사마리아 여인(요 4장)의 정체성에 대한 연구

A New Reading for the Identity of Samaritan Woman(John 4)

The purpose of this paper is to find out the identity of Samaritan woman in John 4. The general result of the researches of Johannine scholars about her identity is that she is a sinner and this assertion is to be based on the mention of Jesus to her husband; "you have had five husbands. … not your husband"(John 4:18). She had availed herself liberally of previsions for divorce, but that after all that she had a man who was not legally her husband. But this opinion does not fully consider some important elements of John 4, a social value at first century and Jewish Law that a woman could not divorce her husband. Therefore, for exposing her identity we examine the text according to a socio-historical background of Samaria, a symbolic meaning of well and spring, a social state of a woman who divorced five times, and honor and a shame in a village. In result, she was a woman who was suffered by "levirate law" and after met Jesus she born many believing children.