Tuesday in the Ninth Week of Ordinary Time, June 2, 2020

Mark 12:13-17

Some Pharisees and Herodians were sent to Jesus to ensnare him in his speech. They came and said to him, “Teacher, we know that you are a truthful man and that you are not concerned with anyone’s opinion. You do not regard a person’s status but teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not? Should we pay or should we not pay?” Knowing their hypocrisy he said to them, “Why are you testing me? Bring me a denarius to look at.” They brought one to him and he said to them, “Whose image and inscription is this?” They replied to him, “Caesar’s.” So Jesus said to them, “Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” They were utterly amazed at him.

The Pharisees arose in the years before the birth of the Lord Jesus, opposing the trend among the Jews to adopt Greek customs, and also opposing the Sadducees, who made up most of the temple priesthood, and who favored the adoption of Greek customs.  In order to get rid of the Sadducees, the Pharisees brought the Roman general Pompey to Jerusalem and opened the city’s gates to him and his army, thus delivering Israel into the hands of the Romans.  The Herodians, mentioned in this Gospel reading, were supporters of the local Judean rulers set up by the Romans.  In the time of Jesus, they supported the ethnarch Herod Antipas, the son of King Herod the Great.  Both the Pharisees and the Herodians were beholden to the Romans.

The question of the paying of the tax divided the Jews.  Most paid it reluctantly, but the Zealots did not.  The Pharisees and Herodians, evidently feeling threatened by Jesus, seem to assume that he would advocate against paying the tax.  This might indicate that they suspected him of being a Zealot, or that he led another revolutionary party.  If they can catch him speaking against the tax, they could drag him before the Roman procurator with a charge of sedition.  The Lord shows up the importance they give to politics, demonstrating the trivial nature of worldly politics, contrasting it with the eternal rule of God.  He says, “Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.”  His teaching, though, begs the question: What belongs to God?  The Lord essentially forces his questioners to answer a much larger question — one with potentially eternal consequences.  Of course, everything belongs to God.  To act as though a mortal man’s image or signature on an object makes him its absolute owner, is foolish.  We have what we have because God shares it with us.  All belongs to him: the existence of all people and things is due to his will and power, as is the conservancy of all people and things in their existence.

We who are baptized belong to God through an act of our will, as well.  When, through pride or some other vice, we try to assert ourselves (by stealing, murdering, fornication, and so on).  It is necessary for our happiness here and hereafter to act as though we are ever conscious of our commitment to God to be his.