NOTES for Mar 12:13-34

It may seem strange: why does Jesus, knowing that His death is near, enter into apparently unnecessary arguments and disputes, and allow Himself to be provoked? After all, the Pharisees and Herodians were not driven by a thirst to find the truth. Likewise, when the Sadducees asked how the law of levirate marriage, which they had so cleverly interpreted (Deut. 25:5-6), would be reflected in the life to come, they only wanted to laugh at Jesus, since they did not believe in the resurrection. We do not know whether Jesus' answers satisfied the Pharisees and Sadducees, but they undoubtedly made an impression on a scribe standing nearby. The question of the greatest commandment in the law certainly troubled this man, and Jesus' answer drew from him a sympathetic response. Jesus reduces all the commandments of the law (not only the Ten Commandments, but all the rest as well, which the scribes counted as 613 in the Old Testament) to the two most important ones: love for God and love for neighbor. This is also the answer to the previous questions and to every later question throughout Christian history: how should one act rightly in this or that case? Christ answers us with precisely these words. And when, reading the Gospel, we see that here we are on Jesus' side, when we answer with the scribe's words, "Well said, Teacher; You have spoken the truth," that means that Jesus' words apply to us as well: "You are not far from the Kingdom of God."

Jesus' words about taxes ('tribute') paid to the emperor are often taken as a demand for complete submission to any authority, one element of which is the careful payment of all required taxes. Yet in the Gospel story the question is framed somewhat differently. It is not about whether taxes must be paid at all; the discussion is about whether it is permissible to do so.

The point is that in those days in Judea there were supporters of extreme, essentially extremist views of Roman power and of any secular power in general. These were the so-called Zealots - or, in Russian, 'the zealous ones.' They believed that the messianic uprising had to begin as soon as possible, and that it had to be directed first of all against Roman rule, since Judea was then part of the Roman Empire, and then against every other secular authority as well, including the authority of Herod the Tetrarch, who then ruled in Galilee.

Since rule in Judea at that time was hierocratic and power belonged to the high priest, this situation remained on the whole acceptable to the Zealots. But the Roman procurator in Jerusalem was a constant irritant to them, as were the Roman soldiers who walked, even if not often, through the streets of the holy city, together with the tax collectors, who naturally worked first of all for Rome. These Zealots believed that paying taxes was impious, that it was treason against God and the true faith as they understood it.

Meanwhile, in Roman eyes a direct call to refuse to pay taxes was equivalent to a call to disobey authority and rebel; it was treated as treason, with all the consequences that followed. So the question asked publicly of Jesus was plainly provocative. The Savior answers it in a somewhat unexpected way: He says that the question of taxes has no direct relation to spiritual life. Whether the emperor receives the money due him or not is a question of this world; for the Kingdom it has no significance. By not paying a tax, a person does not come closer to the Kingdom, just as he does not come closer to it by being the most careful taxpayer. Taxes, like economic and political issues in general, matter only insofar as they in some way affect a person's spiritual condition; everything else is secondary.

This was the Savior's answer to those who believed that the Kingdom and its establishment were a political question, not a spiritual one, and that the Kingdom would be built according to the laws of this world. Jesus reminds them once again: although the Kingdom enters our fallen world, it does not exist according to that world's laws, and taxes have no more relation to it than all the other institutions of the fallen world.

Today's passage is very popular with tax inspectors: it is usually cited as proof that taxes must be paid, that the Savior Himself requires this of us. Meanwhile, the text of the passage says nothing about the necessity of paying taxes. The question is not whether they must be paid, but whether it is permissible to do so.

Such a way of putting the question may seem strange, but in Judea in the Gospel era there were people who considered anyone an apostate who cooperated in any way with the Roman authorities, whom they regarded as occupying forces. And paying taxes, from their point of view, was naturally a form of such cooperation. Of course, we are speaking of representatives of marginal, essentially extremist movements, supporters of holy war, of whom there were nevertheless not so few in Judea at that time.

And the question was unquestionably provocative: to answer it positively meant appearing in the eyes of the radicals as a collaborator; to answer it negatively was the same as a call to revolt, with all the consequences that followed. With "one's own" people the principle was, "you do not ask, and we do not answer," but Jesus, plainly, was not "one of their own" for those who were questioning Him.

And He answers the question in a completely unexpected way, throwing off those who wanted to throw Him off and entangle Him. The meaning of the parable of the denarius, and it is indeed a parable, is quite clear: the Kingdom is not defined by social realities and is not acquired on the paths of political struggle. If the imperial authorities receive their taxes, that fact changes nothing for the Kingdom. Paying taxes is irrelevant to the Kingdom, because the Kingdom cannot be bought with money, or by submission to earthly authorities and human laws. Nor, for that matter, by refusing to submit to those authorities and those laws.

Of course, the way this question is put to the Teacher is a provocation. And we see how brilliantly He gets out of the difficult situation (indeed, for Jews the image of a human being is forbidden, and therefore they cannot even touch coins bearing the emperor's profile), but in His answer Jesus goes much further. The question of the relationship between a person's social obligations and his conscience is relevant in every age. Jesus' famous answer (Mark 12:17) leads a person toward an adult, responsible discernment of what in this world corresponds to God's will and what contradicts it. This, perhaps, is the calling to holiness.

The fact that the Pharisees and Herodians, who usually do not get along with each other, are ready to "join forces against" is not surprising. What is striking is the question they ask Christ. Not its content, since it is only another provocative attempt to catch Christ in His words; there had been plenty of those. What is revealing is the long, ornate introduction to the question, whose very construction exposes the deceitfulness of the questioners. Christ speaks directly about this before answering the question.
Of course, after such a rebuke one could leave the question unanswered. But even this situation Christ uses to give people the opportunity to look at things more sharply than usual. In answering, He brought into the world the understanding that the incomparability of the Highest authority and earthly authority does not mean the denial of earthly duties. But Christ's answer is also a call not to fall into voluntary slavery to yet another idol, while remaining free and faithful to God.
The short phrase about God and Caesar overturned humanity's ideas...

The Pharisees come to Jesus to trap Him in His words. By asking Him to resolve whether it is lawful for a devout Jew to pay Roman taxes, they confront Him with an insoluble contradiction. Whom should a believer obey: God or the secular authorities? To them these things are entirely incompatible. But not to Jesus, who "shows no partiality" and is free from established clichés. The Lord's reasoning is striking in its simplicity. Instead of citing Holy Scripture, appealing to sages, or quoting the opinions of authoritative people, He asks them to give Him a denarius and draws His astonishingly precise conclusion directly from the coin used to pay the tax.

At times we find ourselves in the role of such Pharisees, asking God questions without expecting that He has an answer to them. Yet the solution may lie directly before us, if we are not afraid and fearlessly cast aside every prejudice.

The Pharisees asking the question to Jesus about the giving of tribute to Caesar, plan to accuse Him either as a dissident calling not to obey the government, or as a traitor of the interests of the Jewish people. Judging by the words of the Jewish leaders "we have no king, but Caesar", the Jewish religious leaders have already made their choice. It is necessary to say that it was a secret neither for the Jews, nor for Jesus, Who sees the heart of people. It is extraordinarily important for the human community which cannot subsist beyond the frame of a government the fact that Jesus refuses flatly to discourse in this domain.

His answer “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God’s" puts aside the problem of the state’s structure. It is important for the followers of Jesus to render to God what is God’s. So, only what is related to eternity, relationship with God has a real value. That is why the Church of Christ lives within any government and in any relation with government – from hostile relations in the Roman and Soviet Empires to the more close alliances in the Byzantine and Russian empires. Any form of relations with the government has its merits and demerits. But we are first of all called to answer before God of our relation with Him.

The duty of charity towards a neighbor remains unchanged for Christians in every era whatever relation the Church has with the government. The exploit of prayer does not change either. It is rather useful for us today to know that any relations with whatever governments are something important for the Christians, but not essential. Life remains life, and it is effectively the words of Jesus read today that give an authentic and perpetual dimension to life.

Collisions between the logic of Christ and any version of human logic are always instructive. The Sadducees do not merely want to debate with another opponent; they need to lower the level at which spiritual questions are considered. And so they make one of many attempts to trap Christ, although the artificial situation they present sounds far too much like a joke. But Christ not only does not fall into the trap; in His answer He reveals the mystery that there is no death, that the Living God is the God of the living, and that the life He gives is entirely different, unlike human notions.

When we consider Scripture only by the letter, we sometimes risk falling into arguments akin to the 'Sadducean' kind, trying to apply the logic of our own limited understanding to complex concepts. Yet God's ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts. But although they are not available to us in their fullness, Christ has given us the possibility of reflecting on His logic and thereby drawing nearer to a right understanding of what He proclaimed.

One of the main problems for a person seeking the Kingdom is that he cannot imagine what it is like. He cannot, and yet he tries with all his strength to do so, extending the laws of the fallen world to the Kingdom and then being surprised at the picture he has drawn for himself. Opponents of any revelation then present such humanly drawn pictures of the Kingdom as an argument against those who believe in revelation. This is understandable: for the most part the pictures turn out very strange, at times even absurd, so that no reasonable person will believe in them. Such pictures are easy and convenient to criticize; no one can argue with that criticism, even if he wants to, so the critic can feel like the winner. True, the arguments put forward by the critics usually have nothing to do with the reality of revelation, and in particular with the revelation of the Kingdom, but in the heat of disputes and discussions even the defenders of divinely revealed truths sometimes forget this.

So it was in the Gospel era in the traditional disputes between Pharisees and Sadducees about the resurrection. The Sadducees did not believe in the general resurrection, and they put forward arguments to the Pharisees like the one they presented to Jesus. What we have here is a scheme that came from relationships among people in the fallen world, transferred to an entirely different world and different relationships, to the relationships of the Kingdom. It is no accident that Jesus tells the Sadducees that they know neither "the Scriptures nor the power of God." The point is not that the Sadducees knew the sacred texts poorly; the texts themselves were in fact well known to them.

They did not understand something else: the logic of God's action and the logic of the Kingdom, insofar as it is even possible to speak here of logic in the usual sense of the word. In the Kingdom everything is different. People there do not return to the former life of the fallen world with its laws, but receive a new quality, becoming more like angels than like fallen people. This new life does not fit into theological schemes created on the basis of knowledge drawn from the fallen world. That is what the Savior is trying to explain to the people listening to Him.

Every day we manage to talk about everything. We manage to talk with a neighbor, a colleague, relatives; we manage to share our opinion, to argue. And behind the abundance of noise that fills each day, we do not even have time to think properly about the meaning of what we say. If we pay attention, we will see that on almost every question where our opinion is required, we answer based on our principles and ideas. We easily decide what must be done, what must be answered. But we do not always even manage to understand the substance of the question. We trust ourselves very much. And we often make mistakes.

The experience of constant prayer to which Christ calls us is precisely the experience of pauses, the skill of giving God time to say something important at that very moment. And the voice of Christ is precisely the voice of meekness, the voice of infinite patience and mercy. By letting Christ into our life, we acquire reverence before His presence. Through us Christ can answer a person. He can say something more important than the answer itself. We need to learn to have time to pray before giving an important answer, and we will see what meekness He will give us. We will see how, in this brief prayer, He helps us rely on Him and answer a person with His love and His attention.

The Pharisees could not catch Christ in His answers because He always prayed in His heart and stood before the Father. And He answered meekly in such a way as to show the person who asked what mattered most. They could not catch Christ in His answers because in His words there is always a call to look at the works of God. There is always a call to pray and ask for the gift of meekness.

The Sadducees described in Mark's Gospel, by doubting the resurrection of the dead, thereby doubt, as Jesus shows in His answer, the very "power of God," His Kingdom. In response to the purely speculative form of the Sadducees' question, Jesus simply points out that the question has been framed incorrectly, and that projecting onto the world to come our earthly social institutions connected with death is absurd. "He is not God of the dead, but God of the living."

The Scriptural text that God is not God of the dead but of the living is cited by Jesus as proof of the inevitability of the general resurrection, and not only His own. If we consider this verse in its immediate meaning, we will find nothing of the kind in it: it means only that God is the God of life, not the God of death, and that He leads a person by the path of life, delivering him from death.

Usually this was understood in the context of a person's earthly life: it was assumed that God could, for example, deliver a righteous person from a deadly danger threatening him, including in order to demonstrate to skeptics that He is truly ready to intervene in events and support His witness.

At the same time, however, it was taken for granted that all people are mortal, and even a righteous person who has been granted a happy and long life will still one day die. Such a death was and is called "natural," and although in fact few receive it, in the Old Testament books it was considered the standard, so to speak, the "ideal death": a person lived the life of a righteous man and departed peacefully, leaving an inheritance to his children, whom he had, of course, already had time to raise as righteous as he himself was. Later the righteous awaited resurrection, but this was an event separate from their earthly life.

Jesus, however, says that death is not natural by definition: for God is the source of life and life itself. He did not create death; it became the consequence of the fall, which distorted creation. Against such a background, resurrection is not something accidental, not an ordinary miracle of God that nevertheless might not have happened. It is part of that plan of universal salvation and transformation of creation whose culmination was the coming of the Messiah.

In God's Kingdom there can be no death precisely because it is God's Kingdom, and life, every earthly life, has its foundation in the eternity of this Kingdom. Life can have no natural, physical sources, although it can and does have a natural, physical projection. Life itself is a spiritual process, and what in our world limited by space and time is perceived as a short stretch of time abides in the eternity of the Kingdom as the fullness, revealed to one degree or another depending on the spiritual quality of the life lived, of a concrete person who will remain there forever.

Or will not remain, if there was nothing in that person's life from the Kingdom and from that breath of God with which it is permeated. Resurrection is not simply a return to life, but a return to life in all its fullness, in the fullness of the Kingdom. That is why it can turn out for a person to be either joy or suffering. And what will await him in eternity depends only on the choice the person himself must make here, in this life.

In spiritual life, reason often does not occupy the most honored place. We take care to act well, to follow the commandments, and not to harm either our neighbor or ourselves - and that is wonderful, for this is exactly what the parable of the Judgment speaks about (Matt 25:31-46).

We are attentive to the movements of the heart, to feelings: we strive to have compassion, to rejoice with others, to love God and neighbor. Most often we turn to our reason when we read Scripture: here too, of course, it is important to measure our life against the Word of God, important to listen and hear it, as Mary listened by the manger, 'keeping all these words and pondering them in her heart' (Luke 2:19), but it is no less important still to strive to understand, to read deeply into the meaning.

And we really do this. But how often do we pay attention to how exactly we think? Do we consider this important? Yes, of course, at every service we proclaim our faith, listing the dogmas on which it is built. But how often at that moment do we ponder every word, trying to understand why the fathers of this or that Ecumenical Council established exactly these words as the foundation of our Church?

Sometimes we say: all this can be left to theologians, while I believe as my heart tells me, for the foundation of faith is prayer, the Encounter with God, the reading of the Word of God. Of course, all this is true. But from Jesus' conversation with the scribe it is clear that our Lord values reason no less than feelings, the will directed toward good, or deeds performed out of love.

The scribe says to Him: 'You have spoken the truth.' Truth belongs to reason, to how we think and what we agree with. These words already bring the scribe nearer to God, for he and God have one common truth. The scribe pronounces words that affirm his faith. We know nothing about his deeds, about how he prayed, or how sincerely he conversed with God. We do not even know how attentive he was in studying Scripture, although his membership among the scribes shows that he devoted much time to interpretation. We know exactly one thing: he understood the essence of Scripture in the same way as Jesus and agreed with His words in his mind. And Jesus, 'seeing that he answered wisely, said to him: You are not far from the Kingdom of God.' It follows that not only prayer, not only good deeds, but also precision of thought brings us nearer to the Kingdom.

Jesus does not break the familiar world, but He radically changes it from within, filling established ideas with the right understanding. Out of the many commandments, so familiar, He singles out two, and the meaning of a person's relationship with God and with the world immediately comes into clear focus. True, the scribe is interested in only one commandment, since from a human point of view only one thing can be most important. Yet Christ unexpectedly places two commandments side by side.

That the commandment to love God is named first is natural and could not be otherwise. But that the commandment to love a human being is placed beside it, and that no other commandment can compare with these two, was a breakthrough in grasping the highest Reality. The high dignity of the human person, the calling to deification, is something absent from non-biblical religions and is the reason God became man. Understanding this is one of those golden talents given to us by the Savior that we ought not bury in the ground, but put to use more often.

The scribe who understands this (a very modern figure, by the way) is not far from the Kingdom of God. Someone who is near is not yet inside; he still has to take a step toward Christ, and that step can be so hard to take. People like this scribe often find it hard to decide on such a step, but because they have drawn near, it would also be easier for them to enter.

This is a rare passage in the Gospel where a scribe is shown in a favorable light. When he asks his question, he does so without any trap, truly wanting to receive an answer. And when he receives it, this man keeps it in his heart and draws such a conclusion that the Lord Himself says to him: "You are not far from the Kingdom of God." This scribe grasped Christ's good news that love is greater than burnt offerings and sacrifices.

It appears that for the scribe in the Gospel, the question of the hierarchy of the commandments stopped being a purely theoretical question on which one could sharpen the mind and, besides, catch Jesus. For him it became a question of changing one's whole life in accordance with the importance of these commandments.

The Lord expects from us faithfulness and love for Him and for those whom He has placed beside us, our neighbors. But how often we forget this, especially if those neighbors have thoroughly worn us out. It is easier to observe rules and norms regardless of the fact that by doing so we violate the commandment of love. Because it is easier to offer a sacrifice to the invisible God than to show mercy to a badly behaved teenager or to a homeless person who smells unpleasant.

The dialogue between Jesus and an unnamed teacher of the Torah, a "scribe," is remarkable because, at least outwardly, the participants say nothing especially unusual. The teacher of the Torah asks Jesus an elementary school question about the meaning of the Torah, the answer to which was known to any yeshiva student: the meaning of the Torah comes down to two commandments, the commandment to love God ("with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength," if we recall the corresponding line from Deuteronomy) and to love one's neighbor as oneself (as is said in Leviticus). This understanding of the meaning of the Torah was already quite traditional in Gospel times, and the teacher asks Jesus his question with the clear intention of testing His knowledge of the tradition.

Jesus gives the correct answer, the teacher approves His answer - "well said" - and in turn receives the Savior's assessment: you are not far from the Kingdom of God. What did the Savior like so much in the teacher of the Torah's reaction to His words? Perhaps that he says directly that love for God and neighbor is greater than all sacrifices? Evidently yes, for Jesus constantly reminds people that in the Kingdom and for the Kingdom the main thing is relationships, and that the question of abiding in the Kingdom is connected with a person's spiritual state, not with his activity, even if that activity is religious.

For the spiritual state, what matters is precisely that God be at the center of a person's whole life, in his heart, in his soul, that He be the center of all the efforts a person makes in his life. This, of course, is not about some abstract ideal, nor even about faith as a system of convictions around which religious people often build their lives, but precisely about God's real presence in the deepest part of the human person, in that center which in biblical language is called the heart.

Judging by Jesus' answer, He saw that for the teacher of the Torah who had turned to Him, this was not just theory, that the meaning of the Torah had become reality for him, that he lived as he taught, as far as this was possible for him as a human being. A person is limited here by his fallen nature, but if he does everything possible and lives to the maximum, fully realizing his spiritual potential, then he really is not far from the Kingdom. Only the last step remains, and the One who brought the Kingdom into the world can help him take it.

Christ's answer to the scribe's question about the greatest commandment in the law has fundamental importance for the New Covenant. The question itself reflects the heated debates taking place among the Jews during the Savior's earthly life. Some of them believed that in the law every commandment without exception has decisive importance, and that among them there are none more or less important. From this point of view, the one who sins against one commandment becomes a violator of the whole law. This view found expression, in particular, in the apostle Paul's letter to the Romans. Those who held this position believed that the law as such was given by God and therefore is holy. Yet it is hard to consider equally important, on the one hand, the commandments "I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods" and "you shall not kill," and on the other hand, the commandments "do not spoil the edges of your beard" and the commandment about the need to relieve oneself outside the camp.

Other Jews, on the contrary, considered the commandments of the Sinai covenant far from equal. The answer of Rabbi Hillel to a Gentile who wished to know the essence of Judaism briefly, "while standing on one foot," is well known. Hillel told him: "What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor; this is the whole law, the rest is only its explanation." The Lord Jesus' answer evidently supports this latter point of view. Yet there is a significant difference between the positions of Christ and His older contemporary Hillel.

Unlike the learned rabbi, the Son of God formulates two chief commandments, placing first the commandment to love God. Moreover, the Lord expresses both chief commandments in an active, positive form: instead of "do not do," He says, "love," that is, His understanding of the law is directed not toward what must not be done, but toward what should be done. Further, it is crucial that the Lord joins these two commandments. In essence, the New Covenant gives us one commandment, calling us to love God and neighbor with the love with which the Son of God loved us on the Cross. Finally, Christ resolutely refuses to compare other commandments with these two, emphasizing their uniqueness and exhaustive character.

The scribe who asked the question pays attention precisely to this last aspect: "You have truly said... and to love Him... and to love one's neighbor... is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices." The Lord approved this understanding, telling the scribe that he was not far from the Kingdom of God.

The connection of the two commandments given at the time of Moses shows here, that they are the same thing. It is impossible to love God and the same time don’t love those whom He loves (1Jn 4:20); it is impossible to love a person if we are not dwell in love with God who is Himself love (1Jn 4:16). And Jesus who showed to people what is love by giving " His life for His friends ", shows as well what is love to God, accomplishing all that the Father ordered Him (Jn 14:31). To love as Jesus loves is the fulfillment of this double command.

Speaking about the two commandments the Lord gave us in today's reading, one wants to pay attention to Christ's words about their likeness. At first they seem understandable: indeed, in both cases the matter is love. But let us think about this again. Love for God and love for a human being - how different these things are! We express love for God in prayer. We express love for a human being in labor. Every layperson (in the sense of someone who is not a monastic) who lives a life of prayer knows well that prayer takes time away from labor, and labor takes time away from prayer (especially if the labor is intellectual). That means these are two different principles standing in opposition to each other. Why, then, does the Lord speak of likeness? What does He put into these words?

Looked at from this side, these words cease to be a simple statement that in both cases the matter is love. In general, we must always be extremely careful when something in the word of God seems simple to us. Most often this is an apparent simplicity connected with the fact that we have not penetrated the text deeply enough. After all, the Lord had little time, and He understood this, so He could not waste it on obvious things. What, then, is the meaning here?

Perhaps what is being affirmed here is the ideal of likeness reaching the point of indistinguishability between labor and prayer. This is precisely what we must strive for: that prayer would be labor for us, hard labor, and that labor would be prayer for us. But of course this in no way means (as one often has to hear from secular, unchurched people who are accustomed to working much and intensely) that labor is prayer, a word by which they try to justify themselves before the Most High, dimly perceived by a soul that has not learned to love God.

It is precisely when we live in the tension between these two poles, labor and prayer, unconfused yet inseparable, so inseparable that they manifest a unity, that we fulfill God's commandment.

In His conversation with the scribe, Christ asks him about what he knows by the nature of his work. Answering Christ, the scribe speaks of love for God and neighbor, saying that these are more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices. And Christ says to him: you are not far from the Kingdom of God. In the Apostle Peter (1 Pet 4:1-11) we find a call to serve, that is, to fulfill one's duty and responsibilities according to the strength God gives. In his work, in his studies, the scribe still saw what mattered most. He saw the essence and meaning of faith. Christ constantly calls us to seek the meaning of every step we take and every thought we have: the meaning of what, here and today, we can do for the glory of God and out of love for Him. Serving one another is the most important thing that should become the meaning of our life after love for God. There are different ways to serve. One can work in a factory or raise children. A scholar and a cleaner glorify God equally by their labor if, in that labor, they find time and place for God. The apostle calls us to serve one another with the gift each has received. The gift we have received is the possibility of meeting God at every moment of life; it is the gift of His love. By our life we can confirm His presence in this world, His love for people. And every day we must ask God to give us strength to serve one another. Through constant prayer and communion with Him we will gain the joy of His presence and of recognizing Him in every manifestation of life.