What do you think of this gospel story? Would you include it in Jesus’s greatest hits?
There are a lot of excuses we could offer to get Jesus off the hook in the dialogue between him and the Syro-Phoenician woman: maybe he’s tired, maybe he’s on vacation, maybe he’s joking, and the church over the centuries has turned itself inside out over the seventh chapter of Mark. But I think our call to mutual respect and reconciliation is furthered if we let Jesus’s words here sound as bad as they sound. A Gentile woman whose daughter was ill came before him, begging him to cast out the demon that possessed her. Jesus memorably says to the woman, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” But she answered him, “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” And Jesus responds, “For saying that, you may go. The demon has left your daughter.”
Jesus’s first response is uniquely harsh; no other suppliant in the gospel is treated with such rudeness. Why does he initially deny her request for healing? And no matter how you look at it, the term dog is an insult. Virtually every interpreter agrees. Scholars list several Hebrew Bible and New Testament references to dogs, none of which are flattering. Dogs in this culture were regarded as unclean. Even in the broader Mediterranean context, dogs were considered scavengers, like rats to an American or European, and not as domestic pets.
To match the phrase “little daughter,” the story teller uses a diminutive form, saying “little dog,” and some ambitious apologists suggest that Jesus is only having a bit of fun here. “He’s just calling her a puppy,” says one writer and “she should get the joke.” But how many of us have successfully called a stranger a derogatory name, who by the way is a different ethnicity and gender from yours, and had that “playfulness” go well?
Barbara Brown Taylor suggests Jesus is worn out. He has just come from his home town, where his friends and family have doubted his authority. He has received word that John the Baptist has lost his head, in a frivolous party game at the court of the king. He has pulled away from it all, but the crowds followed him, and he fed them with five loaves and two fish. And then there was a storm at sea. Everywhere Jesus turns, there are people and their needs, and frustrating confusion about who he really is. He is at the end of his rope, all but used up. When the Syro-Phoenician woman comes to him, he draws a hurtful, insulting line. “The doctor is out,” says the sign on the door. “Closed for the weekend.”
But the woman will not stay on her side of the line. “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs,” she counters.
Now most of us have trouble changing our minds when we hear a perspective contrary to our own, but that’s a lonely ghetto that serves neither us nor the common good. Even Jesus is guilty of drawing a line and refusing to cross over it… In a sense, he has his fingers in his ears as the story opens in today’s gospel. Yet the Syro-Phoenician woman will have none of that, and with quiet dignity and a sense of humor that embraces both herself and the man speaking to her, she helps Jesus take his hands from his ears and open up his eyes. And I believe that’s why this stirring drama is included in the scripture: the soul of the woman helps us expand our vision of God and of what’s possible for each of us.
Every human being is sacred and precious, no matter where they come from, what they look like, how they worship, or who they love. The poor, foreign, single mother with a sick daughter is the hero here, not Jesus, at least not until he changes his mind. She says to him, “I’m here and I matter. There is food and grace for each of us. God’s heart is bigger than anyone imagined, and there’s room in there for me and my little girl.” And with that, the line that religion so often draws between those within and those outside disappears.
“The limits he placed on himself vanish, and you can almost hear the huge wheel of history turning, as Jesus comes to a new understanding of who he is,” who we are, and what he has been called to do. “God’s purpose for him is bigger than he had imagined. There is enough of him to go around! And there is no going back to the limits he observed even a moment ago.” The old boundaries, of religion and God and humankind, will not contain this new vision. And Jesus will rub them out and draw them bigger, to include this foreign woman and her daughter today, and who knows who else tomorrow. (paraphrase of Barbara Brown Taylor)
So, although you might not have considered it earlier, I think this story should be on our list of greatest hits, and maybe it ought to be at the very top. This woman and her conversation with Jesus changes everything. It makes all the difference, because it tells us that every death-dealing boundary between people needs to be erased, every wall we have built over time or just this morning, needs to be taken down, stone by hurtful stone. Engaging her, respecting her, including her becomes the very reason for the Jesus movement, because any religious way that doesn’t center folks like her and her daughter is not worth following or standing for.
A group of women I know, in a church somewhat south of Baltimore, were talking one Sunday about this reading from Mark. “That man Jesus was sure enough tired that day, and he said something he shouldn’t have,” one began. “That’s alright, I guess,” said another, “but that sister sure set him straight.” A third offered, “She wasn’t mean at all; she just stood her ground and wouldn’t take no for an answer. She was strong, Jesus listened, and he changed for the better, too.” After a pause, the first woman wondered aloud, “You think my husband has heard this story?” Why don’t we make sure that everyone has?
And you know what? If Jesus’s vision and heart can grow bigger and more loving, like it does in this gospel, then maybe ours can, too.
Love,
David