THE CANAANITE WOMAN AND JESUS THE SAGE:

AN ANALYSIS OF MATTHEW 15:21-28

Vincent Dávila, OP

Biblical Interpretation

April 18, 2012

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Jesus’ encounter with the Canaanite woman in Matthew’s Gospel presents the modern

reader with a troubling account, for in it Jesus acts in a way disparate from his usual self. When

the Canaanite woman first calls out to him, begging for a healing for her daughter and

recognizing him as Lord, he simply ignores her; when she persists, the disciples approach Jesus

about her, and he responds that he “was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,”

seemingly a blatant rejection of the Gentiles (Matthew 15:24). Yet she continues, and thus Jesus

is brought to pronounce what seem offensive, even bigoted remarks: “It is not right to take the

food of the children and throw it to the dogs” (Mt 15:26). But then, departing from the model,

when she again persists in begging for the healing, Jesus acclaims her faith and grants her wish.

What can account for such a radical change in Jesus’ response, from silence and insult to praise

and healing? Perhaps more significantly, how can the image of a Jesus who makes such insulting

remarks be reconciled with a loving Jesus who excludes no one from his care? While many

modern scholars answer these difficult questions by seeing this moment as one of change and

learning for Jesus, their approaches are problematic; yet the difficulties can be solved by seeing

this as a teaching moment for Jesus the sage.

Yet before addressing the approaches of various scholars, it is necessary to recognize the

temptation to simply ignore this pericope altogether, failing to include it in one’s personal image

of Jesus. This is problematic on several accounts: firstly, because it gives primacy to the Jesus of

one’s imagination rather than the Jesus of the Scriptures; but also because the Gospel writer

simply will not allow it. Following the generally accepted source theory for Matthew’s Gospel,

this Gospel is derived at least in part from Mark’s Gospel.1 Thus, a similar version of this

1N.B. Biblical quotes throughout this paper are taken from the NAB.

Cf. Donald Senior, Matthew, Abindgdon New Testament Commentaries (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1998), 25-26; Daniel J. Harrington, SJ, The Gospel of Matthew, Sacra Pagina Series 1 (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1991), 5-7; R.T. France, The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2007), 20-22. France actually has reservations about the “two source hypothesis,” but

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pericope is found in Mark 7:24-30. It stands to reason that if Matthew found this pericope

troubling and unrepresentative of who Jesus was, he would not have included it in his own

Gospel account—yet in fact, he not only included the pericope, but heightened or aggravated

many of the most difficult elements. Matthew replaces “the woman was a Greek, a

Syrophoenician by birth” (Mk 7:26), by referring to her as “a Canaanite woman” (Mt 15:22).

This “implies that she is unclean and pagan…[and] evokes an adversarial relationship, dating

from the divinely-sanctioned conquest of the Canaanites’ land by the Israelites.”2 Matthew

makes other changes as well; as Donald Senior adds, “[t]he evangelist’s changes in the story of

the Canaanite woman intensify the issue by having the woman and Jesus directly confront each

other, not twice but three times, and by having Jesus explicitly reaffirm that his mission is only

to Israel.”3

Other Biblical scholars, accepting the significance of this pericope in a right

understanding of Matthew’s Jesus, offer altogether problematic interpretations. While placing the

Canaanite woman at the center of the story is not per se problematic, some of these scholars go a

step further in making this woman the teacher and Jesus the student. Thus, Daniel Patte will

insist that “contrary to our understanding that Jesus’ role is to teach to disciples God’s

righteousness/justice, out of the wisdom of her own culture the Canaanite woman teaches

overabundant righteousness/justice to Jesus.”4 Similarly, Daniel Schipani states that “the

nevertheless lists it as the standard source theory.

2 Daniel S.Schipani, “Transforming Encounter in the Borderlands: A Study of Matthew 15:21-28,” in Redemptive Transformation in Practical Theology: Essays in Honor of James E. Loder Jr., ed. Dana R. Wright and John D. Kuentzel (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2004), 119.

3 Senior, 180.

4 Daniel Patte, “The Canaanite Woman and Jesus: Surprising Models of Discipleship (Matt. 15:21-28),” in Transformative Encounters: Jesus & Women Re-viewed, ed. Ingrid Rosa Kitzberger (Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 1999), 34.

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Canaanite woman became a prophetic and wise teacher.”5 This teaching is, for Schipani,

ultimately a form of ministry, such that rather than Jesus ministering to the needs of this woman,

it is indeed the Canaanite who, “in the process of her encounter with Jesus …, ministered to

him.”6

Such claims do not seem to square with the Matthean Jesus, nor indeed with the

immediate context of this pericope. For Matthew, Jesus is the “teacher” (Mt 19:16), who a few

chapters earlier—in the Sermon on the Mount—left the crowds “astonished at his teaching, for

he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes” (Mt 7:28-29). Even the

immediate context does not admit this model of Jesus; he has just come from a confrontation

with the Pharisees and scribes in Jerusalem, the teachers of the Jews, in which he has questioned

their authority, calling them “hypocrites” and quoting Isaiah’s prophecy that they worship God in

vain, “‘teaching as doctrines human precepts’” (Mt 15:7, 9). Jesus has just finished teaching both

the Jewish authorities and the crowd regarding true cleanliness, for “it is not what enters one’s

mouth that defiles that person, but what comes out of the mouth is what defiles one” (Mt 15:11).

How strange it would be for Matthew to insist on the greatness of Jesus’ teaching authority (as

even teaching scribes and Pharisees), and immediately thereafter show him as a student needing

instruction—would not this undermine the teaching authority of his previous remarks? And if, as

Schipani proposes, the Canaanite woman can offer Jesus, whose teaching comes from above, a

lesson in righteousness from her culture, why listen to Jesus’ teaching authority at all? Is cultural

authority above the divine authority that Matthew ascribes to Jesus? Such a questioning of

authority would inevitably undermine other areas of Jesus’ teaching, and thus can hardly be

present in Matthew’s Gospel.

5 Schipani, 124.

6 Schipani, 124.

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A further problem emerges from the lesson this Canaanite woman allegedly gives Jesus:

a new understanding of his mission. Thus, Patte states that “Jesus…allows her to transform the

understanding he has of his mission.”7 Still others say that “her encounter with Jesus helps him

discover the wider scope of his healing mission, beyond geopolitical and cultural boundaries.”8

Gail O’Day offers that “it is the marginal one, the one who would be reckoned ‘unclean’, who

pushes Jesus to new possibilities,” and goes on to say that “Jesus was changed by this woman’s

boldness. … She insists that Jesus be Jesus, and through her insistence she frees him to be fully

who he is.”9 Perhaps this quote from O’Day most concisely captures the problem with this line of

thought in insisting that Jesus is liberated by the Canaanite woman to be who he truly is; again,

this simply does not match the Matthean Jesus (or for that matter, the Jesus of any of the Gospels

or the tradition). Jesus is never shown as constrained, but rather as eminently free; thus, he

reaches out and touches lepers (cf. Mt 8:3); he defies the authority of the scribes and Pharisees

by declaring himself “Lord of the Sabbath” (Mt 12:8), by performing an act tantamount to

blasphemy in forgiving the sins of a paralytic (cf. Mt 9:1-8), and even, in the immediate context

of this pericope, confronting the temple authorities by providing a new teaching regarding

cleanliness (cf. Mt 15:1-21). Furthermore, Jesus is shown throughout the Gospels as associating

closely with women, despite how socially unacceptable this would have been (cf. John 4:27).

How, then, can it be claimed that Jesus was set free by this woman from the societal pressures

and preconditioning that would have led him to treat her as an inferior, when Jesus showed time

7 Patte, 35.

8 Lazare S. Rukundwa and Andries G. Van Aarde, “Revisiting justice in the first four Beatitudes in Matthew (5:3-6) and the story of the Canaanite woman (Mt 15:21-28): A postcolonial reading,” Hervormde Teologiese Studies 61, no. 3 (Summer 2005), http://hts.org.za/index.php/HTS/article/viewFile/462/361 (accessed March 2, 2012), 927.

9 Gail R. O’Day, “Surprised by Faith: Jesus and the Canaanite Woman,” in A Feminist Companion to Matthew, ed. Amy-Jill Levine (Sheffield, England: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 125.

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and again that he was in no way constrained by the world in which he lived, that he was free to

do what was right and reach out to those society regarded as untouchables?

Furthermore, how can scholars claim that Jesus came to a new understanding of his

mission through this encounter? To make such a claim would necessitate two things: a prior

ignorance of his mission, and an evident change in his mission after the encounter. Neither of

these is present in the Gospel. From the beginning, Jesus is fully aware of his mission (as, for

instance, that he has “come not to abolish [the law or the prophets] but to fulfill [them]” (Mt

5:17)), and within a chapter of this pericope is already foretelling his Passion (cf. Mt 16:21-23).

Nor do Gentiles first enter the scope of Jesus’ mission in this encounter; from his birth, Matthew

presents Jesus as the Savior of the nations through the visit of the Magi (cf. Mt 2:1-12); and

several chapters before the encounter with the Canaanite woman, Jesus heals the servant of

another Gentile, a Roman centurion—a story similar to this encounter in that the centurion

comes begging for the healing of another, is perhaps as untouchable as the Canaanite woman (for

centurions would have been particularly detested due to their oppressive role in Jesus’ society),

and is acclaimed by Jesus for the greatness of his faith (cf. Mt 8:5-13). Perhaps the more

reasonable conclusion is that, rather than Jesus not understanding his mission, we do not

understand it; or perhaps more realistically, we read into the pre-resurrection Jesus the same

mission given to the post-resurrection Church—but why need these be the same? As one

commentary states, Jesus “came to bring his Gospel to the whole world, but he himself addressed

only the Jews; later on he [would] charge his apostles to preach the Gospel to the pagans.”10 This

recalls the second requirement for showing that Jesus gained a new understanding of his mission:

there would need to be a marked change in his ministry—more than simply healing this one

10 Members of the Faculty of Theology of the University of Navarre, The Gospels and Acts of the Apostles, The Navarre Bible, trans. Michael Adams. (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2000), 116.

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woman’s daughter, for that is hardly different from the healing already performed for the

centurion. Yet no such radical change occurs—Jesus continues to minister to the “house of

Israel” (Mt 15:24).11 Indeed, in John’s Gospel, when Jesus is approached by “some Greeks,” he

takes this as the sign that “the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified” (Jn 12:20, 23)

—thus, the hour for the Gospel to spread to the Gentiles is tied to the hour for the Passion and

the Resurrection; only after the Resurrection could the Gospel spread beyond the Jews.12 This

coincides with the mission given by Jesus to his followers in Matthew’s Gospel: before his death,

he commissions the disciples to evangelize but instructs them: “‘Do not go into pagan territory or

enter a Samaritan town. Go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’” (Mt 10:5-6).

Following the Resurrection, Jesus then commissions them to “‘Go…and make disciples of all

nations’” (Mt 28:19). Perhaps rather than seeing Jesus as ignorant of the Father’s true mission for

him (as going beyond Israel), a clearer understanding of Jesus’ mission as a Jew would be

helpful, such as that expounded by Daniel Harrington, SJ:

If one wishes to be true to the biblical witness, it is necessary to present clearly what the Scriptures say about the chosenness of Israel and how Christians share in it through Jesus. The God of Jesus is the God of Israel. Gentiles call upon and experience this God through Jesus as representative of the Jewish people. The roots of Christianity are Jewish. Gentile Christians have been grafted onto the olive tree (see Rom 11:17, 24).13

John Kilgallen, SJ, who likewise emphasizes that the limitation of Jesus’ mission during his life

was part of the divine plan (as was the expansion of the mission after his resurrection),

furthermore states that this limitation would have been a fulfillment of God’s promises, for in the

Old Testament he had promised time and again to watch over his chosen people—Jesus was the 11 France argues that the feeding of the multitude that follows this pericope in Matthew’s Gospel is a

feeding of Gentiles and thus an “extension of [the Jewish] privilege to the Gentiles also” (see France, 588; Harrington 241-242 espouses a similar view, though with less certainty). Regardless, a single additional miracle does not seem indicative of a radical change of mission, and furthermore, France goes on to argue as I do that this encounter does not represent a radical “redirection of his ministry” (see France, 590-591).

12 Cf. New American Bible (New York: Catholic Book Publishing Co., 1992), footnote for John 12:23.

13 Harrington, 238.

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ultimate fulfillment of the promise, and thus it seems reasonable that he should have come to the

Jews.14

Perhaps the most radical claim made in seeking to explain the behavior of Jesus is that

this pericope reveals Jesus’ faults, his sinfulness, and ultimately his conversion. Patte refers to

this brokenness as a necessary part of Jesus’ humanity (thus, for Patte, to say that Jesus was truly

incarnate, is to say that he acquired these broken ways and was conditioned negatively by his

society); this brokenness is also our way of relating to Jesus, for like him, we often “ignore

desperate cries for help, especially if they come from people who are different from us, be it in

terms of class, race, culture, religion, and/or gender.”15 Patte does not shrink from the necessary

logical conclusion of such a claim regarding Jesus’ humanity: “from the perspective of the

unfolding of the plot [of the Gospel] this means that prior to the resurrection he was not the

almighty (and omniscient) resurrected kyrios.”16 Even Schipani, who at one point states that “we

must reject…as proposed by some radical feminists…that Jesus had to be converted (repent from

sin),” will elsewhere claim that “He seems to be pushed to face the possibility of his own

faithlessness and abandonment of God at this point and, thereby, to come face to face with the

holiness of God ‘beyond the boundaries’ at the prompting of the foreign woman.”17

Though it is certainly important to emphasize the humanity of Christ to fully understand

him, this must be done while recognizing that he “has similarly been tested in every way, yet

without sin” (Hebrews 4:15; italics mine). Furthermore, an emphasis on his humanity cannot be

to the exclusion of his divinity, as is done by claims that he came to know God better—he

14 Cf. John J. Kilgallen, SJ, “The Syro-Phoenician Woman: ‘Only to the House of Israel,’” Chicago Studies 42, no. 2 (Summer 2003), 214-218.

15 Patte, 35.

16 Patte, 43.

17 Schipani, 126; Schipani, 122.

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himself was and is God, and furthermore alone can reveal God, for as Jesus states in Matthew’s

Gospel: “‘All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except

the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to

reveal him’” (Mt 11:27). To claim that he undergoes a conversion and thus comes “face to face

with the holiness of God” entirely defies such an understanding of Jesus. Unlike Patte claims,

Jesus is portrayed by Matthew as almighty (as revealed for instance in his working of miracles),

and omniscient (as in reading the thoughts of the scribes who accuse him of blaspheming when

he forgives the sins of the paralytic (cf. Mt 9:4)) long before the resurrection—Jesus is Lord and

God from the very outset of the Gospel, paid homage to by the Magi and by John the Baptist.

Yet a deeper issue is revealed by these claims regarding Jesus as a man broken and in need of

conversion—clearly disturbed by what appears to be a sinful Jesus who does not square with the

image of a divine Messiah, these scholars have sought to show him as in need of growth; yet as

L.D. Hart has so pointedly explained, “One would think it would occur to any trained expositor

that if he or she has found an incident that does not fit, clinically speaking, the psychological

maturity, the emotional level of differentiation, the intellectual development, or the spiritual

stature of Jesus then perhaps one’s interpretation is mistaken.”18

What, then, is a viable interpretation of this passage that assumes Jesus is fully aware of

his mission and does not need to repent of his attitude towards this woman? What interpretation

can account for his brusque language and his seemingly radical change in responding to the

Canaanite woman? Perhaps the key to such an interpretation lies with one of the major

propositions critiqued above: seeing Jesus, rather than the Canaanite woman, as teacher. Two

initial observations help elucidate such an interpretation: first, as compared to the Markan

18 L.D. Hart, “The Canaanite Woman: Meeting Jesus as Sage and Lord: Matthew 15:21-28 & Mark 7:24-30,” The Expository Times 122, no. 1 (2010), http://ext.sagepub.com.ezp.slu.edu/content/122/1/20.full.pdf+html (accessed March 2, 2012), 21.

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account, “Matthew expands greatly the conversational element” 19—thus, for Matthew the

dialogue between Jesus and the Canaanite woman (as well as the disciples) is absolutely key.

Second, the context for this pericope is fundamental: as mentioned, Jesus has just finished

teaching about cleanliness—in this pericope, that teaching is continued and applied specifically

to the question of the separation between Jews and Gentiles; the Gentiles, despite the tradition to

the contrary, are not truly unclean. This is certainly the view advocated by Kukzin Lee, who

states, “the Canaanite woman’s incident should be examined in relation to its preceding

pericope…Jesus’ ministry among the Gentiles in Tyre and Sidon could be an example of his

termination of the clean-unclean separation in the preceding pericope.”20 Furthermore, there is a

certain irony in that “Jesus acts like Pharisees and scribes in [this] pericope, not representing his

own thought” 21—Jesus takes up the role of those he has just refuted in the previous pericope so

as to again refute their beliefs, this time with regards to the Gentiles. By stepping into their role,

and presenting “responses [that] are exactly what the contemporary readers might have expected

from a Jewish rabbi,” Jesus will then refute them in ultimately turning against his own statements

(and implicitly theirs) by granting the miracle sought.22

This model of Jesus as a rabbinical teacher ultimately provides a lesson for the reader

(who is aware of the previous controversy regarding uncleanness) more so than for the Canaanite

woman; yet Jesus teaches her as well, acting as a sage within the bounds of this pericope. This

role explains much of what seems contradictory in Jesus’ demeanor and speech, for as R.T.

France states, “A good teacher may sometimes aim to draw out a pupil’s best insight by a

19 Harrington, 236.

20 Kukzin Lee and Francois P. Viljoen, “The Healing of a Canaanite Woman’s Daughter (Matthew 15:21-28),” Acta Patristica et Byzantina 20 (January 2009), 84.

21 Lee, 85.

22 Lee, 82.

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deliberate challenge which does not necessarily represent the teacher’s own view.”23 Hart, who is

particularly intent on likening Jesus to the “sages of all great wisdom tradition,” in turn outlines

seven parts of a typical sage teaching method. Thus, for instance, he highlights that “the teacher

waits for the right moment to emerge, and may seem unresponsive to inquirers and disciples who

must themselves wait for the kairotic [opportune] moment,” which could help explain Jesus’

silence when the woman first asks for his help (“But he did not say a word in answer to her” (Mt

15:23)).24

Yet the sage model resolves more than simply Jesus’ original silence, for it can be used to

explain the most difficult part of the pericope: Jesus’ statement, “‘It is not right to take the food

of the children and throw it to the dogs’” (Mt 15:26). Hart lists that “the sage poses questions

that require resolving paradox”—though Jesus’ statement may not be, strictly speaking, a

paradox, he nonetheless presents the Canaanite woman with a problem that she must resolve.25

This is in keeping with France’s remarks above: Jesus does not agree with the statement he has

made, but gives the appearance of embracing it only to elicit the correct response from the

Canaanite woman, for her to realize how false this statement is by being forced to face it; and in

retorting to it, coming to the truth about Jesus and his mission.

The form of Jesus’ statement is also indicative of this being an instance of sage teaching:

France, as well as W.D. Davies and Dale Allison, refer to Jesus’ statement as a “little parable,” in

keeping with his usual method for teaching (cf. Mt 13:10-15).26 Even more enlightening is Hart’s

analysis of Jesus’ statement as a proverb rather than a parable (though both would be used as

23 France, 591.

24 Hart, 22.

25 Hart, 22-23.

26 France, 594; W.D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, Matthew: A Shorter Commentary (London: T&T Clark International, 2004), 256.

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teaching tools). In providing this analysis, Hart refers to R.B.Y. Scott’s categories of proverbs,

among which the fourth are those which focus “on what is contrary to right order, and so is

futile or absurd. [They employ] the mocking comparison.”27 Jesus’ proverb seems to fit this

category, even including a “mocking comparison” by likening the woman to a dog begging for

food from the table. In this type of proverb, the teacher knows that their lesson is absurd when

taken on its own terms; yet this is a teaching strategy meant to guide the students towards the

truth.

Precisely in this sense of guiding towards the truth, these scholars propose that the

Canaanite woman’s response to Jesus’ statement—“Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps

that fall from the table of their masters” (Mt 15, 27)—is an extension/completion of his original

remark. Thus, Davies and Allison state that “Her words take up Jesus’ parable and extend it.”28

Hart in turn states that “Jesus was inviting this Syrophoenician woman to add to the proverb in a

way that moves it forward.”29 By providing her response to the proverb/parable, the Canaanite

woman demonstrates she has learned the lesson, and thus Jesus the sage need no longer teach

through opposition and grants the miracle.

Yet to claim that Jesus has acted as a sage means that a lesson has been taught; what

lesson is that? When the woman approaches Jesus, she certainly believes in him as a miracle

worker, and even acclaims him as “Lord” and “Son of David” (Mt 15:22)—yet Kilgallen says,

“it is not clear yet that she knew him as he wanted to be known,” as the one sent to Israel.30 27 R.B.Y. Scott, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes: Introduction, Translation, and Notes, The Anchor Bible 18

(Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 1965), 6.

28 Davies and Allison, 256.

29 Hart, 23. Interestingly, Scott, whom Hart quotes earlier on this page, states that the parallelism present in the book of Proverbs “supports the assumption that the first line was intended to be spoken by the teacher, calling forth the second line as an antiphonal response from the pupils” (Scott, 18). This fits perfectly with Hart’s notion that Jesus is providing the beginning of a proverb—he is the teacher eliciting a response to complete his proverb.

30 Kilgallen, 214.

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According to Hart, “What Jesus wants to give this woman is not only healing for her little

daughter, he wants to give her the gift of himself–-the gift of participation in his own life, the gift

of participation in the divine life”31—yet to do so, she must know him as he is. She proves to

have come to this knowledge through her completion of the proverb, wherein she recognizes her

role as a Gentile, but nonetheless sees that Jesus can still reach out to her.

Thus, seeing Jesus as a sage teaching the Canaanite woman who he truly ultimately

coheres with the Jesus of the Scriptures and Tradition far better than those interpretations that see

Jesus as changed by the encounter. Furthermore, these latter interpretations fail to grasp a great

lesson Matthew can teach Christians today, for Jesus continues to teach as a sage. Not in vain

does the book of Sirach warn, “when you come to serve the LORD, prepare yourself for trials”

(Sirach 2:1); the path of discipleship is the way of the Cross, a Cross which is a “a stumbling

block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Corinthians 1:23), a lived teaching one can only

struggle to make sense of. Often, the greatest lessons are learned when God seems to oppose his

followers, in times of darkness and suffering, or when he appears entirely absent. Matthew

assures Christians in the midst of trials that they are being led to the truth—and that in the end,

Jesus will heal.

31 Hart, 22.

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