DOG / BITCH OR PUP ????????????
No, in today’s Gospel text, 20th Sunday of the Year, we should not be scandalized at the way Jesus answered the Canaanite woman. According to Matthew we find the word ‘dog’:
'It is not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.'
The language in Mark is somewhat milder: that the children must be fed
"first" (Mk 7:27) allows for the possibility of a later healing and a
window for the coming Gentile mission, but even in Mark the woman's need
is too urgent for that. Jesus probably refers to children's pet dogs;
well-to-do Greeks, unlike Jews, could raise dogs as pets and not view
them merely as troublesome pests (compare Lk 16:21; Ex 22:31).
The image is thus simply one of children's needs (compare 7:9) taking temporal precedence over those of pets. Jesus is not cursing the woman, but he is putting her off (compare 8:7). It is possible that he is testing her, as teachers sometimes tested their disciples, but he is certainly reluctant to grant her request and is providing an obstacle for her faith (compare Jn 2:4).
Perhaps he is requiring her to understand his true mission and identity, lest she treat him as one of the many wandering magicians to whom Gentiles sometimes appealed for exorcisms. Yet he is surely also summoning her to recognize Israel's priority in the divine plan, a recognition that for her will include an admission of her dependent status.
How does the ‘dog’ come in? Certainly according to Jewish Culture, all pagans, all those who had not embraced Judaism, were considered by the Jews as ‘dogs’. So the expression used by Jesus was very normal, HE being a Jew and brought up in the Jewish Culture.
BUT, Mark’s interpretation and rendering is more faithful to the original. According to William Barclay, an authority on Jewish Culture and Bible Commentary, the original word used by Jesus was ‘pup’. This changes the whole picture. It is an endearing word, and HE actually referred to the pups as the ‘children’ not of humans but of dogs. Jesus must have felt, realized that the word ‘dog’ (or rather ‘bitch’ addressed to a woman) might have hurt the feeling of the woman, so HE preferred to use the endearing word ‘pup’.
The image is thus simply one of children's needs (compare 7:9) taking temporal precedence over those of pets. Jesus is not cursing the woman, but he is putting her off (compare 8:7). It is possible that he is testing her, as teachers sometimes tested their disciples, but he is certainly reluctant to grant her request and is providing an obstacle for her faith (compare Jn 2:4).
Perhaps he is requiring her to understand his true mission and identity, lest she treat him as one of the many wandering magicians to whom Gentiles sometimes appealed for exorcisms. Yet he is surely also summoning her to recognize Israel's priority in the divine plan, a recognition that for her will include an admission of her dependent status.
How does the ‘dog’ come in? Certainly according to Jewish Culture, all pagans, all those who had not embraced Judaism, were considered by the Jews as ‘dogs’. So the expression used by Jesus was very normal, HE being a Jew and brought up in the Jewish Culture.
BUT, Mark’s interpretation and rendering is more faithful to the original. According to William Barclay, an authority on Jewish Culture and Bible Commentary, the original word used by Jesus was ‘pup’. This changes the whole picture. It is an endearing word, and HE actually referred to the pups as the ‘children’ not of humans but of dogs. Jesus must have felt, realized that the word ‘dog’ (or rather ‘bitch’ addressed to a woman) might have hurt the feeling of the woman, so HE preferred to use the endearing word ‘pup’.
No comments:
Post a Comment