It was offensive, there’s no doubt. Was it a Freudian slip, or just saying the quiet part out loud? Either way, it caught our attention. While defending his decision to prevent a voter’s rights bill from being voted on, #MoscowMitch, a.k.a. #MitchPlease, Mitch McConnell left all Americans with this little gem:
If you look at the statistics, African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans…
“Wow!” I’ll say it backward. !woW”
To be clear, Republicans aren’t the only racists in the world, though they dress their racism up in spirituality and project their racism onto those they hate as a way to justify their own prejudice—which they don’t have—you’re the racist for calling them racist.
Since they like to use Jesus to justify their bigotry, it only makes sense to see what Jesus has to say about the subject. Which ironically, wasn’t through a sermon or a conversation with Jewish leaders, but personal in his own life, and how he dealt with it is rather simple, though not easy. It involved allowing himself to be called out on his own bigotry and then responding to it honestly.
I am often asked, “How do you know YOU’RE not a racist?” My only answer is, “Because I know that I am.” It’s being open to that awareness which helps me make the emotional, physical, and logical steps that help me understand the problem and bring about actual change—starting with me.
Jesus had one of those moments.
According to his biographers, the authors of Matthew and Mark, the story goes like this:
Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 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.”
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.”
He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
“Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Matthew 15: 21-28
Mark’s version is similar:
Jesus left that place and went to the vicinity of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know it; yet he could not keep his presence secret. In fact, as soon as she heard about him, a woman whose little daughter was possessed by an impure spirit came and fell at his feet. The woman was a Greek, born in Syrian Phoenicia. She begged Jesus to drive the demon out of her daughter.
“First let the children eat all they want,” he told her, “for it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
“Lord,” she replied, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”
Then he told her, “For such a reply, you may go; the demon has left your daughter.”
She went home and found her child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.
Mark 7:24-30
Both gospels agree on these specifics:
- Jesus was along the Mediterranean coast in northern Israel, in the land given to the Tribe of Asher.
- It’s likely he was there because, according to Luke, he had been warned by the Pharisees that Herod Antipas was actively trying to kill him.
- He was approached by a woman on behalf of her daughter who was being tormented by an evil spirit.
- Jesus tried to ignore her.
- She tenaciously begged him to heal her daughter.
- His attempt to ignore her emboldened his disciples in their own bigotry, making them comfortable asking Jesus to send her away.
- Because of her persistence, Jesus rebuffed her, using one of the strongest racial slurs in the Bible… He called her a dog.
- She responded in such a way that allowed Jesus to save face while confronting his own bigotry.
- And finally, Jesus accedes to her request.
However, as always goes with the gospels, there are differences:
- Matthew calls the woman a Canaanite, whereas Mark calls her Greek, born in Syrian Phoenicia.
- Mark’s version is a little softer. Jesus doesn’t come right out and call her a dog, he starts with “first let the children eat…” THEN he calls her a dog.
There’s a lot of exegesis around this particular story. One of my favorites comes from a book written by F.F. Bruce, The Hard Sayings of Jesus. Usually the apologist is making several clumsy gymnastic or acrobatic attempts to avoid coming out and saying what really happened. But let’s look at the story as it is told, in the context of which it was written.
Matthew calls the woman Canaanite. According to the book of Joshua, Canaanites were one of the native cultures Israel was meant to wipe off the face of the earth. While Canaanite was a catch-all phrase for many peoples of that area, Matthew was writing to a Jewish audience, so his intention was probably to show his audience this woman was a descendant of one of the people that escaped Joshua’s crusade and continued on to make life miserable for the Jewish people. They might also see her as a descendant of the Philistines, whom the Old Testament records as one of Israel’s most frustrating Canaanite enemies. They were the bedbugs of Israel. They simply wouldn’t go away.
Mark, writing for a broader “Roman” audience, calls her “Greek,” an enemy of both Rome and Israel (Maccabees). So the title given to the woman by both authors is meant to elicit anger from their readers and justify Jesus’ response to her. How dare she, a “Greek” or “Canaanite” ask anything of Jesus, a man of God. Which apparently Jesus felt too since he tried to ignore her.
The idea of Jesus ignoring her—in a spiritual functionality—makes sense. “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” Sometimes, when we don’t want to deal with someone, or our feelings toward them, we try to ignore them. However, this woman needed something from Jesus, and she knew he could give that to her, so she remained tenacious.
When she wouldn’t go away, Jesus rebuked her, using ‘spiritual’ language. Telling her that his gift of healing was for the children of God only—insinuating that she was not one of those. Then he went even further. He outright called her a dog, stating his true feelings and acknowledging why he was ignoring her.
It’s a fair guess that this wasn’t the first time this woman had been called a dog, or various other racial slurs, but to be called such a thing from a spiritual leader must have been sickening.
Yet her response was brilliant.
Those who have been, and are, the victims of racism have had to take this approach themselves. While they are being insulted, wrongly accused, and outright attacked, the onus always seems to fall upon them to deescalate the situation and convince the bigot that they are, in fact, not dogs, but real humans just like their oppressors. And that’s exactly what the woman did. She chose a peaceful, reasoned response hoping to change Jesus’ heart toward her.
“Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”
And this is the story of today’s racists, such as Mitch McConnell.
First of all, they just want “peace.” They don’t want to talk about their feelings and actions regardless of whom they’re hurting. Life is hard on them. They’re being forced to live alongside Liberals. They’re forced to wear masks. They have to share the playground with the other children who aren’t like them. People are saying mean things about the mean things they’re doing to others. And worse, people are protesting being treated as second-class citizens.
However, the press, like the Canaanite woman, keep hounding—so that there must be a response. McConnell and his kind are finally forced to say something. However, by that time they’re angry and frustrated, and that’s when their true feelings surface. Of course they attempt to make it sound high and lofty, but they’ve really just used a cruel slur. They insinuated that they’re better and those they deem different are ‘dogs.’ Now in today’s society where dogs are far more respected than they ever were, the term is still considered appalling—and it has nothing to do with our attitudes toward our pets.
Yet Jesus, when confronted with his attitudes, rather than double-down, chose the gentle way out he was offered. He credited the woman for her faith. Something McConnell won’t do. Jesus accredited her faith in a way that suggests he was grateful that she opened him up to some of those feelings that he didn’t know were hiding there. He didn’t ‘project’ his attitudes on the woman and call her a ‘reverse-racist,’ he accepted her criticism. And since Jesus was a lot more sophisticated than Mitch McConnell, he altered his behavior and blessed the woman—as a child of God. As one of his own.
And this is the most interesting part of the story. Even if we’re truly seeking a path of spirituality, there are going to be things in our lives that are not ‘spiritual.’ In fact, they may be downright ugly. And it’s going to be someone who represents those non-spiritual emotions and feelings that is going to bring that to light. As Carl Jung would say, it’s going to be OUR Dark Side pointing itself out to us.
But Jesus believed he was a son of God. That he represented the father of all humankind, and that his ‘daddy (Abba)’ loved everyone. So when confronted with someone he wasn’t necessarily sure ‘’he” could love, he allowed himself to see God in her. By seeing God in her, he understood she was more than a second-class citizen. She was his sister. And he healed her daughter—he physically reached out to show her he was willing to love her as his father loved her.
Maybe one day, Mitch McConnell might do the same.
As a side note, just because I find it funny, I was half-way through this article when I finally got the joke, “MitchPlease!”