1. Christ Criticizes The Pharisees Matthew 15:1-20 Pieter Bruegel the Elder Parable of the Blind 1568
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10. Vv. 3-9 Jesus directs his comments to the Pharisees; the crowd and the disciples are also present. Vv. 10-11 Jesus directs his comments to the crowd; the Pharisees and the disciples are also present. Vv.12-20 Jesus directs his comments to his disciples only; no one else present. Jesus speaking to three groups in Matthew 15:1-20 Discerning the Audience
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13. Christ and the Canaanite Woman Jean Germaine Drouais 1763-1788 Matthew 15:21-28
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19. Sebastiano Ricci The Canaanite woman shows us that faith is determined perseverance, or bold determination. She had chutzpah , which was from a Hebrew word indicating tenacity or bold persistence. The Greek word used to translate the Hebrew word means “shamelessness”. Faith is sometimes like that; several times someone would approach Jesus for help with bold persistence and he would respond with “your faith has saved you.” The opposition only heighten her faith; she overcame the silence and the rebuff.
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26. We have the account of the Canaanite woman in vv.21-28 in Gentile territory Mark 7:31, after the story of the Canaanite woman, says Jesus went to the Decapolis region where Jesus heals and so the healings recorded at 29-31 are in Gentile territory also, though not stated. Notice that the crowd “glorified the God of Israel” which suggests that they were not themselves “of Israel”. If they were Jews, one would expect “they glorified God.” Next, we have the feeding of the 4,000 which could have been Gentiles if it were in the Decapolis area and thus a continuation of Jesus’ ministry to Gentiles. Some even see symbolism in the numbers of the 2 feedings: seven baskets, representing the 7 deacons of Acts 6; 12 baskets representing the twelve disciples as representative of the 12 tribes of Israel in the first feeding. The meaning of the 2 nd feeding miracle is that Gentiles also can enjoy the benefits of the coming of Messiah as have the Jews signified by the 1 st feeding.
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Editor's Notes
Jerome Bib. Comm. On vow.
“ Son of David” the distinctively Jewish designation for the Messiah.
Turner, pg.388
The variation in the numbers in the stories may suggest that the gospel writers may intend them to be understood symbolically.
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