Reflections on the Readings for Sunday, October 22, 2023
Exodus33:12-23; Psalm 99; 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10; Matthew 22:15-22
Israel of old had a providential view of history. When the enlightened Persian ruler Cyrus
conquered the Babylonians and released the Jews from their fifty years of captivity, the Jewish
people were convinced God had done it. In chapter 45 of Isaiah, the prophet goes so far as to
call Cyrus a “messiah,” an anointed one or Christ – the only non-Jewish King to be so designated
in the Scriptures. (Many Evangelicals in the USA use this verse to describe how Donald Trump,
so evidently lacking in Christian virtues, manifests by his actions that he is in fact the anointed
of God.) God subdues nations before Cyrus. God arms Cyrus even though he doesn’t know God
(Isaiah 45:1, 5).
It is admirable to be convinced that God is your protector by force of arms. It is also a little
naïve. Some 550 years after their deliverance from exile in Babylon, the Jews were once again
political prisoners – this time of the Romans. They had to pay taxes to their oppressors and
worse still use foreign coinage to do so. The coins carried the likeness of the reigning Caesar.
The Law of Moses, however, forbids graven images. The coins also carried wording which
ascribed divine status to Caesar – effectively a kind of blasphemy.
The zealot wing of the Pharisees was in favour of throwing off the yoke of Roman power by
armed revolt – under God, of course. The Pharisees favoured going more slowly and trusting
God to effect deliverance in his own good time. How would Jesus choose in this touchy religious
and political matter? What would be his attitude to coins that bore images of bowing to a
foreign power or to seeking freedom by violent means? That is the debate in Sunday’s gospel.
Jesus gave a calm and measured reply. If the coin is Caesar’s, give it back to him. That’s the
perfect solution for the Jews who in theory were contaminated by contact with these coins.
Then give to God what is God’s by right. Jesus’ hearers understood what this meant: your life,
your heart, your all.
People of every age have to make choices like this: between money and religious faith,
between violence and honour, between power and love. At one level the choices seem terribly
complex. At another, they are simplicity itself, as when Jesus says, “Give to God what is God’s.”
What is God’s that has to be given to him? Life is God’s. Love is God’s. A chance to grow your
crops or work at a job and raise your children and live and die in peace. All these are God’s
because they are yours.
The world is at least as beset by war and conflict in our day as it was in Jesus’ – probably more
so. The conflicts are terribly complex: self-determination, de-colonisation, competing political
and economic systems, religious and ethnic hatreds, the fact of international pride, the lure of
international markets. At another level the issues are as simple as can be. Will people live and
thrive, or will they be exterminated? Will God prevail and human life, or Caesar – money,
power, and death?
The world’s wars cost Canadians very little in a direct way. You can drive along Robertson Road
near Bells Corners in Ottawa and hardly notice the General Dynamics factory there among the
other buildings. The factory is part of Canada’s extensive production of war materiel. The
Robertson Road site produces ammunition and other materials for military and armed police
forces. War is so much a part of even our lives that we scarcely notice. Wars are not just
something that we do but something that we are.
When Jesus was challenged on taxes and coins of tribute, he was asked to take a side in a
political dispute. He refused to do so. He said to his questioners, “Serve God.” That is the
condition we are in this year of 2023. It is not a partisan issue or the preserve of remote
politicians. Of course we all want peace. Or do we? Would we accept the blow to our economy,
to our standing in the world, if we gave up the industries of war? What sort of price are we
willing to pay to live for peace? What conditions do we set on the lives of others?
Kevin+
Recent Comments