" And from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And he entered a house and did not want anyone to know, yet he could not be hidden. But immediately a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit heard of him and came and fell down at his feet. Now the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. And he said to her, 'Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.' But she answered him, 'Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs.' And he said to her, 'For this statement you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.' And she went home and found the child lying in bed and the demon gone." Mark 7:24-30
"On the surface this ['...and throw it to the dogs'] appears to be an insult. We are a canine-loving society, but in the New Testament times most dogs were scavengers--wild, dirty, uncouth in every way. Their society was not canine-loving, and to call someone a dog was a terrible insult. In Jesus's day the Jews often called the Gentiles dogs because they were 'unclean.' It what Jesus says to her just an insult, then? No, it's a parable. The word parable means 'metaphor' or 'likeness,' and that's what this is. One key to understanding it is the very unusual word Jesus uses for 'dogs' here. He uses a diminutive form, a word that really means 'puppies.' Remember, the woman is a mother. Jesus is saying to her, 'You know how families eat: First the children eat at the table, and afterward their pets eat too. It is not right violate that order. The puppies must not eat food from the table before the children do.' If we go to Matthew's account of this incident, he gives us a slightly longer version of Jesus's answer in which Jesus explains his meaning: 'I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.' Jesus concentrated his ministry on Israel, for all sorts of reasons. He was sent to show Israel that he was the fulfillment of all Scripture's promises, the fulfillment of all the prophets, priests, and kings, the fulfillment of the temple. But after he was resurrected, he immediately said to the disciples, 'Go to all the nations.' His words, then, are not the insult they appear to be. What he's saying to the Syrophoenician woman is, 'Please understand, there's an order here. I'm going to Israel first, then the Gentiles (the other nations) later.' However this mother comes back at him with an astounding reply...
...In other words, she says, Yes, Lord, but the puppies eat from that table too, and I'm here for mine. Jesus has told her a parable in which he has given her a combination of challenge and offer, and she gets it. She responds to the challenge: 'Okay, I understand. I am not from Israel, I do not worship the God that the Israelites worship. Therefore, I don't have a place at the table. I accept that.
Isn't this amazing? She doesn't take offense; she doesn't stand on her rights. She says, 'All right. I may not have a place at the table--but there's more than enough on that table for everyone in the world, and I need mine now.' She is wrestling with Jesus in the most respectful way and she will not take no for an answer. I love what this woman is doing.
In Western cultures we don't have anything like this kind of assertiveness. We only have assertion of our rights. We do not know how to contend unless we're standing up for our rights, standing on our dignity and our goodness and saying, 'This is what I'm owed.' But this woman is not doing that at all. This is rightless assertiveness, something we know little about. She's not saying, 'Lord, give me what I deserve on the basis of my goodness.' She is saying, 'Give me what I don't deserve on the basis of your goodness--and I need it now.'
Accepting the Challenge
Do you see how remarkable it is that she recognizes and accepts bot the challenge and the offer hidden within it?
A good translation of Jesus's rabbinical reply to her would be 'Such an answer!' Some of the translations have Jesus saying 'Wonderful answer, incredible answer.' And so her plea is answered and her daughter is healed. In his study of Mark, biblical scholar James Edwards puts it wonderfully:
She appears to understand the purpose of Israel's Messiah better than Israel does. Her pluck and
persistence are a testimony to her trust in the sufficiency and surplus of Jesus: his provision for the
disciples and Israel will be abundant enough to provide for one such as herself....What an irony! Jesus
seeks desperately to teach his chosen disciples--yet they are dull and uncomprehending; Jesus is
reluctant to even speak to a walk-on pagan woman--and after on sentence she understands his mission
and receives his unambiguous commendation....How is this possible? The answer is that the woman is
the first person in Mark to hear and understand a parable of Jesus....That she answers Jesus from
'within' the parable, that is, in terms by which Jesus addresses her, indicates that she is the first person
in the Gospel to hear the word of Jesus to her.'
Similarly, Martin Luther was amazed and moved by this encounter, because he saw the gospel in it. This woman saw the gospel--that you're more wicked than you ever believed, but at the same time more loved and accepted than you ever dared to hope. On the other hand, she is not too proud to accept what the gospel says about her unworthiness. She accepts Jesus's challenge. She doesn't get her back up and say, 'How dare you use a racial epithet about me? I don't have to stand for this!' Can you hear yourself saying that? But on the other hand, neither does the woman insult God by being too discouraged to take up his offer. See, there are two ways to fail to let Jesus be your Savior. One is by being too proud, having a superiority complex--not to accept his challenge. But the other is through an inferiority complex--being so self-absorbed that you say, 'I'm just so awful that God couldn't love me.' That is, not to accept his offer." pgs 87-90
- Tim Keller
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