Six Stone Jars

This story has often raised a number of additional problems for readers. One issue involves the role of Mary and her relationship to the wedding festival. Another involves the way in which Jesus seems to have treated his mother. Still another involves for some people the whole question of wine as alcohol. Yet another of the issues involves the use of this text in Christian wedding services as a proof-text for legitimizing the church’s role in marriage. And the list could be greatly expanded. The text thus involves both sociological and theological issues.

This story has often raised a number of additional problems for readers. One issue involves the role of Mary and her relationship to the wedding festival. Another involves the way in which Jesus seems to have treated his mother. Still another involves for some people the whole question of wine as alcohol. Yet another of the issues involves the use of this text in Christian wedding services as a proof-text for legitimizing the church’s role in marriage. And the list could be greatly expanded. The text thus involves both sociological and theological issues.

Their purpose provides a clue to one of the meanings of the story: the water represents the old order of Jewish law and custom, which Jesus was to replace with something better (cf. 1:16).

On the backgrounds of this miracle J. D. M. Derrett pointed out among other things the strong element of reciprocity about weddings in the Ancient Near East. It was possible in certain circumstances to take legal action against the man who failed to provide an appropriate wedding gift. The bridegroom and family here might have been involved in a financial liability for failing to provide adequately for their guests (“Water into Wine,” BZ 7 [1963]: 80–97). Was Mary asking for a miracle? There is no evidence that Jesus had worked any miracles prior to this (although this is an argument from silence). Some think Mary was only reporting the situation, or (as Calvin thought) asking Jesus to give some godly exhortations to the guests and thus relieve the bridegroom’s embarrassment. But the words, and the reply of Jesus in v. 4, seem to imply more. It is not inconceivable that Mary, who had probably been witness to the events of the preceding days, or at least was aware of them, knew that her son’s public career was beginning. She also knew the supernatural events surrounding his birth, and the prophetic words of the angel, and of Simeon and Anna in the temple at Jesus’ dedication. In short, she had good reason to believe Jesus to be the Messiah, and now his public ministry had begun. In this kind of context, her request does seem more significant.

Some see in the number six a reference to incompleteness, one less than seven: the Jewish dispensation was incomplete until the coming of Jesus

Significantly, these jars held water for Jewish ceremonial washing (purification rituals). The water of Jewish ritual purification has become the wine of the new messianic age. The wine may also be, after the fashion of Johannine double meanings, a reference to the wine of the Lord’s Supper. A number have suggested this, but there does not seem to be anything in the immediate context which compels this; it seems more related to how frequently a given interpreter sees references to the sacraments in John’s Gospel as a whole.

The meaning of the saying new wine is poured into new skins is that the presence and teaching of Jesus was something new and signaled the passing of the old. It could not be confined within the old religion of Judaism, but involved the inauguration and consummation of the kingdom of God.

3:18 [4:18] “In that day” refers to the day of the Lord (cf. Hos 2:16, 18, 21; Amos 8:9, 13; 9:11). As in 1:5 “new wine” symbolizes not mere sufficiency but abundance. The promise that all the ravines would flow with water no doubt gave hope to a people who had seen their land parched with drought (1:12, 17). The language of abundant prosperity here recalls the familiar expression that Canaan was a land flowing with milk and honey (e.g., Exod 3:8; Deut 26:15) but is even more extravagant. Amos 9:13 similarly promises that the day will come when the land will be so fertile that the “reaper will be overtaken by the plowman / and the planter by the one treading grapes” and that the mountains will drip with wine. Such language obviously is hyperbolic, but the text describes more than simple agricultural plenty because “a fountain will flow out of the LORD’S house.” Ezekiel 47:1–12 similarly anticipates a river of life flowing from the temple (cf. also Ps 46:4–5; Zech 14:8; Rev 22:1–2), and Jesus understood the image in a personal sense in John 7:38.

11 This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him.