In the Greek text the verb aware of (Good News Translation “knew”) is not followed by an object, but one must be supplied in translation: aware of this, “knew what they were saying” (Good News Translation), and “knew that they were angry” (Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, 1st edition). Matthew places aware of in an emphatic position in the sentence.

Why do you trouble the woman? has been rendered as “Why are you bothering this woman?” by Good News Translation. Others have “Why are you criticizing this woman?” Since Jesus does not really want an answer, some translators have “Stop bothering this woman.”

A beautiful thing (so also New International Version, Phillips, Moffatt; An American Translation, New English Bible “a fine thing”; Barclay “a lovely thing”) is more literally “a good deed” (New American Bible) or “a good work.” A footnote in New Jerusalem Bible points out that the Jews classified “good works” as either “almsgiving” or “charitable deeds.” The latter category was considered superior, and included in it was that of the burial of the dead. Therefore according to this interpretation the woman had performed “one of the good works” (Jerusalem Bible) which was superior to that of giving to the poor (verse 9). Since the woman’s deed was an expression of spontaneous love, it seems probable that Jesus was actually praising the motive behind what the woman did rather than the deed itself.

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .