Matthew 15:27

But she said, Yea, Lord: for even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table.

Christ, at that very moment, was a fugitive from his own race and nation; and the wondrous faith and humility of that foreign woman of Canaan thus brought into sharpest focus the contrast with the bigots in Jerusalem who, even then, were planning to murder the Lord. There is a play on words in the woman's reply. Christ used the word "dogs"; but the woman came back with another word (also translated "dogs" but with a slightly different meaning). The word she used means "little dogs" or "puppies." It is as though she said, "Yes, Lord, I am indeed a dog, but not a very big one, only a tiny one; and since the little dogs stay under the master's table and eat the crumbs the children drop, surely you must be able to help me. It is only a crumb that I ask." It may be that the apostles, even that late, did not see the full truth of what Jesus was doing; certainly, it took a miracle later on to convince Peter that the Gentiles should be admitted; but, when at last he knew, how his heart must have burned when he thought of this incident.

There is another remarkable discernment in the woman's reply, in that she held the table to be not the children's, but the Master's, showing that she was aware of the hostile attitude of the Twelve and was bypassing them in a direct appeal to the Lord, placing Christ above them!