Saint Photini (Also known as Photine, Photina, or Svetlana) is the Samaritan woman Jesus encounters in the fourth chapter of the Gospel of John. The early Christians gave her the title isapóstolos, which means "equal to the apostles". To understand the context of her meeting with Jesus, we review the history and tense relationship of the Jewish and Samaritan communities of Jesus' time, and discuss how the Christian faith is, as Paul puts it, a "ministry of reconciliation". We discuss also Saint Photini's role as an evangelist and martyr for the new Christian faith.
The Christian Saints Podcast is a joint production of Generative sounds & Paradosis Pavilion with oversight from Fr Symeon Kees
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Iconographic images used by kind permission of Nicholas Papas, who controls distribution rights of these images
Prints of all of Nick’s work can be found at Saint Demetrius Press - http://www.saintdemetriuspress.com
All music in these episodes is a production of Generative Sounds
https://generativesoundsjjm.bandcamp.com
Distribution rights of this episode & all music contained in it are controlled by Generative Sounds
Copyright 2021 - 2023
Saint Photini (Also known as Photine, Photina, or Svetlana) is the Samaritan woman Jesus encounters in the fourth chapter of the Gospel of John. The early Christians gave her the title isapóstolos, which means "equal to the apostles". To understand the context of her meeting with Jesus, we review the history and tense relationship of the Jewish and Samaritan communities of Jesus' time, and discuss how the Christian faith is, as Paul puts it, a "ministry of reconciliation". We discuss also Saint Photini's role as an evangelist and martyr for the new Christian faith.
The Christian Saints Podcast is a joint production of Generative sounds & Paradosis Pavilion with oversight from Fr Symeon Kees
Paradosis Pavilion - https://youtube.com/@paradosispavilion9555
https://www.instagram.com/christiansaintspodcast
https://twitter.com/podcast_saints
https://www.facebook.com/christiansaintspodcast
https://www.threads.net/@christiansaintspodcast
Iconographic images used by kind permission of Nicholas Papas, who controls distribution rights of these images
Prints of all of Nick’s work can be found at Saint Demetrius Press - http://www.saintdemetriuspress.com
All music in these episodes is a production of Generative Sounds
https://generativesoundsjjm.bandcamp.com
Distribution rights of this episode & all music contained in it are controlled by Generative Sounds
Copyright 2021 - 2023
God is glorious in his saints!
Welcome to the Christian Saints Podcast. My name is Darren Ong, recording from Sepang in Malaysia. In this podcast, we explore the lives of the Christian saints, from the Anglican, Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions. Today we will be contemplating the life of Saint Photini, known in the Gospel of John as the Samaritan woman at the well. She is also referred to as Photine, or Photina, and the Slavic Christians also refer to her as Svetlana. She is a very highly regarded figure in the early church as an evangelist and a martyr. The Greeks give her a title, is-apostolos, or equal to the Apostles, that signifies that a particular saint is to be regarded as highly as Jesus’ closest followers.
Let us first lay some groundwork. The Samaritans were very closely related to the Jews, with a very similar religion, except that they believed that the right place to worship God was in their temple in Mt Gerizim, rather than the Jewish temple at Jerusalem. During Jesus’ time, there was a great deal of animosity between Jews and Samaritans. John notes in his gospel that “Jews do not associate with Samaritans”). Another gospel account that speaks to the tense relationship between the two communities is Luke 9:51-56.
51 As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; 53 but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem. 54 When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them[b]?” 55 But Jesus turned and rebuked them. 56 Then he and his disciples went to another village.
In this story, we see Jesus taking a stand against his Jewish disciples’ animosity towards the Samaritans. The Samaritans appear quite frequently in Jesus’ parables and in his actions, and they are almost always put in a positive light. The phrase “good Samaritan” has entered the vocabulary even of non-Christians, but the parable becomes even more powerful when you realize that Jesus was talking about sworn enemies of his Jewish race. In that light, let us contemplate the parable of the Good Samaritan, in Luke 10:25-37:
The Parable of the Good Samaritan
25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”
27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’[a]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b]”
28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”
29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii[c] and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’
36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”
37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”
Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
***
The Apostle Paul refers to the Christian faith as the ministry of reconciliation. Jesus’ mission is reconciliatory in two ways. He reconciles the broken relationship between God and humanity, brought about by our sin and wickedness, and he reconciles the broken relationship between humans and other humans, all our ethnic division, infighting, the hatred we feel towards other people, Jesus means to restore all of that. Galatians 3:28 famously states that there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus
It is in this spirit of reconciliation, let us read of Saint Photini’s encounter with Jesus. In John 4:4-26
4 Now Jesus had to go through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])
10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
17 “I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”
19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
“You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” Saint Photini, expressed surprise at how Jesus was willing to even talk to her. As John noted, Jews and Samaritans did not get along. Yet Jesus steps in to bring peace in this centuries-old conflict, and also bring peace between this woman and God.
Saint Photini has not lived a pious life, but here she is given this wonderful opportunity to receive the Messiah, Christ. And in so doing, Jesus brings about reconciliation between her and God as well. Devout Jewish men like Jesus were not supposed to talk to women this way, and talking to a woman who had a reputation for being “loose”, that was absolutely scandalous. Yet Jesus ignores these social taboos, and instead goes out to Saint Photini in love. Even more than that, he comes to her in a spirit of humility, of vulnerability, he is thirsty, and asks her for a drink.
Let us continue on to the second part of John’s gospel account:
27 Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”
28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.
31 Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”
33 Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”
34 “My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. 35 Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. 36 Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. 37 Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. 38 I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”
39 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. 41 And because of his words many more became believers.
42 They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”
***
Even immediately after her first encounter with Jesus, we see that Saint Photini has the gift to be a great evangelist. She boldly tells her whole village about her encounter with Jesus, and they plead for Jesus to stay for two days. Now again, this man is a Jew, sworn enemy of the Samaritans- yet Jesus agrees to stay with them for two whole days! Saint Photini participates in Jesus’ reconciliatory work, by bringing the people of her village to him. This same calling is set out for all Christians, we are given this great privilege and opportunity to continue, and participate in Jesus’ ministry of reconciliation, bringing peace where there is conflict, bringing peace between God and man, and bringing peace between man and man.
I think the message that Saint Photini brings to her neighbours is very striking: “He told me everything I ever did!” Clearly, from Jesus’ conversation with Saint Photini she was very embarrassed about her sordid life history. But one encounter with Jesus, with this assurance that Jesus loves her, and is willing to look beyond the mistakes she made in her past, and Saint Photini is proclaiming proudly her indiscretions in the public square, caring not for her own reputation, but only that Jesus be made known and glorified.
Saint Photini is not mentioned after this in the Bible. But we do see in the Book of Acts 8 that, after Jesus’ death and resurrection, and the establishment of the Christian church, the Apostle Philip goes to Samaria and the Samritans there receive the Christian faith eagerly. Perhaps the receptiveness of the Samarians to the gospel message here was a legacy of Saint Photini’s encounter with Christ, and her evangelistic work.
According to Christian tradition, five of her sisters and two of her sons also become Christians, and they all become tireless evangelists for the new Christian faith. They traveled to Carthage and became missionaries there. During the reign of emperor Nero, Photini, her sisters and sons eventually end up in Rome, and are subjected to terrible torments for their faith. Saint Photini however, ends up converting one of Nero’s daughters Domnina to Christ, further enraging the mad emperor. He flays St Photini’s skin, kills her family in grotesque ways, and throws her in prison.
This account of Saint Photini’s final encounter with Nero, and her martyrdom comes from the website of the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America:
After this, Nero had St. Photini brought to him and asked if she would now relent and offer sacrifice to the idols. St. Photini spat in his face, and laughing at him, said, “O most impious of the blind, you profligate and stupid man! Do you think me so deluded that I would consent to renounce my Lord Christ and instead offer sacrifice to idols as blind as you?”
Hearing such words, Nero gave orders to throw St. Photini down a well, where she surrendered her soul to God in the year 66.
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Christian Saints Podcast. You can find me on Twitter, at podcast_saints, or on facebook, at Facebook.com/christiansaintspodcast (no spaces). You can also go to my personal website www.drong.my (drong.my) for my other contact information. The music in this episode was composed by my friend James John Marks, of Generative Sounds.
Let us end this podcast with an Eastern Orthodox liturgical hymn to St Photini, sang on her feast day on March the 20th
***
Tropar
Illuminated by the Holy Spirit, All-Glorious One,
from Christ the Saviour you drank the water of salvation.
With open hand you give it to those who thirst.
Great-Martyr Photini, Equal-to-the-Apostles,
pray to Christ for the salvation of our souls.