Sermon:
22nd Sunday after Pentecost Year A 16 October 2005
In the name of God, who calls us to
life. Amen.
Aaah, tricky questions!
Today’s Gospel reading shows Jesus grappling with some of the forces
that were lining up against him towards the end of his ministry. So that we can
get a better sense of what is happening in these encounters, I would like to
give a bit of structural background on where they fit in to the overall story of
Matthew’s Gospel.
The plot, if that’s the right word
for sacred text, of Matthew’s Gospel falls quite neatly into six parts. The
first 4 chapters (1:1 – 4:16) tell us about who Jesus is – this section
shows us how Jesus’ birth fitted into history and gives details of his
preparation for ministry. There are seemingly interminable genealogical tables,
the story of his conception and birth, the coming of the wise men, the flight of
the family into Egypt to escape massacre, the ministry of John the Baptist,
Jesus’ temptations in the wilderness and his entry into Galilee, ready to
begin his public ministry.
The next section (4:17 – 11:1) shows
how Jesus is the Messiah, the long awaited fulfilment of God’s promise to the
Jews. It does this through recounting his words and deeds in ways which would
show how his teaching and actions fitted in to Jewish expectations. The third
section (11:2 – 16:20) draws a contrast between the growing faith of the
people who are following Jesus and the growing hostility of Jesus’ opponents.
Both these sections deal with Jesus’ ministry in Galilee. In the next section,
we hear about the journey to Jerusalem (16:21 – 20:34). The emphasis in this
section is strongly on building up the community of faith. Jesus talks to his
disciples about what will happen to him, about the costs of discipleship and
about living together as church.
The fifth section of the Gospel –
the one from which today’s reading comes – deals with Jesus’ ministry in
Jerusalem (21: - 25:46). It is full of conflict between Jesus and the various
power factions of the time and shows the inexorable movement towards an ultimate
confrontation.
The sixth section (26:1 – 28:20)
tells the story of Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection.
The two stories contained within
today’s Gospel come form the time of his ministry in Jerusalem and belong in a
set of four stories, all of which highlight the way in which Jesus’ teaching
conflicted with accepted views of the time. Jesus’ reluctance to align himself
with any of the various religious or political parties of the time left him open
to attack from all sides. In
today’s two stories he is taken on by the Pharisees, the Herodians and the
Sadducees.
Let us look first at the question
about taxes. It was one of the hot issues of the day in Jerusalem – a bit like
IR reform today. Was it right for the Jewish people to pay taxes to the Roman
emperor?
And now for a bit of historical
background: when Herod the Great died in 4 B.C. the kingdom was divided among
his three sons. Paying taxes to Herod’s sons was no great problem because they
were Jews. Herod Antipas ruled Galilee, where Jesus started his ministry until
39 A. D.. Judea, the region where
Jerusalem is located, did not have such stability. Initially it was taken over
by Archelaus. However, after ruling for nine years Archelaus became so hated by
his subjects that the Roman emperor had to remove him in order to prevent a
revolt. In his place the emperor sent a Roman prefect to rule Judea and now he
collected the taxes --- hence the problem. Some of the most zealous Jews, such
as the Pharisees, refused to pay the taxes while others who benefited from the
Roman occupation were very much in favor of paying the Roman taxes. The
Herodians, as their name implies, were partisans of the ruling Roman family and
fitted solidly into this group.
And so we find two very strange
bedfellows in this story. Only a major external threat could possibly have
brought together such opposing groups as the Pharisees, deeply pious and
religious purists that they were, and the Herodians. (I will refrain from
drawing comparisons with the Anglican Church in Australia where we have seen
similarly unlikely alliances between conservative evangelicals and conservative
Anglo-Catholics on a number of issues.)
But here they thought they were on a
winner – here was the question that would bring this Galilean upstart into
disrepute and possibly even lead to his arrest.
A little smooth flattery and then in
for the kill: ‘Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor or not?’
If Jesus answered “No,” the Herodians, those who enjoyed
the benefits of Roman rule, would report him to the authorities as a traitor or
seditionist. If Jesus answered “Yes,” the Pharisees would have ample fuel to
discredit him among the people as a Roman sympathizer, a person unfaithful to
the faith of Israel.
It must have seemed to those who were
listening that there was no way out for Jesus. But he deals deftly with the
question, leaving his questioners amazed and with no response.
The second story in today’s reading
reminds me of the kind of questions that Year 6 RE classes always come up with.
In saying this I mean no disrespect to the Sadducees – it is, rather, a
reflection on the way in which these questions of life after death are central
to human life. The Sadducees did not believe in resurrection and they too had
constructed a question designed to trip Jesus up, a question they believed to be
unanswerable. Jesus, however, gives them short shrift, and makes them look
foolish by turning the issue on its head and accusing them of not having read
their Scriptures properly.
It is highly unlikely that Jesus won
himself any friends amongst the Pharisees, Herodians and Sadducees who had tried
to trap him. Public humiliation tends to alienate people rather than draw them
to you. On the other hand, he may have won over some people who saw the wisdom
of his responses and who despised the attempts to trap him. And for all those
who disliked the Pharisees, the Herodians and/or the Sadducees, his responses
would have been sweet indeed. Gotcha!
Many sermons, particularly stewardship
sermons, have been hung on this passage of Scripture. But I am reluctant to
attach this kind of weight to it. Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees and the
Herodians is a clever escape from a Catch 22 question, but it does not give any
clear guidance on what he might have meant, or on how he thought we should
balance out the demands of our temporal and spiritual lives. Just what is the
emperor’s and what is God’s?
The point of this section within the
Gospel is to highlight the confrontation between Jesus and various groupings. It
is part of the political and religious scene-setting for the crucifixion. If
this incident had been intended as teaching about stewardship, I suspect we
would have found it in the earlier section in the Gospel which deals with
Jesus’ teachings on the life of the community.
The question of how we balance our
lives, how we allocate our priorities, which responsibilities we take on and
which we avoid, is a live question for us, and one which we need to consider
prayerfully and in the light of scripture. But as we reflect on this question,
let’s not try to make this particular text say more than it does.
Amen.
Sarah Macneil, October 2005