John 2:6

Now there were six water-pots of stone set there after the Jews' manner of purifying, containing two or three firkins apiece.

Here is the vivid description of an eye-witness who, after so many years, could still see the six great water-pots sitting there, precisely in a certain place; nor is the indefinite capacity of the water-pots (two or three firkins) a contradiction of this. After the custom of the times, those water-pots were hand-made of stone; and there is hardly any possibility that they were of any precise capacity in each case. Containers sold in markets today are required by governments to be of an exact capacity, but that was not the case with these water-pots. One can only be astonished at the conclusion of a scholar like Richardson who said:

In view of the vague "two or three" ... this consideration alone is enough to convince us that the story is a parable, not an actual historical event.[4]

How strange that a certain school of interpreters can make so much of the indefinite capacity of the pots and so little of their exact number! No eye-witness could have told by looking at them exactly how much water they held; and, therefore, an indefinite statement of their capacity was strictly proper and correct. The parable theory regarding this sign is really hard-pressed for evidence to support it when its advocate will seize upon something like this.

After the manner of the Jews' purifying ... In Mark 7:3,4 is a reference to the extensive washings of hands, cups, pots, and brazen vessels; and the observance of such ceremonies by the Jews required a bountiful supply of water-pots.

Two or three firkins apiece ... A firkin was not an exact measurement, being about seven or eight gallons; and thus the capacity of the six water-pots was something between eighty and one hundred and fifty gallons. Again, the water-pots of that day were not precisely machined and uniformly crafted containers with exactly equal capacities, but they were made by hand in diverse patterns and varying sizes.