Charles Ellicott Commentary Mark 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." — Mark 7:26 (ASV)

A Greek—that is, in the sense that the word had acquired in Palestine, a Gentile, as in Romans 1:16 and Romans 2:9-10. The modern use of “Frank” in the East for Europeans of every country, offers an analogous extension of the original meaning of a name.

Syrophenician.—The word, which occurs in Juvenal (Sat. viii. 159), may be noted as an instance of St. Mark’s tendency to use Latin forms. The Emperor Hadrian divided the province of Syria into three parts—Syria proper, Syro-Phoenicia, and Syria-Palestina—and we may well believe that this official distinction rested on a pre-existing nomenclature.