Bible Trivia - 11/14/2008

Question: What was the name of the well where Jesus met the Samaritan woman?

Answer: Jacob’s well. (John 4:6-7)

Comments: Jesus' famous encounter with the woman at the well took place at Jacob's well in Sychar. This is the only passage in the Bible in which Sychar is referenced. Some have held that Sychar is actually another name for Shechem ("Sychem"). In fact, the traditional site of this meeting is associated with Shechem, the modern city of Nablus.

The site has been associated with the story since the Crusades. The ruins of two churches and the unfinished walls of a third are found there. A cross-shaped church was built at the location during the Byzantine period using the well as its center. The Crusaders built their own church over the earlier one. Construction was begun on a Russian Orthodox Church in 1914 but the Communist revolution halted construction in 1917. The building has never been never completed.

and Jacob's well was there. So Jesus, being wearied from His journey, was sitting thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour. (John 4:6, NASB)

Note: This illustration is "Jésus et la femme samaritaine" by Corinne Vonaesch. It is part of a series of 21 images illustrating the Gospel of John.