spin

You got a fair amount of factual input.

"Ask the writer", for example, should have indicated the problem you faced. If you take that for sarcasm or condescension, that's your bad.

As to "that's your problem" when you decontextualise it you misrepesent it. Again, your bad. Go back and read the context for "that's your problem".

If you have a reason to take offense, take it out in the mirror.


spin

Magdlyn

I see now what your thought process was, but I still think the way you put it was needlessly abrupt and hurtful. But, never mind...

I disagree. There is much that can be learned from the study and deconstruction of this passage, without needing to inquire of the long dead author.

Please expand on this. Your brusqueness is not adding to the understanding of what it meant to be a "Jew" in the 1st century. I'm not attempting to decontextualize it. On the contrary. Here is what decontextualizing looks like:

From a 21st century pov, if I may draw an analogy, a Bostonian (with a Boston accent) drives down to NYC for the weekend. On her way home, she stops in at a Starbucks in central Connecticut.

"Give me a grande latte," she says.

"You're from New York City," says the barrista.

Makes no sense. Our coffee lover would not sound like a NYer from having spent the weekend there.

And I don't think Jesus (literary character) from Galilee would have sounded like a Juaean to a Samaritan either.

Obviously, the story was created for a theological purpose, to make Jesus the "Jew" seem powerful and omniscient--a mind reader!-- to the readership.

But there is another theme. Judaeans and Samaritans don't get along. Now, 2000 yrs later, are we to assume the writer knew Galileans also did not get along with Samaritans, or that the writer didn't know the difference between Galilee and Judaea? Or is there other ways to understand it, keeping in mind the subject of this thread?

And please, if you don't know, spin, just ignore these questions and let someone else answer. Thanks.

spin

You've just done it again, decontextualising a comment I made so you can't get the meaning out of it. This is what I said last message:
You've given no sign of having gone back and read what I originally said so you miss out on what I meant, when I referred to your decontextualising "that's your problem". Here is the original comment:

I didn't just say "that's your problem". You are asking questions that you seem to have no hope of getting at, ie their assumptions, what their audience knows, what they take for granted. And you get annoyed when I try to indicate the problem you put yourself in.

How can I say this less "brusquely": think of questions that you have a hope of getting meaningful answers to.

I thought we were talking about the Samaritan woman's recognition that Jesus was a Jew. You just seemed to change subject.

The writer gives you no help in how the Samaritan woman knew that Jesus was Jewish. For all we know it may have been a different writer from some of the other material in John -- the Galilean stuff, perhaps written to bring John into line with the other gospels.

Perhaps it would be better for me not to comment. :wave:


spin

Magdlyn

Actually, I am getting good info here. Some of the other posters, JD, Solitary and Toto, were quite helpful with links and book recs, and with opinions of their own.

We were, and then I moved on to another possible purpose/aspect of the passage.

Right. But I'll be sure to ask him, or her, next time I see him, or her. :wave: Buh bye.

Solitary Man

At what point did Celts in Gaul stop being Celts? Why? You're not answering these questions.

You asked how can one separate religion from ethnicity? Could you be Christian and Roman? Only if you respect the Gods, thus retaining the religion of Rome (non-separation). But if you didn't you were killed.

However, that was an official decree, not sociological one. People were indeed both Christians and Roman (one geographic, one religious term) especially so after Constantine, and only so after Theodosius the II.

spin

I was asking about the culture of the ethnos and the religion of the particular ethnos.


spin

J-D

I can't tell you when, but I can tell you how: they adopted or acquired a new ethnic identity, such as 'French'.