Sermon for St. John’s Cathedral, Hong Kong
For the 25th Anniversary of Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui as a Province and 180th Anniversary of Foundation as a Church.
Eucharist, Sunday 22nd October
The Very Revd. Prof. Martyn Percy
Render Unto Caesar
Matthew 22: 15-22: Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. And they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, “Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone’s opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances. Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why put me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said, “Caesar’s.” Then he said to them, “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” When they heard it, they marvelled. And they left him and went away.
To claim today’s gospel is taxing would be something of a pun. But taxing it is, and perhaps the most important thing to note from the outset is that this exchange between Jesus, the Pharisees and Herodians is one of the most misunderstood passages we have in the gospels. That has been so for every century since the original incident. But why?
Well, some have used it to justify the appropriate right of civil and legal orbit of government power, and the passage reminds Jesus’ followers to be good citizens wherever they reside. That’s true, and I don’t dissent from that interpretation. But the passage is about money and taxes, and not about obedience. So I wonder if it might help us to ask some questions of the past in order to understand our obligations as citizens and Christians in the present – whether Chinese here, or from the country that you belong to.
Taxes. When did you ever hear a sermon on taxation? Or a good explanation of taxes that made you think taxation might be quite a rewarding subject, and not just a topic to grumble about. But if we start with taxation, we can begin to think ourselves into this exchange and incident with the Pharisees and the Herodians. So let me make some observations about systems of ancient taxation.
First, Joseph and Mary were tax-payers. The Census at Bethlehem recorded in the Gospel of Luke is a ‘head count’, but also the basis for leveraging a tax on citizens. Joseph returns home to the place of his birth, in order to register. That registration would have resulted in some kind of annual tax falling on each household.
In the Roman Empire, there were four primary streams of tax revenue: on cattle, land, customs (so imports and exports) and the profits from any profession. That would include Joseph’s trade as a carpenter and builder. There was no income tax. The taxes were there for the same reasons they are now: funding security, the military, public works, transport networks, upkeep of roads and stimulating the economy – they all need support. Zacchaeus, Matthew and others are named as tax collectors in the gospels. Raising taxes was vital for social flourishing then, as it is now.
The ancient Roman Empire also divided their taxation into two streams. One stream of tax – tributes is what they were called – were levied on land ownership, which was effectively a wealth tax. The other main stream of taxation was the Poll Tax, which covered inheritance, auctions (including slaves), sales and even postage. City states could also levy local taxes, and the Roman Empire also permitted licences for religious taxes.
This brings us, neatly enough, to the Gospel of Matthew. And here, it always pays to ask, where does this encounter take place, who was present, what was at stake, and why does it matter? Here, we need to do some geography having done some maths. And the first question is, where is Jesus from?
The answer is, though born in Bethlehem where Joseph is registering for Poll Tax, Jesus is in fact an ethnic Galilean and Nazarene. He came from Nazareth in Galilee, but his birth in Bethlehem is in Judea. This matters, because Galilee was not part of the Roman Empire. Jesus was Galilean. Galilee was, at the time, a kind of ‘client province’ of the Empire, and under the heel of Rome, but allowed to be ruled by the Herodian Dynasty.
Herod and his son, Herod Antipas were the client ‘kings’ in the lifetime of Jesus. They were effectively puppet rulers – tetrarchs – there to keep order on the edge of the Empire, and granted titles and freedoms in return for loyalty and obedience.
This is important, because when it comes to the trials of Jesus prior to his crucifixion, Pilate washes his hands of the affair because Jesus, as a Galilean, is not subject to Roman law or jurisdiction. Nor is Jesus subject to Judean law. Nor is Jesus subject to Galilean law, as his alleged crimes are committed in Roman territory – and they are not crimes under Roman or Galilean law. The Sadducees, Scribes and Pharisees want Jesus put on trial under Jewish law, but neither Herod or Pilate can oblige. The High Priests argue blasphemy should lead to the death penalty, but the only way to achieve that end was to avoid a trial altogether, and judge and condemn Jesus without due legal process. That is what happens. Remember Caiaphas’ words: “what need have we of witnesses?!”. Caiaphas does not think Jesus should have a legal process, because were that to happen, he’d be acquitted.
I raise this here, because you might think Jesus is “rendered to Caesar” in the false accusation and mock-trials he undergoes. But the phrase “render unto Caesar what is Caesar, and to God what belongs to God” is not only about tax and money. It is about Jesus himself, and you and I, and the wider world. Jesus will be rendered to God – to whom he belongs. Lots will be cast for Jesus’ clothing, to be raffled by Caesar’s soldiers. What you have belongs to the world. You cannot take it with you. But you belong to God.
Jesus, of course, is no fool. He’s a consummate politician. The question he is asked is “shall we pay tribute to Caesar?. Jesus answers with a different verb, and states “Give back to Caesar the things of Caesar’s – and to God what belongs to God”. Jesus does not deal with paying tributes. In other words, the quizzers have answered their own question. The Herodians and Pharisees hey use and benefit from Caesar’s economy so that their tribute is not gift but simply what’s involved in that economy. That then fits with Solomon’s ‘All things are yours and of your own do we give you.’
This Question and Answer Session takes place in Jerusalem, so lots of monetary currencies are legitimate here. But what of the coin in this encounter? Please note that it is Jesus who asks to see a coin. The coin was not one pre-selected by his trickster-accusers, and it must have surprised his questioners that Jesus demanded to see the currency. A denarius is produced. But what else could it have been?
There are seven coins named in the New Testament. The value of coins lay in their weight as well as in size. Old English versions often translate the coinage as ‘pennies’ and ‘farthings’.
But the real history is more interesting. The lightest was the Lepton, usually known as the ‘Widow’s Mite’ (c.f., Mark 12:42, Luke 12:59; 21:2), and had the least value.
The Drachma, in contrast, was a sliver coin that was heavy enough to be a bridal dowry, and they would be passed from mother to daughter. The coin could not be spent commercially, but would have family, sentimental and actual value. It is this coin that is referred to in the Parable of the Lost Coin. It really is an extremely precious coin, akin to something like losing your mother’s wedding ring.
The Didrachma were smaller silver coins, and exchanged in the Temple, and equal in value to Shekels. But Jews were not permitted to use their own silver for coins under the treaty-terms with Rome. The Didrachma was minted in the city of Tyre – a gentile city – and the coin bore the head of Baal. So moneychangers in the Temple were needed, because a good Jew could not make an offering or Temple payment using a coin that bore the image of an idol and false God. Judas was paid his thirty pieces of silver in this coinage.
The Herodian dynasty had its own coinage; a kind of Royal Mint in Jerusalem which produced the silver Shekels that Jews could trade in. But there were few in circulation. Most people used Quadrans, Assarius and Denarius – which were like US dollars today; everybody had them. That was the currency of the Roman Empire, and it is that coin that Jesus holds in his hand, and asks whose image is to be seen.
Even here, there is some religious ambiguity. Is the image of Caesar that of a pagan ruler, false god or foreign idol? The Pharisees could have argued so. Is the image of Caesar that of a tyrant heading-up an illegal occupation of Judea? Herodians might argue that.
The entrapment that Jesus is contending with is therefore very sophisticated. Is he going to endorse Baal – the old, false god we find in the Old Testament? Is he going to endorse the new gods of Rome, or Caesar as a legitimate dictator? Is Jesus going to suggest a third-way, that incites economic and political rebellion? In fact, his answer avoids all these bear-traps. You give to God what belongs to God. You give to the authorities what belongs to the authorities.
Tellingly, in the gospel story that follows ‘render unto Caesar’, Jesus is questioned on who a wife belongs with at the resurrection if she has been married to each of the seven brothers in her earthly life? You might think this is a story about marital fidelity.
But it isn’t; this is about possession and ownership. The wife belongs to nobody in the end. Jesus does not regard the woman as a chattel to be inherited, possessed or divided up. She is, first and foremost, a woman. Matthew records, with characteristic understatement, that “hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together with others to plot and kill Jesus”.
Jesus, by evading the money-trap, also throws the question back to us. How are we meant to live? Jesus’ answer – or at least the one clear principle you can infer from the story – is that his followers are obliged to not only follow the law, but also to exceed the law.
The only laws Jesus ever actually resists are punitive religious codes. It is often assumed Jesus’ ministry embraced all-encompassing forgiveness and indiscriminate compassion. Yet we note the Gospels record no such sentiments directed by Jesus towards the religious leaders of his time, and who presided over a culture that systemically oppressed and abused others.
This collective group – Scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees and Chief Priests – were seen as agents of injustice protecting their powers and prestige. When the moneychangers are whipped in the Temple by Jesus, you can see something of the anger he harbours for religious hypocrisy and exploitation. It is a planned attack by Jesus too. He sees the corruption in the morning, and assaults later in the afternoon, after he has made a whip to drive out the moneychangers.
Arguing with Jesus must have been hard work 2,000 years ago. Not that I think it is any easier now, by the way. Jesus was alive to the social, political and economic ambivalence of his time. Herod’s alliance with Rome brought money, employment, trade and stability to Judea. It came at a price, however. The Roman symbol of the Golden Eagle had been erected directly outside the Temple, and as a symbol of foreign might and idolatry, would have been hard for religious hard-liners to stomach.
Herod’s taxes would not have been popular – but were any taxes ever popular? Herod used taxation for civic enterprise on the one hand. But yes, on the other hand, his expensive tastes for luxury imported goods and lavish entertaining were well-known, and deeply resented.
Ultimately, the message to us is this. Our true citizenship lies within God’s kingdom. We belong to God. So we give to earthly powers what is their due.
We have obligations as citizens to support others in our service of society. The services supported include the work of our education systems, social welfare, good government, law, order, police, fire and security. Even the Roman Empire provided roads, water, policing, and sometimes relief for the poor. We may not always agree on the type or extent of services our governments should provide, but we know that we are obliged to contribute to society in order to help of those who cannot help themselves.
So, render to Caesar what is Caesar’s. Render more to Caesar if you can, and exceed in your civic duty, and excel at being at being a good model citizen. Jesus raised protests against punitive religious laws; but he did not take issue with secular authorities.
So render to God what God requires of you. And if you can, exceed that too, as God’s own must. Go the extra mile. Give all you can. Remember the words of Brother Roger of Taize: “God will never ask too much of you…but he will demand everything…”.
Amen.