Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost Proper 24; October
19, 2014
Those of you who know me understand that I am a
believer in reading Sacred Scripture as real history; this means we have to
understand the historical context of the reading. This is especially true of today’s Gospel reading.
We are all familiar with the story of Christ being
confronted by the Pharisees and Herodians and Jesus’ classic dictum to them to,
“render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” To really understanding this story we must
know a little history of what was transpiring in Palestine in the first century
BCE.
Devout Jews, felt that according the book of Deuteronomy
homage to any but JWAY was blasphemy. The
Pharisees were the most conservative sect within the Jewish community and felt they
alone could correctly interpret the Torah. The Herodians on the other hand were followers
of Herod Antipas and had allegiance to the devine Caesar and felt him to be a
god.
The Pharisees joining the Herodians in confronting
Jesus was most peculiar to say the least.
Jesus must have presented both groups as a particular threat to their
belief system. Just how great a threat
was indicated by the Pharisees inviting the heathen Heridians into the temple;
a place so holy that only the ritually pure were allowed to enter. What is even more evidence of the duplicity
was the bringing of a denarius into the temple?
The denarius was a coin that had the likeness of Tiberius Caesar stamped
on the face of the coin referring to him as august and divine, a deity. The bringing such a blasphemous icon into the
holy of holies was unheard of.
Yet today’s Gospel tells us that this is what
happened. The reason for this
unprecedented behavior lies in the threat to temporal powers that Jesus’
represented. Christ upset the Pharisees
by making the simple but earth shaking revelation that the fulfillment of the
law as reveled in the Torah was, to love God with your whole being and love
your neighbor as yourself. The Herodians
were threatened by the implication that Jesus was going to upset society by
asserting that there was a God who was greater than the emperor. Both groups saw Jesus as a threat to their
belief system.
Posing the question as to whether it was lawful to
obey Roman law and pay taxes to a system that held that the human, Tiberius
Caesar, was a living god – which was a clear transgression against the laws as
delineated in the Torah Spefically the first and second commandments. Or conversely was it lawful to disobey Roman
law to withhold tax money which was demanded by Rome. In effect they were putting Jesus in the position of no
matter how he answered the question he was committing a crime punishable by
death. Imagine they were congratulating themselves on
getting rid of a major social gadfly.
Jesus’ answer to them was a response that avoided the
conflicting messages. “Render to Caesar
that which is Caesar’s and to God which is Gods.” This is a way of saying that his followers,
today’s Christians, must have a dual allegiance, to God and Government. It is only when issues of morality place one
in the position of having to make a choice between Gods will and government
mandate. The issue of taxes is in
reality mute. In all historical
governments, including today’s, we all pay taxes because we understand it takes
public money to pay for public works such as roads, police forces to protect
the citizenry, as well as the many services mandated by the citizenry. We may grumble but we pay the taxes.
The problem comes when we must make a moral judgment
regarding the actions of government.
These are personal judgments and Christians will fall an all sides of
any civil action that involves morality.
For instance what should the moral stance of our nation be toward the
current crises in Iraq and Syria? Or
what should the government’s role be with role be on same sex marriage? Should marijuana or other drugs be decriminalized? Christians will differ on appropriate
answers to questions such as these.
Jesus is telling us that we should be proactive in our governmental
actions and accept the morality of the issues at stake.
Jesus’ instruction to us in his answer to the question
posed by the Pharisees and Herodins is to be involved in governmental affairs
and act in ways that are appropriate to our sense of morality. It is important as we approach Election Day
that we keep in mind Jesus lesson from today’s Gospel. We can each in our own way express our
understanding of what our government represents with respect to our
understanding of the moral issues.
AMEN
