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Matthew 15:2128

John P. Meier Interpretation 1986 40: 397 DOI: 10.1177/002096438604000407 The online version of this article can be found at: http://int.sagepub.com/content/40/4/397.citation

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Union Presbyterian Seminary

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elaborate upon this extraordinary truth which prophetic insight gave to the world: T h e meaning of life is discernible not from something within life, or from within human history, but only from the God who created it!

JOHN P. MEIER

Associate Professor of New Testament The Catholic University of America

Matthew 15:21-28

O T H E THEOLOGIAN or pastor exploring the theme of Christianity and world religions, Matthew's account of the encounter between Jesus and the Canaanite woman hardly seems promising. After all, the story starts with Jesus the Jew brushing offa pagan woman because his mission is restricted to a Jewish Israel. What this could possibly say to Christianity's relation to world religions today is at best unclear. "Relevant" applications of the text strain the most ingenious of hermeneutical imaginations. Yet biblical hermeneutics does not consist of findingor inventingone-for-one correspondences; those rarely, if ever, exist. Hermeneutics is possible because, by the light of faith, believers can perceive surprising structural similarities in different encounters between human need and divine graceeven across the gaping chasm of cultural shifts. Granted, in 15:2128 Matthew obviously did not intend to treat the modern problem of Christianity's relation to world religions. Yet the theologian who approaches this story with the contemporary problem in mind and who watches the encounter between Christ and the pagan with open eyes comes away with a new vision. But first things first: All hermeneutical projects, however grand, begin with listening to the text on its own terms and with its own structures. Indeed, the structure Matthew has devised for 15:2128 is most intriguing. As is well known, Matthew's miracle stories tend to boil down the narrative to a single encounter between the petitioning word of the person in need and the healing word of Jesus. In Matthew 15:2128, however, the verbal encounter occurs four times, for particular structural and theological reasons. Scholars often point to the "law of threes" in biblical narrative. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, for example, there are precisely three persons who come upon the victim; the audience instinctively knows that the climax will occur the third time round. Only with this law of threes in mind can we appreciate the structure of Matthew's story. 397
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T h e audience senses that the woman will get three chances: "Three strikes and you're out!" But God is not held to the rules of narrative anymore than he is held to the rules of theology. Divine grace supplies a fourth time at bat. The four verbal encounters thus give our story an extraordinary structure and an extraordinary theological insight. (1) T h e story begins with the initiative of Jesus, as he withdraws to the pagan regions of Tyre and Sidon. Yet, strangely, the tension in the rest of the story springs from Jesus' refusal to take any initiative when it comes to the natural result of his action: encounter with a pagan. It is rather the Canaanite woman who seizes the initiative by "coming out" (symbolically?) from "those [pagan] regions" to plead with Jesus. In a sense, the woman already has three strikes against her before she even starts: She is a woman; she is the mother of a demoniac; and worst of all she is a pagan Canaanite, a member of the ancient enemy of Israel, the indigenous people of Canaan who fought Israel over its inheritance in the Promised Land. Still, for all her handicaps, the woman is not shy about shouting her need. T h e first verbal encounter begins with her cry of "Lord" and "Son of David." In Matthew, "Lord" is addressed to Jesus only by true believers, and "Son of David" is used by the marginalized of society, the no-accounts who recognize the Messiah of Israel, whom the leaders of Israel reject. T h e woman knows full well that her insight of faith gives her no claim on the Jewish Messiah; all she can do is beg for mercy for her tormented daughter. From the reader's point of view, the woman has a lot going for her, but the three strikes against her seem to carry more weight with a disturbingly hard-hearted Christ. Jesus refuses the verbal encounter; he speaks not a word in reply. His first rebuff is silence. (2) The second verbal encounter arises out of the initiative of the officious disciples. They are annoyed with the woman's persistent cry of faith; so, just to get rid of her, they presume to tell Jesus to grant her request (this seems to be the sense of "send her away"). This time, Jesus deigns to speak, but it is a word of rebuff. God has sent him on a mission restricted to his own people Israel, who have all gone astray like lost sheepno more so than in their refusal to recognize the Son of David. Faced with the urgency of his mission, Jesus cannot transgress the limits set by the Father's plan of salvation. His second rebuff is theology. (3) As the third verbal encounter begins, the audience senses that the climax is now being reached. Persisting in the face of discouragement, the woman of faith "comes" to Jesus and "worships" him (proskyne, a favorite Matthean verb for the proper act of reverence toward Jesus). She repeats her petition with heart-rending simplicity: "Lord, help me." Like the Psalmist, she is at the end of her rope. Surely now, importuned by a third 398
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request, Jesus will relent and show compassion. T h e audience is as disappointed as the woman when Jesus smashes the law of threes and adds the insult of a racial slur to the injury of turning a deaf ear. He repeats the excuse of his limited mission, but now in the form of a harsh parable. He tells the pagan that the bread of his healing and teaching ministry is meant only for God's children, the Israelites; he may not waste it by tossing it thoughtlessly to the "dogs" (a Jewish epithet for pagans). T h e story seems to end in disaster: T h e woman of faith is bereft of her request and an aloof Jesus is bereft of compassion. His third rebuff is sheer insult. T h e reader is left bewildered. (4) T h a t is where it should endby the law of threes. But a genuine encounter of human faith with divine mercy can put an end to all ends and limits, however sacred they may be to either theology or narrative criticism. That is what "eschatology" is all about. This extraordinary woman of persistent faith shows herself to be a woman of wit and humor as well. She deftly takes u p the gauntlet of the parable cast down by Jesus and turns it to her advantage. "Yes, Lord," she says, replying to insult with politeness as well as with faith and humility (cf. Matt. 5:3842!). " I accept your viewat least for the sake of argumentthat I am a pagan dog when compared to the privileged children of Israel, my masters. And I acknowledge that I have no right to snatch bread out of the children's hands. But, after all, even the dogs lying under the table are allowed to nibble the unwanted scraps that haphazardly fall from their masters' table." T h e woman boldly engages Jesus in a game of wits, matching mashal with mashal; and her faith, spiced with determination and humor, trumps the Lord. Yet Jesus hardly seems dismayed by the outcome. T h e reader comes to realize that this whole verbal duel has displayed the maieutic method by which Jesus has led this woman u p four steps to the heights of faith, a faith that can transcend the barriers of race, religion, and even the set periods of salvation history. At the end of Matthew's Gospel, after the death-resurrection, Jesus will indeed tear down the barriers he affirms in 10:56 and 15:24 by sending his disciples to all nations, but the desperate need of this woman cannot wait. Her impatient faith leaps the barriers of time and religious groups to touch directly the healing power of Christ. Salvation history was made for man, not man for salvation history. Hence Jesus' final cry is one of approval and praise, not of weariness and defeat: woman, great is your faith!" It is such irregular, unlawful, but all-powerful faith that can bring healing to a possessed humanity, even if it ignores the "proper channels" for coming to Christ. By now, our unpromising pericope has begun to show promiseeven for such an "un-gospel like" theme as Christianity and world religions. T o 399
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Start with, the notably different roles of Jesus and his disciples suggest a key distinction in our hermeneutical reflections on this story. When one speaks of the exclusivity of the claims of the Christian religion, one must carefully distinguish between Christ and his church. The true exclusivity lies in the person and the role of Jesushe is the one mediator between God and humanity (I Tim. 2:5); no one comes to the Father except through him (John 14:6). He alone can grant healing to the well-disposed pagan standing before him. It is important to remember that this exclusive claim about Christ was not hammered out by the early Christians in ignorance of the other great religious movements around them. T h e first-century Mediterranean world presented a smorgasbord of religions and cults, from the high ethical monotheism of Judaism to the lowest pagan magic and self-mutilation. Over against all of its competitors, the church consciously and deliberately proclaimed the unique role of Jesus Christa theological obsession that struck most pagans as odd. To be sure, the church in the twentieth century has gained much wider knowledge and sympathetic appreciation of non-Christian religions. This in itself is a grace, not least because such widened horizons can deepen the church's understanding of God's workings in the world, both in and apart from the church. Still, none of this changes the church's basic faith-affirmation that just as there is one God (the monotheism of the Shema'), so there is one mediator (the Christology of the creed). To replace that confession with a "broad-minded" syncretistic smorgasbord is not to reinterpret Christianity but to replace it with a new gnosticism. It is Jesus, and Jesus alone, who brings the fullness of God's healing to humanity. Christianity rises or falls on the centrality of God and the finality of Christ: Shema' and creed. The exclusive claim of Christ does not, however, entail an equally exclusive claim by his churchthough the church is constantly tempted to arrogate to itself the unique and indispensable role of Jesus. T h e disciples officiously try to act as middlemen between the pagan and her Lord, only to be dismissed by Jesus. (Notice how the disciples disappear from the rest of the story; they are neither wanted nor needed by either party in the duel of wits.) Jesus is quite capable of dealing with the pagan woman directly. After all, it is he, not the disciples, who is the object of the pagan's trust and prayer. Granted, we cannot draw facile present-day lessons from a unique past situation in which Jesus was physically present and the church was not yet established. But the church must constantly remind itself that it is dependent on Christ, and not vice versa. If Jesus is really Kyrios, then he is Lord of all the world and of all men and women. T h e church is the special locus of his lordship in the sense that the church alone explicitly and 400
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knowingly acknowledges, worships, and obeys him as Lord. Yet Jesus exercises his lordship over all men and women, whether they are aware of it or not, whether they like it or not, and whether the official (not to say officious) church is on the scene or not. The Lord is free to lavish his grace and mercy on whom he wills (cf. Rom. 9:1516). If he sees fit, he can sanctify pagan hearts and draw them close to himself, using whatever "natural sacrament" or elements of pagan religion he chooses. This is what it means to be Lord: to be sovereign in bestowing grace, both in and outside the church. T h e church is Christ's special instrument in the world, but not his only one. This is not to say that the church must not pursue her mission of evangelization with zeal. T h e Matthew who shows us Jesus dispensing with his disciples as he interacts with a pagan is also the Matthew who presents the risen Lord commanding those same disciples to undertake a universal mission (Matt. 28:1620). To be sure, in ways hidden from our eyes, Jesus may continue acting to save sincere pagans apart from the church's preaching of the gospel. We hope it is so; we pray it is so; but, of course, we have no way of knowing it is so with complete certitude. What we do know from the New Testament is that the risen Lord wills the myriad divisions of mankind to be overcome in one visible family of God, with one baptism, one code of discipleship, and one Lord acknowledged openly by all his people in his church. He who is de facto Lord of all refuses to be hailed as such without the preaching of weak, inadequate disciples like ourselves. The Word still insists on becoming flesh, however inefficient that procedure may be. Some claim that it is imperialistic of the church to persist in its universal mission, as though it were some international conglomerate intent on a hostile takeover of other religious corporations. Such a haughty, imperialistic attitude can beand has beena serious error in the church's missionary activity. At times, silence, theology, and insult have become Christian weapons in the encounter with non-Christians. Yet true mission, true servanthood to the nations, is anything but imperialistic. Imagine, for a moment, what would happen if the church fully succeeded in carrying out the great commission of Matthew 28:1620, if the church so perfectly reflected the measureless mercy of the Son of David that it drew all nations to itself. Imagine Canaanites and Israelites, or Arabs and Jews, or all Asia and Africa united in the one family of God. Wouldcouldthe church look anything like it does today, with bureaucratic and theological leadership still very much entrenched in the first world? Would not Christian liturgy and lifestyle undergo a sea change, as billions of Asian and African Christians had their proper say and impact in the one church of Christ? If
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the great commission is ever fulfilled, it will mean not the imperialistic triumph of the present form of the church but rather its death, followed by the resurrection of a genuine world-church, catholic in a sense we can hardly dream of. The one thing that would remain the same would be the church's Lord: the Son of David who is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb. 13:8). He is already at work in Tyre and Sidon; we obtuse disciples have yet to catch up.

LEANDER E. KECK

Dean and Professor of Biblical Theology Yale Divinity School

Romans 1:1823
OULD ANYTHING in the New Testament be more negative and less promising for a consideration of "Christianity and World Religions" than this paragraph? Paul on Mars Hill is much more congenial, claiming that the God he proclaims is the one other people grope toward (Acts 17:2231). There he assures his "pagan" hearers that God has in fact overlooked "the times of ignorance" prior to Christ and the gospel, but here he opens with a salvo about God's wrath aimed at everybody, and goes on to assert that "their senseless mind was darkened." Scarcely the sort of opening one would use at an inter-faith dinner! Did the Editorial Board, in planning this issue, choose the wrong passage? Hardly. What this passage can contribute to the theme should not be underestimatedan alternative to both a self-serving sense of superiority and a forfeiture of a distinctly Christian understanding of the human condition. Receiving this contribution requires us to distinguish Paul's agenda from what is often our own. Indeed, it is far from evident that he would have understood "Christianity and World Religions." For him it was rather Judaism and the plethora of Hellenistic gods worshipped in diverse ways, the great religions of South and East Asia being unknown to him. Moreover, there was not yet a "Christianity"a self-defined religion with its own distinct symbol system, rites "for all seasons," canon, clergy, and sanctuaries for worship. Paul is far up-stream, too near the headwaters, to understand what "Christianity and World Religions" entails. Nonetheless, what he said about the religions he did know deserves careful consideration precisely because of the standpoint from which he said it. 402
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