Commentary on Mark 6

THE SYROPHÅ“NICIAN WOMAN AND HER DAUGHTER--A DEAF AND DUMB MAN HEALED. ( = Mat 15:21-31). (Mar 7:24-37)

And from thence he arose, and went into the borders--or "unto the borders."

of Tyre and Sidon--the two great Phœnician seaports, but here denoting the territory generally, to the frontiers of which Jesus now came. But did Jesus actually enter this heathen territory? The whole narrative, we think, proceeds upon the supposition that He did. His immediate object seems to have been to avoid the wrath of the Pharisees at the withering exposure He had just made of their traditional religion.

and entered into an house, and would have no man know it--because He had not come there to minister to heathens. But though not "sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Mat 15:24), He hindered not the lost sheep of the vast Gentile world from coming to Him, nor put them away when they did come--as this incident was designed to show.

but he could not be hid--Christ's fame had early spread from Galilee to this very region (Mar 3:8; Luk 6:17).