Matthew 22:17, “Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar, or not?” KJV

Matthew 22:17: “Tell us therefore, how does it seem to you? Is it lawful to give the head tax to Caesar or not?” Aramaic Peshitta

I purchased some gas for my car yesterday and paid $3.98 a gallon.  Out of that I tithed .87 to the city, county, state and Federal government.  That is more than a 20% tithe. But I have no objection.  For this tithe goes to build and maintain the roads that I drive on, install the signs and traffic signals to control the traffic so I can get to my destination, plow the snow in the winter and lay salt on the ice and it helps to pay for the governmental guardians who would be the first on the scene if I had an accident and to make sure I got to the hospital and the rest of the traffic continues to flow. They would even entice a further tithe from me if I abused the privilege of using these roads.  For me the gasoline tax is one of the fairest taxes we have.  The more you drive and use the roads means the more gas you use and thus the more you pay to use the roads, if you never drive you are never asked to pay for the roads.  The only exceptions are these smug environmentalists who drive electric cars and I have to pay their way on the road while they look at me as if I were some environmental snob. If it wasn’t for my air polluting car buddy you would not have a road to drive your gas free car on and besides .26 of my .87 tithe goes to cleanup the environment.  So I say fine to thee.

In the King James Version which follows after the Greek text Jesus is asked if it is lawful to give kensos (tribute) to Caesar.  This question makes little sense as the Jews really had no objection to paying a tribute to Caesar, after all he maintained the Roman roads, a military presence that kept order in the streets and protected them from outside invasion. It was merely payment for services rendered.  Oh yeah, you had a few bleeding hearts who wanted complete independence but it was not as bad as we are led to believe today to have lived under Roman rule.  Above all, the Jews did not consider a tribute to be sinful. Usually, a tribute was paid by the local government to Rome.  In this case Judea was ruled by Rome and as such King Herod collected a tax and paid tribute to the Roman government.

It is a passage like this that leads me to believe the Gospels were written in Aramaic and later translated into Greek because the Aramaic word that is used is far more accurate from the historical and cultural context.  The Aramaic uses the word kespa which really refers to a head tax.  Now this makes more sense.  Under Roman rule all Roman citizens were forced to pay a head tax or what we would call a property tax. This included a tax on all your animals as well as you.  This tax was not supposed to be applied to non-Roman citizens.  Yet in Judah, which was under the control of Tiberius, such a tax was being forced upon the people.  Jesus came from Galilee which was not under Roman control and ruled by Antipas and such a tax was never an issue.  However, to pay a kespa as a personal tax on your own property was considered a declaration that you were submitting to the rule of the Tiberius unlike a tribute which was only to pay for the services the government offered.  Tiberius was considered a god and of course the Jews would swear no alliance to any God but Jehovah.  But did the Roman government really distinguish in the use of a tribute verses a kespa or head tax?  Of course not, it was all just thrown into the royal treasury.  When the rubber meets the road, it was a good religious excuse to get out of paying a person tax that others who had no property did not have to pay.

I mean when I pay a gasoline tax, I know where that money is going.  When I pay my income tax I have no idea if that money is going to aid victims of natural disasters or to purchase bombs.  I once had a pastor tell me that he had no problem cheating on his income tax because he was against war and he did not want his money going to purchase bombs.  Yet his few dollars were mixed in with the trillions in the US Treasury, you don’t know if your dollars are going to pay for a bomb or to feed the hungry.  I tend to think this pastor was looking for a noble excuse to not pay his income tax. Why not simply say, “Lord, in my heart I am designating my portion in foreign aid to Israel or to help those who suffer from natural disaster.”

I mean really, the whole thing is crazy when you try to cut the fine lines as to where your money goes if there is no specific designation like you have in property tax or gas tax,  so too in Judea during the time of Christ.  To say a tribute was ok because the king paid it and it was for services of the Roman government but to pay an individual tax to the Roman government which went to pay the same services was a sign of subjection to a false god and idolatry is getting a little persnickety. Jesus thought so too.  There was nothing in the Torah that forbids the paying of tribute or a head tax, it was just tradition that forbids it.  Just as there is nothing in the Bible that forbids dancing or going to movies, but our fundamentalist Christian tradition took the passage that we are not to conform to this world and tried to decide what things we could do that were conforming to the world and what was not and of course it was decided that dancing and movie theaters were of this world and thus were sinful. When television came out religious leaders got together again to decide if watching a movie that ran in theaters was sinful and if a movie that did not run in a theater was not sinful. This is the mindset that Jesus was addressing.   He was saying, “Come on, you can graze your sheep because Rome is protecting you from foreign invaders which would destroy your herds, they deserve to be paid a head tax for each sheep they protect.  You are not Roman citizens, you are not bowing down to Caesar you are only paying for services rendered.

But Jesus took it one step further, He asked one of the Pharisees to produce a coin and asked whose picture was on it.  The Pharisees stepped right into the net.  He pulled out a coin and said, Caesar’s.  Jesus didn’t have to say it, they all knew,  Jesus merely followed up with, pay Caesar for the services he provides for you.   You see the second commandment tells us we are not to make any graven image of anything that is in heaven above or the earth below that demands worship.  Caesar demanded to be worshipped as a god and this Pharisee was violating the second commandment by carrying a graven image of a god in his pouch.  That is Scripture, not one’s interpretation of the law or expansion of the law.

I remember listening to a pastor preach fervently against drinking, smoking, dancing and attending movies. He was death to them all. He also weighed 450 pounds and if you rode in a car he was driving you were taking your life in your own hands. Of course we all know that drinking, smoking, dancing and attending movies is far more sinful than overeating and reckless driving.  Right?