16. The Discourse of Jesus Christ on the Significance of Ancestral Traditions. The Healing of the Demoniac Daughter of the Canaanite Woman. Miracles in the Region Beyond the Jordan

Among the hearers of Jesus Christ in recent times the “Jews”—by which are meant not the common people but the scribes and Pharisees—had begun to appear more and more frequently. Many of them, having heard of the preaching and miracles of the Savior in the Galilean cities, had deliberately come there from Jerusalem to keep watch over Him and to prepare the ground for a formal accusation before the supreme court of undermining the religion and the law of Moses. The Savior’s last discourse on Holy Communion had evidently thrown them into a fury, and they sent word to Jerusalem to make all preparations for the feast of Passover with a view to destroying the Prophet so hateful to them. But Christ, seeing through this dark design of the forces of evil, did not go to Jerusalem on this occasion and spent Passover in Galilee, continuing His ministry for the salvation of humanity.

Having suffered a complete failure in this cunning scheme, the Jews again appeared in Galilee after the feast and began to watch the Savior and to look for occasions with which to accuse Him of breaking the law. An occasion presented itself to them quickly, but it served only for their own exposure. The Jewish legalists were not content with the simple fulfillment of the Mosaic law, but had over time added to it a multitude of arbitrary additions and supplements to which they sometimes ascribed even greater authority than to the divine law itself. These additions were observed with particular zeal by the scribes and Pharisees, who looked upon them as a “fence” around the law, despite the fact that they often stood in direct contradiction to it and served as a cover for base hypocrisy. The Pharisees noticed that the disciples of Jesus Christ once did not wash their hands before eating. In their view this was a great crime—as grave, according to the teaching of the rabbis, as eating pork. “Whoever does not wash his hands at table is liable to be cut off from the community,” “he is worthy of death,” “he is like a murderer”—and so on, as the strict legalists interpreted it. The Savior seized upon this occasion to give the wretched literalists a lesson that they must look to the spirit of the law and not to its letter, lest they find themselves in contradiction with the very law they think to protect. Replying to the reproach, He in turn asked them: “Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother; but ye say, Whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me, and honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free” (Matt. 15:3, 5, 6). That is, when parents demanded from their children due respect and especially material support, it was enough, according to Pharisaic tradition, to declare even verbally that the portion of property which should have gone to the support of the parents had been devoted to the Temple, in order to consider oneself free from the obligation of supporting or assisting them—since what had been dedicated to the Temple or to God could by law no longer be applied to other needs. This base hypocrisy found a reprover in Christ. “Thus,” He observed to them, “have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. Ye hypocrites!” (Matt. 15:6–7) And then the Savior taught both the people and His disciples that in the Kingdom of Heaven purity of heart is more important than purity of hands. “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Matt. 15:19). These are the things that truly “defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man” (Matt. 15:20), and this very rule was prompted only by the ordinary requirement of cleanliness and has by no means an absolute moral character, as the Pharisees interpreted it—these “blind leaders of the blind” (Matt. 15:14).

To avoid further accusations of Pharisaic cunning and to rest His weary spirit in solitude, the Savior resolved for a time to leave Palestine altogether and to travel to the borders of the neighboring country of Phoenicia. “And Jesus departed thence and withdrew into the parts of Tyre and Sidon” (Matt. 15:21). Phoenicia at this time was living out its last historical glory, and along its shores there were already more ruins than flourishing cities. It was the seat of idolatrous impiety, the homeland of Baal and Astarte—a land of pagan darkness. But even here at least one ray was to shine of “a light to lighten the Gentiles” (Luke 2:32). And it did shine in the brief appearance there of the Source of light. The fame of the Savior’s miracles had reached the borders of Phoenicia before He arrived, and had found an echo in many believing hearts there. Scarcely had the Savior entered the borders of this land than a woman, who had evidently long been yearning to see Him, addressed Him with a tearful supplication: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Thou Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil!” (Matt. 15:22). But the Savior did not immediately answer her plea; foreseeing the depth and strength of this Canaanite woman’s faith, He wished to manifest it more brightly to His disciples through testing. At first He did not answer her petition at all. But the Canaanite woman did not desist. Wearied by her persistent petition, the disciples at length began to ask Him to send her away. “I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” (Matt. 15:24) replied the Teacher, and turning to the weeping woman He added coldly: “It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs” (Matt. 15:26). Such an answer might have chilled her soul; and if the Savior had not foreseen that her soul was full of that rare hope which can see mercy and the granting of a petition even in an apparent rejection of it, He would not have answered her thus. But all the snows of her native Lebanese mountains could not have quenched the fire of faith burning in her heart, and without hesitation she gave the glorious and immortal reply: “Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table!” (Matt. 15:27). And her faith triumphed. Not one moment longer did the Savior prolong the anguish of her waiting. “O woman!” He exclaimed, “great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt” (Matt. 15:28). And at once the miraculous word took effect. “And her daughter was made whole from that very hour” (Mark 7:30).

How long the Savior remained in these parts and at what places He stopped is unknown. His departure from there was hastened by the notoriety which attended this miracle and which deprived Him of the desired rest. He therefore preferred to seek solitude again beyond the Sea of Galilee. On the way thither He performed two great miracles—namely, He healed a deaf man with a speech impediment, in whom, by the Savior’s word: “Ephphatha, that is, Be opened” (Mark 7:34) (accompanied by certain outward actions, such as putting His fingers into his ears, spitting, and touching the man’s tongue), “straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain” (Mark 7:35). “And they were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well: He maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak” (Mark 7:37). This miracle gathered a great multitude of people around the Savior once more, eager to hear His word and to benefit from His miracles, and on the shore of the Sea of Galilee Christ once again repeated the miracle of the feeding of the people—feeding four thousand men besides women and children with seven loaves and a few small fish. After this the Savior entered the region of the Decapolis. This was a territory across the Jordan, presenting a league of ten free cities with a mixed semi-pagan population. The Savior had already been in the borders of this region previously and had there, among other things, healed the Gadarene demoniac, who had become an ardent preacher of the Kingdom of God in this dark semi-pagan land. His preaching had evidently not been without effect. The semi-pagans who had once asked Christ to depart from their borders now welcomed Him with joy and hastened to benefit from His miracles. Thus near Bethsaida Julias He healed a blind man who was brought to Him. This healing did not take place all at once but gradually. “And He took the blind man by the hand,” Jesus “led him out of the town; and when He had spit on his eyes, and put His hands upon him, He asked him if he saw ought. And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking. After that He put His hands again upon his eyes, and made him look up: and he was restored, and saw every man clearly” (Mark 8:23–25). Concerning this healing the Savior forbade any telling in the village, and this gave Him the possibility of finding at last the desired rest, to converse with His disciples in private.