Chapter # 7 Paragraph # 2 Study # 2
June 21, 2022
Moss Bluff, Louisiana
(318)
1901 ASV
7:24 And from thence he arose, and went away into the borders of Tyre [and Sidon]. And he entered into a house, and would have no man know it; and he could not be hid.
7:25 But straightway a woman, whose little daughter had an unclean spirit, having heard of him, came and fell down at his feet.
7:26 Now the woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by race. And she besought him that he would cast forth the demon out of her daughter.
7:27 And he said unto her, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children's bread and cast it to the dogs.
7:28 But she answered and saith unto him, Yea, Lord; even the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs.
7:29 And he said unto her, For this saying go thy way; the demon is gone out of thy daughter.
7:30 And she went away unto her house, and found the child laid upon the bed, and the demon gone out.
- I. The Place Of This Paragraph In Its Larger Context (Within The Context Of Danger -- i.e., "Beware").
- II. The Details Of This Paragraph.
- A. The first word, "From there..." (ekeithen). Its significance: accountability (there is no greater reality of dangerous significance for the welfare of man).
- B. Mark's use of "got up" (anistemi).
- 1. This is the fifth of seventeen uses of this word in Mark's record. The meaning ranges from "getting to one's feet from a sitting/reclining position" to "rising from the dead" (the most powerful exercise of "might" known to man). In our current text, the word is an aorist participle, indicating action taken just prior to the action of the main verb (an aorist indicative of apercomai to go/come away from).
- a. The first time Mark told us of someone "arising", the record was of Jesus "getting up" early in the morning while it was still dark to go to a secluded place to pray (1:35). In this use the word is also an aorist participle used before the verb exercomai (to go/come out from there).
- 1) This reference is in the first context where the issue of Jesus' popularity is front and center. This is the issue of danger: Jesus' death was occasioned by His popularity and there is a highly significant connection in regard to the disciples' strong attachment to "being popular".
- 2) In this first context, at issue are these things...
- a) Jesus had been up late the night before, healing and casting out demons.
- b) Jesus deliberately prevented the demons from speaking because they knew Him (translated "Who He was" by the NASB). This is the second time when Jesus refused to allow the demons to speak because they "knew" Him (see 1:24).
- c) Jesus immediately rejected the unspoken implication of the disciples' "Everyone is looking for You": Jesus' "popularity" was not His goal at all; it was simply a necessary by-product of His commission from His "Commissioner". What the disciples were focused upon was what they would have felt if everyone was seeking them out (an immense ego-gratification). This is the first hint of Mark's interest in making sure his readers understand how dangerous it is to want to be sought out by men.
- d) This "having arisen" was for the purpose of departure to a proper place of prayer in a secluded place to address Jesus' sense of His mission (1:38 with the reality of John 5:19-20 heavily involved).
- b. The second time Mark told us of someone "having arisen" (aorist participle), the record is of Jesus saying to Levi, "Follow Me", who then "having arisen", followed Him (2:14).
- 1) A "Follow Me" (literally, "fall in behind Me") was first used in 1:17 where Jesus summoned Andrew and Simon. They did. Then Jesus "called" James and John, and they "left ... and went away to follow...". There is no mention of them "arising". This action is an "implied meaning" in these settings, but Mark took it out of the realm of "implied" meaning to "stated" meaning in respect to Levi.
- 2) In this second context, the issues are all involved with people coming to Jesus in large numbers and, in that setting, Jesus saying to Levi, "Follow Me", and Levi "having arisen", followed (the word akoloutheo, not "fall in behind Me").
- 3) In Romans 8:28, Paul refers to this reality by attaching the concept of "called according to purpose" which is at the heart of the participle form of "arise...".
- c. The third use is in 3:26 where Jesus has been accused by "official Judaism", with all of their influence over many (their version of "being popular"), of being in league with Satan. Jesus said that their reasoning was seriously flawed because if "Satan has risen against himself ... he is finished".
- 1) Jesus' logic destroys the accusation.
- 2) At issue is the jealousy of "official Judaism" because of Jesus' extreme popularity.
- 3) This "possibility" that Satan would do such a thing is a clear indication that a part of the meaning of "rising up" is to take action to accomplish some goal (in this case, putting his assets in conflict with one another). This "clear" indication (implied meaning) is present in all of these early uses of this word.
- d. And, the fourth use is in 5:42, after Jesus had said to the daughter of Jairus, "Get up" (egeiro), the 12-year-old "arose" (anistemi ; Aorist Indicative), with the fact that, according to Jesus' insistence, she "arose for a purpose" that was to be restricted ("strict orders that no one should know about this": 5:43) and was walking".
- 2. Now, in this fifth use (7:24), the word is used in conjunction with "region" (opion) in the phrase "went away from there into the regions (plural; mistranslated as a singular by the NASB) of Tyre".
- a. The reference to "region" is first used in 5:17 where the Gerasenes implore Jesus to leave their "region" because thousands of their hogs perished.
- b. That reference is followed by only three more in Mark (7:24, 31, and 10:1).
- 1) 7:24 -- our current text.
- 2) 7:31 -- after Jesus casts the demon out, He again went out from those regions to end up in the regions of Decapolis.
- 3) 10:1 -- "Getting up, He went from there to the regions of Judea..." to run smack into the "testing" Pharisees.
- c. The word "regions" refers to instances where Jesus left the typical "Jewish" regions (Judea and Galilee), except for the last one where He returned to the regions of Judea from those other regions.
- 3. The word "Jesus" is inserted into the text at this point by the translators of the NASB for clarity as to "who" it was that "got up"; an insertion not warranted by any significant textual tradition and not found in the Authorized Version, and totally unnecessary. This, for some, is an extremely "minor" issue among men (too ignorant to subscribe to Jesus' "jot and tittle" theology), but reveals how careless men have been for centuries in regard to the attitude we should take toward the Scriptures. By contrast, the Jewish scribes would actually destroy hours of labor on copies of the Word of God if they made any kind of "mistake" in their copying.
- a. This is an extremely prevalent attitude during this "Age of Grace" where men enjoy the pleasures of "Grace" without recognizing their arrogance .
- b. Though the Jewish alternative smacks of their overweening terror of God's intense scrutiny of all actions of human beings, it does have this result: the Old Testament transmission of the text, being extremely accurate, is not even close to the carelessness of the transmission of the New Testament text.
- 4. Tyre [the inclusion of Sidon at this point is not established by the textual traditions].
- a. Mark refers to "Tyre" in three of his texts (3:8; 7:24 and 31). Tyre was a city of Phoenicia, outside the boundaries of Jewish geography.
- b. This movement by Jesus into the regions of Tyre are the beginnings of a large circle of ministry by Jesus that went from Tyre, through Sidon, to the region of Decapolis. It is Mark's expansion of Jesus' activities as The Mighty One and the spread of His reputation.
- 1) Mark is making it very plain that there will be no excuse on the Day of Wrath for those who reject the testimony.
- 2) The horrors of "Death" in the setting of the infinity of Time lurk in the background.
- C. Mark's Record of Jesus' Desire And His Inability To See It Fulfilled.
- 1. Jesus' desire was that no one should "know" He was in the house which He had entered.
- 2. Jesus' inability to see that desire fulfilled was emphatic by the use of "ouk" coupled to the use of "dunamai".
- 3. This is a direct statement of Mark's "lurking reality"; no one will be able to say, "I never heard of Him".
- a. This inability to make that claim is adamantly declared by Paul in Romans 10:18.
- b. There will be no recourse for "rejectors" on That Day.