The Gospel of Mark shares this story with us about one of Christ’s most misunderstood teachings:
13 And they send unto him certain of the Pharisees and of the Herodians, to catch him in his words.
Mark 12
14 And when they were come, they say unto him, Master, we know that thou art true, and carest for no man: for thou regardest not the person of men, but teachest the way of God in truth: Is it lawful to give tribute to Cæsar, or not?
15 Shall we give, or shall we not give? But he, knowing their hypocrisy, said unto them, Why tempt ye me? bring me a penny, that I may see it.
16 And they brought it. And he saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription? And they said unto him, Cæsar’s.
17 And Jesus answering said unto them, Render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, and to God the things that are God’s. And they marvelled at him.
The phrase, “Render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” has been the favorite dictum of government authoritarians and statists (“state-ists”) for literal millennia now. And it is easy to see why, right” Divorced of its context it certainly sounds like Christ is teaching that it is lawful, that is in accordance with the Law of Moses and later Christian Gospel, to pay taxes and, by extension, submit to the authority of the State itself. It is certain that this view is exceedingly common among most Christians. But is it the most logical interpretation of the story? Does it accord with what we know of scriptural teachings and the historical context that Jesus was operating in? And if not, then what is a better interpretation of this and how should we apply it in our lives as His disciples in our relationship with the kingdoms of the world? Let’s dig into it.
The Classical Argument
So, what is the logic of the classic interpretation of these verses? Well, it goes something like this:
And everywhere we, more readily than all men, endeavour to pay to those appointed by you the taxes both ordinary and extraordinary, as we have been taught by Him; for at that time some came to Him and asked Him, if one ought to pay tribute to Cæsar; and He answered,
First Apology, Chapter 16Tell Me, whose image does the coin bear?And they said,Cæsar’s.And again He answered them,Render therefore to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.Whence to God alone we render worship, but in other things we gladly serve you, acknowledging you as kings and rulers of men, and praying that with your kingly power you be found to possess also sound judgment. But if you pay no regard to our prayers and frank explanations, we shall suffer no loss, since we believe (or rather, indeed, are persuaded) that every man will suffer punishment in eternal fire according to the merit of his deed, and will render account according to the power he has received from God, as Christ intimated when He said,To whom God has given more, of him shall more be required.Luke 12:48
Those are the words of Justin Martyr, one of the earliest and most influential Christian theologians of the post-Apostolic period, written around 155 AD. The First Apology was written to the Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius as an explanation of why Christianity wasn’t a threat to his power or the power of the Roman state. This context for Justin’s interpretation is important because it helps us to understand how he came to the conclusion he did. He was looking for anything from the teachings of Christ that might make it sound appealing to the Emperor with the hopes that he would declare it a legally accepted religion of the empire, which in turn would protect Christians from all manner of persecutions and dangers. He was trying to sell Christianity as a pro-State religion to the head of the most powerful empire in the Western world.
Is it difficult to see how this might have colored his interpretation of the text, why he needed to see it in a way that establishes the power of the State to tax people and the role of the Christian as being one who submits to and obeys the orders of those in power? To do anything else would be to put his entire objective in danger. So of course it is no surprise that he, and the many after him who also lived in absolutist and authoritarian states ran by autocrats and monarchs where concepts like the freedom of religion, personal liberty, and limited government were as realistic as unicorns and fairies are in our time, would interpret “render unto Caesar” as an injunction to obey their powerful and wealthy patrons and rulers? Of course not. But it also doesn’t mean it is the most correct interpretation of the scripture or its teachings. To discern what Christ is teaching here, lets return to the text and ask ourselves some very important questions about it.
What Belongs To Caesar?
It is important to know who came to lay the verbal trap they were hoping Christ would walk into by either supporting or opposing the paying of taxes to Rome. The Pharisees were the legalistic proponents of the not only the Law of Moses as recorded in the scriptures, but also the traditions which had developed around the Law over time and at least one sect of the group was violently opposed to the Roman tax system. On the other end of the spectrum from the Pharisees are the Herodians. The Herodians were the supporters of Herod the Great and his successors, whose authority as rulers depended on their having been appointed by their Roman masters. Thus, the Herodians were much more willing to support the Roman political system, including the system of taxation it forced upon its subjects. It seems that by coming together to test Jesus on His view of paying taxes to Rome they were hoping He would either endorse one of their positions or say something they could use against Him to discredit Him. So they ask Christ whether it is legal to pay taxes to Caesar. Here it is important that they aren’t talking about the laws of the state. The answer there is obviously in the affirmative. The Romans demand tribute in the form of taxes, therefore it is legal according to their laws to pay taxes to Caesar. When they ask the question of whether it is legal to pay taxes to Caesar they are asking if it is legal according to the Law of Moses. And the Savior’s ability to teach the scriptural truth without falling into either camp, without springing their trap, is brilliant.
So, what is so brilliant about Christ’s response? Well, let me ask you a question.
What belongs to God?
After all, Christ tells us to give to God all things that are His and to Caesar all things that belong to Caesar. In order to do this we need to answer the question of what belongs to God so that we can give everything that is His to Him and with whatever is left we can begin to determine what portion of that belongs to Caesar.
So, what belongs to God?
Let’s look at the scriptures to answer this question:
The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it; for he founded it on the seas and established it on the waters.
Psalm 24:1-2
To the Lord your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it.
Deuteronomy 10:14
I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens, for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills.
Psalms 50: 9-10
Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine.
Exodus 19:5
For the Lord is a great God,
Psalm 95: 3-5
And a great King above all gods,
In whose hand are the depths of the earth,
The peaks of the mountains are His also.
The sea is His, for it was He who made it,
And His hands formed the dry land.
The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of Hosts.
Haggai 2:8
I could go on, but I believe I’ve made my point. The scriptures teach that everything above the Earth, every single living creature or thing on the Earth, and everything within the Earth, including all its gold, silver, and other precious metals and stones -every single person, place, and thing along with all things that can even be thought of, that can be conceived – all of it belongs to God. So if we are to give to God all things that belong to God, that means we give Him everything. And once we have given God everything then what is left over to be given to Caesar/the governments of the world?
Nothing.
Not even the coin Jesus was holding as the metal of which the coin was made came from within the Earth and everything within and on the Earth belongs to God. And since even that coin belongs to God then what is left for us to render unto Caesar? What is left for us to give to the governments of the world once all things which belong to God have been given to Him?
Nothing.
This is what makes Jesus’s answer so brilliant and why the Pharisees and Herodians were so “amazed” when they heard it. Jesus knew that what He was saying could be taken two different ways based on the knowledge the hearer had of the scriptures and the revelations of God to His prophets. To the ignorant Romans, a group of people who not only were ignorant of the revelations of God but who could not even conceive of the idea of a God who ruled and owned all things and in their own religion taught that all creation was divided up among and owned by multiple gods, it sounded as if Christ was telling people to pay their taxes because the money they used had Caesar’s image on it and therefore it was his as he demanded. But to the Jews, to those people whom Christ had come to teach and whose conduct He was directing by His answer, to a people who were deeply knowledgeable of the scriptures and its teachings and who therefore understood that God owned all things, these people understood Jesus’s true message – that nothing belonged to Caesar and therefore they should give Caesar nothing, but that everything belonged to God so therefore they should give Him everything. And the fact that Christ had been able to teach the truth and escape their verbal trap so effectively and so subtly just absolutely blew the minds of the Pharisees and Herodians.
Taxation and Tribute to Caesar
The application of these truths to taxation is obvious. If nothing belongs to Caesar and we therefore have nothing to give him, then we have no moral obligation, or any obligation of any sort really, to pay taxes or tribute to him either, because that money he demands actually belongs to God and should therefore, according to Christ, be given to Him. This is the exact opposite of the traditional interpretation of this saying. By saying there is nothing that Caesar owns and therefore there was nothing that Caesar owned which to render to Caesar, the Lord Jesus Christ was effectively teaching His followers that they did not have to pay taxes to Caesar because after you’ve given everything to God then there is nothing left over with which to pay taxes to the government.
And, to be clear, the Pharisees clearly understood that this was exactly what Jesus was teaching. We know this because it is the exact crime they accused Him of committing when they brought Him to Pilate to be executed. Luke 23 records the Jewish leaders brings Christ before the Roman governor Marcus Pontius Pilate and the specific accusations they level against Christ that they knew would convince the Roman governor to execute Christ for treason. Here is what Luke records:
Then the whole body of them got up and brought Him before Pilate. And they began to accuse Him, saying, “We found this man misleading our nation and forbidding to pay taxes to Caesar, and saying that He Himself is Christ, a King.”
Luke 23:1-2 (NASB)
The Jewish leaders here aren’t lying in any of their accusations. Jesus was the Christ, the descendant of David and the true King of Israel. He taught truths that the leaders believed to be false and misleading. And He taught His people that they did not need to pay taxes to Caesar. The Jewish leaders, being versed in the scriptures and revelations of God, knew what Christ meant when He taught people to render to God everything that was His, and they knew this meant there would be nothing left -no wealth, no obedience, no authority – leftover to then be rendered to Caesar, which in turn meant that there would never be taxes to be paid. After everything has been given to God there is nothing to give to Caesar.
All of these truths combined could be made to sound like Christ was calling for insurrection against the State, which, in a way, He was. Though he promoted no violent revolution, His teachings were far more dangerous to the State than any rebel leader. Violent rebels merely challenged the ability of the Roman state to exert militaristic control over all its territory. Christ’s teaching, if accepted by all, even if simply by a large percentage, would undermine the very ideas that undergirded the concept of the State itself. As Christ told Pilate, His kingdom was not of the world, but that does not mean that it was not in the world. And as more people joined it and came to believe everything belonged to God and that everyone was their brother and sister whom they should always treat with love, mercy, and kindness then the whole program of the State and its rule through violence and power is completely overthrown, not through armed militancy but through humble submission to the Lord. Christ is as much the Master of Nonviolence and Civil Disobedience as He is the Master of the Universe.
The real question is why do so many Christians fail to understand Christ’s teaching about rendering unto Caesar. I can only come up with one reaosn. It is most likely because they start from a position of subservience to the government first and foremost and read that bias into the scriptures to justify their obedience to Caesar and their disobeying the teachings of Christ. To be fair, most people these days are taught in Caesar’s schools which spend a great deal of time indoctrinating people in obedience to the State first and foremost from their earliest childhood. People often conflate the “render unto Caesar” event with the time that Christ paid the temple tax as recorded in Matthew 17:24-27 and use the Him paying the temple tax as a justification for paying taxes to the State. But this is a very serious error. The “temple tax” was in fact an offering commanded by God, not a tax levied by government. As a result paying the temple tax is more akin to paying tithing than it is state mandated taxes. The lesson to be drawn from Christ paying the temple tax is that we should pay our offerings to God and His church, not that we should give our money to the government.
Special Application to Latter-day Saints
While these teachings apply to all those who follow Jesus Christ to any degree, it is of special importance to Latter-day Saints. This is because we aren’t only taught that everything belongs to God as Christ taught, but we are actively placed under covenant to God to give all our things to Him for the building of His kingdom in the temple. Because of the sacredness of the temple Endowment I will not be going into it in too much detail, but one aspect of it is directly applicable to the discussion of what we have to render to Caesar in the form of time, talents, or taxes. During the ceremony, after being instructed in the first symbol of the Melchizedek Priesthood everyone in the ceremony is placed under covenant to live the Law of Consecration. The ceremony explicitly explains that this means we are to consecrate, that is dedicated and give to the Lord, ourselves, all our time, talents, and everything we have to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to be use din the building of the earthly Kingdom of God and the establishment of the City of Zion.
Brother and Sisters, if we have covenanted to take everything we have, everything we are, and everything we ever will gain and give them to the Church for the building of God’s kingdom, then how on the Earth are we supposed to have anything left over to give to Caesar, to the government? To covenant to give our all to God and then turn around and give what we have to Caesar is to violate our covenant and to rob God. The only comfort I take in all this is that I do not pay taxes. Pay assumes I have the ability to choose to buy or not buy something and that either choice will be peacefully respected, such as when I choose to pay for clothes from Target, or Wal-Mart, or Old Navy, or Burlington, or Amazon, or wherever I choose. If I pay to purchase something form Target then Amazon doesn’t send its goons to my door to kidnap me, beat me, and imprison me. When your only choices are to give someone your money or they will beat you up, take everything you own, and lock you in a cage until you either submit or die then you aren’t paying for something – you’re being extorted, you’re being robbed.
So when the State seizes my wealth from me against my will then I am not paying taxes, I am not robbing God. I am striving to keep my covenants with the Lord and it is Caesar who is robbing God. And just as I am not responsible for what a mugger who steals my wallet does with his stolen wealth, I am not responsible for what those in power do with the wealth they stole from God, at least as long as I don’t give them my support and consent for their various forms of gross wickedness. I dedicate myself to serving God as best as I can and trust in the Lord who has promised that one day His justice will consume and end all the nations of the world when He holds them accountable for their evils. (See D&C 87:6) It is my work to serve God and have faith in His ultimate power. This I try to do. Still, I find myself looking at the corruption of the world, how it is full of violence, and think about how all of us could change so much of this if enough of us simply followed Christ’s direction to give everything we have to God and deprive Caesar -the State, the government- of the most important things he needs to continue to reign with blood and horror upon the Earth – our wealth and our obedience, which, like everything else, belong to God alone.