Does your Teacher not pay the temple tax?

 

 Now while they were staying in Galilee, Jesus said to them, "The Son of Man is about to be betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill Him, and the third day He will be raised up."  And they were exceedingly sorrowful.  

When they had come to Capernaum, those who received the temple tax came to Peter and said, "Does your Teacher not pay the temple tax?"  He said, "Yes."  And when he had come into the house, Jesus anticipated him, saying, "What do you think, Simon?  From whom do the kings of the earth take customs or taxes, from their sons or from strangers?"  Peter said to Him, "From strangers."  Jesus said to him, "Then the sons are free.  Nevertheless, lest we offend them, go to the sea, cast in a hook, and take the fish that comes up first.  And when you have opened its mouth, you will find a piece of money; take that and give it to them for Me and you."

 

- Matthew 17:22–27 

 

 Yesterday we read that, upon Jesus' return from the Mount of Transfiguration with Peter, James and John, when they had come to the multitude, a man came to Him, kneeling down to Him and saying, "Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and suffers severely; for he often falls into the fire and often into the water.  So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him."  Then Jesus answered and said, "O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you?  How long shall I bear with you?  Bring him here to Me."  And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured from that very hour.  Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, "Why could we not cast it out?"  So Jesus said to them, "Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.  However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting."   

Now while they were staying in Galilee, Jesus said to them, "The Son of Man is about to be betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill Him, and the third day He will be raised up."  And they were exceedingly sorrowful.  This is the second warning to the disciples of Jesus' death and Resurrection (see also this earlier reading for the first).  My study Bible comments that Jesus makes these predictions in order to establish that He is going to His Passion freely and not being taken against His will.  

When they had come to Capernaum, those who received the temple tax came to Peter and said, "Does your Teacher not pay the temple tax?"  He said, "Yes."  And when he had come into the house, Jesus anticipated him, saying, "What do you think, Simon?  From whom do the kings of the earth take customs or taxes, from their sons or from strangers?"  Peter said to Him, "From strangers."  Jesus said to him, "Then the sons are free.  Nevertheless, lest we offend them, go to the sea, cast in a hook, and take the fish that comes up first.  And when you have opened its mouth, you will find a piece of money; take that and give it to them for Me and you."  My study Bible explains that the temple tax was an annual head tax which applied to all male Jews (except priests) over twelve years of age.  This was for the purpose of the maintenance of the temple (see Numbers 3:43-51).  Since Jesus is the Son of God, He is both High Priest and the "proprietor" of the temple -- therefore is exempt from the tax.  But nonetheless, He pays it anyway.  My study Bible explains this is both to avoid unnecessary offense and to show thta He has completely identified Himself with mankind.  

 

The story of the coin from the fish's mouth is one that is only found in St. Matthew's Gospel.  Most commentary emphasizes this structure in the story of the question of whether or not Jesus -- as Son of the living God -- is really required to pay this temple tax.  According to the framework of the Law, with this identity, He should not be.  This also would extend to His disciples as "sons" -- and Jesus concludes here that "then the sons are free."   So He first settles that question with Peter.  But we know from this and other stories that Peter struggles with public perception and pressure regarding His identity as a Jew and Jewish scrutiny upon him as a follower of Jesus.  He struggles mightily within himself even as the followers of Christ and the nascent Church would deal so much with this particular struggle of identity as well.  Indeed, we can read St. Paul's accusation against St. Peter regarding the question of Christian Jews and Christian Gentiles eating together in what is called the incident at Antioch (Galatians 2:11-14).  Perhaps we see St. Peter's susceptibility to intimidation of such a type in his denial of Christ three times in the courtyard of the High Priest (Matthew 26:69-75).   There, it seems, even a servant girl noticing his Galilean accent becomes something he wishes to deny in order to avoid identification as a follower of Christ -- which leads to his own bitter tears at his failure, and fulfillment of Christ's warning to him (Matthew 26:31-35).  So Christ's miraculous prophecy, with its wondrous quality of Peter the fisherman being told to cast in a hook, and find a coin in the mouth of the first fish he caught, becomes effectively a way both to uphold that "the sons are free" and also to allow Peter the firm certainty of place in the temple and in his community of Capernaum among those who asked if his Teacher paid the temple tax.  Jesus graciously avoids giving what is at this time unnecessary offense in this place of His ministry headquarters and St. Peter's home.   It is a kind of beautiful parable, one of those astonishing outcomes of Christ similar to the verbal outcomes of His jousts with the Pharisees in the temple during the final Passover week -- a sort of brilliant if miraculous logic at work.  But, as we reviewed in yesterday's reading and commentary, our recent readings seem to come to a focus again and again on the importance of faith and its indispensable need in our lives.  Faith connects us to everything Christ has to offer, to the healings in the Gospels, to His "mighty works" (and even the lack of them when faith is lacking), to casting out demons, to the seven "signs" in John's Gospel.  And the fish as a symbol of faith dates to the earliest periods of the Church.  The word for fish in the Greek of the first century,  ιχθύς/ixthys forms an acronym for the statement "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior" (Ἰησοῦς Χρῑστός Θεοῦ Υἱός Σωτήρ/Isous Christos Theou Yios Sotir).  Symbolically, then, we can view this miraculous coin as the product of Peter's faithful obedience to Christ and Christ's love and mercy expressed in response to that faith.  It also leads us to ask, indeed, who are the "sons?"   In that light, let us consider the day as we enter into the holiday of Thanksgiving in the United States, where many readers of this blog reside.  For our true treasure is symbolized in that gold coin of God's love and mercy, the product of our faith in Christ the Rock, upon whom we rely for "every good and perfect gift" (James 1:17).