Fr. Prior Simon
Today we get a very entertaining passage from Matthew's Gospel, short but full of tension and drama, sarcasm and wit. It all happens after Our Lord's triumphal entry into Jerusalem and the cleansing of the Temple. Riding on the wave of popular support, as it were, Jesus has swept right into what was the very centre of political power and religious devotion for the Jewish people. Surrounded by largely admiring crowds (who suspect and hope that he might be the long-awaited Messiah), he has implicitly claimed for himself a place among the mighty and the powerful of the day - or even above them. He is standing in the Temple, preaching on his own authority, without supporting references, footnotes and permissions from the established authorities. Needless to say, the latter don't like it at all. They are jealous and they fear that he might cause trouble. What is more, Jesus has just delivered a series of parables clearly aimed at their main parties and groupings, as if deliberately stirring up the hive. Now he is cleverly dodging one attack after another, while the crowds watch and listen. Enjoy the show while it lasts, because we know what happens next: the waters of popular support will soon subside, Jesus will be left alone surrounded by the bad guys and they will get him in the end. But for now let us admire his dribbling skills, as it were. Leo Messi on his own against whole teams of players, scoring one spectacular goal after another. And these are rugby players not footballers, men hardly interested in the ball, they just want to catch their opponent and tackle him to the ground. Yet time and again they fail and fall flat on the ground, empty-handed. How funny.
“Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” This is a trap, of course. The denarius had a graven image of the Emperor Tiberius on it, and an inscription which proclaimed the said Tiberius to be son of the divine Caesar Augustus. The tax in question was the imperial poll tax, introduced some 25 years before, when Judea fell under the direct rule from Rome. The tax was low, but had to be paid in Roman coinage, and was based on an imperial census – another “no-no” as far as the Jewish Law was concerned – and therefore became the symbol of Roman oppression. Its annual collection often sparked riots in Judea. The Essenes, a Jewish sect associated with John the Baptist and many of Jesus' own disciples, refused to use or even to carry this coin, preferring to live on the fringes of society. The crowds surrounding Jesus when he was being questioned would have been mostly anti-Roman. The Herodians, on the other hand, were a group of collaborators, with connections in high places. Jesus faced being arrested for inciting anti-Roman sentiments, or else losing the support of the crowd, which would have left him helpless in the face of the Jewish religious authorities. But he gave a clever answer, dribbled pass them, scored a goal, and thereby bought himself a little more time on top.
Yet, entertaining as it might be, this is a very superficial reading of our passage. There are layers and layers of meaning below the simple answer: “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's”. Some of these layers are familiar to us. Beginning at least with Tertullian, the Church has read Our Lord's words in the light of the account of creation in Genesis. If a denarius was minted by the Romans and bore the image of their emperor, then God's coin is man himself. After all, “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them”. Every kingdom collects taxes to preserve itself, and to fund whatever it provides in return – security, infrastructure, the rule of law, opportunities for trade and personal advancement. Yet, in spite of its idolatry and violence, it would be a mistake to think that the Roman Empire directly threatened God's kingdom on earth. That would imply that the two exist on the same plane. Like it or not then, if you happen to live within the Roman Empire, it's certainly no sin to pay imperial taxes. God's kingdom has a different coinage and a different way of collecting its dues, and it promises different benefits to those who want to be its citizens. This is something to think about. Do not presume that you have paid your dues to God by just giving him a small part of your life, while keeping the rest to yourself. God lays claim to the entire person. Those chosen by him should bear his image and likeness and spread it around, they should make his kingdom, his power, visible throughout the world.
Origen introduced an interesting twist to this by linking Our Lord's answer with a famous passage from St Paul's Letter to the Philippians. In the beginning man was God's coin on earth, but then he fell from grace and sin obscured the image of God engraved on him. The currency became useless for dealing with God, the created world stopped paying its heavenly taxes and lost all the benefits. God's kingdom withdrew from us. But then the Only-begotten Son, the perfect Image himself, the original pattern, “emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men”. In other words, in Adam the form of man lost the image of God through sin, and all exchange between God and humanity ceased. But then in Christ the original Image himself took on the form of man, and saved it from pointless existence.
By looking at Jesus, especially in the Eucharist, we can finally see again what God is like, imitate it and thus become the currency in God's own kingdom, circulate around the world (make profit, bear fruit) thereby making that kingdom known and present, even to those who don't believe. There is then also irony in today's Gospel passage. The Pharisees, the Herodians and the Sadducees will in fact soon render to God what belongs to God - by handing Jesus over to the Romans to be crucified. He forgave them from the Cross, for they knew not what they were doing, just as he forgave us. Through Him and with Him and in Him, we have paid all our dues to God. The thing to do now is to remain with Him and in Him at all costs, for he is the only mediator between God and man. And it's only through Him that we belong to God, who will collect us from the world when the time comes.