Rendering to Caesar what is Caesar’s in Matthew 22
The gospel reading for Trinity xix in Year A is Matthew 22.15–22, the short exchange betwixt Jesus and his opponents on the question of the Roman 'poll' taxation. This has of import theological implications for our understanding of issues of politics and power, though it is ofttimes misread.
We are now well embedded in Matthew's triple group of three-fold incidents which started in Matthew 21:
| Matt 21.1–22 | Three symbolic actions | The entry into Jerusalem on a donkey Overturning tables in the temple The blasphemous of the fig tree |
| Matt 21.28–22.14 | Three polemical parables | The parable of the ii sons The parable of the wicked tenants The parable of the hymeneals banquet |
| Matt 22.15–forty | 3 hostile questions | The question near poll tax The question about union at the resurrection The question near the greatest commandment |
Unfortunately, nosotros volition not become to consummate this sequence, as the lectionary breaks away from continuous reading in the coming weeks leading into Advent for the new liturgical year—and so avoids the challenging serial of 'woes' confronting the Pharisees. The three synoptic gospels agree on the order of material here, with this question post-obit the parabolic instruction (in Marking and Luke, the parable of the wicked tenants only), and being followed by the other two questions.
Matthew and Mark agree in identifying the Pharisees and Herodians as those who challenge Jesus here. Marking implies, and Matthew makes explicit, that it is the 'disciples' of the Pharisees, rather than the leaders themselves, who are involved here; the leaders will footstep up for the 3rd challenge to Jesus in Matt 22.34. All through this department (as nosotros take seen) Matthew has been careful to specify the identity and the variety of Jesus' opponents, who include 'the chief priests and the scribes' (Matt 21.15), 'the chief priests and the Pharisees' (Matt 21.45), here 'the Pharisees with the Herodians', 'the Sadducees' (Matt 22.23) and again 'the Pharisees' (Matt 22.34). In affiliate 23, the field of study of Jesus' claiming is 'the scribes and the Pharisees'. These descriptions give a sense of both the broad opposition to Jesus, and the variety of specific groups involved.
The Pharisees were a broad, mostly lay, movement, concerned with Mosaic purity in the whole of life, and were oftentimes in conflict with the more elitist Sadducees, who were concerned with their authority as a priestly grouping with ability deriving from their function in temple worship. In contrast to the Sadducees, the Pharisees were opposed to cultural and political compromise with the occupying powers, so it is rather surprising to see them allied with the Herodians; there is some debate near exactly what this term refers to, merely it is nearly probable pointing to courtiers of Herod Antipas, who was Tetrarch (ruler) of the 2 disconnected territories of Galilee to the north and Perea to the east. These two groups must accept had very different interests in both the question itself and the desire to trip Jesus up—but we saw them plotting together at the beginning of Jesus' ministry building in Mark 3.6.
Their aim is to 'entrap' or 'entangle' him in his own words; the word usedpagideuo only occurs here in the NT, and is a term from hunting used to draw an brute that is trapped (see Eccl 9.12). It is used in relation to an unwise commitment in Prov six.two, simply likewise of the spiritual dangers of idolatry in Deut seven.25. Jesus' opponents hither are not just wanting him to expect foolish or contradictory, but to set a trap that volition incriminate him.
The opening comments past these disciples has the ironic ring of empty flattery—simply in fact they correlate very well with what we take seen of Jesus' ministry and activeness in the gospels. He is a fearless speaker of truth, and does not trim his message to make information technology convenient for his hearers even if they are people of influence and ability. To say that 'you are true' is not very far from Jesus claiming 'I am…the truth' (John 14.6) and there is no 'shadow of turning' with him, where he says ane thing in i situation and something different in another (James ane.17).
The adjacent phrase of flattery, 'you do not care about anyone's opinion', or 'you do non courtroom their opinion' or 'you aren't swayed by others' renders the simple idiom 'no-1 is a business to you'—clearly non in the sense of being unconcerned for the welfare of others, just in non being concerned to print or flatter them—precisely the matter that the opponents here are trying to do! The final flattery might be taken every bit 'you are not swayed by appearances', since the phrase is simply 'you do not wait on a person'south face'. This thought has deep roots in the OT; when Samuel is discerning who will be the next king of Israel, God instructs him not to be impressed by outward appearances.
The LORD does not wait at the things man beings look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the middle (ane Sam 16.7).
(In that location is fifty-fifty a snappy chorus based on this verse: 'Man looks on the outside, but God looks…[clap, clap] on the heart.') The metaphor hither in the Hebrew Bible is 'people look at the optics', but in the Greek Lxx it has become 'people look on the face'. This is very close to the root metaphor of one of my favourite words in the NT,prosopolempsia,and the related phraselambano prosopon,literally meaning 'to have the confront', only used with reference to partially—making a judgement on rank or outward advent, or showing favouritism. Information technology is a cardinal attribute of God'south nature that he does not evidence favouritism, and this is key not just ethically just in turning the grace of God outward beyond ethnic Jews to include the Gentile mission (run into Acts 10.34, Rom 2.11 and James ii.1, 9). The deceitful flatterers ironically attribute this primal feature to Jesus and brand it the basis of their appeal for a sentence on the poll revenue enhancement.
The question of the Roman poll tax was not one of mere political opinion or inconvenience, but central to contemporary Jewish ideas almost the kingdom of God, their liberation, and attitudes to the Roman occupation. The tax was imposed equally a result of straight Roman rule of Judea in Advert vi—simply of class not in Galilee which continued to be ruled by Herod Antipas. Information technology was fiercely resented by patriotic Jews, and gave rising to a rebellion led by Judas the Galilean aided by Zadok/Sadduc the Pharisee, which later inspired the zealot revolt of Advertizing 66 which in turn led to the devastation of the temple at the end of this outset Jewish State of war in Advertisement 70. Josephus comments:
The Jews, although at the beginning they took the written report of a tax heinously, yet did they exit off any farther opposition to it, by the persuasion of Joazar, who was the son of Beethus, and loftier priest; and so they, being over-persuaded by Joazar's words, gave an business relationship of their estates, without any dispute virtually it. All the same was there one Judas, a Gaulonite, of a city whose name was Gamala, who, taking with him Sadduc, a Pharisee, became zealous to draw them to a revolt, who both said that this tax was no better than an introduction to slavery, and exhorted the nation to assert their liberty; as if they could procure them happiness and security for what they possessed, and an assured enjoyment of a still greater practiced, which was that of the honor and celebrity they would thereby learn for magnanimity. They as well said that God would not otherwise be assisting to them.. (Antiquities, Book 18.1.1)
Thus we see a theological business concern for moral and spiritual purity working hand in hand with a political business concern for national autonomy. The two issues of 'rendering unto God' and 'rendering unto Caesar' are considered to be both overlapping and in conflict, so that you lot cannot practise the i without refusing to do the other, and vice versa.
So Jesus' opponents, with this background supposition, lead him into an impossible pick. If he supports the paying of the revenue enhancement, then he will be seen to compromise in his devotion to God, and lose the support of those who long for political liberty, which we tin see expressed in both spiritual and theological terms as the hope of the coming messiah in the Benedictus:
…to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable united states of america to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days… (Luke 1.74–75)
But if he supports the withholding of the tax, here at the centre of power in Jerusalem, he will look similar a seditious rebel, and appear to make his claim as a rival leader to the ability of Rome—the kind of merits on which he is in fact unjustly convicted.
Jesus' response to the question both exposes the cunning and hypocrisy of his opponents, and undermines the basic theological premise of the dilemma that they have presented him with.
Jesus is fully enlightened of their 'malice'; on such an important upshot, they are more interested in scoring political and theological points than actually resolving the question. He accuses them of 'testing' or 'tempting' him, using the termpeirazo, which describes the activity of Satan in the wilderness at the start of Jesus' ministry. The testing has never really stopped, even if the players have changed.
He so highlights their 'hypocrisy'. The denarius was a comparatively big-value coin, existence worth a day'due south wages for a worker (equally we saw in the previous parables), but the actual coin demand not accept been used for payment. A denarius in the time of the emperor Tiberius would have the image of the emperor, in itself a serious offence to observant Jews, but as well the inscription 'Ti[berius] Caesar Divi Aug[usti] F[ilius] Augustus' and on the reverse the championship 'Pontif[ex] Maxim[us]', meaning Loftier Priest.
He is thus proclaimed to exist not only the son of the divine Augustus, but also a high priest; the two titles together could hardly be more calculated to offend Jewish piety (R T French republic, NICNT, p 833).
And still Jesus' opponents have one in their pocket and are carrying information technology effectually! Those who announced to be most concerned near ritual purity and political independence are carrying with them the very signs of spiritual compromise and political bunco!
Much is often made in preaching that the money has the paradigm (eikon) of the emperor on information technology, and that all humans are made in the image (eikon) of God, and then that in that location is an analogy between the handing over of the coin in payment of the tax, and the handing over of ourselves in obedience to the call of God. Only in fact within this narrative that parallel is not fatigued on or emphasised at all, and so information technology is non clear that this is the primary issue.
More important is Jesus' emphasis, obscured in the traditional translation of 'render unto Caesar,' on payingback. If the coin has the emperor's head on information technology, then there is a sense in which paying the tax is indeed giving dorsum what belongs to the emperor, and there is a pointer here to the bones principle of (fair) taxation, that tax covers the costs of what governments spend for the benefit of the population at large. Cue a showing of the Monty Python sketch 'What accept the Romans always done for the states?' linked below…
More than fundamentally, Jesus is redrawing the theological relationship between political power and the actions of God's kingdom. The Pharisees, along with other Jewish groups, come across the spiritual and the political inseparably intertwined, and then that God's kingdom cannot be realised without the accompanying political 'regime change'. The spheres of God's activity and political reality mostly overlap, and are rival regimes making competing claims for loyalty (encounter the diagram on the right).
However this is something that Jesus has rejected from the very beginning of his ministry. Despite the political implications of his proclamation of the kingdom of God, he has refused to pursue a political path to its realisation, and has specifically rejected the political ambitions of those who would make him king (for case, in response to the feeding of the five,000, John 6.xv). The kingdom of God has political implications, but these tin never be achieved by merely political ways. This is not only a conviction of Jesus; the history of the OT testifies to its reality. It is a alter of heart, not simply a change of government, that the people demand.
But much interpretation of Jesus' maxim has separated the two spheres of the authority of God and the authority of the emperor—or successive political powers that have taken his place. We render unto Caesar what is his due (for example in paying taxes), and quite separately we render unto God what is his due (for example in pious devotion and church attendance). In this reading, what God requires of us and what Caesar requires of us are quite split, then that our political, economic and social lives are separate from our religious lives. This has been a distinctive approach of post-Enlightenment modernity, where the religious becomes an interest or a hobby, or fifty-fifty a gear up of important and motivating personal convictions—but information technology can never make claims over the political realm. It is private rather than public truth.
Withal Jesus conspicuously believes that 'the earth is the Lord's, and everything in it' (Ps 24.1). Whatever power the emperor or any other ruler has, they have it just because it has been delegated to them by God, as Jesus says explicitly to Pilate during the trial narrative in the 4th Gospel (John nineteen.11).
Thus the sphere of influence and ability of Caesar doesn't sit and then much every bit a complete system as a rival to the power of God, nor does it sit as an alternative sphere of activity an say-so separate from the concerns of the kingdom. Instead it rightly sitswithin the concerns of God and his authority. This ways that at that place is no one political system or ideology which has a monopoly on kingdom realities (as in the kickoff arroyo)—merely neither is whatsoever regime free from scrutiny.
We should treat political and economic systems with due respect (Romans 13), acknowledging the source of all truthful authority, and recognising the purposes of skillful regime under the say-so of God. But we also need to be alert to the moments, in all political systems, where Caesar claims more power than is his due, and seeks to readapt the kingdom and take the role of God in the offer he makes or the loyalty he demands. Whilst we return to Caesar what is his legitimate due, that must besides sit in accountability to our higher duty to render to God what is his due.
Information technology is this theological understanding of political ability which will let the followers of Jesus to seek first the kingdom of God, without needing to come across that expressed in a specific political land in a geographical territory, and hateful that they are able to bring the dynamic of the kingdom to every tribe, language, people and nation.
And now for that Monty Python sketch…
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