Posts Tagged ‘Canaanite woman’

Arguing with Jesus – changing and being changed

August 15, 2026

Pentecost 12 – 2026

Matthew 15:10-28

Marian Free

In the name of God who is both unchanging and yet dynamic, who  listens to the greatest as to the least and whose desire is to bring all people into the kingdom. Amen.

I hope that you are not surprised to learn that Christianity is not a monolithic, static set of creeds and dogmas. Faith is not something that once set in stone, is fixed forever. Rather, faith is a relationship with the living God. It is vital, dynamic and alive which gives it a somewhat disturbing, fluid nature. This for many people (often good, faithful people) can be a very confronting notion. There are many Christians who are more comfortable with a belief system that is black and white, one which sets out clearly what to believe and how to behave, one that provides well-defined criteria against which to measure one’s place before God and one which describes a clear path to salvation.

There are a number of problems with this view. These include a) that it is not biblical, b) that it doesn’t take into account a maturing of our understanding as to what it means to be a Christian and c) that an ever-changing society requires a certain amount of flexibility and adaptation, a re-interpretation of scripture in the light of new insights and developments. This doesn’t mean that God is fickle or that God changes God’s expectations of us on a whim. It means that our understanding of God is necessarily limited and finite, whereas God is boundless and infinite. Our understanding of God grows and expands as our faith and maturity grows and expands. Like Abraham we can argue with God; like Jacob we can wrestle with God all night and, like Jesus, we can challenge long established religious practices and interpretations of the scripture and still be in relationship with God. 

Jesus upset the conventional view of faith observance and of the regulations that governed the practice of faith.  On occasions he emphasised the original intention of the law – challenging, for example, the strict censure against working on the Sabbath. At other times he defied or simply ignored existing regulations by mixing with the unclean – the lepers, the tax-collectors, prostitutes and women. In today’s gospel we see examples of both – Jesus revising what it meant to be faithful in the first century. 

The context of Jesus’ teaching today is a dispute between himself and the Pharisees regarding the purity laws. The Pharisees and scribes had observed that Jesus’ disciples did not wash before they ate, thereby breaking “the tradition of the elders”. Jesus’ response was to point out that washing was simply an outward display of ritual purity, but that washing alone did not and could not change a person’s inward state of being. Jesus drew the attention of the crowds to the real intention behind the practice of washing – which was to signify the cleansing of the heart and soul.  He made it clear that the routine observance of the law did not achieve the purpose for which it was intended. External washing alone did not render a person clean.

This exchange is followed by another quite different but related discussion. The topic is still one of ritual purity, but Jesus’ interlocutor is poles apart from the Pharisees and scribes. For unknown reasons, but perhaps for narrative effect, Matthew tells us that Jesus leaves Genesserat on the shore of the Galilee and heads towards the coast. This takes him into Gentile country which by definition is impure. On his way Jesus is accosted by a woman who is triply unclean – she is a woman, she is a Gentile and she is closely related to a person who is demon-possessed. According to Jewish law, contact with her would make Jesus unclean on any one of these grounds. 

Surprisingly, to the reader, it is as if his conversation with the Pharisees had never occurred. It would appear that despite what he has just said, Jesus has not yet generalised his views on internal versus external cleanliness. His initial reaction to the woman is that she is unclean as defined, not  by the state of her heart, but by her outward characteristics. Jesus’ reaction the woman is shocking, and not at all consistent with the Jesus we have come to know. Jesus ignores her shouting and he doesn’t censure the disciples who demand that he send her away. To add insult to injury, when Jesus finally does respond, it is to refuse the woman’s request. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” This would not be unexpected from the Jesus who had earlier sent out the disciples with the instruction: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt 10:5,6) but it makes no sense in the current context – especially given that Jesus put himself among the Gentiles!

Clearly, up until this point in his ministry (at least as the evangelists have recorded), Jesus has perceived his mission to be that of reforming the people of Israel. He has challenged their rule-bound behaviour and confronted their hypocrisy. He has broken their rules, and gone beyond their boundaries to demonstrate God’s inclusive, forgiving love. He is also a person of his time and in his mind Gentiles are not part of the programme. (This despite the fact that Naaman, a Gentile warrior was healed in the river Jordan at the urging of Jewish prophet. 2 Kings 5)

Significantly, the woman is desperate for her daughter to be healed and sufficiently confident of her place in the world, that she refuses to go away and refuses to be silenced. Jesus has no choice but to engage with her, even if to our ears he is more than a little rude. The woman’s argument is compelling. She has a comeback for each of Jesus’ points . In the end, Jesus reverses his position and lets go of his faith-informed prejudice and heals the daughter. The woman’s arguments have shown him that there is a different way to be and to act.

Whether Jesus’ encounter with the woman went exactly as the evangelist has recorded it, or whether it is being used in the gospels to demonstrate that it was always Jesus’ intention that Gentiles be included in the reformed people of God, this story warns us against the temptation to believe that what we hold to be true today, will be held to be true for eternity.  Throughout history the Christian church has accommodated itself to the community around it and much of what we believe, and practice is not original to Jesus . The dates on which we observe Christmas and Easter come from the pagan world in which the early church found itself and our attitudes to slavery, to people of colour, to homosexuality, to children and to divorce have all undergone reversals as we have responded to societal and scientific developments and have better understood God’s compassion and all-embracing love.

“Even the dogs eat the crumbs”.  Who are the people whom we ignore, denigrate and exclude and are we willing to accept that they have an equal place in the kingdom and that they might even have something to teach us?

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Everyone has a place at the table

August 19, 2017

Pentecost 11 – 2017

Matthew 15:21-28

Marian Free

In the name of God whose goodness and mercy include all who seek it. Amen.

Movies/TV shows are a great way to learn about the culture of another country without having to go there. For example, there is a movie simply titled “Water”. It is set in India and follows the lives of two widows – one who appears to be only twelve years old and the other who seems to be in her twenties. In Hinduism widows are reviled; their husband’s assets revert to his family and any assets the woman might have had become the property of her family. As a result, widows find themselves destitute. At the same time they are considered to be bad luck – as if their husband’s untimely death has somehow tainted them. It is little wonder that, when it was legal, some widows willing threw themselves on their husband’s funeral pyre. Those who choose life are confined to an Ashram in which they are expected to live a religious life and never to remarry. They are totally dependent on the charity of others and often live in quite impoverished circumstances.

The older of our two widows is very beautiful, even in her simple white garment. It is hard to imagine that she is an object of disgust who must be avoided at all costs, but this is her fate. One of the more confronting moments of the movie occurs when someone accidentally brushes up against the young woman, immediately recoils and hurls a string of abuse at the widow whose responsibility it seems is to remain invisible and to steer clear of those who do not share her despised status. (It is her job to ensure that she does not contaminate them, not theirs to avoid her.)

It is easy to cast judgement on what, to us, appears to be the inhuman and insensitive treatment of widows and indeed of the caste of “untouchables” within the Hindu religious and cultural system. But before we pat ourselves on the back for our “enlightened” attitudes it is important to remind ourselves of our own heritage. Most cultures and religions have holiness or purity laws that serve to distinguish and separate people and things into holy or profane. This was certainly true of the Old Testament people and of the Jewish culture into which Jesus was born. Some of these regulations are spelled out in the book of Leviticus that identifies the holy and profane, the clean and unclean. This was important in a religious sense because those who were contaminated by the unholy and unclean could not enter the Temple (the place in which God met with the people of Israel). In some instances that which was profane or unclean were considered to be in some way contagious – that is that contact with the person or item rendered the other profane or unclean[1].

Fear of contamination explains why, in the parable of the Good Samaritan, the Priest and Levite avoid the injured man. If he is in fact dead, they will become unclean and will have to purify themselves before they enter the Temple (to which we presume they are walking). Gentiles (non-Jews) were considered to be unclean and to have unclean practices. This was the reason that their inclusion in the new community caused so much dissension (as is attested especially by Paul’s letters to Galatia and to Rome).

Purity and holiness laws served to set the Jews apart. By observing the rules and by engaging in prescribed behaviours and by avoiding those who did not observe them Jews in the first century could maintain their sense of difference and their belief in their own distinctiveness and holiness. When Jesus enters the picture he blows all those constructs apart and makes it clear that holiness is not a matter of external behaviours, but is entirely dependent on the state of one’s heart.

We can see this in the context of Matthew’s account of Jesus encounter with the Canaanite woman. Matthew places the story immediately after the Pharisees and scribes challenge Jesus with regard to what is clean and unclean. In response, Jesus redefines the concepts making it clear that it is not externals that make a person clean or unclean, but their acceptance of and faith in Jesus. That Matthew’s placement of the story is not accidental is suggested by the fact that Jesus (without any particular justification)– Jesus travels from wherever he is into what is very clearly Gentile territory – the region of Tyre and Sidon. The woman who approaches Jesus is clearly (from the Pharisaic perspective) an outsider who is also unclean. Jesus doesn’t recoil. Engaging with the woman will not contaminate him. Instead (after initially ignoring her) Jesus allows the woman to engage him in debate and then accedes to her request. The woman’s recognition of Jesus as “Lord, Son of David”, confirm to the reader that no matter how the Pharisees might view her, she is no longer an outsider and as such no longer unclean. Following this meeting, Jesus returns to Galilee (of the Gentiles) where he heals, without discrimination, all those who are brought to him. Like the woman they too make it clear that they are no longer outsiders by praising “the God of Israel”.

Through the way in which he has organized the material available to him, Matthew seems to be describing a progression from a ministry and mission that was directed solely to Israel (10: 6, 15:24) to a ministry and mission that is directed towards and fully inclusive of the Gentiles (28:19). An essential part of this programme is a re-framing of the concepts of clean and unclean, holy and profane. In the new economy, the barriers between the sacred and profane have no meaning and the divisions between Jew and Greek have been broken down.

From the genealogy, through the coming of the magi, Matthew has been making it clear that through Jesus the rules have changed – the definitions of holy and profane have been recast. Holiness no longer refers solely to those who were born Jews, to those who observed the purity laws and maintained a comfortable distance from the unclean and the profane. In the new economy, holiness/purity knows no boundaries. Inclusion is no longer determined by race or gender, class or skin colour. Everyone who recognises Jesus as Lord has a place at the table.

[1] (The use of iron tools to cut a stone altar made it unfit or unholy – Exodus 20:22, contact a corpse would exclude a person from the Temple until they had purified themselves and so on.)

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Moving the boundaries

August 16, 2014

Pentecost 10. 2014

Matthew 15:21-28

Marian Free

 

In the name of God who is constantly breaking down barriers and opening new possibilities for existence. Amen.

The account of the Canaanite woman is perhaps the most confronting story in the New Testament. Our familiarity with the Gospels means that we are not at all shocked by the way that Jesus befriends sinners and eats with them. Nor are we surprised that he allows a woman of the street to wash his feet. It seems perfectly reasonable to us that Jesus should heal on a Sabbath. But this story is shocking Jesus is rude and unsympathetic. He refuses to respond to a mother’s agonised cry for help. Worse still, not only does Jesus ignore the woman’s pleas, he adds insult to injury when he justifies his refusal by likening the woman to a household pet that does not deserve the same food as the children.

This hard, uncompromising Jesus is almost unrecognisable. Is this, we might ask, the same Jesus who only a short while ago had such compassion for the crowd that even though he needed to be alone he healed the sick and fed more than 5,000 people?

What is going on here? Such an unflattering and unexpected description of Jesus demands further explanation. Why would the Gospel writers include an account in which Jesus is so uncompromising, so rude? What is it that causes Jesus to withhold healing in this situation? Did he think that he would find the peace he was seeking outside Israel’s borders and did the woman interrupt that peace? We may not be able to find a satisfactory answer to those questions, but we can draw the conclusion that the purpose of this story in Matthew’s gospel is to explain how it is that the Gentiles have come to faith in a Jewish Messiah. – why it is that the faith community consists of both Jew and Gentile.

There are two versions of Jesus’ encounter with a Gentile woman in Mark and Matthew. A comparison between the two accounts shows that Mark’s record of the meeting is much less confrontational. Matthew has heightened the contest in a number of ways, which makes the outcome even more surprising. He elevates the position of the woman and he emphasises Jesus’ refusal to help. The woman recognises Jesus as the Son of David and falls down and worships him. This makes her a more formidable combatant than the woman in Mark’s account as she knows who Jesus is at a time when Jesus’ disciples have not yet made up their minds. The battle lines are more clearly drawn In Matthew, Jesus ignores the woman’s request not once but twice and his refusal to acknowledge her is supported by the disciples who urge him to send her away. Jesus’ response to the woman is strengthened by the assertion that his responsibility is only to the lost sheep of Israel. Matthew makes the woman stronger, Jesus harsher.

The basic elements of the story are the same in both gospels. Tyre and Sidon are on the Mediterranean Sea – a long way from Galilee and in territory that is primarily Gentile. It is Jesus, not the woman, who is out of place. The woman who seems to appear out of nowhere is desperate. An evil spirit oppresses her daughter. When Jesus rejects her plea for a second time she is not deterred. So confident is she in his authority and in his ability that she informs him that the crumbs will be enough. In her wisdom (or humility) she has understood that there is more than enough to go around and that even the left-overs will be more than sufficient to meet her need[1]. By helping her daughter, she suggested Jesus’ ministry to Israel would in no way be diminished.

Jesus is outside his territory on the woman’s home ground and she demands that he take her faith seriously. Consciously or unconsciously, the woman foreshadows the future. After Jesus’ death, the gospel will be preached in the regions beyond Israel. There the Gentiles will recognise Jesus and will demand their place in the community of faith.

In the final analysis, this account is much more than a story about one woman’s faith. It is in fact a reflection about boundaries, boundaries that turn out not to be rigid and immovable but fluid and ever-changing. The world into which Jesus was born was very clear about who was in and who was out and the lines between the two were fiercely guarded. Belonging was more than a birthright it also required adherence to strict purity laws. One could be born a Jew but still be an outsider. Anyone with a disability or skin disease was considered unclean, tax collectors and prostitutes were excluded. Temporary exclusion could result from contact with a corpse, a flow of blood or a failure to observe the purity laws. It was close to impossible for anyone from outside to be given admission to God’s chosen people. The woman’s insight and her refusal to be denied made it clear that the boundaries were moving and that Jesus’ message was intended not just for a few, but for the whole world.

Our readings today remind us that God doesn’t observe conventions or maintain strict boundaries. Genesis tells us that by default Joseph, the Hebrew slave of Pharaoh, becomes the ruler of all Egypt. In Romans Paul reminds us that, contrary to expectation, wIld olive shoots (the Gentiles) are grafted on to the rich root of the olive tree (the Jews).

The faith that grew in Jesus’ name shattered all previous boundaries and admitted as full members those who were previously on the outside or who were languishing in the shadows.

The Canaanite woman demanded and received recognition for her faith. She challenged Jesus’ narrow mind-set and forced him to think differently. In a world in which boundaries are becoming drawn ever tighter or being raised against perceived threats or new fears, perhaps it is time for us to consider where we stand and to ask ourselves whether our fences represent the mind of God or whether they are simply there to separate ourselves from others and to protect the ways of the past.

[1] An interesting insight in view of the quantity of leftovers from the feeding of the 5,000.

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