SteemChurch:"To Cesar What Is Cesar" ... Origin, Cause And Purpose Of The Popular Sentence

To Cesar what is Cesar ... Many often say as a way to express a need for balance on a specific issue. However, many do not know that this popular expression emerged for the first time from the mouth of Jesus; in a rather controversial situation in which he and the Pharisees debated the civil obligations of his people (the Jews) before the Romans.
According to the sacred scriptures, this response from Jesus provoked great admiration and respect; So impressed were his contenders, that they gave up trying to prove it with questions of words and arguments for a while.

It is an event that we find related in three of the four gospels; the discussion on whether or not to pay tax to the Roman state was something conjunctural at that time. Something that could be of little relevance in our time, but at that time; It implied that Jesus and his followers were placed on one of two diametrically opposed sides.

Source

The controversy according to the scriptures begins like this:

"Then the Pharisees left and consulted how to surprise him in a word. And his disciples sent him along with the Herodians, saying:

-Master, we know that you are a lover of the truth and that you teach truthfully the way of God, and you do not take care of anyone, because you do not look at the appearance of men. Tell us, then, what do you think? Is it permissible to pay tribute to Caesar, or not? "Matthew 22: 15-17
To Caesar what is Caesar's…
The main aspect to consider to understand the impact of these words of Jesus on his audience is to understand that Jesus was a Jew, and all Jews as well as their cities, sacred places, and fortified sites remained under the rule of the Roman Empire; who as a gesture of good will had allowed them to keep their customs, religion and a good part of their laws and system of government.

The Jews had a very complex legislative and religious system, which trying to abolish by the Romans would cause unnecessary war ... therefore cultural and religious domination was not a priority for Rome as was economic domination. So although there were all kinds of disagreements between the Jews and Romans, while these first will pay tributes (in Roman currency) to the latter, everything was fine.

The Promise of a Liberator

However, the Jews anxiously awaited the manifestation of a deliverer, a prophesied messiah (anointed one); that although he was right in front of their noses in the person of Jesus, they were not able to recognize. They were waiting for a man to come and give them freedom from Roman domination. And that not only that but that it undertook great campaigns of conquest on other nations; which would take them to recover all the territory that God had promised.

The Jews expected a man of the stature of David (as the prophecy would say would be called "son of David") or the likes of Joshua who was able to introduce them into the promised land and to conquer much of Canaan. A man with these interests; he would never stand on the Roman side, before he should show himself with a hostile attitude towards imperial domination; but Jesus was not that kind of leader ...

He seemed to focus on showing what the official Jewish religion was doing wrong ... and on announcing the kingdom of God in a totally different way than what had been heard so far.

Are you with the Jews or with the Romans? ...
This was the question that was basically on the table with the question asked of Jesus about the tribute to Caesar. Jesus had never been worried about the Roman occupation, and although his countrymen knew that he was a Jew, his lack of opposition to the Romans made him look like a traitor to the fatherland, on the contrary; if he said he did not agree to pay the tax that every Jewish citizen owed to the empire; I would be in open opposition and rebellion against Rome.

The latter was certainly convenient for the adversaries of Jesus, since it would force the Romans to get rid of him. As a precaution against the possibility of the uprising.

So the question about tribute in short was nothing other than forcing Jesus to assume a radical position. "You do not agree with the tributes" you are a nationalist in search of the opportunity to rise up against those who oppress us and dominate (osse the Romans).

Or, "you agree with the tributes"; You are a traitor to the fatherland, one more that is only waiting for your own benefit. And to see what he gets out of the sad situation of domination of his own people, not very different from the family of herodes; nor of the tax collectors of that moment.

Another important aspect to highlight was the religious perspective of both peoples ...

The Religious Disencounter
The differences between the Romans and Jews at the religious level were when they were quite disproportionate ...

The Jews were monotheistic worshipers of a single and true God, who was the epicenter of all their culture and religious life. There were then different types of sacrifices and days of celebration all related to something that the God "Jehovah" had done in the past; facts like the crossing of the Red Sea. Or the day when the angel of death in Egypt spared the lives of the firstborn of the Hebrews and not so with the Egyptians were grounds for celebration.

However, the Romans saw the religious universe totally different ... They were polytheists, and worshiped many gods, as required by their daily human activities. There was therefore a god of fertility, one of the navigators, one of the war .... A god for each occasion and an occasion for each god ... there were also demigods among which were "the emperors" who according to Roman culture were worthy of veneration and adoration, as many of them self proclaimed gods.

So for the Jewish people; Roman domination represented in a certain sense the constant risk of accepting their cultures and customs. According to which the "Cesar was god" and should be revered and worshiped as such.

Each thing in its place…
But Jesus, knowing their malice, told them:

-Why are you trying me, hypocrites? Show me the tribute currency.

They brought him a denarius. Then he asked them:

• Whose image is this and the inscription? Matthew 22: 18-20

The currency is the base of exchange in the economy of a country. And what Jesus with this question is showing them is that they "had already been dominated"; that is to say, they were not in a situation that allowed them to demand or aspire to liberties beyond those they enjoyed, had assumed the economic system of the Roman Empire; which had nothing to do with the worship of his God.

The biblical text continues saying:

They said: De Cesar.

And he said to them, Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God what belongs to God. Matthew 22:21

With this answer Jesus makes it clear that his kingdom is not based on taking by force what does not belong to him; that if the coins of the tribute are of the emperor, tributes must be paid to the emperor.

And to God (Jehovah) is the worship and worship of him as a Jew.

Jesus shows that all authority established in one way or another has been instituted by God; and that the existing circumstances are favorable or not. By God they have been allowed with a purpose ... Institutions must be respected and civil duties fulfilled; since not only both have been allowed by God; but also God himself (in the person of Jesus Christ) respect them.

To the emperor belong the tributes (taxes) and the currency but to God belongs full and total worship and veneration.

To Cesar what is of Cesar and to God what is God's.