PART III

 

 

THE CHRISTIAN’S OBEDIENCE TO THE

STATE

 

Here, then, is the antithesis we must consider in the next chapters.  'Yes, of course, the Christian must be non‑violent in his private fife,' I shall be told, 'but as the State must secure respect for order and justice by compulsion, and as the Christian is also an obedient citizen, he is called on to support the State, and to use violence, if need be, in helping it to defend the nation against its enemies.  In short, the Christian must also obey the State.'

 

 

Chapter I

 

 

THE CHRISTIAN’S ATTITUDE TO THE STATE

 

I HAVE used the word 'State' only with some hesitation.  For one thing, the word is not in the Bible, and it is always dangerous to introduce into theology not only a word, but an idea with that word, an idea which is foreign to Biblical thought.  It may also be ambiguous, since there is little enough in common between the Israelite theocracy, the pagan Roman Empire, the Christian theocracy the men of the Reformation dreamed of, and the modem State, secularized and more or less totalitarian.

 

There is, however, a common denominator behind these widely varying forms of political organization: there have always been authorities who exercised the civil power over a given territory.  It is in this sense, then, that I have reluctantly decided to use the word State; but we must take good care here not to introduce into theology the pagan virus of a deified City.

 

1.  The Evidence of the New Testament

 

The first striking thing, when we approach the problem of the Christian's obedience to the political authorities, is the very small number of texts which can serve as a basis for such a study.  That in itself is significant.

 

(a) In the Gospels we find an allusion to the kings who 'exercised authority' over their peoples (Mark 10:42), two ambiguous texts about the payment of tribute to the Romans (Mark 12:13‑17; Matt.  17:24‑27), and the equally ambiguous answer which Jesus gave Pilate on the power He had received from on high (John 19:11).  And that is all.  For we have already seen that if in certain parables Jesus presents kings who exact tribute and punish, no normative conclusions can be drawn from such people, who are described as they are, not as they should be.  I shall be returning to these four Gospel texts later on.

 

(b) The evidence to be found in the Acts is extremely vague.  It is true that in it the apostles always keep a very respectful attitude towards the civil authorities, whether the Sanhedrin of Jerusalem

 

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(Acts 4:9; 7:2; 23:5) or the Roman authorities (Acts 24:3, 10).  Sometimes Paul does not hesitate to appeal to the latter for protection against the mob attacking him (Acts 23:17; 25:10‑12).  He proudly invokes his status as Roman citizen, one privileged under the law, to avoid unjust punishment (Acts 16:37; 21:39; 22:25).  But elsewhere the apostles do not seem to have been unduly concerned to respect these authorities' orders.  Peter and John openly Rout the Sanhedrin, who had forbidden them to preach the Gospel (Acts 4:29, 33; 5:42).  They even go so far as to proclaim frankly before the Sanhedrin that they will go on preaching Christ's name (Acts 4:19‑20).  Paul for his part seems to have maintained a very unrestrained attitude towards the local and Roman authorities he was continually coming up against in his missionary tours; and we should not forget that he was very often in prison.  But apart from the proud answer of Peter and John, 'We ought to obey God rather than men' (Acts 5:29), there is no precise indication in the Acts to throw light on our problem of the Christian's attitude to the State.

 

Let us note, however, that the proconsul Gallio refuses, as representative of the State, to pronounce on religious questions, so long as no crime has been committed against the public order (Acts 18:14­15).  This text appears to fit in well with the traditional theory of the separation of the two orders.  But why should the theologian consider Gallio's attitude as normative, when the Acts show us several other representatives of the political authorities whose attitude does not fit in with that theory nearly so well?  Let us see we do not choose in the Scriptures anything which corresponds to our preconceived ideas, while discreetly leaving on one side anything which contradicts them or simply does not corroborate them.  All one can say is that the author of the Acts may have seen Gallio's attitude as a model of political wisdom.  But it is equally possible that we in the twentieth century find it excellent because it agrees with our ideas, whereas it is reported here in a purely objective way without any apparent hint of approval.  Calvin, for instance, actually blames the proconsul for having stopped Paul making a defense, for speaking in mockery and disdain of God's law, and for not 'maintaining the pure service of God' by upholding the truth Paul was proclaiming.  For 'there is no greater absurdity than to leave the service of God to men's appetites.’[63]  In fact Calvin deplores Gallio's religious neutrality, which nowadays we tend to admire.  So we must be careful how we use this text, and not try to make it the basis for any sort of theory of the State.

 

 

 

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(c) It is in the Epistles that we find the most definite texts on the Christian's obedience to the political authorities, in particular the only one which is truly explicit and apparently categorical: Romans 13.  This will serve as a basis for my whole study, and so I shall not linger on it here.

 

In the first Epistle to Timothy Paul asks that prayers be made 'for kings and for all that are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty....  For God ...  win have all men to be saved, and to come into the knowledge of the truth' (2:2).  Barth, it is well known, has tried to find in this text the theological foundations of Law and the State‑which must maintain the order indispensable to human society and thus allow the Church to preach the Gospel.  Calvin had already expressed the idea in his own theological perspective: 'The magistrates are ordered of God for the guarding and preservation both of religion and public peace and honesty.'[64]

 

Paul also tells Titus to remind believers 'to be subject to the magistrates and the authorities, to obey, to be ready to every good work ...  (Titus 3: 1).  Even if the word 'obey' goes with 'the magistrates,' which is not certain, it would merely confirm that there is a general duty of obedience to the authorities.  Let us look more closely at what is implied in such a duty.

 

In the First Epistle of Peter (2:13‑17) there is a text which seems to be a commentary on Romans 13, and which does not otherwise bring in anything new: 'Submit yourself to every authority established among men, for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king as supreme; or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil‑doers and the praise of them that do well....  Honour the king.’  Calvin interprets 'sent by him' as 'sent by God,' though without justifying this interpretation; but even if we accept it, we still have only a new confirmation of the general duty of submission to the State; nothing about how far a Christian should submit.[65]

 

(d) The allusions to the Roman State in Revelations are strikingly different from those in the Epistles.  The Roman Empire is represented rather unflatteringly as a beast with ten horns and ten crowns, to whom 'the dragon gave his power and his seat and great authority.’  This beast has 'a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies,' he 'makes war with the saints,' but 'all that dwell upon the earth adore him .  .  .’  (Rev.  13, see also 17:8‑18).  Obviously the atmosphere here is quite different: the Roman Empire's persecution of Christians had

 

 

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reached its climax.  The author of Revelation therefore sees the State as a reality essentially hostile to the Church and the kingdom of Christ, the 'incarnation of the devil.'[66]  'For the (Christian) community realized that it was confronted by a State which claimed absolute power; so it could only consider that State as delivered over to demons.'[67]

 

This passage scarcely suggests that the Roman State received its power from God.  'It was given unto him,' says verse 7, 'to make war with the saints, and to overcome them; and power was given him over all tribes, and tongues, and nations.’  The context expressly reveals that this power and authority comes to 'the beast' from the dragon (v.  2); verse 6 speaks of his blasphemies, and verse 8 of the pagan worship of him.  If despite all this the State's authority is taken as coming from God, it is only a de facto authority granted by God's mysterious providence, not a de jure one legitimizing the State's activities.  The three other times 'it was given unto him' is used in verses 5 to 7, and the general use of this phrase in Johannine writings[68] makes it impossible to take the phrase at the beginning of verse 7 as meaning a de jure authority explicitly given by God.

 

So there are very few New Testament texts which might serve as basis for a theology of the State.  Doubtless it was so delicate and dangerous a subject, both for the readers and for the writers of the documents of primitive Christianity, that the latter did not dare express themselves freely.  We should remember that in Palestine, and in most of the countries referred to in the New Testament, men were living in an atmosphere of great bitterness and resentment because of the Roman occupation.  This was odiously cruel and universally detested.  The tragic dilemma between resistance and collaboration is latent everywhere in the Gospels[69] as in other books of the New Testament.  So because there are few texts on the 'political' question,[70] we should not conclude that the Christians of the primitive Church were not concerned with it.  It was certainly an important and painful question for them, especially as 'the primitive community was confronted by a State which set itself up in a religious sense, not merely an earthly and human one.[71]

 

It seems very likely that the texts favorable to the political authorities, particularly those in the epistles which so strongly recommend obedience to the magistrates and to the king‑that is, to Caesar­were written precisely in reaction against a tendency among Christians of that time to reject and despise those authorities.  'It can be seen from several passages,' says Calvin, 'that the apostles

 

 

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had great difficulty in keeping the people submissive and obedient to the magistrates and principalities.  For we all have a craving to rule, so nobody of his own accord becomes the subject of somebody else.  Many people thought that the publication of the Gospel brought such liberty for themselves that everyone could free himself from slavery.  Moreover, because they saw that the principalities and powers of the world were contrary to Christ, they easily came to think that these did not deserve to be honored.  For all the magistrates of that time were adversaries of Christ, and abused their authority.'[72]  Further on Calvin explains why Peter strangely puts 'the king' in the very last place of those who should be honored.  (I Peter 2:17): 'Yet he names the Emperor: all the more because this kind of domination was more odious than all the others, and the others were included in it.'[73] In these four texts, in fact, Paul and Peter were reacting against the anarchist tendencies of the Christians they were addressing; and this must be taken into account in order to appreciate properly the significance of their recommendations.

 

The Gospels, like the Epistles, were intended for wide diffusion through public reading during services; and so their writers may well have taken care to put in nothing that might displease the police authorities of the time, who were always on the look‑out for possible rebellion.[74]  When they spoke of the State, then, they might insist on Christians' positive duties towards it, and pass over in silence the complaints they had against it.  This is probably why the writers of the New Testament do not accuse Pilate of the crime of Christ's death; why the author of the Acts lays the blame at the door of 'the Jews', as if they alone were responsible for the difficulties the apostles met with, and to present the Romans as loyal protectors of those preaching the Gospel.  It is not by chance that Acts ends with words which sound somewhat one‑sided: Paul preaching at Rome 'in all freedom, no man forbidding him.'

 

Only Revelations shows us the State in a frankly gloomy and pejorative light.  But it does so in a very mysterious language, which would therefore be inaccessible to the profane; it is also a book which was clearly not intended for wide diffusion.  Yet it probably gives us a better picture of the first Christians' real attitude towards the empire and Caesar than do the recommendations of the Epistles, which may be slightly over‑officious.  Opposition to the worship of the Emperor and to the Roman State's religious pretensions exists throughout the New Testament: it appears in many discreet or indirect allusions revealing 'a line which, from indifference

 

 

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towards the State, must lead to an attitude consciously rejecting it.'[75]

 

Of course we must be content with the few texts we have, and take them as they are.  But just because they are so few I believe we should look at them in the context I have just described.  They have been juggled with too often, used too often as a repository for general laws, where in fact there are only admonitions to prudence and solemn warnings‑very circumstantial and couched in a language where words are most carefully weighed.  Even in Rom.  13 I find it mistaken to look for a calm, systematic summary of the relationship between Church and State.

 

2.  Texts on the State in the Gospels

 

In the light of all this, what guidance on our problem can be found in the four texts from the Gospels?

 

(a) 'Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's' (Mark 12:13‑17).  Here is certainly one of the texts in the Gospels most often quoted both by theologians and profane authors.  It is also one of the least understood, for it is usually quoted carelessly, out of context and in the wrong sense, making Jesus say things alien to His thinking.  Some writers do not seem to have realized that for Jesus and His contemporaries Caesar was the equivalent of what Hitler was for Frenchmen, say, in 1943 and even worse.  Almost all of them triumphantly bring up Jesus' words to justify their own doctrine which puts Church and State in different spheres.  The profane authors are happy, with the authority of Jesus Himself, to relegate the Church to a vague 'care of souls'; while the theologians are happy to invoke that authority in justification of their surrender to the State's demands and of their anxiety to avoid any conflict with the political authorities.  Unfortunately the commonly accepted interpretation is altogether unsound.

 

Before examining the text itself, we must ask whether this famous phrase is an answer in the realm of principles which can serve as a basis for a doctrine of the State.  Did Jesus mean, in a general and permanent way, that the believer has duties to fulfill towards the State besides his duties to God?  Plainly He did not, and we must anyhow give up the idea of interpreting His words as a clear affirmation of principle.  His answer is rather a sort of riddle, for these reasons:

 

1.  The question asked by the Herodians and the Pharisees is a trap: if Jesus falls into it, it could discredit Him for good.  Mark

 

 

 

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specifies that they came to him 'to catch him in his words.’  The parallel with Luke is also explicit: 'They ...  sent forth spies, which should feign themselves just men, that they might take hold of his words, that so they might deliver him unto the power and authority of the governor' (Luke 20:20).  If Jesus answers, 'Yes, the tribute to Caesar must be paid,' the Pharisees, very patriotic and with a great popular following (since the vast majority of the people are antiRoman), will at once say: 'He can't possibly be the Messiah; he tells you to obey the Gentile foreign tyrant'‑which may well be fatal for His ministry.  But if He answers, 'No, the tribute to Caesar should not be paid,' the Herodians, unashamed collaborateurs, will quickly have Him arrested as preaching subversive ideas which Pilate obviously cannot tolerate‑and everybody will be rid of Him.  It is a cunning and formidable trap.  'And they marvelled at him,' Mark concludes the episode.  'And they could not take hold of his words before the people,' comments Luke; 'and they marvelled at his answer, and held their peace.’  So His answer is more complex than is generally believed: He avoids both 'yes' and 'no,' each of which would have meant falling into the trap.  It is therefore not a statement of principle either acknowledging or disputing the legitimacy of the Roman tribute.

 

2.  There is only one other text in the Gospels which can throw a little light on this one.  During the trial of Jesus, the following charge is made against Him before Pilate: 'We found this fellow perverting the nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, saying that He himself is Christ, a king.’  (Luke 23:2).  There is no proof that this charge refers to the text we are considering here, but it seems probable.  In any case, if those accusing Him before the governor are alluding to another statement by Jesus, it can hardly be supposed that He would have spoken then about the tribute question quite differently from the way He does here.  The Jews, in fact, when accusing Him to Pilate, dishonestly give His words, 'Render unto Caesar .  .  .', the meaning 'do not pay tribute'; and they could not have done so if such an interpretation had been obviously absurd.  So at least that statement can be taken in contradictory senses.

 

3.  There area great many other texts showing Jesus' enemies trying to trap Him with cunning questions.  Usually He answers by asking them something.  Besides showing, no doubt, that it is He, the King, who has the right to ask questions, He is putting them in a corner, forcing them to give the answer they have come to get from Him.

 

 

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In Matthew, for instance, there are twelve other occasions when the priests or the Pharisees ask Him questions: only twice does He answer clearly; three times His answer is ambiguous; and seven times He retorts with another question.  Plainly He does not care to be cross‑examined, as can be seen again in His trial.  In the present text Jesus also begins by asking questions back, and His final answer can really be taken as a new and decisive question to the Herodians and the Pharisees.  Indeed, if it called for an answer from them, this would explain Luke's 'and they held their peace.’  The alleged statement of principle turns into another question, leaving the Jews to draw their own deductions in applying His words to the payment of tribute.

 

4.  Jesus' answer is also ambiguous in its logic.  'It is easy to see that the parallel is deliberately ironical,' writes Dibelius.[76]  For 'what on earth' (literally) are the things which are not God's, and could therefore be reserved for Caesar?  'The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts,' proclaims Haggai (2:8).  So there is no question of a division into separate and independent spheres, as when you cut a slice of cake, and the slice is now a separate and independent entity from the rest of the cake.  Jesus' words assume quite a different image: two concentric circles, with the smaller, that of Caesar, remaining an integral part of the larger, that of God, from which nothing is subtracted.  So His words cannot be applied at all easily to the particular problem of the tribute.

 

To sum up, when the Jews come to ask Jesus whether it is 'lawful' to pay tribute to Caesar, yes or no, He refuses to give either answer, and His words are ambiguous.  To appreciate their full significance let us now look at the text itself.

 

Verse 13: 'The Pharisees and the Herodians.’  At first sight the association of these two parties seems strange, but they differ less in their practical attitude (both do in fact pay the tribute) than in their ideas on the Messiah.  Their question is more concerned with how the Messiah would regard Rome than with the immediate problem of paying tribute.  The Herodians would have been pleased to recognize the Messiah among the kings of the Herodian dynasty, who would somehow collaborate with Rome; whereas the Pharisees cannot imagine a Messiah respecting the Roman domination, and in that they have almost the whole of popular sentiment behind them.  What both parties want here as in most other cases, is to force Jesus out of His reserve on the subject.  They are not so much saying 'Ought we to pay?' as, 'You claim to be the Messiah, so tell us

 

 

 

THE CHRISTIAN’S ATTITUDE TO THE STATE 89 whether we ought to pay.’  The question of the tribute is only a pretext to unmask Him in His Messianic pretensions.  This explains why they flatter Him with phrases like 'we know that ...  thou carest for no man'‑though the contempt of these Jewish aristocrats for the upstart from Nazareth is barely concealed in their obsequiousness.  They hope He will be flattered, and provoked, into making some rash anti‑Roman statement which will be His undoing.

 

Verse 14: 'Is it lawful to give tribute to Caesar, or not?  Shall we give, or shall we not give?' All Jews faced the problem of the Roman tribute, and it was insoluble.  Caesar was even more a religious enemy for them than a national enemy; he was the real anti‑Christ, preventing the manifestation of the Messiah.  To pay the tribute was a grave infidelity towards the God of the Promise, as if you had given up waiting for your Messiah.  Monnier relates that new coinage was struck under Bar Kokaba, and Roman currency declared invalid.[77]  It was against the Roman tribute that Judas of Galilee revolted.  Yet anyone who did rebel against the tribute was bound to be crushed; so the problem remained insoluble.  Caesar was master of Palestine, and the Torah surely called for obedience to the authorities whatever they were.  Yet Israel's deliverance must be expected.  Wait till the Messiah gives the signal for insurrection‑was that all you had to do?  The Pharisees said 'yes,' but the Herodians retreated before this masked nationalism.  So if Jesus approves their prudent reserve, the patriot crowd will see clearly that He is not the Messiah.  if He encourages the nationalist sentiments of the Pharisees, He will be faced as Messiah with having to head the movement of revolt against Rome, or else be called a cowardly and impotent Messiahor be at once denounced and arrested.  Both parties are equally keen to extract an admission from Him that He is not the Messiah, and both think they have as good as got such an admission

 

Verse 15: 'But He, knowing their hypocrisy.  .  .’  This is not only in laying a cruel trap for Him, but also in trying to attack His claim to be the Messiah while apparently submitting to His judgment a difficult problem of conscience.  Perhaps too they are showing even graver hypocrisy, swallowing a camel and straining at a gnat.  For they pretend to be tormenting themselves lest by paying tribute they delay the Messiah's coming; yet when He is there before them, they refuse to believe in Him.

 

a

 

...  said unto them,why tempt ye me?' The word 'tempt' (wetp '~w) has a double sense of 'laying a trap‑‑'putting to the test,' and also 'leading into temptation.’  For here again Jesus is tempted, even by His

 

 

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enemies' words, to declare Himself as the King whom Israel is awaiting.  But His Kingdom is not of this world; He will not head a revolutionary movement to liberate the fatherland; He does not believe in violence.

 

'. . . Bring me a penny, that I may see it.’  Here is the whole point of the story.  Jesus at once puts the question on the level of practical realities, limiting and simplifying the problem.  There are no abstractions concerned here, but only this coin.  He will answer not in generalizations but through the concrete reality embodied in the material object He has asked them for: a denarius (or penny, our nearest equivalent).  Rather mischievously, indeed, He catches them in disobedience to Rabbinic observances; for here is one of them carrying on his person this idolatrous and abhorred money, against all the rules of 'purity.'

 

By getting them to produce a denarius, Jesus is pointing out the facts, without raising the problem of whether Rome has a right to be occupying Jerusalem.  His serene assurance shows only that He does not regard Caesar as His personal enemy.  Caesar is not the anti‑Christ, but holds de facto authority over the country.  That is all.

 

Moreover, in asking to see this coin, Jesus is showing both Pharisees and Herodians that they have already answered their own question, since they carry on them this impure money, symbol of the Roman domination.  But He does not blame them for it, since Caesar is not the direct adversary of the Messiah.  By their earthly and nationalist idea of the Messianic kingdom, the Jews will always see Caesar as anti‑Christ.  Their obsession with Caesar's hated reign almost hypnotizes them, and gives them an inferiority complex towards Rome.  Jesus, however, the true sovereign of the world, though His kingdom is not of this world, can smile quietly, sure of His own power, and point to the sign of Caesar's ephemeral rule.

 

Verse 16: 'And they brought it.’  With some shame, no doubt, at holding between their fingers this sullied object, and uneasiness at being taken unawares by their formidable adversary.  How is He going to use it?

 

'Whose is this image . . .?' For the peoples of antiquity the effigy on a coin was the sign of who owned the coin.  So instead of giving any decision as to whether or not the Roman tribute is lawful, Jesus merely says: 'You have accepted the domination of the Romans, since you have traded with them, and apparently you have some of their currency on you.  Draw your own conclusions.  Caesar

 

 

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demands this coin, which belongs to him; so return it to him.  It makes absolutely no difference to the Messiah's kingdom.'

 

But the use of the word 'image' (eikwvn) may well be deliberate, evoking another, complementary image; recalling the verse in Genesis, 'God created man in his image' (1:27), where the word used in the Greek text is the same.  Jesus is then implying: 'This coin is in Caesar's image, so return it to him; but remember that you yourselves are in God's image.  The whole of your personalities must be consecrated to His service.'

 

The image of God?  Since the Fall no man has carried it fully within him except the Son of Man.  He, Jesus, is the image of the invisible God (II Cor.  4:4; Col.  1:15).  So He is inviting His questioners, and us too, to recognize that He is the only genuine image of God.  Why, then, do they refuse to understand this, and draw the consequences by believing in Him?

 

'. . . and this superscription?' My Messianic interpretation of the debate is confirmed by the fact that Jesus mentions the inscription going with Tiberius' effigy: 'Tiberius Caesar, son of the divine Augustus, supreme pontiff.’  The parallel He wishes to establish between the coin and Himself is obvious.  Why bring in this inscription, so infuriating for the Jews, unless to suggest that He, God's only Son, is the true Supreme Pontiff?  The Roman emperor proudly claims to be son of a god and the world's high priest, but his rights extend only to this little coin.  'Don't you realize that I, the true Son of God and High Priest, have all the rights over you all?'

 

'And they said unto him, Caesar's.’  For the second time Jesus has made them utter the accursed name.  By reminding them of the inscription on the coin, so much of an insult to them, He brings out still more sharply the contrast between Caesar and the Messiah, and the deadlock both parties have landed themselves in by their political conception of the Messiah, the Pharisees wanting Him anti­Roman and the Herodians pro‑Roman.

 

Jesus, however, destroys this opposition, showing them they should acknowledge Him as Messiah despite Caesar's crushing power and this little coin with its idolatrous effigy and scandalous inscription.  For both are in a sense signs, however grotesque, of His royalty, no less than the Temple at Jerusalem and its High Priest.  The Jews are wasting their time defending their Temple against Caesar.  Jesus knows that He is proclaimed by one as much as by the other; and both are equally powerless before Him.  Caesar's representative in Palestine may have the illusion of being able to

 

 

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destroy Him (John 19:10).  But all Caesar's power has really been given him by God; and through Pontius Pilate he will unwittingly play an important part in bringing about the Redemption.  God uses a Caesar in sovereign fashion.  For the divinity claimed by Tiberius is only vanity; Christ alone is the Son of God, the true King.

 

'Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.’  'This coin you are showing me bears Caesar's effigy?  Then you must give it back to him, if he demands it, because it belongs to him.  But give back to God what you owe Him: all of yourself created in His image, straining towards Him by the faith in His only Son who bears His mark and perfect image.’  Let us note once more that Jesus is not passing any judgment on the lawfulness of the Roman tribute; He is speaking only of this particular coin.  It represents the things that are Caesar's, not a foreign tyrant's right to exact a tribute.  In other words, Jesus recognizes Caesar as having the right to the coin but not to the tribute.  This is what disconcerts His questions and breaks their trap.  His concrete answer to their abstract question gives no handle to their malice: from this formidable Rabbinical duel Jesus emerges as victor.

 

If He is not pronouncing here on the principle of the tribute, He is clearly still further from pronouncing on the principle of the obedience due to the de facto political authority.  'Nothing was more remote from His thought than to establish a principle from which the domains of God and of Caesar would be exactly delimited for the rest of time.'[78]  As Martin Dibelius expresses it, 'the story is completely misunderstood when statutory relations between Church and State are deduced from it.  There is a conflict between the occupying power and national piety, but instead of entering this conflict, Jesus formulates another: God and the world.  As surely as the money bears the emperor's image, so surely is it of the world and belongs to the powers of this world, to the emperor. . . .  So when Jesus says, Give the Emperor what belongs to him (not "what comes to him by virtue of a divine order") and give God what is His, it is an ironical parallel‑which would not be noticed straight away.  Jesus had no intention of putting the emperor's rights and God's on the same level.  The emperor's rights flow from the order of this world, and Jesus makes no judgment on them.  He seems to be saying: give the same thing to God as to the emperor.  But what He means in reality is: above all give God what is His, perhaps in conflict with everything else.  The people who in pretended piety ask "Do you support the national resistance?" 'receive no reply.  Instead they are reminded

 

 

 

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that their "piety" is chiefly concerned with nationalist claims, which may be necessary and may be harmful, but are anyhow of the world.  Jesus gives no more decision on them than He does on the social system.  All who wish to talk about them and make judgments on them should first notice the question He asks as soon as He is approached on a national problem: are God's demands satisfied?'[79]

 

So those who deduce a theory of the State from this text have a series of gaps throughout their argument which they do not attempt to bridge.  They talk of the rightful State, but Caesar was a hated foreign tyrant (like Hitler in occupied France).  They talk of the obedience due to the State, but only the tribute was in question.  They start from the idea that Jesus sanctioned the payment of a tribute, but this is just what He did not do.  Most incredible of all, they use this text to justify both the national payment of tribute to a foreign occupying power and the national army which defends its country by arms against the foreigner.  For them Jesus was sanctioning both collaboration (by payment of tribute) and resistance (by armed combat).  Patently, in fact, they are trying to justify preconceived ideas, without even bothering about consistency, rather than seeing what the text actually says.

 

Some readers will perhaps be disappointed and disconcerted by the strictly Messianic interpretation I give to this famous text.  'Is it no more than that?' they may ask, feeling that I have unduly minimized the importance of Jesus' words.  But a terrible trap had been set for Him, and He easily escaped from it.  Moreover, He was a Jewish Rabbi who had to adapt Himself to the kind of religious discussions His contemporaries were used to, even if this may upset us a little because our historical perspectives are distorted or inadequate: there are other Rabbinical discussions reported in the Gospels which are strictly duels of oratory.[80]  But I would add for the benefit of such readers that it is wonderful to see how the Master succeeded in using a vicious trap to proclaim implicitly that He was the Messiah, and in confronting His hearers with an essentially spiritual question, which applies equally to us today: that of our faith in Him.

 

It is indeed disconcerting, however, to find so many writers misusing this text to justify their theory of a division of spheres between the State and God.  But the Church after Constantine was rash enough to introduce the Roman idea of the City and the Empire into its theology; and probably this is the way in which the very name of Caesar, execrated by the Christians of the first three centuries, became the symbol of an inherently good and benevolent

 

 

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State.  How many 'Christian sovereigns' have been proud to be called Caesar!  Louis XIV, coveting the title of Caesar, accorded to Leopold I of Austria, even had himself represented on a statue in the costume of a Roman Emperor!  The whole of Christian tradition has been so distorted by such an attitude that for centuries Christians have persistently interpreted this text in a way which would have seemed stupefying and monstrous to the apostles and the writers of the New Testament.  We must not make Jesus say what He not only did not say but could not possibly have said.

 

(a) H.  Roux, for instance, claims that by His answer Jesus 'gives a Christian content to obeying the authorities of this world'(LTvangi1e du Royaume, p.  267).  G.  Dehn, on the other hand, writes justly: 'I do not think it can be said (here) that Jesus is specially considering the State' (Le Fils du Dieu, p.  209).

 

(b) The episode of the State (Matt.  17:24‑27) is the replica of the preceding, but the tribute here is being collected by the Jewish authorities for the upkeep of the Temple and the priestly administration at Jerusalem: this time it is a national and religious tribute.  But although Jesus declares it to be lawful, that is all that can be deduced from His attitude and language in this passage.  A new threat is hanging over Him, a new trap has been laid: does He respect the Law of Moses?  This Temple tribute is expressly prescribed in the Law (Exo.  30:12).  So He is confronted by an embarrassing dilemma: not to pay would be to violate the Law openly, and also show Himself no patriot; worse, to show Himself a bad Jew, for it is well known how sacred the Temple of Jerusalem was in the eyes of the Jews.  If He refuses to pay, He will offend the people's deepest feelings, will scandalize them in a way that may gravely compromise His authority.  Moreover, He has always conformed before to the Law's demands, and there is no reason why He should depart here from His usual line of conduct.

 

But if He pays the tribute, He will act so much as an ordinary citizen that it will be like letting these tax‑collectors strip Him of His claim to be the Messiah.  Besides, He, Jesus, is the real Temple of God, while the Temple of Jerusalem has been to some extent superseded since He started His ministry; so if He pays the Temple tribute, He will be putting the accent on the sign, when the reality this sign announces is already present‑stressing the provisional (Matt.  24:2) at the expense of the permanent.

 

He decides nevertheless to pay this tribute, but does so in a very detached manner, no doubt wishing to underline that as Son of God

 

 

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He could dispense with a custom which has been nullified by His own coming.  But He submits to it so as not to give 'offence.’  The whole point of the story clearly lies in this word, and it must be interpreted in the light of Biblical teaching on 'offence.’  Anyhow Jesus is here proclaiming 'the double principle of liberty and charity':[81] the Christian is free from subjection to any, as Luther was to say, but submits voluntarily to all by reason of his love and respect for them.

 

From this mysterious episode no teaching can be deduced on the Christian's relations with the State.  The question of the religious tribute belongs more, in Jesus' eyes, to the chapter on 'Christian charity' than to the chapter on 'rights of the State.’  True, he pays the tribute, pays it for Peter as well (since it was often jointly paid by two people so that they could pay more easily).  But He has not paid it from His own purse, but with the aid of nature, showing such casualness that nobody can seriously take His attitude to justify the principle of the tribute, let alone any principle concerning the State.  Also, His exclamation, 'then are the children free,' sounds fairly anarchist or Anabaptist, whatever Calvin may say about it.  All we can say here with certainty is that this is a Messianic text, not one where the problem of the State comes up at all.

 

(c) '. . . they which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and their great ones exercise authority upon them.  ..'(Mark 10:42).  'Jesus remarks on the fact without discussing its lawfulness,' says Roux.[82]  This is obvious.  The same might be said of Jesus' question in the preceding episode: 'Of whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute?  Of their own children, or of strangers?' (Matt.  17:25).  There too He was speaking of kings as they are, not as they ought to be.  I even think that implicitly, though very discreetly, Jesus is here deploring this tyranny of the great ones of the earth: for He demands of His disciples an attitude diametrically opposite to that of the tyrants.  'The Church of Jesus Christ has nothing to do with those who govern the people and oppress them . . . the spirit of domination and tyranny and the spirit of love and sacrifice are mutually exclusive.’[83]  The two verbs used by Jesus stress the pride of these kings, and Mark's text even has a note of sarcasm concerning them: 'those which are accounted to rule. . .’  or 'imagine themselves to rule . . .'[84]  But of course if Jesus criticizes them, it is because of their spirit of proud domination, not their being kings.  Once again Jesus simply points out that there are kings, that they rule over peoples and make those peoples pay tribute.  'And very

 

 

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necessary too,' it may be said, 'if human society is not to disintegrate.’  No doubt; but this is to bring in ideas, reasonable though they may be, which are not implied in the text.

 

(d) "Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above.’  Jesus makes this reply to Pilate who has just said to Him: 'Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee and have power to release thee?' (John 19:10‑11).  What exactly is this power or authority (Greek exousiva) which Pilate has received from above, that is, from God?  Is it an occasional, de facto power, as one might speak of the power of a lion which attacks you and may kill you or (to use an example given by Karl Barth) of the Tower of Siloam (Luke 13:1‑5)?  Or is it a de jure power foreseen in God's plan and properly integrated into the order He has fixed for the world?  If the former, our text offers no justification of the political authorities; but if the latter, here is a text at last which might give a Scriptural basis for the theory of the divine right of such authorities and of the State.  Only I find it very difficult to see how this latter hypothesis can be maintained.

 

Calvin first sets out the former interpretation: 'The world is governed by God's will; whatever the machinations of the wicked, they will not be able to lift their little finger to stop God's secret power governing from above.'[85]  This explanation is undoubtedly in agreement with the general thinking of the whole of the Bible.  'But,' he goes on, 'those who restrict this passage to the position and office of magistrate have a sounder opinion in my judgment.’  He does not, however, give very convincing reason for this judgment: 'For by these words Jesus Christ rebukes Pilate's mad arrogance in setting himself up on high, as if his power had not been from God....  But Pilate was not made judge without His providence.’  This fits in very well with the hypothesis that Jesus was speaking only of a de facto power which had indeed been given Pilate by divine providence.

 

Karl Barth devotes several pages to this text,[86] but without giving any precise answer to the question I have raised.  He interprets the text in the light of the theory of political demonic powers, according to which the political authorities are dominated unawares, through God's express will, by angelic powers which are yet often in revolt against God.  The power of the State, embodied in Pilate, would thus be theologically founded in law.  But does our text really imply this doctrine?  Simply because the Greek translation of Jesus' statement uses the word exousiva (authority), must we say that Jesus saw in Pilate one of these 'authorities' legitimately ruled by angelic powers?

 

 

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In other words, did Jesus recognize Pilate here as having a de jure power?

 

The word exousiva is used several times in the Gospels,[87] in texts where one cannot find the smallest beginnings of a theory of political 'demons.’  On all but one occasion it is applied to Jesus' own power or authority, and the exception, 'this ...  is the power of darkness,' which He says when being arrested (Luke 22:53), can hardly refer to a de jure power.  These are the only texts in the Gospels, to my knowledge, where exousiva is used in the singular; and in the Epistles, where Paul refers to 'angelic' powers, it is always in the plural.  Because the singular is used almost exclusively of Jews, I believe that in our text Pilate's power should be interpreted by reference not to any angelic powers he might represent, but merely to his proud opposition to Jesus' power.  In any case we obviously cannot define Pilate's power too exactly from this text.

 

But even if there is more than mere coincidence in the use of exousiva, surely in contrast with Jesus' power Pilate's power represents the world, not the State.  The State has not been referred to in this chapter, while the world is expressly mentioned (John 18:36‑37), and is often contrasted with Jesus in the Johannine writings.  All that John may have meant was that Pilate is the occasional and passive instrument of the divine providence, which uses him to bring about the Justification; it would be very hard to read more into the verse than this.  I agree, in fact, with F.  J.  Leenhardt's conclusion: after analyzing the text in detail, he writes: ‘It treats of the Roman magistrate's de facto power, not the political government's inherent authority.’[88]  I wonder, incidentally, how those who think this text shows Jesus approving Pilate's political authority, can avoid thinking that He must also have approved of foreign occupations.

 

So the result of our enquiry is negative: the Gospels, the Acts, and Revelations contain no texts which imply a definite doctrine of the State or might serve as a basis for one.  Traditional Protestant theology must have built up its extravagant theory about the State on a tendentious interpretation of three texts in the Epistles; these texts I shall now discuss.

 

3.  Submission to the Political Authorities

 

'Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers,' Paul writes to the Romans, and a little later: 'Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath but also for conscience sake' (Rom.  13:1, 5).  To Titus he writes: 'Put them in mind to be subject to the magistrates

 

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and to the powers, to obey .  .  .’  (3:1).  Peter uses a still stronger phrase: 'Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be to the king ...  or unto governors .  .  .’  (I Peter 2:13).  What exactly is entailed by this submission to which Christians are clearly called?

 

First, it means that the political authorities, and in general all the authorities which exist within human society (like masters and husbands, for instance) have a real and positive value in the eyes of God, and therefore in the eyes of a Christian.  God takes them seriously, and somehow integrates them into His plan.  This is why we must be 'subject' for the Lord's sake.  It implies that we too accept and take seriously the authorities who are placed above us; it implies a readiness to obey them.  This is why slaves are called to submit to their masters (Titus.  2:9; Eph.  6:5; Col.  3:22; 1 Peter 2:18), wives to their husbands (I Cor.  14:34; Eph.  5:22; Col.  3:18; 1 Tim.  2:11; Titus 2:5; 1 Peter 3:1), and citizens to their kings and governors.  Also, the young should submit to their elders (Eph.  6:1; Col.  3:20; I Tim.  3:4; 1 Peter 5:5), and the faithful to their spiritual leaders (I Thes.  5:12; Heb.  13:17).

 

We must therefore respect, be ready to obey, these higher powers or authorities‑'higher' meaning 'those placed above us.’  Render therefore to all their dues . . . honor to whom honor writes Paul (Rom.  13:7); and Peter specifies the hardest thing for a Christian: 'Honour the King'‑that is to say, Caesar (I Peter 2:17).  Now Peter and Paul probably became martyrs at the hands of this 'King,' who they say should be honored.  and these 'authorities set up by God' to whom they say submission is due.  Christian dialectic has to reckon with this, and submission must not be confused with passive obedience.  Calvin translates 'be subject' in Romans 13 by ‘voluntarily endure and support the power and domination of the magistrates.’[89]  Karl Barth finds even finer shades of meaning: ‘It is not a matter of being the subject of a person but of respecting a person in the position he occupies.’