Because the woman at the well mentions Jacob, we quite naturally expect to find Jacob connected to wells. In this, we are not disappointed. Indeed, having seen Abraham and Isaac in connection with such, we would have to be astonished not to find similar stories concerning Jacob. Like Abraham’s servant, who had found Isaac’s wife (Jacob’s mother) through an event at a well, so too does Jacob find a wife for himself in much the same way. In Genesis twenty-nine, Jacob, having fled from his father’s house because of the ruse and fraud he had perpetrated upon his father and his brother (the source of a none-too-minor dispute between Jacob and his brother), “saw in the field a well with three flocks of sheep lying beside it, because the flocks were watered from that well” (29:2a). Providentially, Jacob, though this is the place to which he has been directed by his mother, presumably comes to the same well to which the servant of Abraham had come, and at which he is able to make inquiries concerning his mother’s brother, Laban. It is in concert with this inquiry that one of his future wives, Rachel, is introduced into the narrative, as she was coming towards the well with her father’s sheep (29:6).
In contrast to what we saw with Abraham’s servant, whose plea to the Lord was answered with Rebekah watering his animals, Jacob “went over and rolled the stone off the mouth of the well and watered the sheep of his uncle Laban” (29:10b). Similar to what we have seen previously from him, when Rachel informs her father about Jacob’s presence, “he rushed out to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his house” (29:13b). Fascinatingly, this is the only well that we see in connection with Jacob, as part of the Scriptural narrative. Never do we see anything referred to as “Jacob’s well,” as alluded to by the Johnannine author and the Samaritan woman. Now, this is not to say that there was no such thing as Jacob’s well, as it is most likely, due to its location, a well located within the territory of the promised land that was bequeathed to Joseph before Jacob’s death. With such knowledge, we can surmise that a well there came to be known as “Jacob’s well,” even if there was no overt connection to Jacob within the shared historical memory of Israel. This piece of information, however, does nothing to change the nature of the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman. The fact remains that a tradition of wells would underscore the thoughts of Jesus, His disciples, the woman at the well, the townsfolk that hear the woman and her story, and the author of the narrative.
From here, we depart from Genesis, moving on to Exodus, which is the event (so much more than just the title of the book) that gives definitive shape to Israel’s self-consciousness. Indeed, it can even be said that the understanding of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as revealed in Genesis, is shaped by the self-revelation of that God as the God of Israel’s exodus. This means that the God that reveals Himself as One Who works and intervenes on behalf of His people and His creation, from the beginning of the Genesis narrative, is understood through the lens of the God that liberated Israel from Egypt, provided them a covenant charge, with guidance as to how to live up to their covenant responsibilities, and guided them to their promised land. This holds especially true if Moses is indeed the primary author/compiler/compose of the Torah, thus making it impossible to separate the notion of exodus (rescue, deliverance, redemption, restoration, etc…) from thoughts about the Creator God of Israel. Indeed, thinking along such lines allows us to view Genesis one and two as a divine rescue, much like Israel was divinely rescued from their Egyptian bondage.
With such thoughts reverberating within our minds during our conscientious approach to the broad Scriptural narrative, we are thoroughly unsurprised to see Moses, after fleeing Egypt in the wake of his murder of an Egyptian that had been mis-treating an Israelite, settling in the land of Midian and doing so by a “certain well” (Exodus 2:15b). Our level of surprise continues in its restraint as we read that “a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and began to draw water and fill the troughs in order to water their father’s flock. When some shepherds came and drove them away, Moses came up and defended them and then watered their flock” (2:16-17). In this, Moses becomes like Jacob, watering the flock for one who will eventually come to be his wife. Like we saw with Rebekah and Rachel, there was a rush to return home so that these girls might share their story with their father (2:18-19). In response, Moses is summoned to the home of the priest. He “agreed to stay with the man, and he gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage” (2:21). With this third patriarchal (in the broadest sense) instance of a wife being found at a well, it is with interest that we note that part of Jesus’ conversation at the well, with the Samaritan woman---the part that convinces her of His status as a prophet, centers upon the subject of marriage. It is almost as if to say that the woman, who actually lacks a husband though it is said that she has had several, has come to the well, and through this encounter with the one that can truly provide water (as did Jacob and Moses), she found herself a true and lasting husband.
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