Draw the Line

11 August 2025  Matthew 17:22-27

“However, not to give offense to them….” Matthew 17:27

Jesus was famously unwilling to get sidetracked by arguments about taxes.

The most well-known occasion is recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, when some Pharisees asked Jesus what they thought was a sly question: “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” Shaking his head at the obvious trap, Jesus asked them to produce a coin and asked them whose image was on it. Told it was Caesar’s, Jesus replied, “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21). He wasn’t going to argue with them about taxes – it would distract everybody from the topics that really mattered.

It was the same with the matter of the half-shekel temple tax that was expected of every Jewish man 20 or older. There was some controversy about that tax. The Pharisees said it was based on the Torah – Exodus 30:13-16. The Sadducees opposed it because it was the Pharisees’ idea. The Essenes said it was a legitimate tax, but was only to be paid once in a lifetime. Jesus wasn’t willing to get involved in that dispute either. He didn’t think support of the Temple was immoral, even if He had some issues with the people who ran it.

But what happens if taxes become immoral?

In A.D. 70 the Romans destroyed the Jerusalem Temple, making the temple tax a moot point. However, the Romans decided to keep the temple tax going, only now it was going to support the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in Rome. Now the taxes were going to support an idol, something specifically forbidden by the First Commandment. Now what?

In those days Christianity and Judaism were not considered separate religions. In fact, Romans could not tell the difference between a Christian and a Jew – they looked the same and spoke the same languages, they read the same Bible, and worshipped the same God. But this matter of taxes became a source of division. The Scribes and Pharisees thought that refusal to pay the tax would lead to even more oppression from the Romans, maybe even the destruction of the Jews entirely. Followers of Jesus, however,thought that a line had to be drawn on a matter as basic as idolatry, no matter the cost. The dispute became so bitter that at the Council of Jamnia about 90 A.D. – the council that reconstituted Judaism after the loss of the Temple, the priesthood and the entire sacrificial system – the Jews added a condemnation of Christians to their daily prayers.

This is not to say that the Christians were right, and the Jews were wrong on the matter of the temple tax. The Pharisees reasoned, very practically, that theological purity was rather useless if all your people were destroyed. Christians reasoned, very practically, that you don’t even have a people without theological purity. They both had a point, and they both understood that drawing lines was dangerous work. It still is. Jews are being murdered in Israel today because of their theological identity. Christians are being beheaded in Mozambique and other places in sub-Saharan Africa because of their theological identity. Christians and Jews both have paid in blood for the lines they have drawn.

Nabeel Qureshi, a Muslim who converted to Christianity, dedicated his book, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus to his parents, who are Muslims still. He wrote:

Ammi and Abba, your undying love for me even when you feel I have sinned against you is second only to God’s love for His children. I pray you will one day realize His love is truly unconditional, that He has offered forgiveness to us all. On that day, I pray that you would accept His redemption, so we might be a family again. I love you with all my heart.

This side of the Kingdom we will have to draw painful, dangerous lines. It will make our love hurt sometimes, but as long as we love without condition, we can hope for a time when divisions will be healed, and all the lines washed away.