=25, 26. The woman saith unto him.= Chrysostom well expresses her spirit: “The woman was made dizzy by his discourse, and fainted at the sublimity of what he said.” So she turns away from the present revelation, procrastinating its application with the expectation of a better opportunity when the Messiah comes.--=He will tell us all things= is not to be interpreted literally; it is the expression of a vague hope of a clearer light by and by.--=I that speak unto thee am he.= Christ did not until a much later period declare his Messiahship to his own disciples; he never declared it more clearly than to this sinful Samaritan woman. There is a reason for it, in that this declaration took from her all excuse of procrastination, and in fact made her a missionary of the Messiah. Perhaps, too, the very fact that she was an uninfluential woman and a Samaritan may have made him more ready to reveal himself; for it was certainly his general purpose not to disclose his character and mission to the public until his death (Matt. 17:9). We certainly have no right to say, with some rationalizing critics, that because we cannot fully understand his reasons it is incredible. Such a method of criticism would make havoc of all history. Most scholars suppose that the words “which is called Christ” were spoken by the woman. It seems to me more probable that they were added by John, as an explanation to his Greek readers of the Hebrew term Messiah. The word Christ is its Greek equivalent. * * * * *