Pentecost 10A: What the Canaanite Woman Teaches
Text: Matthew 15:21-28
Dear Partner in Preaching,
I’ve got two questions for you arising from the Gospel reading this week. And I’ll warn you ahead of time that each question which might rock a few boats in your community.
First question: can Jesus learn?
I know that may sound odd. On the one hand, we may quickly answer, “Sure, why not?” Until we worry about the theological implications of that answer. If Jesus learns, a voice inside us may ask, does that means he’s not perfect, or complete, or sinless, or…. And suddenly a cadre of theological police seem to be patrolling the long corridors of our imagination.
I ask this first question because at the heart of this challenging and even somewhat disturbing passage is a key interpretive question: Did the Canaanite woman Matthew describes pass a test or persuade the Lord? If we go with the former – which is probably the more traditional reading – then Jesus didn’t really mean what he said. You know, about saying he was exclusive, ministering only to the Israelites, let alone calling her a dog. All of this was just a test, a way of bringing to harvest the faith that God had already planted in her.
As I mentioned, this is probably the more traditional read of the story. In fact, many commentators will draw our attention to the fact that the word translated “dogs” is actually the diminutive form of the word, meaning “little dog” or “puppy.” I think we favor this interpretation because it saves Jesus from looking like, well, kind of a jerk. Instead, he’s the all-knowing faith-tester, the drill sergeant to the new recruit, tearing her down in order to build her back up again. (Maybe you can guess, but I don’t favor this interpretation. 🙂 )
The other possibility, of course, is that Jesus’ own sense of God’s kingdom is challenged, stretched, and enhanced by his encounter with this fierce and faithful woman. Maybe, that is, Jesus is serious – that is, he believes he was sent only to the Israelites – and the woman takes him on and, in fact, persuades him that something larger is at stake. In this context, her “great faith” isn’t so much an amount, but rather is simply the fact that she just holds plain holds on. She won’t let Jesus go until she wrests a blessing from him on behalf of her daughter. Moms with sick kids are like that – they won’t let anything get in the way of their taking care of their child. Not unsympathetic doctors or health regulations or lousy insurance, not even a slightly narrow-minded messiah-type.
If you go this direction, then Jesus can, in fact, learn. And he does. He learns that God’s kingdom and his mission to enact that kingdom is bigger than he had initially imagined and that it is more encompassing that he’d at first dreamed. Does this mean he’s not perfect or sinless or all the other things the most orthodox among us will worry about? To tell you the truth, I think those are questions this passage isn’t interested in. Rather, I think this passage invites us to image that God’s purpose unfolded throughout Jesus’ life and ministry and continues to do so in our own lives and experiences. This tenacious and faithful woman, a complete stranger, pushed Jesus to reconsider, to learn, and to grow.
All of which brings me to a second question: can we learn?
I ask this because of a conversation I’ve repeated with literally hundreds of well-intentioned folks deeply concerned about their congregations: how do we get young people to come to our church? It’s no secret that the mainline traditions are both aging and getting smaller, and so many are wondering what happened, what went wrong, and how we might entice young adults and young families into our congregations. Rather than answer that question directly – as if I have the answer! – I instead ask them a question back: have you asked any of the people you wish would come to church why they don’t? Or what you could do differently in terms of Sunday worship that would make it meaningful for them?
The answer is almost always “no.” Not “No, we’d never do that.” But rather, “No, that never occurred to us.” Which is understandable, as our congregational patterns and worship practices seem to have worked for generations, and so it simply doesn’t occur to us to ask others what they think of them. We simply assume this is the way to do congregational life and Sunday worship.
But taking a cue from Jesus’ encounter with this woman, what we might do is wonder with people how what we do as a community of faith might be more engaging and helpful as they seek to connect their faith and their everyday life. Which means that if we want to learn, we first need to listen. And, once we’ve listened, we need to be open to changing how we nurture worship and congregational life in a way that is meaningful not only to the ever-smaller but loyal cadre of “regulars” but also to the folks who aren’t coming, or who used to come, or who might come. (And who knows, if we construct worship that is interesting and meaningful to them, it might even be more interesting and meaningful to us as well!)
So here’s my suggestion and challenge this week, Dear Partner. This week, before you write your sermon, ask someone who’s not in church why they don’t find it meaningful. Are there particular barriers or obstacles keeping them from coming (either in their own life or in the congregation)? Are there elements they just don’t understand? But then go on to ask them what might make church more interesting, more worth getting out of bed for, more meaningful and useful to them as they try to live faithfully in the world? I’m guessing it won’t be hard to find someone willing to have this conversation. Perhaps it will be one of your children, or a sibling, or a family friend. I’ve had this conversation a couple of times, and while it was initially awkward (more for me out of my insecurity than for the other person), it was also incredibly helpful. We’re good at talking in the church; I think it’s time we learn to listen.
If you want to take this further, invite your leadership team (church council or board of elders or vestry) to invite one or more conversations with people over the next few months and start your meetings by discussing what you’re hearing. Or even invite those in attendance this Sunday to have just one of those conversations in the week to come and email you what they heard. Believe me, this is the kind of practice that can be transformative if you engage it with gusto.
Because here’s the thing: the woman Jesus meets, dismisses, and then learns from is a person, with all kinds of needs and concerns and hurts and interests. And the “great faith” she demonstrates is that she won’t allow herself or, even more, her sick daughter, be dismissed. Too many people are used to being dismissed by the church. They assume (sometimes based on experience) that the church isn’t really interested in them as persons with all kinds of needs and concerns and passions, but rather just sees them as potential members or giving units. And so they have no vested interest in being as tenacious as this woman was. For this reason we need to reach out to the persons around us as persons who have a lot to teach us, and we need to do this not as a strategy to grow our congregations but because that’s what Jesus discovered from this encounter with this woman and that’s what, I believe, he would have us learn from her as well.
This isn’t easy work, Dear Partner, but I know you’re up for it. Why? Because when you get right down to it, you don’t simply care about your congregation for its own sake, but rather for people who make up that congregation and for those who might also find life in it and contribute their questions and insights and strengths to it. And so whether you go in this direction or not, thank you for caring so much about yoru community of faith, and blessings on your life, ministry, and proclamation this week and always.
Yours in Christ,
David
Notes: 1) Post image, “Christ and the Canaanite Woman,” Rembrandt (c. 1650), The Getty Museum.
2) If you’re interested, you can find the letter I wrote on this three years ago at Working Preacher.
What a contrast of the Canannite woman’s great faith and Peter’s little faith.
David,
Thank you for this reflection! When we read this in our Bible class my first semester of seminary, I think my actual interpretation was (and I said it out loud!)that Jesus was wrong in his first response to the Canaanite woman. Many of my classmates took great exception to that interpretation, yet I have always felt that this text shows just how human He is. It also is a text that can give us hope, and maybe permission, for changed minds and behaviors. That, I think, may be one of the most important things we can learn as Christian disciples. Change of behavior occurs only with change of heart.
I see your skipping the 1st 10 verses of the chapter where Jesus talks about how it’s what comes out of the heart that makes one unclean or less than holy. So question would be was Jesus speaking from the heart. We believe the disciples where (they were always wanting to send away those whom they didn’t want to deal with). In my minds eye I can just see them nodding in approval at everything Jesus was saying. But then he demonstrates what’s really on his heart which will blow their collective minds. I could be wrong or it may just be letting my high Christology show.
Thank you, as always. I really like your insights and they are much closer to the direction I usually am thinking than any other resource. We will see what comes out of a week of reflecting on this, and the pastoral events of the week (and self). Last week I got to “Faith is like a golf swing” complete with club in hand. It is the doubts, not the fears that make us sink, and doubting is so natural. God was the club that you had to “let swing” not force with muscles, with practice to groove the “spiritual process.”
As I read it, Jesus is moving from one experience of “lost-ness” to another (John’s beheading, the disciples never “getting” what he is talking about, hungry crowds, Peter’s challenge to Jesus’ path to the cross, etc. etc.) Each revealing how “lost” are the sheep of Israel. Jesus and his disciples have moved away from the crowds. He will have time with his special lost sheep and the Caananite woman comes with the raw cry of a mother begging for her daughter to be made whole. I agree with David that Jesus is changed by this encounter, whether it is a broader view of mission or simply a change of perspective at a moment when he most needed it – we see the very human side of Jesus met by God in this outsider.
The disciples want the Canaanite woman to go away and Jesus tells her that his mission is to save the lost sheep of Israel (see them standing over in the corner trying to get rid of you?). Furthermore, my mission is not to save puppies (the Greek here is the diminutive form).
What happens is that she really listens and instead of being offended takes his dismissal and ironically turns it back on him…even puppies get crumbs. In response Jesus really listens to her. I believe he recognizes that God is speaking to him and to his disciples through her. He is saying don’t focus on how lost my sheep are, keep breaking the boundaries, keep pouring out your healing love to whomever calls for it, I will do the rest…trust me…because my love knows no boundaries and this is what it means to be my Son in the world.
Carol, thank you for this. Love your reflection…
I am grateful for the insights that you bring to this text. I believe that Jesus can learn – that’s his humanity practically demonstrated. His life was really a learning curve. He learned what it meant to be the Messiah, the Christ. He struggled in desert to discern how best to be ‘The Lamb of God’. Would it be by turning the stones into bread or leaping from the Temple? He had to learn these things together with how to deal with the issues of the ritualistic laws of the Jews. He learned that the Sabbath was created for humans and not the other way round – he learned that eating the right foods didn’t ensure righteousness and in our text he discovered the full breadth of his mission – not merely to the “chosen” but to all the nations. He learned, too, that holding these views would cost him his life but he went forward none-the-less and even in the garden of Gethsemane he was still learning what it meant to be faithful. We should therefore be willing to learn. I think the church has done this; we’ve graduated from belief in a flat earth, abolished slavery, emancipated women, overcome Apartheid, and now, as we deal with new issues like same-sex marriage, global warming and abortion we have to ask ourselves whether we will continue to learn.
I would like to see the other messages David has done on this Canaanite lady. How do I access David’s archives? Say, this text three years ago. -thanks for the help -ron
Ron – there’s a link at the bottom of David’s post that will take you to an entry from three years ago on Working Preacher.
Thank you, David; I always appreciate your posts. I deviate, however, from the current trend of scholarship, which paints Jesus as a flawed, racist or narrow-minded jerk. What we see in this gospel is an author who is desperately trying to make Jesus palatable to a 1st C. Jewish audience. Matthew was an apologetic, trying to explain his Messiah to a community who would be slow to embrace those particular Messianic ideals, and a community that was entrenched in separateness. That was no easy task, and to take on such a task was radical, to put it mildly. The passage also reflects the growing divide between Jews and non-Jews of the day as a result of the increased hostility and tension of life under Roman rule. To take the position that Jesus was the short-sighted one is to contradict the rest of scripture, where Jesus reaches across gender, cultural, ethnic, and religious barriers. His work wasn’t revolutionary; it was revelationary!
Keep up the good work; your posts are great sermon fodder! Peace, Byron
I agree with your assessment that Jesus is evolving in his vision of God’s Kingdom and it’s applications to the 1st century Jew. Of course, this radically presupposes that Jesus is NOT all knowing, etc, etc, therefore He is NOT a literal God in a human suite. As you know, this makes the creeds obsolete. In my opinion, that is an 1,800 year change that is far overdue in a world of modern science and laws of physics. Magic and Mind Readers need not apply in the interpretation of this story. Thanks for your work. Parenthetically, I have noticed an evolution in your own interpretation of the bible and Jesus these past few years. A welcome change in my opinion.
In Hebrews it is stated that Jesus was made lower than the Angels for a little while. In Human form. This seems to me to say that before and after human form he was/is greater than the Angels. For me the idea that Jesus not being all-knowing while on earth so that he could experience the human condition first hand makes sense. Emmanuel. Then with that knowledge and experience he ascended to his Divine position. I would not assume that because he experienced human limitations and form this indicates a permanent state of being. Jesus meeting and accepting this woman, and the woman at the well and the centurion, are all examples of Jesus reaching even deeper into everyone’s human experience, not just the traditional Jewish experience. That is the message I get from this pericope.
It may be as you, and seemingly most contemporary scholarship, suggest. But I wonder, then, why it is Jesus says, “Woman great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” Should not Jesus say something along the lines of, “Woman, great is your wisdom and teaching–you have opened my understanding in a new, profound and most gracious way. I was blind, but now I see. Let it be done for you as you wish for your insight transcends that of the Pharisees, the scribes and the Son of Man.”
This is one of my favorite scriptures. Several years ago I took the 2nd path that Jesus could learn and the theological police came down like a ton of bricks, in both the local church and my DS. Thank you for your boldness and willingness to look beyond the obvious and the easy.
Julie,
That is a shame. Keep on preaching, sister.
Changing ones mind or going beyond the mind that I have indeed breaks cultural and religious boundaries. I would push a little further into Matthew’s context. Asking what was the gospel writer conveying about Jesus that his audience had misplaced or overlooked too often we approach Jesus in the Gospels like many literalist and lose the voice of the writer. Just another thread in the tapestry of a learning Jesus. Thank you for providing In the meantime!
This was really awesome! Thank you.
I have always loved this passage, because as a minister very much interested in interfaith dialogue, the question often asked by Christians,it affirms that God is present in all religions. Christians often ask, can non Christians find salvation? The answer is a resounding yes! Jesus does not do the healing, it is her faith, her belief in God, and we see this theme over and over, in the Gospels. As perhaps an ultra progressive Christian, I see Jesus as the embodiment, the “way” to God, not through belief in him, but by following his example and living our lives the “way” he taught us too
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I do not believe that Jesus had to or has to learn, nor do I believe that the Canaanite woman taught Jesus. I believe that Jesus used the Canaanite woman to teach His Disciples and us – He was not the person in need of learning – His Disciples were and so are we because we want little to do with those who do not believe as we do. We are not patient enough to truly listen to them before disregarding them.
This pagan woman, whose people adored and prayed to false gods was like the woman in Iran recently who was jailed with her two year old son and pregnant with her second child (which she delivered in jail) who knew the truth – knew that Jesus was God and she knew (as did the woman in Iran) that only He could help her and her daughter. The Cannanite woman knew this and humbled herself before Jesus (on her knees showing her meekness and sinfulness before Jesus). – She knew she was not worthy just like we are not, but she had heard about Jesus curing the lame, the ill and put her faith and trust in Him. She humbled herself before Jesus, agreeing with what He was saying, not arguing or becoming defensive. Jesus spoke the truth, she recognized it humbly as all will when standing before God (although even then God will give us free choice, we can still reject Him). This woman did not reject Jesus – she did just the opposite. She accepted what He had to say and knowing and believing He was the Son of David (the Messiah), she trusted in His mercy and love. I think like the following homily says – that faith and humility are virtues that unite us to Jesus and to His Will. Surely, Jesus wants all people to come to Him for healing and be saved. He answers prayers that are in line with His Father’s Will. The Canaanite woman’s prayer was in line with God’s Will.
The Canaanite Woman
A Lesson on Faith and Humility
In chapters 14 through 18, St. Matthew focuses on important instruction Jesus gives to Peter and the apostles, and through them to us. One particular incident that captures my attention is the story of the Canaanite woman (Mt 15:21-28).
As the narrative unfolds, a pagan, a Canaanite woman, a non-Jew, a goy, shouts to Jesus with the urgent plea: Kyrie, eleison – “Lord, have mercy on me.” Then she adds, “my daughter is severely possessed by a demon” (15:22). But Jesus responds with ominous silence!
When the apostles asked Jesus to send her away because she kept crying after them, he replied coolly: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (15:24). Then the Canaanite woman knelt before Jesus pleading, “Lord, help me” (15:25). Jesus answered in words that seem degrading, “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (15:26). The Greek word, kunarion, rendered in our text as “dogs,” refers to little housedogs. Let’s interject ourselves into the story. How would you feel if someone implied that you and your little girl were worthless pagan dogs?
However, notice the remarkable response of this amazingly humble woman. She agreed with Jesus’ assessment without defensiveness while continuing her plea. “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table” (15:27). She fully accepted the reality of their situation. She was not in covenant with God as part of his chosen people. Earlier she identified Jesus as the “Son of David,” (15:24) thereby expressing her faith in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. Therefore, she and her daughter are aptly called little dogs in relationship to the creator of heaven and earth. She will gladly accept a role for herself and her daughter as house pets in the palace of the King of Kings. She will be delighted and grateful if they can eat the crumbs from his table.
When I reflect on the response of this surprising woman, I think of our little dog, Georgia. Georgia came to us unexpectedly one day with her head down and her tail wagging. She was so docile and humble that she captured every heart in the family. This is how Jesus responds when He is approached with humility.
The exclamation “O” only occurred five times in all four Gospels. They always come from the mouth of Jesus. In one instance Jesus gave a mild rebuke to the disciples on the way to Emmaus: “O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe” (Lk 14:25). On three other occasions they punctuated strong condemnations (Mt 17:17; Mk 9:19; Lk 9:41). However, in the case of this Canaanite women, “O” was exclusively used to introduce Jesus’ admiration. “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire” (15:28). Two thousand years later we remember her as the woman of great faith and admirable humility.
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Additional insight is gained by reflecting on Jesus’ use of the word, “woman” (15:28). Jesus twice identified his own mother as “woman,” first at Cana when he began his formal assault on the kingdom of Satan, and finally on Calvary where he consummated his victory. By so doing Jesus identified his mother with the “woman” of Genesis 3:15, and with the queen mother (Revelation 12:1-2, 4-5,17) whose seed will crush the serpent’s head. Jesus’ address of the Canaanite mother as “woman” connected her with Mary, the prophecy of Genesis and the revelation of the Apocalypse. This may seem surprising until one recalls another familiar incident.
Matthew reported that someone told Jesus, “‘Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to speak with you.’ But Jesus said in reply: ‘Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?’ And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother’” (Mt 12:47-50). The humble surrender of this pagan woman to the “obedience of faith” (Rom 1:5; 16:26) incorporated her into Jesus’ covenant family. She was no longer a dog eating the scraps from the Master’s table. She was now the Father’s daughter who was invited to dine at the wedding banquet of the Lamb.
How do we view ourselves? Are we someone of importance? Do we crave approval and recognition? Or do we admit that we are “little dogs” who God has elevated to the awesome destiny of being his sons and daughters, a vocation that we could never deserve.
St. Augustine gave a powerful instruction on the importance of humility. “I wish you to prepare for yourself no other way of seizing and holding the truth than that which has been prepared by Him who, as God, saw the weaknesses of our goings. In that way the first part is humility; the second, humility; the third, humility: and this I continue to repeat as often as you might ask direction, not that there are no other instructions which may be given, but because, unless humility proceed, accompany and follow every good action which we perform being at once the object which we keep before our eyes, the support to which we cling, and the monitor by which we are restrained, pride wrests wholly from our hand any good work on which we are congratulating ourselves.”
The great Spanish mystic and director of souls, St. John of the Cross also wrote about humility: “God falls in love with the soul not because his eyes are attracted to her greatness, but to the greatness of her humility.”
Humility is based on truth. It begins with the recognition of God’s infinite grandeur and holiness on the one hand, and our weakness, ineptitude, and sinfulness on the other. No matter how lofty the creature, the abyss between that person and God is infinite. Humility is the recognition of that infinite chasm. Then when we reflect of Jesus’ humility, we quickly discover how far we are from being truly humble. The greatest of the saints are the most humble, but Jesus is more humble than all the saints. So it is
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that Jesus instructed us: “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart” (Mt 11:29).
Saint Charles Borromeo Catholic Church, Picayune, MS http://www.scborromeo.org
Reposted with permission of
James Seghers and Totus Tuus Ministries http://www.totustuus.com
All Rights Reserved
I know that you have moved on to the next reading… but I wanted to share this.
I was inspired after reading your article, Dr. Lose, to try even still another approach. v. 23 notes that Jesus didn’t address her… (that seemed like a strange thing to include for the gospel writer… I figured that it probably had a meaning) So I asked… in human gatherings… what does it mean when people who often speak do not… even when addressed. Even though he wasn’t speaking to her, was Jesus paying close attention to her and the situation? I let that rest ever so briefly…
Then the disciples are annoyed with her being around and they let Jesus know… it seems that Jesus addresses the disciples almost privately in v. 24. Then it hit me… if the disciples represent the Israelites… Jesus is voicing the expected argument… disciples are almost certainly nodding their heads in agreement.
In v. 26 they are then even more certain of their position of exclusion… (a position that the Israelites have taken for years) because Jesus voices it to her… but then in v. 27 she easily unravels that argument like a puppy that swipes its paw to move a new toy on the floor. Jesus exclaims you have got it… and the disciples are left without an argument that the Messiah is only for the people of Israel. Disciples’ mouths hanging wide open wondering what just happened.
Dr Lose, you argued that this was a mama that wasn’t going to take no for an answer. No course language or insult was going to get in her way of her daughter being healed… What if, in his silence Jesus was sizing her up? Making sure that she could handle the push back and stand her ground? I am wondering if the original audience that Matthew wrote for needed to know that the messiah was not to be limited to a Jewish audience?
So I then wondered aloud with my congregation… what does this mean for us who are pretty alike and sometimes afraid of those who look different, sound different, are from somewhere different.
The miracle was that I had a gentleman visit our congregation looking for help last Monday to find a home to rent last week… from Pakistan… turns out that he was Christian with an MDIV from a Methodist Seminary.
All I know is that his appearance in this congregational building timed with this gospel, the events in MO, caused me to pause and go hmmmm. And then resolve to make sure that the gospel of Christ is not hindered by any boundaries I would draw… and encouraged my members to do likewise. Reminding them that Christ meets people where they are and as they are… loving them. We have to do our best to stay out of the way.
This also seemed to advance the question of purity asked in the previous section.
Thanks for reading.
I’d been looking for a commentary on this pericope which doesn’t go straight down the ‘Jesus tests the woman’s faith hypothesis’. This interaction has troubled me for years, and in the process of doing the Jesuit ‘Light Works’ mini-formation I’ve been re-thinking it, to come to the conclusion you also arrive at. It was a relief to find someone else taking that view, and a really well-argued expression of that view. Thank you!