The difficulty in interpreting
4:22 rests in great measure on the meaning of “from” in the phrase translated “salvation
is from the Jews.” The Greek preposition translated “from” is ek (sometimes
ex). This preposition can mean “of” as in “a part of” or “can be found
within.” It can also mean “out of” or “emerging from.”
Those who read 4:22 as the positive
counterbalance to the negative portrayal of the Jews interpret “salvation is
from the Jews” as “belonging to or reserved for Jews only.” But in Greek the
phrase can just as easily be read “salvation emerges from the Jews.” John’s point
here is not to emphasize that the Jews are the origin of salvation but that
Jesus is the one through whom salvation comes. In other words, Jesus, the Jew
who, by rights, should not have been speaking to a Samaritan woman, is the
salvation that comes from the Jews. This analysis supports the idea that, while
Ioudaioi is a positive term here, the point of the verse is not to
stress Jesus’s Jewish origins so much as to draw attention to Jesus himself.
It may seem that an interpreter keen
to avoid Judeophobic teachings of this passage might do well to focus on the
positive resonances of John 4:22 and downplay the Christological and rhetorical
elements of the verse in its context within the gospel. Taking this route,
however, amounts to an apologetic reading that, perhaps paradoxically, may reinforce
the anti-Judaism it is attempting to avoid. A more successful, as well as more
critically defensible, approach is to situate this passage within its literary
and theological context in John’s Gospel. Doing so allows us to see that 4:22,
like 8:44, contributes to the gospel’s rhetorical program. (Adele Reinhartz, “Gospel
of John,” in Judeophobia and the New Testament: Texts and Contexts, ed.
Sarah E. Rollens, Eric M. Vanden Eykel, and Meredith J. C. Warren [Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2025], 146)
