit for it, indicating it was his job to provide the wine, a role that Jesus steps into (185). In addition, in chapter three, mere verses before the story at the well, John the Baptist declares himself the friend of the bridegroom, and Jesus, the one who has the bride in John 3:29.  Just as Jesus replaced the six purification jars with the good stuff, he now replaces the woman’s six imperfect partners with himself.  Jesus is number seven, the symbolic number of completeness in the Hebrew Bible.  Thus in his gospel, John says Jesus is the replacement for Jewish ritual and the one true God.

Why does John use marriage and betrothal language for all of this?  Coloe explains, “In the Old Testament, the covenant at Sinai between God and Israel was frequently described using the image of betrothal and marriage.  At the wedding in Cana, (and, I add, in these first chapters of John) Jesus is described as the presence of a covenental God, the bridegroom of Israel” (185).  There’s that Bible word, “covenant” again.  It’s an agreement or promise.  We’ve mentioned God’s covenant with Abraham, but there’s more than just that one in the Bible because the People of Israel needed reminders of God’s faithfulness along the way.  A broad overview of these covenants is God promises to belong to his people, and God’s people promise to belong to God.  Sounds like a marriage, right? John creatively takes this established metaphor for mutual belonging and amplifies it using symbolism, allusion, and patterned betrothal narrative to proclaim that God keeps his promises.  God will be faithful to the church, no matter how often we give ourselves to lesser things.  Jesus, the bridegroom, stops at nothing, not even death, to bring his truly beloved people to himself.     

John alludes to the story of Hagar to reveal the presence of a covenant forming God-Who-Sees.  He alludes to Jacob and Rachel to reveal Jesus as fulfilling God’s promise to seek and save all of God’s beloved ones.  Next time, we’ll unpack John’s use of a symbol that shows God to be the one who dwells intimately with us.  That’s all three members of the trinity in one story, Friends.  Brilliant.

Notes

Other Hebrew Bible betrothal type-scenes include the stories of Rebekah and Isaac, Moses, Ruth, Saul, and David.

Works Cited

Alter, Robert. The Art of Biblical Narrative. New York: Basic, 1981.

Coloe, Mary L. “The Woman of Samaria; Her Characterization, Narrative and Theological Significance.” Characters and Characterization in the Gospel of John Edited by Christopher W. Skinner, Bloomsbury, 2013, pp.182-196

Duke, Paul D, Irony in the Fourth Gospel: A Study in Literary Design. Atlanta: John Knox, 1985. 

Green, Joel B., et al., editors. Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels.  Intervarsity Press, 1992.

Martin, Micahel W. “Betrothal Journey Narrative.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, vol. 70, no.3, 2008, pp. 505-23.  JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/43726329. Accessed 26 Jul. 2022.

Neyrey, Jerome H. “Jacob Traditions and the Interpretation of John 4:10-26.” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, vol. 41, no. 3, 1979, pp. 419-37. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/43714719. Accessed 26 Jul. 2022.