How did Jesus escape the questioners' trap in the "Render to Caesar" incident?

[Joel]

It seems any interpretation of the passage needs to at least answer the following two questions:
1) What was the trap set by the question? ("plotted to entrap him")
2) How did Jesus escape/avoid the trap? ("they were amazed; and they left him and went away")


According to a common interpretation that I've heard, the dilemma was between answering "don't pay your taxes" and being handed over to the Romans, or answering "pay your taxes" and having the populous and/or followers upset and reject Jesus. So whichever Jesus chose, they would cry, "Gotcha!" And then Jesus' answer is commonly interpreted as being equivalent to "Pay the taxes." But if Jesus just picked the latter fork of the dilemma, why didn't the questioners clap their hands and say, "Aha! Gotcha."? Why instead were they silenced in amazement and simply left? This interpretation isn't a satisfying answer to my two questions. There were other incidents in the Gospels where Jesus is asked a question where either answer is a gotcha, and Jesus cleverly avoids the trap. So what is it here?

I have some ideas for answers to these questions, but I'd like to see what other people think first.



Some possibly related issues:

I find it interesting that the question is not whether paying taxes is required, but whether it is even permitted ("lawful").

A third question that may need to be answered in conjunction with the first two:
3) What was the questioners' hypocrisy?

What was the purpose of the questioners' praise of Jesus before posing the question?

[One Bad Pig]

I believe it has to do with the 'graven image' of the emperor on the coin. In Pharisaic understanding, it seems to have been a violation of the Second Commandment. In order to pay the taxes, one would need to use the offending coins. In demonstrating that they also had the coins, he caught out their hypocrisy.

The (false) praise of Jesus was IMO intended to make him feel important, so he would be more inclined to answer.

[Sparko]

I believe it has to do with the 'graven image' of the emperor on the coin. In Pharisaic understanding, it seems to have been a violation of the Second Commandment. In order to pay the taxes, one would need to use the offending coins. In demonstrating that they also had the coins, he caught out their hypocrisy.

The (false) praise of Jesus was IMO intended to make him feel important, so he would be more inclined to answer.

I think the trap was that they wanted Jesus to say that paying taxes was something to be avoided, that he would be giving what should be given to God to the Romans, so they could turn him over to the Romans for promoting rebellion.

[KingsGambit]

Another important verse here that is debated is Luke 23:2. Many scholars believe this is evidence that Jesus did oppose the paying of taxes. Citing the passage discussed above, conservative scholars conclude that this must be a false accusation. However, this seems like a facile dismissal; there very likely was a kernel of basis for this accusation, even if the assembly was lying in their accusations of Jesus.

[Joel]

I believe it has to do with the 'graven image' of the emperor on the coin. In Pharisaic understanding, it seems to have been a violation of the Second Commandment. In order to pay the taxes, one would need to use the offending coins. In demonstrating that they also had the coins, he caught out their hypocrisy.

I have seen that pointed out. The inscription on the denarius said that the emperor was divine. It was explicitly a graven image of a false god. While on the other hand the inscription they are supposed to carry around is from the law. The Shema (the Lord our God is one), right?

Was it legally an option to avoid paying the tax on the grounds that you don't have any denarii? Would the Romans have said, "Oh, okay, then. Never mind."?

I think the trap was that they wanted Jesus to say that paying taxes was something to be avoided, that he would be giving what should be given to God to the Romans, so they could turn him over to the Romans for promoting rebellion.

So one side of the trap is arresting Jesus. What was the other side of the trap? Is it that he would appear to be teaching contrary to the law by "giving what should be given to God to the Romans"? If so, and if Jesus' answer is to pay the tax, then why didn't the questioners respond, as they surely had planned to, with, "Gotcha. Look everyone, this guy is teaching contrary to the law!"? (And let's stone him as a false prophet?) Why were they instead amazed into silence?

Another important verse here that is debated is Luke 23:2. Many scholars believe this is evidence that Jesus did oppose the paying of taxes. Citing the passage discussed above, conservative scholars conclude that this must be a false accusation. However, this seems like a facile dismissal; there very likely was a kernel of basis for this accusation, even if the assembly was lying in their accusations of Jesus.

Yes, I've seen it argued that from Jesus' "Render unto God" answer, the questioners believed that Jesus did oppose paying the tax. Interesting, huh?

[One Bad Pig]

I have seen that pointed out. The inscription on the denarius said that the emperor was divine. It was explicitly a graven image of a false god. While on the other hand the inscription they are supposed to carry around is from the law. The Shema (the Lord our God is one), right?

I'm not sure they were required to carry any inscription around.

Was it legally an option to avoid paying the tax on the grounds that you don't have any denarii? Would the Romans have said, "Oh, okay, then. Never mind."?

Highly doubtful. Very likely the response would be "then go get some." Although given the Roman practice of hiring locals to do their tax collecting for them, I suppose the collectors might accept payment in kind.

[Joel]

I'm not sure they were required to carry any inscription around.

I guess my memory mixed up some parts of Deut 6:

[b]frontals [c]on your forehead. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

I was thinking of the requirement to bind the words on their hand.

Highly doubtful. Very likely the response would be "then go get some." Although given the Roman practice of hiring locals to do their tax collecting for them, I suppose the collectors might accept payment in kind.

So if the tax had to be paid regardless of possession of the coin, then possession of the coin seems to be not hypocrisy about paying the tax. It could still be that the hypocrisy has something to do with bearing an image of a false god.

[Obsidian]

Personally, I don't understand why there would be anything wrong with carrying around a pagan coin. So I don't think that's the solution to your question.

[KingsGambit]

Personally, I don't understand why there would be anything wrong with carrying around a pagan coin. So I don't think that's the solution to your question.

The issue isn't whether you would, the issue is whether the Pharisees would have had a problem with it.

[Joel]

Whatever is the dilemma, one possibility is that Jesus avoided the dilemma by not answering it. Jesus' answer technically doesn't answer the question, but re-frames the question in terms of asking what is Caesar's and what is God's.

Not answering the question is consistent with Jesus' response to other traps that questioners put to him in the Gospels. E.g. the woman caught in adultery, or by what authority Jesus does these things. Instead Jesus' practice is to pose a question to the questioners that reveals their own hypocrisy.

If Jesus' response was a challenge to the questioners, perhaps they then faced the same trap that they had intended for Jesus. Their hypocrisy may be that they were unwilling to answer the question they expected Jesus to answer. Or maybe that they had an answer but their actions were contrary to what they believed the answer to be.

[One Bad Pig]

Whatever is the dilemma, one possibility is that Jesus avoided the dilemma by not answering it. Jesus' answer technically doesn't answer the question, but re-frames the question in terms of asking what is Caesar's and what is God's.

Not answering the question is consistent with Jesus' response to other traps that questioners put to him in the Gospels. E.g. the woman caught in adultery, or by what authority Jesus does these things. Instead Jesus' practice is to pose a question to the questioners that reveals their own hypocrisy.

If Jesus' response was a challenge to the questioners, perhaps they then faced the same trap that they had intended for Jesus. Their hypocrisy may be that they were unwilling to answer the question they expected Jesus to answer. Or maybe that they had an answer but their actions were contrary to what they believed the answer to be.

Jesus may not have said, "pay taxes," but the implication that one should is obvious from his response. Don't let your libertarianism dictate how you interpret scripture.

[Christianbookworm]

Because He's Jesus!

Maybe the ambiguity of His response is the point? I read somewhere(don't remember what book) that there are several ways to interpret Jesus' statement being pro tax or anti tax or somewhere in between.

[Joel]

Jesus may not have said, "pay taxes," but the implication that one should is obvious from his response. Don't let your libertarianism dictate how you interpret scripture.

It's not obvious. I asked before that, if he obviously chose one of the horns of the dilemma, then why didn't they say "Gotcha"? Or if there was no dilemma (there was an obvious way out), how did they expect to entrap him?

Also, I assume the implication you draw is from the image and inscription being Caesar's to the coin itself is Caesar's? But isn't that an equivocation on the term "Caesar's"? If I own a photograph of One Bad Pig, and we ask whose image is in the photo, we'd say One Bad Pig's. But if we ask who owns the photograph, the answer is that it is Joel's. We say without contradiction both One Bad Pig's and Joel's, because they don't have the same sense. It is "One Bad Pig's" not in the sense of ownership but only in the sense of it being a likeness of One Bad Pig. It's not true that you own everything with your name on it or everything with your likeness on it.

We said earlier that in the case of the denarius it's not only a likeness of someone but a purported graven image of a false god. So the implied teaching could be to have nothing to do with such an image. But that's not the same thing as "pay the tax" either. They could have satisfied that by simply not having any denarius. But we said that the legal requirement to pay the tax is presumably unaffected by whether they possessed any denarius.

Some people have thought that the obvious implication of Jesus' answer is that paying the tax is unlawful (and there is some evidence that the Pharisees thought that was the obvious implication). The consistent teaching of the Hebrew scriptures is that everything is God's. Presumably that is where the questioners' question comes from in the first place. Why would there be a question at all about whether paying the tax is unlawful unless there was some reason why at least some people thought that it was a violation of Mosaic law? Presumably the questioners thought that it was unlawful or at least thought that Jesus believed it to be so. It seems they wanted Jesus to say it out loud. Thus in the initial flattery, praising Jesus for teaching "the way of God in accordance with truth" and not in deference to anyone (e.g. the Romans).

[Obsidian]

Let's think about this for just a minute: Why in the world would it be sinful to pay taxes?

You really think Jesus was teaching that?

[Joel]

Let's think about this for just a minute: Why in the world would it be sinful to pay taxes?

You really think Jesus was teaching that?

If it is obviously crazy to think it was "unlawful" to pay taxes, then why would the questioners think they could entrap Jesus by asking whether it is unlawful to pay taxes?

If, on the other hand, you are asking about sinful for Christians today, I'm not arguing that Jesus taught that. I only raised the possibility (which I've seen argued before) that Jesus didn't answer the question that he was asked.

Some people do add the further premise that all is God's and nothing is Caesar's, in which case one might conclude that paying taxes is sinful. A counter might be that in another place in the Gospels (Matt 17), Jesus said that they were exempt from paying the temple tax, but he (through a miracle) paid it "so that we may not cause offense". Though we could also ask whether a temple tax is different from a tax to Caesar.