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§15 Defiled from Within (Matt. 15:1–39)

15:1–2 / Knowledge of Jesus and his ministry had by this time spread throughout Palestine. Scribes and Pharisees came all the way from Jerusalem to question him about his activities. The scribes were Jewish scholars who copied the sacred Scriptures of the Old Testament and consequently became the professional interpreters of Scripture. The Pharisees were a religious order, primarily laymen, who devoted themselves to strict adherence to the law. Most scribes were Pharisees, but not all Pharisees were scribes. The question used by the religionists from Jerusalem was more an accusation than an honest request for information. Why do your disciples keep breaking (parabainousin is present tense and suggests repeated action) the tradition of the elders? Specifically, why do they eat without the proper ceremonial cleansing?

The tradition of the elders was a body of oral literature that grew out of a desire to expound the written law and apply it to new circumstances. This growing body of oral tradition reaches back at least to Ezra in the fifth century B.C. but was not written until the second century A.D. The scribes and Pharisees considered it to be as binding as the written law itself, although the Sadducees rejected it, and the “people of the land” (the ‘am-hā’āreṣ) ignored it. The “washing” before eating had to do with ceremonial uncleanness, not personal hygiene. Leviticus 11–15 treats the subject of unclean foods. From the Jewish point of view, people became unclean by contact with any sort of ceremonially unclean object or person. To ensure purity, people would go through a rather elaborate ritual of purification before they ate. It involved pouring water on the hands with the fingers up so the uncleanness would flow off the wrists. It then was repeated with the fingers pointing downward. This was followed by rubbing each hand with the other fist.

15:3–9 / Rather than answer their question, Jesus, in rabbinic fashion, counters with another question. Why, in fact, do you yourselves (emphatic in Greek) keep on breaking (continuous present) God’s commandment in the interest of your own tradition? Now for the example. God said, “Honor your father and mother” (Exod. 20:12), and “anyone who curses [them] must be put to death” (Exod. 21:17), but you say that if a person dedicates to God something his father or mother could use, he is then free of any obligation to be of help to them. In this way you have used your tradition to nullify the law of God.

Korban (a technical term for sacrifice found in Ezek. 20:28) was the practice of devoting things to God and thus making them unavailable to others who might have a legitimate claim on them (the word is used in Mark’s narrative, 7:11). It was a solemn oath that strict scribes said could not be broken under any circumstances. Gundry writes, “Behind the declaration stands the purpose of retaining one’s own use of the item” (p. 304). Though appearing to be terribly pious, such a practice was in direct violation of the fifth commandment.

Jesus cuts through all the religious pretense of his questioners with the stinging rebuke, You hypocrites! Isaiah described you rightly when he said you paid lip service to God but your hearts were a long way off (vv. 7–8). The Greek hypokritēs was a play-actor or pretender. The word became used for hair-splitting legalists who manipulated the law for their own advantage. Filson is correct when he observes that “wherever in the church tradition and forms gain ascendance over the Scripture, the Pharisee position has won control” (p. 177). The passage quoted by Jesus is from Isaiah’s letter to the exiles and comes from the LXX translation (Isa. 29:13). Cold hearts and empty words make it impossible to worship God. When man-made rules are taught as the laws of God, all worship becomes useless. Barclay quotes William Temple, the renowned archbishop of Canterbury, as defining worship as quickening the conscience by the holiness of God, feeding the mind with the truth of God, purging the imagination by the beauty of God, opening the heart to the love of God, and devoting the will to the purpose of God (vol. 2, p. 117). Understood in this way, seldom is God actually worshiped. Twenty centuries after the Pharisees of Jesus’ time, the words and rituals of much contemporary religion still echo the emptiness of human precepts.

15:10–11 / At the beginning of the chapter the Pharisees and scribes asked Jesus two related questions (v. 2). The more general question about why Jesus’ disciples did not obey the oral tradition was countered in verses 3–9. (It was not really answered, because it was more an accusation than a question.) The second question had to do with the laws of ceremonial cleanness and is answered in verses 10–20 (note v. 20, which ties together the entire discussion). The major problem raised by the section is Jesus’ apparent rejection of Old Testament laws of clean and unclean and why, if that was what he intended to do, there was so much difficulty in bringing Gentiles into the church (cf. Gal. 2:11ff.).

Jesus called the crowd to him and cautioned them to pay close attention to what he was about to say. Verse 15 calls the statement that follows a parable, that is, an enigmatic saying or riddle in the sense of the Hebrew māšāl. For the pious Jew who observed with care all the laws of ceremonial purity, the statement would have been radical. A person is defiled not by what goes into the mouth but by what comes out. This revolutionary concept would undermine the entire system of Jewish ritual practice. It threatened their basic idea of religion.

In the parallel account in Mark we find the added parenthetical remark, “In saying this, Jesus declared all foods ‘clean’ ” (Mark 7:19). Beare represents those who feel that Jesus’ statement annuls in principle the entire corpus of laws of ritual purity (p. 338). On the other hand, Tasker suggests that Jesus may have done no more than to emphasize that evil coming out of the mouth is far greater than any evil that could enter by eating food that was ceremonially unclean (p. 149). Gundry writes, “The cleansing of all foods does not countermand the law, but intensifies it by transmuting the dietary taboos into prohibitions against evil speech, just as the so-called antitheses in the Sermon on the Mount did not destroy the law, but fulfilled it” (p. 306). In either case, the point of the saying is clear: the ultimate source of defilement is the heart, not the diet.

15:12–14 / Verses 12–14 occur only in Matthew (although the statement about the blind leading the blind occurs in another context in Luke 6:39). The disciples’ question (Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?) would imply that the Pharisees understood Jesus’ statement in verse 11, which seems strange in view of Peter’s asking for an explanation in verse 15. No difficulty exists, however, if verses 12–14 are taken as an editorial insertion and if what offends the Pharisees is Jesus’ rebuke of their casuistry in setting aside God’s law by human tradition (vv. 3–9). Stahlin says that “the primary meaning is ‘deep religious offense’ at the preaching of Jesus” (TDNT, vol. 7, p. 350). The verb often has the force of “to lead into sin” (Matt. 13:21; 24:10) and in the present context implies that their “offense” included the sin of rejecting Jesus.

Jesus’ response to the timidity of the disciples, who apparently did not wish to offend the religious rulers, was that plants not planted by his heavenly Father would be pulled up by the roots, so for the time being they may be left alone (cf. the parable of the wheat and the weeds, Matt. 13:24–30, 36–43). The image of Israel as a vineyard is common in the Old Testament (Isa. 5:1–7; 60:21; cf. 1QS 8.5). Not only has allegiance to oral tradition led them to dishonor the law of God, but it has placed them outside his favor as well. Schweizer writes, “Israel and its ruling class of Pharisees is not the vineyard planted by God but a wild thicket” (p. 327). They are blind guides leading the blind. The obvious result of that combination is for both to end up in a pit. Apparently rabbis considered it an honor to be given the title “leader of the blind” (cf. Rom. 2:19). They lead the blind, Jesus would agree, but how unfortunate that they also are blind. In the Old Testament falling into a pit was a metaphor for disaster (Isa. 24:18; Jer. 48:44).

15:15–20 / Peter now asks to have the parable (Gk. parabolē) explained to him and the other disciples. That which is not understood is the enigmatic saying in verse 11. Parables have a way of concealing their truth from outsiders but yielding it to those who will press for an explanation (cf. Mark 4:34). Jesus responds, “Are you, like them, still without understanding?” (the pronoun hymeis is emphatic, and the adverbial accusative akmēn places the stress at the beginning of the sentence). Whatever enters the mouth travels through the stomach and then out of the body into the drain (aphedrōn). It is what comes out of (not into) the mouth that defiles, because it originates in the heart. That is the real source of all that makes a person unclean. Matthew then lists seven evils (v. 19). After the first (evil thoughts), they follow in the order of the sixth through the ninth commandments (murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander). It is interesting that the listing of evils from the second half of the Decalogue follows the discussion of the violation of the fifth commandment in verses 4–6.

The final verse ties together the entire section from verse 1 on. A person is made unclean by what rises out of the heart, not by eating with unwashed hands. The question remains as to whether Matthew understands Jesus as thereby setting aside the entire pentateuchal system of dietary laws. Verse 19 would suggest that Matthew is transmuting dietary taboos into prohibitions in speech and conduct.

15:21–28 / Departing from Gennesaret (cf. 14:34), Jesus goes in a northwesterly direction to the area around the Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon. The journey of approximately fifty miles took him into gentile territory (although Jeremias cites evidence that the eastern Tyrian region was largely Jewish, Jesus’ Promise to the Nations, pp. 31–32, n. 3; pp. 35–36). A Canaanite woman of that district came to him crying out on behalf of her demon-possessed daughter. During the time of the Judges the Canaanites were the major enemies of Israel. They were the heathen population of Palestine. Mark identifies her as “a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth” (Phillips, Mark 7:26). Matthew’s use of Canaanite emphasizes that the woman to whom Jesus talks is of a distinctly different ethnic background. “Crying at the top of her voice” (Phillips), she keeps calling out (Gk. ekrazen is imperfect) for mercy. Her daughter is harassed by a demon and is in a terrible state. By addressing Jesus as Son of David she shows an awareness of his messianic role.

Although the Canaanite woman keeps calling out for mercy, Jesus does not respond. The disciples come to him and urge that he send her away (without granting her request). They were annoyed because she was trailing along after them and continuing to cry out. The apparent insensitivity to suffering on the part of Jesus can be explained by the lesson in faith that follows in the next few verses. The disciples are without excuse. Jesus’ delayed answer is that he has been sent only to the lost sheep of Israel (v. 24). The reference is to all those within Israel who wandered without spiritual direction, rather than to all Israel regarded as lost. Undaunted by his reluctance to help, the Canaanite woman knelt before him (proskyneō may also mean “to worship”) and continued to call out for help.

Jesus continues to withhold help. He answers that it is not appropriate to take bread that belongs to the children and toss it to their dogs. Many modern commentators have taken severe exception to these words. Beare says they exhibit “the worst kind of chauvinism”—a “violent rebuff’ that reveals “incredible insolence” (p. 342). He decides that “the story is best understood as a retrojection into the life of Jesus of the controversy over the propriety of extending the Christian mission beyond Israel, with echoes of the bitterness of the struggle within the early Church” (p. 342).

Such a strong response is hardly necessary. We are dealing with a proverbial statement by which Jesus is pointing out no more than that his mission is directed to his own people. Dog was a common Jewish term for Gentiles based on their making no distinction between clean and unclean foods. It is not necessarily a derogatory term. It has been pointed out that the Greek kynarion (diminutive of kyōn) referred to house dogs or little puppies. Barclay reminds us that the tone in which something is said and the look that accompanies it make all the difference: “We can be quite sure that the smile on Jesus’ face and the compassion in his eyes robbed the words of all insult and bitterness” (vol. 2, p. 122).

The woman’s retort is directly to the point. Yes, Lord, … but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table. I am not asking for what belongs to others. I am simply asking to be treated like the little house dogs that get to eat whatever falls on the floor. What remarkable faith, Jesus responds. You will receive what you ask for. From that very hour, the demon-possessed daughter was healed. The persistence of the woman and her strong confidence in Jesus’ ability to cure her daughter result in a miraculous healing. “Indomitable persistence springing from an unconquerable hope,” Barclay calls it (vol. 2, p. 124).

15:29–31 / In Matthew’s account the scene shifts immediately from the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon (cf. 15:21) to the eastern shores of the Sea of Galilee (the Markan parallel says “the region of the Decapolis,” 7:31). It is not certain how much time Jesus spent in non-Jewish territory, although there may have been about six months between the feeding of the five thousand in Matthew 14 (v. 19 says they sat “on the grass,” thus indicating early spring) and the feeding of the four thousand in Matthew 15 (v. 35 says they sat “on the ground,” epi tēn gēn, which suggests later in the summer, when the grass would be scorched). A comparison of Matthew and Mark indicates that the latter records the healing of a deaf mute, while the former gives a summary of Jesus’ healing ministry among the Gentiles. Though there were non-Jewish settlements on both sides of the Sea of Galilee, they were clustered far more heavily on the eastern side. Those who were healed praised the God of Israel, a title most appropriate in the mouths of Gentiles. Reference to the lame, blind, and mute stems from Isaiah’s prophecy in 35:5–6. The evangelist adds the crippled and includes Isaiah’s “deaf” in his inclusive many others.

15:32–39 / A great crowd had gathered, and as Jesus saw them he was moved with compassion. They had been with him for several days and no longer had food. Learning from his disciples that they had seven loaves of bread and a few small fish, Jesus had the crowd seated, and they were fed. After they all had eaten their fill, the leftovers were gathered, and there remained seven basketfuls. Not counting the women and children, some four thousand had been fed from the meager supply of the disciples.

A question that is always asked concerns the relationship between the two miraculous feedings as reported both by Matthew (14:13–21 and 15:32–39) and by Mark (6:30–44 and 8:1–10). Luke records only one (9:10–17), and John 6 (vv. 1–15) seems to combine the two. It has been suggested that Mark (followed by Matthew) found two accounts of the same feeding in his sources and copied them both. Lohmeyer (JBL, vol. 56, pp. 235ff.) supports the view that the duplication relates to the ethnic composition of the audience. The feeding of the five thousand is addressed to a Jewish population (the twelve baskets of Matt. 14:20 represent the twelve tribes of Israel), and the feeding of the four thousand relates to the Gentiles (the seven baskets of Matt. 15:37 symbolize the seven deacons of Acts 6:1ff.). Carrington (The Primitive Christian Calendar, p. 16) says that the writer of the Gospel was following a lectionary that required the duplication. Beare holds that we have here not simply a second account of a feeding but a more extensive cycle (p. 347).

It is more likely that we have not two accounts of a single event but two separate but similar events. It is unlikely that the Gospel writers, because of the limits of a scroll, would copy two accounts of the same incident. Though the two accounts have some points in common (desert location, lack of food except for a few loaves and fish, a large crowd), they also diverge at many important places. The number of people fed, loaves available, and baskets of fragments remaining are all different. The lessons Jesus teaches are different (utter dependence on God in the first and sympathy for the gentile world in the second). The most important point, however, is that Jesus himself separates the two feedings. In Matthew 16:9–10 he says, “Don’t you remember the five loaves for the five thousand … or the seven loaves for the four thousand?” With evidence like that, it seems fruitless to pursue the possibility of duplicate accounts of the same event.