3.11. The Canaanite Woman — A Mother's Persistexce.
CHAPTER XI The Canaanite Woman — A Mother’s Persistexce. THE incident of the Canaanite woman stands by itself without parallel in the gospel story. The time, the place, the nationality of the woman, her conduct, and the treatment she receives, are all unique. Jesus was now an exile from the familiar scenes of His labour among His fellow-countrymen of Galilee, opposed by the leading authorities, rejected by the great body of the people, deserted by the bulk of His old followers, with only a dwindling remnant still attached to Him, the tide of popularity having entirely ebbed away. It was positively dangerous for Him to be discovered on Jewish territory. He had no fear for Himself, and the time was not far distant when He was to set His face steadfastly to go up to Jerusalem, knowing that it was to meet His death there; but the training of the men who were to carry on His work was not yet complete, and therefore His “time” was “not yet come.”
Accordingly He was now in retirement with these faithful few at the remote north-west corner of Palestine, or perhaps actually over the border and in heathen territory.
We may so read the account in Mark as to understand that He walked through the streets’ of the ancient city of Tyre, where He found a house in which to rest, hoping that He might remain there unknown. But that was not possible, for the fame of the great Healer had penetrated even to this distant city.
Thus it came about that a native of these parts hearing Mat 15:21-28; Mark 7:24-30. of His presence in her neighbourhood daringly seized lier opportunity, heathen as she was, and came to Him — St. Mark says, into the very house — beseeching His help for her afflicted daughter. In Mattlieto she is described as “a Canaanite woman;” in Mark as “a Greek, a SyroPhcenician by race.” “Phoenician” is just the Greek equivalent for “Canaanite.” The old Phoenicia of Tyre and Sidon being now a part of the large Roman province of Syria, it came to be called “ Syro-Phoenicia “ to distinguish it from the Phoenicia of North Africa, Carthage and its neighbourhood — the Punicus of the Romans, which is but a Latinising of the same name. The woman was therefore strictly speaking not a Greek at all. She is simply called a Greek in a general sense, as one who was not a Jew, and who belonged to the outlying district which had all been comprehended in the Macedonian Empire, and into which the Greek language and civilisation had been introduced. The careful exactness with which St. Mark describes the racial relations of this woman shows us how much importance he attaches to them. He makes it clear beyond all possibility of dispute that she is no Jewess. She is not only a Gentile; she is of the stock of Canaan — the people whom the Israelites had set themselves to exterminate like vermin — of the race of the Baal-worshippers in the days of the kings. This is to prepare us for the singular reception she receives from Jesus. That it does not quite prepare us for it, however, must be fairly admitted. The story is one of some perplexity even after every conceivable explanation has been given. A mother’s undying love is the motive that sends the Canaanite woman on her daring quest. It is this that summons up her strength for the attempt, sustains her obstinate persistency in spite of discouraging rebuffs, and inspires her at the ciitical moment with a most delightful repartee, as humble as it is clever. She is the mother fighting for her child, and in her motherhood it appears that all racial and even all religious differences must be lost sight of. Here we are at one of the great primitive passions of human nature. The mother is at heart the same, whether she bo the Jewish Rizpah guarding her seven sons’ corpses from the vultures, or the Greek Niobe weeping for her murdered children, Hagar, the outcast slave in the desert, despairing for her son’s life, or Jeroboam’s queen secretly seeking counsel and help from the prophet of Jehovah in her desperate need while the young heir to the throne of Israel lies dying in the palace at Tirzah. History and legend give us replicas without number of a mother’s devotion, heroism, self-sacrifice. It is always the same story in spirit and character, though with every possible variety of incident, the nearest to the Divine of all earthly events.
Prompted by the indomitable urgency of a mother’s heart the Canaanite woman enters the presence of the Jew stranger, and casting herself at His feet cries, “ Have pity on me. Lord, Son of David, for my daughter is terribly afflicted with a demon possession.” It is her daughter that she is pleading for, and yet in the first place she unwittingly begs for compassion on herself; for the child’s affliction is the mother’s agony, and it is her own distress that is visible to Christ as she lies prostrate before Him. But the strangest thing about her words is that she addresses Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. He is the “ Son of David.”
We know that the Messianic idea had spread in a vague way far over the East; it must have been known in Tyre. But this woman has actually come to the faith in Jesus as the fulfilment of that idea, a faith that has not yet found expression even among our Lord’s intimate companions, for the time is earlier than St. Peter’s great confession. It is clear that the belief was in the air as a sort of surmise.
Some accepted it, others had different explanations to offer for the amazing career of the Prophet of Nazareth. But this heathen woman catches at the great title that she has somehow heard attached to the name of Jesus and unhesitatingly offers it Him. His treatment of her shows that He recognised more in it than the language of empty flattery or the parrot-like repetition of a casual appellation.
She had some sort of notion of what the phrase meant, and her use of it was one sign of true faith. She had heard enough of Jesus by repute to begin to have faith in Him. And yet how little there had been as yet on which to feed her faith! At first this was spurred on by the mother’s love, a love that prompted her to make a very daring venture of faith on what could be but yet very slender grounds of knowledge.
Hitherto the cry for help has never come to the ears of Jesus in vain. Now for the first time in His life He turns a deaf ear to the piteous appeal. This surprises us. We should never have imagined anything of the kind. The very improbability of the narrative, standing as it does entirely by itself, speaks for its veracity. Nobody would have invented such a story as this; nobody could have invented it. Yet how are we to account for it 1 In the first place, notice that hard as the conduct of Jesus might seem to us if we were not well assured that there must be some way of explaining it in consistency with the invariable kindness of His heart, to His disciples it seemed even too easy and lenient. For they took upon them to suggest that He should send the importunate woman away. Then He was not giving any indication that her presence was annoying to Him. A strict Jew would have resented the intrusion of a heathen woman. It would not have been at all remarkable in the eyes of His nation if Jesus had scornfully repulsed this Canaanite mother for daring to seek His aid. Jesus was doing nothing of the kind, and His patient silence called from the disciples some remonstrance. It can scarcely be doubted that the woman availed herself of it as an encouragement to press her plea for pity all the more urgently. At least she has an opportunity for obtaining a full hearing, and that is more than she had any right to expect when she set out from her home with the delibei’ate intention of violating a very strict social convention.
Nevertheless all this does not satisfy us. To people who know the character of Jesus Christ, Jewish conventions count for nothing in explaining His actions. Why then did He hesitate in the present case? He gives us His own answer. There is no excuse for not accepting it or for making any attempt to explain it out of its natural meaning.
He was only sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. His earthly mission was solely to the Jews. All His ministry had been carried on within the confines of the land of Israel. With His boundless human sympathies this limitation must have been a positive pain to Him. The Son of Mun, would He not have entered with joy into the prosecution of a world-wide mission such as that to which His servant Paul was afterwards called? But He knew it was His Father’s will that He should labour in the more limited sphere, among the people who were most prejudiced against His choicest teaching, and yet where after all He could best find and train the men who were to build on the foundation He was laying. It was in the eternal counsels of God that the salvation of the world should spring from Israel, and that not arbitrarily, but because in this way it could be best eflfected. Had Jesus thrown Himself into a great mission to the heathen world two direct conquences of a most disastrous kind would have followed. First, He would have lost His last foothold among the Jews; and second, His activity would have been dissipated, scattered over a boundless sea. It was necessary that it should be concentrated in order that it might live and work.
Besides, His great mission was not for miracle-working. That only came in by the way, because while He was conscious of possessing the power His heart was moved with compassion to exercise it for the benefit of the sufferers who came across His path. Had He gone through the world as a Healer of all who came to Him He would have been known only, or at least chiefly, as a great Thaumaturgist. He could not have been the Saviour of the world if He had not been first the Christ of Israel.
There are few things more galling to a man of energy than the sound of the command “Halt”; but still more trying is it to one of endless compassion to hear that unwelcome word when he sees before him opening opportunities of gracious helpfulness. How difficult it must have been for the British marines from the fleet on guard in Cretan waters to resist the temptation to strike a blow for the relief of the Greeks! But obedience comes even before mercy. We may be sure then that Jesus would have felt keen pain in remaining silent under the piteous appeals of this mother on behalf of her afflicted child. If she was hurt by His apparent coldness, He must have been hurt much more in feeling compelled to give her so unusual a reception.
Nevertheless His subsequent yielding shows that He did not interpret the limitation of His ministry in an absolute way. After all there might be exceptions. The law of God is not a formal rule only to be read in the strictness of the letter. He speaks to the intelligence of His servants, and expects every case to be considered on its own merit& Our Lord’s silence may indicate that He was debating this new question in His own mind. Never before had He been placed in such a dilemma — His heart drawing one way, His mission another. Still there might be some exceptional excuse for an exceptional action.
Perhaps He was waiting for that to appear. His silence gave the woman an opportunity to further reveal her character. Or shall we say that He was silent for very compunction of heart? He did not yet see His way to yield to her request; yet He could not bring Himself to say her nay. That was a word He had never yet spoken, never could speak, to any humble trustful applicant for His mercy. The position is not a little peculiar — the Canaanite woman persistently urging her plea, Jesus receiving it in unbroken silence! At length the disciples interfere to end what seems to them to be an awkward situation. They venture to urge Him to send this importunate heathen person away. As if He could not have done that of His own accord had He so willed! Yet it is to be remarked that unlike the cases of Bartimseus whose unseemly shouts the disciples themselves rebuked, or of the women who brought their children to Jesus for His blessing at an inconvenient moment, breaking into an interesting discussion of casuistry, and were repelled by the disciples with some irritation, in the present instance they did not venture to interfere directly and themselves order the woman to go. Even they must have perceived that it would be a strange thing for Jesus to resist an appeal for help, though this might for once come from a heathen. His disciples’ words of remonstrance call forth a strange speech from Jesus. He seems to be taking refuge in a cruel Jewish proverb. It is not fitting to take the children’s bread and fling it to dogs. Various attempts have been made to mitigate the apparent harshness of these words, so amazing as falling from the lips of the gentle and merciful Jesus. Thus it has been pointed out that the Greek term is a diminutive, meaning little dogs, and so suggestive of the young dogs that might be treated with more considerateness than the full-grown animals. But on the other hand it has to be observed that in this later provincial Greek it was very usual to employ diminutives for no particular reason. Then it has been said that Jesus did not mean those surly, half-savage brutes that prowl about Eastern cities in search of offal — the scavengers of the streets, making night hideous with their yells, but little pet dogs that the children play with as they run under their table. But it is extremely doubtful whether any dogs were treated in this way in Syria — though the woman is clever enough to apply the saying to dogs that are privately owned and admitted to the house. Besides, it is not Jesus, but the Canaanite woman who first refers to the dogs under the table. And look at it how we may, the fact remains that Jews were accustomed to call their heathen neighbours by the offensive nickname of “dogs,” and for Jesus to employ the word at all in addressing a heathen woman could not but suggest to her the Jews’ contempt for her people.
We must look in another direction for the explanation of the seeming contradiction between this strange utterance of Christ’s and all that we know of His kind and considerate character. Of one thing we may be sure, even if no satisfactory explanation be forthcoming, Jesus never could be really harsh to any troubled soul. You would sooner find gloom in a sunbeam than unkindness in word or look of Christ, Anger He could show against hypocrisy and cruelty and injustice, an anger that blazed out at times with fierce indignation; but harshness towards a humble, pleading application it was not in Him to exhibit.
We must remember that in the bareness of theu’ narratives the evangelists do not give us any of those nuances that soften the lines of more dainty literature. They have no idea of supplying us with those details which we look for in the model raconteur. We might almost compare these gospel narratives to the severe statuary of the more ancient period of Greek art before Phidias had arisen to breathe into it the subtle spirit of human life. They are perfectly honest and truthful, and thus we are safe in their hands from any of that romancing by means of which some historians succeed in giving to their narratives the charm of a novel. This is their great merit. But the price we have to pay for it is the loss of those thousand and one delicate touches that we are accustomed to find in modern writing. The evangelists say nothing of the tone of the voice, the look of the eye, the manner and expression of the speaker when he gives utterance to the sayings they content themselves with ascribing to him in the simplest possible way. They never tell us when Jesus smiled. But a smile is often more significant than a sentence. There may be a world of meaning in a look. Once, as an exception to this rigorous suppression of detail, we are told that Jesus turned and looked at Peter, and ever after painters have despaired of rendering that look, feeling that it meant volumes to the heart-broken man who received it. We know very well that the very same words may convey totally different impressions according as they are spoken in jest or in earnest, in tones of irony or of serious conviction, with gentle or angry expression, a smile or a frown.
What if Jesus quoted this Jewish proverb in a hesitating tone, citing a well-known saying as though He meant, “You know they say you must not take the children’s bread and cast it to dogs. What do you make of that 1 “Suppose He spoke with a smile on His lips and a kindly light in His eye. In that case the whole meaning of the phrase would be changed. Since concerning all such very important factors of the case we are left entirely in the dark, with nothing but our own conjectures to guide us, is it not only just to allow that some explanation might be forthcoming if only we could cross-examine an observant witness of the scene. And now this keen-witted woman sees her chance. The vei’y words which to the dull hearer would seem to shut the dungeon door on hope, open to her quick mind the way for a fresh plea. Can we suppose that Jesus had not seen at a glance what sort of a person He was dealing with 1 These nimble minds reveal their nature at once to a less penetrating gaze than that of One who was always accustomed to read the thoughts of the people with whom He was conversing. Had she been of a more sluggish ternperament He might not have addressed her as He did.
It is not everybody to whom a remark of pleasant irony can be safely made. Jesus saw that here was a case in which He could use this dangerous style without any risk of being misapprehended; or at all events He discerned the courage and persistency of a woman who would not be put off by a phrase which she had wit enough to turn against the speaker. So seizing her opportunity the suppliant actually makes the words that seem to be a cruel rebuff the very excuse for pressing her demand. She discovers a little chink in the wall that Jesus has built round His grace, through which she can creep in and obtain her morsel. Even the very dogs may eat of the crumbs that fall from their master’s table. What delightful repartee! How apt!
How exactly to the point! And how timely! What clever things we could all say if only we had time to hunt them out! Only the happy thought comes too late. That new point of hers is delicious — “ their master’s table.” Thus she quietly suggests a sort of claim, though one confessedly inferior to the children’s right. She will not account herself a stranger. The children’s father is at least her master, and even she has a place in the family, though the very humblest, only that of a watch-dog. There is fine intelligence in this fresh device of hers. But a child’s fate is at stake, and the very most must be made of the opportunity that has come once for all. Happy woman that she has the gift to use it! May we not even call her wit an inspiration mercifully given her for the saving of her child?
It has been said that in this one case Jesus was outwitted in argument by a woman, and that He graciously acknowledged His defeat by yielding to the woman’s clever plea. It may be so; but that He could not have kept up the contest of words had He chosen is not to be supposed. Was He ever worsted in argument when He put forth His strength? Jacob contends with the “ Traveller unknown “only so long as his mysterious Antagonist permits; at a touch the Patriarch’s sinew shrinks. Jesus had no desire to get the better of this suppliant in her argument. Nobody could have been more delighted at her clever reply than He was. It is not only that the sparkle of intellect is always welcome, but the spirit of the answer means so much.
Nothing is more dangerous than the faculty of smartness in repartee. Too often it wounds when no unkindness is intended; and it is especially difficult when the speaker is addressing a superior. But the remarkable thing about this woman’s answer to Christ’s seemingly repellant speech is, that while it is adequate for her purpose there is not a grain of impertinence in it; that she contrives to retain her humility even when turning our Lord’s words against His own case. There lies the perfection of her wit and the charm of it. She does not attempt to deny the correctness of the harsh Jewijh proverb. A woman of duller mind or less delicate feelings would have tried to push her attack on these lines, and then she would have proved herself to be but ordinary. It is by admitting to the full, or at least tacitly acquiescing in, the painful words she has just heard that she is able to erect a new plea on the very ground they furnish her. Thus while her method reveals the fine perfection of her wit, at the same time it shows the true modesty of her spirit. Nothing can be more humble than this plea for the crumbs that the very dogs are not hindered from taking. If only we could see it we should admit that self-assertion is always the greatest possible barrier to the reception of the grace of Christ. The lower we place ourselves before Him the stronger is our plea. Our abject need is our one claim. Before God our sole ground of hope is the mendicant’s destitution. A further charm in this plea for the crumbs is that with all its humility it does not admit of any lessening of the boon sought after. There is no haggling about it. Tho suppliant does not say, “If I have asked for too great a thing, give me some smaller favour, more suitable to my position.” There is just one thing she wants, and a great thing it is, this healing of her afflicted daughter — to her mother’s heart more desirable than any other conceivable favour. This is all she has come to beg; and nothing but this will satisfy her now. Yet she ventures to class it with the crumbs that fall from the children’s feast in comparison with the wealth of bounties it is the power of Jesus to bestow. Thus the very expression of her mingled ingenuity and modesty is a sign of her amazing faith. Even this great favour that she is daring to seek will be largely exceeded by what Jesus will be doing for His own people.
Immeasurably valuable as it is, she believes that it must be but as a crumb to the royal feast that the Christ is spreading for the children of the kingdom. Here is a delicate ascription of praise, too delicate and at the same time too genuine to be called a compliment. To describe the great boon as but a crumb from Christ’s table is to imply that the bounty of that table must be something inconceivably magnificent, and the power and generosity of Him who is providing for it incomparably glorious. It needs to be recognised that the timorous spirit which shrinks from asking great things of Christ is not thereby commending its own humility. A more modest temper would be that of the Queen of Sheba, amazed that the half had not been told i|er. A greater than Solomon is here, and just in proportion as His ^eatness is acknowledged, we shall perceive that nothing is too wonderful for Him to perform. There is logic in the familiar refrain —“ Thou art coming to a king; Large petitions with thee bring.”
We need not be astonished that Jesus yielded at once to this perfect plea of the suppliant at His feet. He had no pride to lead Him to resent the appearance of being worsted by a heathen woman, and no unreasonable obstinacy urging Him never to change an attitude He had once taken up.
It must have been a rare pleasure in those times of depression amid failing hearts for Him to discover the faith that revealed itself in the Canaanite woman’s apt reply. He could deny her nothing now. Had she not proved herself to be in heart a true daughter of Abraham by discovering a double portion of Abraham’s faith? Astonished and delighted He exclaims, “ woman, great is thy faith: be it done unto thee even as thou wilt.” She is to have just what she sought, her daughter healed from that very hour.