Sayings of Jesus: “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s”

There’s something of a pattern to the ways in which religious leaders sought to ‘catch Jesus out’ to ‘prove’ his deviancy from authentic Jewish faith, as they saw it through trick questions. We see three consecutive examples in Luke chapter 20 (including as the ‘meat in the sandwich’ the one we’ll be looking at here). We might wonder why Jesus was so regularly asked such questions. One of the challenges in having a ‘written constitution’ for beliefs and practices (which is kind of what Torah was) was the constant need for interpretations and applications of its 613 commandments (do this, don’t do that) in new situations. In particular, when Israel evolved from a nomadic people in the wilderness—the context in which Torah was given—to a settled people in cities, towns, and villages, where the questions as to what faithfulness to the commandments looked like were different. Different rabbis were always being asked for their interpretations (and as with biblical interpretation today, unhelpfully for the ordinary person, they varied).

Ostensibly, this was the case—notwithstanding the questioners’ sinister motives—in the story we’re looking at here, which was driven by Israel being occupied by the Roman legions (since 6 CE) and their heavy taxing of the local population in line with their practices throughout the Roman Empire. The Jewish resentment was aggravated by those taxes being collected for the Romans by tax collectors who were fellow-Jews: collaborators with the occupying forces. People were so disgusted by these ‘traitors’ that when the religious leaders were searching for the worst insults they could throw against Jesus, they came up with ‘demon-possessed’, ‘a Samaritan’, and ‘a friend of tax-collectors’.

The story behind the headline here reflects that background. Very similar versions are found in Matthew 22, Mark 12, and here, in Luke 20:

Keeping a close watch on him, they [the teachers of the law and chief priests] sent spies, who pretended to be sincere. They hoped to catch Jesus in something he said, so that they might hand him over to the power and authority of the governor. So the spies questioned him: ‘Teacher, we know that you speak and teach what is right, and that you do not show partiality but teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?’

He saw through their duplicity and said to them, ‘Show me a denarius. Whose image and inscription are on it?’

‘Caesar’s,’ they replied.

He said to them, ‘Then give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.’

They were unable to trap him in what he had said there in public. And astonished by his answer, they became silent.

I’m slightly surprised that ‘the spies’ didn’t respond by accusing Jesus of ‘trying to be clever’ or ‘not answering the question’ (which he really didn’t—they had posed it as an ‘either-or’, but he wisely did a swerve around that). It was a great answer, but the reason it was great is not least because of the inherent ambiguity in how it was supposed to be heard in relation to the question.

If Jesus answered with a ‘yes’, he would be accused of collaborating with the pagan Roman occupying forces and endorsing the punitive taxes extracted against the local population. This would discredit him as a true son of Israel. Indeed, the way the question is framed here is goading Jesus to affirm what they called “the way of God in accordance with the truth.” If he answered with a ‘no’, though, he would be accused of inciting rebellion against the governing authorities and subject to arrest and criminal charges. He might well be executed, which would conveniently absolve the religious leaders from blame (the Romans would have done their dirty work for them). These ‘no win’—‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’—options were no doubt in the questioners’ minds and in Jesus’ mind.    

Jesus’ answer was ambiguous because language like “giving back to Caesar what is Caesar’s” implies the Roman taxes were valid. Caesar’s image is on the coins, thus indicating ownership (Caesar being entitled to what is already his). And yet, by adding an extra dimension to the question, Jesus metaphorically muddies the waters against a straight either-or response: God also has ownership claims that equally need to be recognised: “Giving back to God what is God’s” also needs to happen. The implication is that they ought not to be addressing the one without concurrently addressing the other. The ambiguity lies in what Jesus has in mind by that second element—and how it relates to those Roman taxes.    

The irony that will not have been lost on anyone when Jesus said what he said is that all of those present would have had denarii in their pockets or purses, using them every day for buying and selling, so they were immersed in the Roman economic system under Caesar already. The question was in effect inviting Jesus to declare himself against one high-profile aspect of the monetary system that didn’t suit them while ignoring the rest of it that did.

Moreover, those coins not only bore Caesar’s image but also an inscription that declared his claim to divine sonship status. Hence, those questioning Jesus were already happily carrying around what amounted to a pagan idol. Might Jesus be quietly exposing the double-standards of those questioning him: metaphorically straining at gnats while swallowing camels (in the imagery of Matthew 23:24)?

The 64,000 denarii question is what Jesus had in mind by “giving back to God what is God’s.” Given his image-on-the-coin criterion for determining what was Caesar’s, it’s unlikely he had in mind something purely monetary, like a tithe or temple tax.

So in what context do we see God’s ‘image and inscription’ referenced in a parallel way? People; who are ‘made in the image of God’ (per Genesis 1:27). People who bear his image and inscription. Caesar may have ownership claims to money, but God has ownership claims to people.

Hebrews 1:3 speak of Jesus as (depending on the version) the ‘exact imprint,’ ‘imprinted with God’s image,’ or ‘the very stamp of his nature’. The Greek word here (charaktēr) derives from an instrument used for engraving or impressing (stamping) an image onto a coin or a wax seal. The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges says:

“This Epistle (Hebrews) has so many resemblances to Philo that the word may have been suggested by a passage in which Philo compares man to a coin which has been stamped by the Logos with the being and type of God; and in that passage the word seems to bear this unusual sense of a ‘stamping-tool,’ for it impresses a man with the mark of God.”

[Philo was a Greek-speaking first-century Jewish writer who lived in Alexandria]

The reason that the second commandment (Exodus 20:4; Deuteronomy 5:8) forbids making images of God probably has two aspects: one is to avoid people wittingly or otherwise worshipping the image rather than the reality (idols were believed to carry with them the life essence, or presence, of the god) and two is, because the only valid image of God is people. We were created to be his exclusive image—not in any sense to be worshipped, of course, but in reflecting and representing him to the world. The New Testament Greek word for ‘image’ is eikon, from which we get our word ‘icon’ (a religious image or idol).