Taking a look at Matthew 15:21-28 tonight.
Here Jesus healed the daughter of a Gentile woman who sought Jesus' help persistently. Jesus commends her for her faith in v. 28, "Your faith is great."
This story is also found in Mark 7:24-30.
Some critics of the Bible point out that in Mark 7:26 the woman is described as a Syrian-Phoenician and in Matthew 15:22 she is called a Canaanite. However, the two terms might actually be interchangeable. The Syrian-Phoenicians were probably Phoenicians who lived in Syria and Phoenicians were derived from the Canaanites.
Another unusual feature of the story was Jesus saying in v. 26, "It isn't right to take food from the children and throw it to dogs."
From the context, Jesus seemed to be equating the children with the people of Israel and the Gentiles with dogs!
Sounds harsh!
However, in context, it sounds like these dogs aren't wild dogs but rather family pets. In v. 27, the woman said, "the dogs (little dogs in Young's Literal Translation) eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table."
This does soften it some but it is still a little jarring to the ears. It may well have been culturally appropriate to use such terms. Thus, Jesus capitalized on it and it allowed the woman to show her great faith and allowed Jesus to show conclusively that His blessings though first offered to the Jews was indeed available to non-Jews too.
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