seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
Matthew 15:1 Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”
3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’[a] and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’[b] 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8 “‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’[c]”
10 Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”
12 Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”
13 He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14 Leave them; they are blind guides.[d] If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”
15 Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.”
16 “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. 17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”
21 Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 22 A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.”
23 Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”
24 He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
25 The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
26 He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
27 “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
28 Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
29 Jesus left there and went along the Sea of Galilee. Then he went up on a mountainside and sat down. 30 Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others, and laid them at his feet; and he healed them. 31 The people were amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled made well, the lame walking and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel.
32 Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, or they may collapse on the way.”
33 His disciples answered, “Where could we get enough bread in this remote place to feed such a crowd?”
34 “How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asked.
“Seven,” they replied, “and a few small fish.”
35 He told the crowd to sit down on the ground. 36 Then he took the seven loaves and the fish, and when he had given thanks, he broke them and gave them to the disciples, and they in turn to the people. 37 They all ate and were satisfied. Afterward the disciples picked up seven basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. 38 The number of those who ate was four thousand men, besides women and children. 39 After Jesus had sent the crowd away, he got into the boat and went to the vicinity of Magadan.
a. Matthew 15:4 Exodus 20:12; Deut. 5:16
b. Matthew 15:4 Exodus 21:17; Lev. 20:9
c. Matthew 15:9 Isaiah 29:13
d. Matthew 15:14 Some manuscripts blind guides of the blind
This is from the easy English site.
The three sections of chapter 15 show Jesus’ attitude to people who were not Jews. He wanted them to be happy with the good news in his message:
1. Verses 1-20 Jesus taught about clean food, and food that is not clean. This removed the idea that people who are not Jews are different.
2. Verses 21-28 Jesus healed the daughter of a woman who was not a Jew.
3. Verses 29-39 Jesus fed the crowd of hungry people who were probably not Jews
Jesus spoke to the Pharisees and to the men who taught the Law. They considered that their traditions were more important than God’s commands. Jesus reminded them about one command as an example. God said that people should give honour to their parents. When parents need something, their children have a responsibility to help them. But the Pharisees had another tradition. People could put things aside that their parents needed. Then they could say that they had given those things to God. Sometimes they only pretended to give these things to God. But this avoided the need to help their parents. The Pharisees made serious promises in front of God that they must keep. But they were making a tradition more important than their responsibility to their parents.
Jesus told the disciples to stay away from the Pharisees. They should have showed the people the way to God. Instead, they led people away from God.
Jesus went away partly because the Jewish religious leaders were opposing him. People who were not Jews lived in Tyre and Sidon. Also, the crowds in Judea were preventing him from teaching his disciples. He did not have time to prepare them and himself for the future.
The woman was a Canaanite. They had been the Jews’ enemies ever since Joshua’s time long ago. Somehow, she had heard about Jesus and she called him ‘David’s Son’. David had been king over the nation when the Jews had defeated the Canaanites.
Jesus had not sent the woman away. So she repeated her request to him very humbly. Jews called foreigners ‘dogs’ as an insult. They were referring to the wild, dirty dogs that lived on the streets. But Jesus used a different word when he spoke to the woman. It meant the ‘little dogs’ that people kept as pets. As he said this, Jesus may have smiled. He was not insulting her. He was just reminding her that she was a foreigner to him.
Jesus usually only helped Israel’s people. But the woman knew that Jesus had more power than that. He had enough extra power to help her too. Jesus knew that she believed him. In a similar way, he had recognised that the army officer believed. And that officer was not a Jew either (Matthew 8:10-11). He had healed the officer’s slave without going there to see him. Jesus did not go to see the woman’s sick daughter either. But he still healed her.
Some people think that Matthew told the same story twice. They think that this is the same event as the story he told in Matthew 14:13-21. But in Matthew 16:9-10 Jesus refers to both miracles. The main facts are similar. But there are several differences in the details:
1. That time there were 5000 men in the crowd. This time there were 4000.
2. The crowd had been with Jesus for ‘three days’ this time.
3. There are seven loaves this time, and there were only five before.
4. These fish are ‘small’ and before there were just two fish.
5. This account does not mention grass. The people sat down on the ‘ground’. This suggests a time of year later than April. So probably, the grass had dried up.
6. The word for ‘baskets’ is different. In Matthew 14:20 the word means a small narrow basket. A Jew might carry his food in such a basket when he travelled. The word in this account was a large basket that could be big enough to carry a man.
7. The disciples picked up enough pieces to fill 12 small baskets in the first account. In this account, they picked enough to fill 7 big baskets.
Jesus fed 5000 people in the first event. That showed that God is very kind to the Jews. He fed 4000 people this time. And this showed that he cared about people who are not Jews too.
So this chapter must have been written when that tax collector, Matthew, was thinking about dinner! It's as if Matthew goes from washing the hands, to the meal and the clean up.
Jesus was attracting large crowds.... and neither the Roman government nor the leaders in the Temple wanted large crowds to meet. It was important for them to know all about what the large crowds were learning.... so they sent some teachers and Pharisees to check Him out. I find it kind of interesting that here in this chapter Matthew is discussing washing hands while the news about handwashing and facemasking is so important.
Anyway.... the Pharisees and the Sadducees made up a bunch of rules and regulations that were loaded on top of the 10 commandments. Back in Genesis and Exodus.... God gave the humans rules to keep them civil and safe..... but the Pharisees and the Sadducees thought their rules would make people better than God's rules.... and the washing of hands was a ritual that became a ceremonial tradition. It wasn't like Denise the Menace coming in with muddy hands having to wash his hands before sitting down to a nice bowl of tomato soup.... this was a ritual designed by men who think their poop doesn't stink.
Now Jesus said.... those Pharisees, Sadducees, and teachers from the Temple should be more concerned about what comes out of their mouths. The stuff they were doing.... the stuff they were saying.... their rules, regulations, rituals and traditions were driving people away. That is not what God had in mind.
The time was short for Jesus to get His disciples trained.... and the crowds were making it difficult for Him to get training time in. So Jesus went to towns inhabited by gentiles. Getting away from the Jews would give Him a little time..... but then the Canaanite woman showed up. All this talk about dogs and crumbs is traditional but ...
I live in a retirement community. There are a lot of widows in my neighborhood.... and the majority of them keep "lap dogs" as companions. These dogs are really good for nothing.... they don't hunt.... they don't herd..... and if someone comes to the door they make a lot of noise but then their only offensive move to thwart a burglary is licking.... constant... irritating licking. Jesus compared the Canaanite woman to a cute little lap dog rather than insult her. Her faith and her persistence got Him.... and He healed her daughter.
And still.... even though Jesus was trying to train His disciples..... the people found out He was there..... even in the largely gentile area He was drawing crowds.... and this time.... it was a crowd made up of gentiles as well as the descendants of Jacob [Israel]. After the meal.... there were seven [perfect] huge baskets of fish.... the perfect amount left over......
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