“(Jesus) had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar…Jacob’s well was there…Jesus said to her “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know…”. John 4:4, 5, 21

On March 5, 2020 we were with a tour group in Israel and about to visit the church over the site of Jacob’s well in Samaria and the ruins of Shechem (most equate the site to Sychar of the Bible). The sites were suddenly closed due illness among a group that had visited the day before - being a little out of the loop on vacation this was our first inkling that COVID might be a big deal. Wanting to see a little something of the site, we drove to the top of Mnt Gerizim and looked down on the archeological site of Shechem and the church over Jacob’s well. The ruins on the mountain are remains of a 475 AD byzantine era church built over the site of the ancient Samaritan temple. Finds from excavations in the 1980’s and early 2000’s attest to a temple from the 5th century BC , destruction, rebuilding in the 2nd century BC, and destroyed again by Jewish military forces. Even after its destruction, evidence of the use of the site as a place of worship was abundant. The area at the top of Mnt Gerizim was surrounded by a fence which limited our exploration, but we were still able to get a few pictures.

Seeing the geography of the site makes it easy to imagine the gazes of the Samaritan woman and Jesus looking up at Mnt Gerizim, the Samaritans’ holy place, looming above Jacob’s well. Jesus revealed that he is the Messiah and true worship is not dependent on being in Jerusalem or on “this mountain”.