1. It’s interesting how this passage is almost universally ignored by modern western Christians discussing citizens’ obligations to their civil magistrates. Instead, we almost universally jump immediately to the passage where Jesus teaches us to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. Is this behaviour evidence of submitting to Scripture or is this “selective listening” evidence of forcing Scripture to fit predetermined beliefs that need to be challenged? Most of us also have a perverse interpretation of what it means to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s because we act as though Caesar has a right to everything that he demands.

It’s a natural human tendency to avoid conflict, so maybe our starting point is a sinful commitment to not rocking the boat, and we’re just happy to have found a Bible passage that – with the blessing of most of our religious leaders – allows us to put a (very thin) veneer of spirituality over this sinful attitude. Matthew 17:24-27 peels that veneer away.

2. Jesus said: “From whom do the kings of the earth take customs or taxes, from their sons or from strangers?” Peter answered: “From strangers.”

At one time, it was broadly recognized that taxation was a form of subjugation and oppression, so kings didn’t require it of their children. (In some cultures, civil magistrates first sought to extract more from peoples they subjugated than from their own citizens.) Jesus could use that broad-based conviction as a starting point to teach a lesson. (His lesson was not that this was a sinful notion of the tax.) This passage is a reference to a “temple tax.” (There is much about the historical context that is of interest, but that we won’t address here.) The giving of the tithe – God’s tax – is an expression of subjugation to God, of submission to His Lordship. The Bible says we are either slaves of God or slaves of the devil. This is why refusal to pay the 10% tithe is an act of rebellion and defiance against God – a declaration of one’s autonomy.

3. Since taxation is an expression of subordination, it is a tool of subjugation and oppression when excessive. Saying so is a Biblical assertion, not necessarily an expression of disgruntled “Tea Party” activism. Christians today have many different ideas of the legitimate role and size of the civil government. We could probably eliminate over 90% of the arguments among today’s western Christians simply by affirming the clear Biblical teaching that taxation of 10% or more is oppression. How much of the civil government’s current activity could be maintained if taxation was rolled back to 10%? (We would already roll back the civil magistrate’s activity significantly if we criminalized his financial rape and pillage of our children and grandchildren by terminating government debt and deficit financing.)

Also 10% is all God asks, so a state that demands more than 10% is demanding greater subordination and allegiance from us than they want us to give to God. Christians who tolerate and even support taxation of more than 10% are, therefore, embracing idolatry and oppression. Caesar is demanding more than is lawfully his – if we understand law firstly as God’s law rather than whatever law Caesar seeks to impose on us. And 10% is the cap for all levels of government. (It should be collected by local governments, who are then responsible to allocate a portion to provincial and central governments.) Christians may disagree with a 10% tax cap but, by doing so, they are replacing God’s revealed infallible with their own fallible and dubious opinions. If deny the reliability of God’s law-word in such areas where the ethics can be evaluated by all men, why would people trust our claims that it’s reliable on matters of faith and redemption?

4. Jesus said, “Nevertheless, lest we offend them, …”

This doesn’t sound like the language of someone who is enthusiastic about paying the tax and, therefore, showing willful submission to the civil authorities. It sounds more like a decision that this was not a battle Jesus wanted to fight at the time; It was a hill He wasn’t willing to die on; a battle He wasn’t prepared to fight. Perhaps the most important point to make is that Jesus did not owe allegiance to anybody. That seems to be His point when He says to Peter, “‘Then the sons are free. Nevertheless, …” Jesus was King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He was not subordinate to any civil or ecclesiastical magistrate. “But to avoid offence…”. Jesus was the God-man. He had a human role to play, and he honoured that responsibility. Interestingly, however, he did not take the tax money out of His own wealth, or the wealth or donations of those supporting Him; He used “found” money. He produced extra money from an unexpected source, using His divine power. Perhaps this was to make the point of His sovereignty and lordship to His disciples.

We might also call Jesus’ actions obedience to the letter of the law, but not to the spirit of the law. Putting it that way puts us on touchy ground when it comes to the superficial, one-dimensional thinking of modern Western Christians about submission to our civil authorities. We are told that the correct respectful attitude we are to exhibit to civil authorities is one of willing obedience and subordination. And that’s often taught as the sum total of our responsibility to civil governors. Talk about a stilted, anti-Biblical mentality, a mentality that can only be sustained through a very selective use of Scripture. In fact it was the deadly humanist, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who said: “As long as private citizens have the power to resist the force of the executive, they will think they have the right to do so; and as long as they wage petty wars against each other, how can the state live in peace?”

I wrote in a recent ChristianGovernance eletter about the Biblical teaching on lesser magistrates and the legitimacy of their role in advancing justice by resisting corruption by other civil governors. This is a key aspect of a robust Biblical understanding of civil government. The modern western Church needs to rediscover this kind of vital truth. Cornelis Van Dam, a retired professor from the Canadian Reformed Theological Seminary in Hamilton, Ontario, recently published “God and Government,” and in the first chapter of that book, he also discusses this principle of lesser magistrates. I hope to bring you those few paragraphs where he discusses this teaching in a subsequent issue of our eletter.

He notes that, for those of us who are Presbyterian, we have John Knox as a more recent patriarch, a powerful leader who even advocated resistance by non-magistrates against tyranny: “John Knox went further than Calvin. In his view, if the nobles did not act against an unfaithful ruler, then the common people could do so.” Perhaps he was wrong, but Christians who disagree, should demonstrate ourselves to be at least as serious students of the Bible as Knox was. We should avoid being reactionary with a chronological snobbery that assumes we know better because we have the benefit of all kinds of subsequent theological study (much of which may have been coloured sinfully by the pervasive Rationalism and Humanism that surrounds us). Presbyterianism owes a great deal to John Knox and even conservative Presbyterians should be taking that legacy more seriously in our day.

Why is all this important?

Jesus talks far more about His Kingdom than He does about “personal salvation”, “justification”, “being born again”, “four spiritual laws,” and the like. Jesus was building a Kingdom, and He began on this earth. He began His public ministry, saying the Kingdom of God is at hand. His Kingdom is not OF this world, but it is IN this world. It extends into eternity, but we are to be involved in building it now, on earth, in history. Nobody has seriously read Jesus in the Gospels if they don’t understand this. The ethic of the Kingdom is humility. Ethically, it’s an “upside-down” Kingdom – or right-side-up Kingdom – when contrasted with the kingdoms of this world, and we need to see ourselves first and foremost as Kingdom citizens. When we do, it will revolutionize our thinking Biblically. This will include our thinking about issues like allegiance and subordination as discussed here. This will help to provide the kind of paradigms and clarity on the issues discussed here regarding the relationship of citizens to their civil magistrates. Christians are citizens or subjects of two kingdoms, and our primary allegiance is to Christ’s Kingdom and, therefore, to Christ as King.

What does it really mean to live primarily as a subject of King Jesus?