Prejudice based on race or nationality: Matthew 15:22-28 describes an incident between Jesus and a Canaanite woman. Mark 7:25-30 describes the same incident, identifying her as Greek/Syrophenician. One commentary on the Bible explains that "The inhabitants of this area were racially and linguistically connected with the ancient Canaanites." 8 She begged Jesus to cure her daughter who was possessed by a demon. He first ignored her, but then explained that he was sent only to bring the Gospel to the Jews, not to the Gentiles such as she. Jesus cruelly replied to the desperate mother that it was not right for him "to take the children's bread and to cast it to dogs." i.e. it is not appropriate to take the Gospel, which was intended only for the Jews, and offer it to Gentiles as well -- here described as sub-humans, as dogs. Here, Jesus was following the behavior of other observant Jews in the 1st century CE who would frequently refer to Gentiles contemptuously as "dogs.") She quipped back to Jesus that even the "dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table." Jesus relented and, from a distance, cured the daughter of demonic possession because of the mother's faith.
The sin in this case was to treat a person of another race and/or nationality as sub-human, by referring to them as a dog.
2006-11-30
07:04:00
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