Historical Commentary v1-13 concern themselves with cleanliness, while v15 concerns itself with food laws. Ludemann (2001, p49) argues that v15 cannot answer the problem posed by the Pharisees in v5. In that view the whole scene is an erroneous creation of the writer of Mark based on a faulty understanding of Jewish law, and thus, is utterly unhistorical. Gundry (1993, p354), by constrast sees the progression from how to eat to what to eat as a very natural one. As the writer of Mark is a playful fellow with an acute sense of humor and vast knowledge of the OT and Jewish tradition, this writer is hesitant to reach for the "error" explanation myself. Two important motifs in Mark, bread and eating, appear together here. These two ideas wind through Mark all the way back to Mark 2, where we encounter the loaves that David ate (or didn't eat), and Jesus eating with sinners. In this pericope the disciples are eating the magic bread created by Jesus in the last feeding miracle. Another important Markan theme is highlighted by the dispute over purity: who is inside, and who is outside. This pericope has a typical Markan chiastic structure with a simple exterior and a complex parallel/paired interior. A Now when the Pharisees gathered together to him, with some of the scribes, who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands defiled, that is, unwashed. B  (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they wash their hands, observing the tradition of the elders; and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they purify themselves; and there are many other traditions which they observe, the washing of cups and pots and vessels of bronze.) And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, "Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with hands defiled?" C A And he said to them,"Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, B  `This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.' C  You leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men." C A And he said to them, "You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God, in order to keep your tradition! B  For Moses said, `Honor your father and your mother'; and, `He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him surely die'; C  but you say, `If a man tells his father or his mother, What you would have gained from me is Corban' (that is, given to God) -- then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God through your tradition which you hand on. And many such things you do." B And he called the people to him again, and said to them, "Hear me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him; but the things which come out of a man are what defile him." A And when he had entered the house, and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. The structure also displays the paired oppositions that the writer is so fond of. In A, Tyre and Sidon oppose Jerusalem, and Jesus (he) opposes the Pharisees. In the B bracket, the emptiness of focusing on clean hands is opposed to the real defilement of a dirty heart. At the same time the interior gives us yet another complex structure. In the interior, there are two pairs of triplets, each beginning with an expression of anger, followed by a citation of scripture, and finally, an accusation that they have rejected the word of the Lord. As is often the case in Mark, a second, smaller structure highlights a saying. A And when he had entered the house, and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. B And he said to them, "Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a man from outside cannot defile him, since it enters, not his heart but his stomach, and so passes on?" (Thus he declared all foods clean.) B And he said, "What comes out of a man is what defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, fornication, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a man." A And from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon. At the same time, Sayler (1993) has shown that this structure contains a complex argument that elaborates and extend chreia structures. Mark 7:1-23 is truly a tour de force. Basser (Jesus and the Pharisees) observes: "The themes and forms of the passage are entirely Jewish. Indeed in rabbinic literature one can find Biblical verses (see BT Shabbat 139a) interpreted as if referring to a class of corrupt judges. While our current texts identify them as boastful, the commentator Rashi calls them class "boastful Pharisees" and his text may have had this reading. Thus, the literature of the successor's of the Pharisees approves of using Scripture to condemn unscrupulous, hypocritcal judges and unethical scribes. It is noted they pervert justice. However, scribal law is not attacked, just fraudulent applications of it. Mark 7:1-23 goes beyond such attack in assaulting their legal system as well as their character." This pericope is found in the Bethsaida section of Mark, a disputed section that to many exegetes looks like it has been interpolated into Mark. It has a very Markan feel to it. Note that in v1 there is a reference to the scribes who have come down from Jerusalem. At the moment Jesus is far from Jerusalem. Perhaps this pericope was originally located in Mark 10, perhaps in Mark 10:46, where a pericope has been removed. The missing events in Mark 10 take place in Jericho. It is easier to imagine the scribes coming out to Jericho to see the rabble-rouser rather than making the long trek to Galilee merely to become the targets of Jesus' wit. The presence of the supernatural magic bread from previous events indicates that we are not looking at a dispute preserved from a source that goes back deep into the tradition, but rather something was created by the author of the Gospel. The event as depicted here cannot possibly have taken place. Nor can a tradition of dispute over handwashing be demonstrated as no evidence exists to support the idea that there was any handwashing violation here. Further, the dispute over eating seems to refer to problems of later Christianity and thus represents a true anachronism. In sum, nothing in this pericope may be deemed supportive of historicity.

Historical Commentary: Verses 25-30 contain a typical miracle story, with the usual features, including Elijah-Elisha parallels. Donahue and Harrington (2002) write: Intertextually the story has echoes of the Elijah and Elisha narrative cycles. The initial story of the Elijah cycle takes place in Zeraphath (1 Kgs 17:8-24), a city that "belongs to Sidon" (1 Kings 17:8; see Mark 7:24). Elijah is commanded to "rise up" (1 Kings 17:9; LXX anastethi); see Mark 7:24, where Jesus "rose up." Then he alone meets the widow of Zarephath, and a miraculous feeding takes place....Though the healing of the son is narrated in more detail than in the case of the Syrophoenician woman's daughter, the words of the prophet take the form of a simple pronouncement: "See, your son lives" (17:23); compare Mark 7:29: "the demon has already left your daughter."( p236) It also parallels the Elisha cycle, where the son of the Shunammite woman is restored to life (2 Kings 4:18-37), where the locale is in the north, the woman falls at his feet (and grasps them), and the healing is followed again by a simple pronouncement (Donahue and Harrington 2002, p232). Funk et al (1997) observe that the aphorism the writer presents here is not attested anywhere else in the tradition, and thus is probably an invention of the writer of Mark. The story also contains the bread motif (bread/crumbs). Strangely, it presents Jesus confronting this woman without his disciples. This pericope presents an outstanding problem of historical interpretation for most exegetes. As noted elsewhere, exegetes tend to carry around two seriously contradictory criteria. First, they argue that anything that reflects negatively on Jesus is probably a real tradition going back to the Historical Jesus, the so-called Embarrassment Criterion. At the same time, they also wield a criterion that says that anything that looks like it was invented to address issues in the later Church is probably a fiction. These two criteria contradict each other and never more clearly than in this pericope, for the exegete can opt for either. Perhaps the Embarrassment Criterion applies, as Jesus is shown insulting the woman by implying that she is a dog. Or perhaps this is an invention of the later Church, which, aimed at gentiles itself, wanted to show Jesus approving its mission to the gentiles. Either one could be supported, and without some kind of meta-criterion that tells you what to opt for when criteria clash, it is impossible to know which one is right. This pericope is the reason the usual positive criteria are entirely rejected in this commentary, for they founder on this pericope.  One proposal for the structure of the discourse here is that in 7:24-30 we are looking at another variation on the chreia form, this one a Setting-Challenge-Riposte version, where Jesus challenges the woman to justify her position. With great skill, the writer of this pericope has interleaved a chreia and a chiasm. The center of the pericope has a chiastic A-B-B'-A' structure that focuses on the keywords children -- dogs -- dogs -- children: A let the children be fed! B It's not right to give good food to dogs B' but even dogs under the table A' eat the children's crumbs There are other, similar parallel structures in this pericope. Consider this: A But immediately a woman, whose little daughter was possessed by an unclean spirit, B and came and fell down at his feet. A' Now the woman was a Greek, a Syrophoeni'cian by birth. B' And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. Gentiles, like demons, were unclean. Here is a chiasm for this pericope. A chiasm can be constructed, but the triplet chreia structure, unlike any other in Mark, the fact that no clear bracketing is available for the verse I have blocked out as CDE, and the lack of a neat doublet in the center, as well as the masked ABBA and ABAB structures, all indicate that this is probably not from the hand of the writer of Mark. A And from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon. B And he entered a house, and would not have any one know it; yet he could not be hid. C But immediately a woman, whose little daughter was possessed by an unclean spirit, heard of him, and came and fell down at his feet.   D Now the woman was a Greek, a Syrophoeni'cian by birth. E And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. E And he said to her, "Let the children first be fed, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs." D But she answered him, "Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs." C And he said to her, "For this saying you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter." B And she went home, and found the child lying in bed, and the demon gone. A Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the region of the Decap'olis. The presence of the supernatural, the probable chreia structure, and the allusions to the Elijah-Elisha cycle all indicate that there is no support for historicity from this pericope.

Historical Commentary Ludemann observes (2001, p52) that "because of the detailed description the story reads almost like instructions for Christian miracle workers." This healing is not found in either Matt or Luke. Meier (1994) writes: "Certainly no other miracle story of comparable length in the Gospels carries so many accouterments of the symbolic of the ritual or the magical (depending on one's interpretive point of view)"(p713). The specific details are often cited here as a basis for authenticity. Gundry (1993, p387), writing in this vein, states: "It is hard to imagine that a redactor would make up the circuitous route and functionally useless reference to Sidon. No convincing reason is forthcoming to tell why, if he wants to portray Jesus as a minster to unevangelized Gentiles, he does not retain the prior setting in Tyrian territory or establish a new setting in Sidon rather than through-passing it in favor of a return to the Sea of Galilee..."  Such claims are totally subjective, of course. The Aramaic word that the writer uses in v34, Eph'phatha, is often considered to go back to Jesus, but its usage here is consistent with magical formulae in antiquity, which often rely on imported words as words of power (Sanders 1992, p145, also Funk et al 1997, p71)). In our own culture Latin often fulfills this role, as in The Book of the Dun Cow, or the Harry Potter series. This pericope has a nicely balanced chiastic structure. However, the center is so wordy that it strikes me as unMarkan. Markan centers typically balance a prolix comment with a pithy one to produce a satisfying rhythmic effect. A Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the region of the Decap'olis. B And they brought to him a man who was deaf and had an impediment in his speech; and they besought him to lay his hand upon him. C And taking him aside from the multitude privately, he put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue; D and looking up to heaven, he sighed, and said to him, "Eph'phatha," that is, "Be opened." D And his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. C And he charged them to tell no one; but the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. B And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, "He has done all things well; he even makes the deaf hear and the dumb speak." A In those days, when again a great crowd had gathered, and they had nothing to eat, he called his disciples to him, and said to them, No support for historicity can be found in this pericope due to the presence of the supernatural, conventional formulae for magic workers, Markan motifs, Markan stylistic signals (the interreference in v32), the parallels to previous miracles in Mark, and creation from the OT .