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(Parallel: Mat_15:21-29)
Mar_7:24. And from thence He arose, and went.—That His departure was at the same time a breaking away from the Pharisaic party, is emphatically shown both by Matthew and Mark. His travelling towards the borders of Tyre and Sidon was the prophetic and symbolic representation of the future progress of Christianity from the Jews to the Gentiles. So in ancient times Elijah travelled out of his own land into Phœnicia. Elijah was driven away by the ascendency of idolatry in Israel; Christ was driven away by ascendency of a hierarchy and of a traditionalism which in his eyes was apostasy from the law of God, and therefore idolatry. Yet Jesus did not yet separate from His unbelieving people; He did not actually go into Phœnicia, but only into the adjoining borders of Galilee ( åἰò ôὰ ìåèüñéá ), that is, into the district of the tribe of Asher. But afterwards, during His travels among the mountains and on His return to the Galilean sea, He actually passed through the Sidonian region. On those travels, see on Mat_15:21, Critical Note, p. 281.—And entered into an house.—Here also He had friends and dependants, as He had in the opposite direction, on the borders of Perea.
Mar_7:26. A Gentile, or Greek.— Ἑëëçíßò , according to the Jewish phraseology of the time, indicating a Gentile woman generally. This was not merely the result of the intercourse of the Jews with the Greeks specially; but it sprang from the fact that in the Greeks and in Greece they saw the most finished and predominant exhibition of this world’s culture and glory. Syrophenician, as distinguished from the Ëéâõöïßíéêåò , the Phœnicians of Africa, that is, Carthage (Strabo). The Tex. Rec. has Óõñïöïßíéóóá ; but the true reading wavers between Óõñïöïéíßêéóóá (Codd. A., K., &c., Lachmann) and ÓõñáÖïéíßêéóóá (Tischendorf, after Codd. E., F., &c). Thus she was a Phœnician-Syrian woman: most generally viewed, a Gentile; more specially, a Syrian; and still more specifically, a Phœnician. Phœnicia belonged to the province of Syria. But the word may also, more precisely still, describe the Syrian of Phœnicia, the Canaanite woman (Matthew).
Mar_7:30. And her daughter laid upon the bed.—A sign of her perfectly tranquil condition: the demon had previously driven her hither and thither. But there is also an intimation of her exhaustion after the last paroxysm; and this is one more instance of that gradual restoration which Mark loves to describe. The arrival of her mother, who was the subject of healing faith, perfected then her now life and vigor.
Mar_7:31. Through Sidon.—Meyer thinks that the analogy of Ôýñïõ requires us to understand the town of Sidon. But the coasts of Tyre do not refer to Tyre as a city, but to Tyre as a country. Thus we agree with Ewald, that only the travelling through the district of Sidon is settled. The direction of the journey was first northward towards Lebanon; thence from the foot of Lebanon northeasterly, and back through the district of Decapolis, that is, back through the region which lay to the east, or the farther side, of the sources of the Jordan, to the eastern bank of the Sea of Galilee. On Decapolis, comp. Winer, and the Critical Notes on Mat_15:21.
2. The circumstance that Mark passes over the mediation of the disciples on behalf of the Gentile woman, is explained by the critics in various ways, after their favorite fashion of external comparison. Meyer thinks Matthew’s the original account. But if we look at internal motives, this whole intervening occurrence, which would be very easily understood by the Jewish-Christian readers of Matthew, would not, without some commentary, be at all intelligible to the Gentile-Christian readers of Mark. Matthew gave prominence to the points which proved to the Jewish-Christian how strictly Christ remained, during His work in the flesh, within the limits of His calling; and that He received the Gentile woman into communion and fellowship of His healing works, only on account of her strong faith, attested by the Israelite witness of the disciples themselves. This motive had no force in Mark’s account. Hence he might, in harmony with his own design, paraphrase the repelling word of the Lord, modifying it according to its inner meaning; and we need not, with Meyer, attribute it to the “softening down of later tradition.”
3. As Christ, in the former narrative, let a ray of His transfiguring glory fall upon the low region of meats and the “draught,” so here He casts one upon the poor dog. Under the light of the kingdom of heaven, everything common and natural obtains a higher meaning; it obtains a value in the economy of God, and as a figure of the relations of His kingdom. The place of daily corruption is a figure of the purifying grave and kingdom of the dead; the dog a figure of the Gentile world. Sin remains more than ever condemned, but only that it may be made subservient to the judgments and honor of God.
4. As the earnest coming of the Syrophenician woman evinced a strong susceptibility among the Phœnicians, humbled by many severe judgments, it was needful that Christ should for the present leave this country, in order that His Jewish people might not be alienated by his premature labors among the Gentiles. But He left the region with the glad anticipation that the prophecy of Psa_2:8 would one day be fulfilled.
Starke:—Canstein:—Christ’s travels from one place to another.—Quesnel:—A servant of Christ in the Gospel may indeed remain hidden, but it must be so as not to incur the shame of neglecting any duty owing to his neighbor.—Cramer:—When we pursue honor in an unreasonable manner, it flies from us; when we fly from it, it pursues us.—Quesnel:—Every sin is an unclean spirit which possesses the sinner; from Jesus we must in all humility, every man for himself, seek the only remedy.—Sufferings urge men to seek God: happy those who use them to that end.—Christ is still, and for ever, the Saviour of the Gentiles, Rom_3:29.—Parents should feel the utmost anxiety on account of their children, that they be delivered from the power of Satan and led back to God.—Lange:—The sharper the test, the more blessing does it bring when believingly endured.—Bibl. Wirt.:—Faith in the heart permits no displacence against God’s rule to arise in the soul. However God disposes, and whatever He says, must be best, 1Pe_5:5-6.—Hedinger:—Perseverance presses through, and a good warfare obtains the prize.—Quesnel:—It is a great consolation to a Christian mother when God converts, in answer to her prayer, a daughter possessed by a worldly spirit. But how little prayer is urged for that blessing!—Rieger:—A very little word, falling into a softened, broken, and humbled heart, works great things.—Faith derives greater advantage and strength from humble submission and willing acknowledgment of its unworthiness than from anything else.—Braune:—Let every one limit himself to the field of labor which God has appointed to him: he will soon see whether or not God gives him a commission to go beyond it.—Let no one be offended if he is hemmed in by a narrow limit, according to God’s will. Holy charity and heroic love are all in all.—Schleiermacher:—For this word, go thy way. It was not merely a word of faith, but such an answer, too, as fell in with our Saviour’s design. Without abolishing the distinction between those who belonged to the people of the old covenant and those who were idolaters, it yet threw such a veil over the distinction that many demonstrations of love might seem proper to pass from the one to the other.—Gossner, on Mar_7:24 :—Many might remain hidden enough, but they will not.—A seemingly great severity is often a preparation for great benefactions.—Bauer:—The first act of salvation in the Gentile world.—Ahlfeld:—Persevering faith is sure to win its object. When a heavy cross weighs thee down, seek the light of Christ’s countenance; hold on in faith, and doubt not; He will give at last all that thou needest.—Thomasius:—How the Lord awakens faith in the hearts of men.—Greiling:—The time of suffering is a time of test.—Hartog:—The three stages of victorious faith: 1. It looks with longing at the divine Saviour; 2. it waits with all humility for help; 3. it holds fast its hope with firm confidence.—Bödecker:—Wherefore doth God delay His help?—C. G. Hoffmann:—The mighty word of faith: I will not lot Thee go.—Dittmar:—Great faith in its three stages: 1. Its stage of distress; 2. its stage of sifting; 3. its stage of confirmation.
Footnotes:
Mar_7:24.— Ὄñéá : Lachmann, after B., D., L., Ä . êáὶ Óéäῶíïò is wanting in B., L., Ä ., &c. Tischendorf and Meyer omit it; taken from Mat_15:21 .
Mar_7:25.—Tischendorf, afte r B., L., Ä ., Versions: ἀëë ’ åὐèýò ἀêïýóáóá ãõíÞ .
Mar_7:27.—Lachmann and Tischendorf: êáὶ ̀ ἔëåãåí , after B., L., Ä ., &c. (D.: êáὶ ëÝãåé ; Vulgate: que dixit). And this is more in keeping; for it is not a definitive utterance, like the ὁ äὲ ’ Éçóïῦò åἶðåí .
Mar_7:30.—See Meyer, concerning the inversions of this clause. [Lachmann and Tischendorf, after B., D., L., Ä ., Versions, have adopted the transposition: ôὸ ðáéäßïí âåâëçìÝíïí ἐðὶ êëßíçí êáὶ ôὸ äáéìüíéïí ἐîåëçëõèüò . The Received Text is to be retained; the reading of Lachmann is accounted for from the fact, that the copyist passed immediately from the êáß following ἐîåëçëõèüò to the êáß in Mar_7:31, so that the clause, êáὶ ôὴí èõãáô . to êëßíçò , was left out, and was afterwards inserted in the wrong, but what seemed to be the more fitting, place. Hence the clause, èõãáô . to êëßíçò , and not the clause, ôὸ äáéìüí . ἐîåëçë ., is the omitted and restored one; so that all the variations in the readings are found in the former and not the latter. Meyer, in loco.—Ed.]
Mar_7:31.—Griesbach, Lachmann, Tischendorf, after weighty authorities, read åἰò instead of ðñüò (as in Mar_3:7 ). Lachmann and Tischendorf, after B., D., L., Ä ., Coptic, Ethiopian, Syriac, Vulgate, Saxon, Itala, read ἦëèå äéὰ Óéäῶíïò instead of êáὶ Óéäῶíïò ἦëèå .