Putting Jesus to the Political Test

On Tuesday of the week when Jesus was executed, his religious political enemies sought to entrap him by various trick questions. The first one was the political question on the payment of taxes. It is a theological-political question that relates to life in the society and to life as a Christian. If he had said, "Pay the taxes," the Jewish people who resented Rome would possibly have turned on him and if he had said, "Do not pay the taxes," then he would have been in trouble with the political power of the Roman occupiers.