Canaanitish
Canaanitish
CANAANITISH.The Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 rendering of (Authorized Version of Canaan) in Mat 15:22 (only here in NT). The word is used to describe the woman who came out of the borders of Tyre and Sidon, desiring to have her daughter healed who was grievously vexed with a devil. St. Mark (Mar 7:26) calls her a Greek (), a Syro-phnician () by race. A Canaanite, signifying properly dweller in the lowland, is used in a wider or a narrower meaning in the OT, Canaan being a name applied either to the strip of seacoast from Gaza to Sidon, or, more loosely, to the whole possession of Israel, or that part which lay west of Jordan (Gen 10:19; cf. Jos 5:1, Num 13:29, Gen 11:31). The LXX Septuagint renders Canaanite () indifferently by and (Exo 6:15, Jos 5:1, Num 13:29, (Num 13:30), Jdg 1:30-33, while in Exo 16:35 and Jos 5:12 we find translation by and . These coast inhabitants being the great traders of the old world, Canaanite or Phnician was often used simply to mean a merchant (Isa 23:8 [LXX Septuagint ], and cf. Hos 12:7, Zep 1:11).
The woman who came to our Lord was a Canaanite in the sense that she belonged to the stock of the old Phnicians of Syria termed Syro-phnician to distinguish them from those of Africa. These were heathen, and between them and the Jews existed the bitterest hostility; see Josephus circa (about) Apion. i. 13 (who mentions the Phnicians, especially of Tyre, with the Egyptians as bearing the greatest ill-will towards the Jews). This fact makes instructive a comparison between our Lords treatment of this woman and His dealing with the woman of Samaria; cf. especially Joh 4:9 with Mat 15:26. The Clementines (Hom. ii. 19, iii. 73) mention her by the name of Justa, and maintain that the Lord first won her from heathendom, and after that was able to heal her daughter, whose name is given as Bernice.* [Note: is to be distinguished Irom , TR (Mat 10:4), which means a Zealot, and is the designation of the Apostle Simon. See Cananaean.]
Literature.The Commentaries on the Gospels, esp. Swete on Mar 7:26; the articles in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible and the Encyc. Bibl.; Trench, Miracles, ad loc.; Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, ii. 37ff.; Expos. Times, iv. [1892] p. 80ff.; W. Archer Butler, Serm, i. 155 ff.; Lynch, Serm. to my Curates, p. 317ff.; Ker, Serm., 2nd ser. p. 200ff.; Bruce, Galilean Gospel, p. 154ff.
J. B. Bristow.