Homily 70 — Matthew 22, verses 15 to 33

“Then the Pharisees went and took counsel how they might trap him in his talk.” [a]

“Then.” When? When most of all they ought to have been moved to heartfelt sorrow; when they should have been amazed at his love for humankind; when they should have feared what was coming; when from the past they ought to have believed what he told them about the future as well. For what he had said was already crying aloud in actual fulfillment — I mean that tax collectors and prostitutes had believed, and that prophets and righteous men had been killed. From these things they ought not to have argued against what was said about their own destruction; they should have believed it and come to their senses.

But even so their wicked acts do not stop. They go on conceiving more, and go further still. Since they could not lay hands on him (for they were afraid of the crowd), they took another road, meaning to bring him into danger and make him answerable for crimes against the state.

For “they sent their disciples to him with the Herodians, saying, ‘Teacher, we know that you are true, and teach the way of God in truth, and you defer to no one, for you show no partiality to anyone. Tell us, then, what do you think? Is it lawful to pay tax to Caesar, or not?’”

They were by now paying tribute, since their state had passed under the rule of the Romans. They had seen that Theudas and Judas, with their followers, had been put to death for this very thing, as men preparing a revolt, and they meant to bring him too under that kind of suspicion by these words. So they sent both their own disciples and Herod’s soldiers, digging, as they thought, a pit on either side of him and setting the snare in every direction, so that whatever he said, they might seize on it. If he answered in favor of the Herodians, they themselves could find fault with him; if in their own favor, the others would accuse him. And yet he had already paid the didrachma, though they did not know it. [c]

They expected to catch him either way, but what they wanted more was for him to say something against the Herodians. That is why they send their own disciples too, to push him toward it by their presence, so that they might hand him over to the governor as a usurper. Luke also hints at this and makes it plain, when he says that they asked him in front of the crowd, so that the testimony would be all the stronger. But the result was the very opposite: before a larger crowd of onlookers they only put their own folly on display.

And look at their flattery and their hidden cunning. “We know,” they say, “that you are true.” Then how could you say, “He is a deceiver,” and “He leads the people astray,” and “He has a demon,” and “He is not from God”? How could you plot to kill him only a little while before? [f]

But they will try anything their cunning against him suggests. A little earlier they had asked in their arrogance, “By what authority are you doing these things?” and had got no answer to the question. So now they hope to puff him up with flattery and persuade him to say something against the established laws and opposed to the government in power.

That is why they testify to the truth about him, admitting what really was so, but not with an honest mind, and not willingly. And they add, “You defer to no one.” See how plainly they want to push him into words that would make him offend Herod and bring on him the suspicion of being a usurper, as a man setting himself against the laws, so that they could punish him as a stirrer of rebellion and a usurper. For in saying, “You defer to no one,” and, “You show no partiality to anyone,” they were hinting at Herod and Caesar. “Tell us, then, what do you think?” Now you honor him and count him a teacher — you who so often despised and insulted him when he was speaking of the things that concern your own salvation! That is also why they have joined forces.

And see their craftiness. They do not say, “Tell us what is good, what is advantageous, what is lawful,” but, “What do you think?” That is how fixed they were on this one aim: to betray him and set him at odds with the rulers. Mark shows this, and uncovers their arrogance and their murderous intent more plainly, when he reports that they said, “Should we pay tax to Caesar, or should we not?” So while they were breathing anger and in labor with a plot against him, they pretended respect. [g]

What, then, does he say? “Why are you testing me, you hypocrites?” Do you see how he speaks to them with more than his usual severity? Since their wickedness was now full-grown and out in the open, he cuts deeper. First he throws them into confusion and silences them by making their secret thoughts public, showing everyone with what kind of purpose they were coming to him.

He did this to beat back their wickedness, so that they would not come to harm by attempting the same things again. And yet their words were full of respect: they called him Teacher, bore witness to his truthfulness, and said that he showed no partiality. But since he was God, none of this deceived him. So they too ought to have guessed that his rebuke was not a guess, but a sign that he knew their secret thoughts.

He did not stop at the rebuke, however, though it was enough merely to have exposed their purpose and shamed them for their wickedness. He did not stop there, but shut their mouths in another way as well. “Show me,” he says, “the coin for the tax.” And when they had shown it, he does as he always does: he draws the verdict out of their own tongues and makes them the ones who decide that it is lawful — a clear and open victory. So when he asks, he does not ask out of ignorance; he wants them to be bound by their own answers. For when they were asked, “Whose image is this?” and said, “Caesar’s,” he says, “Give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” This is not giving, but giving back; and he shows it both by the image and by the inscription. [h]

Then, so that they could not say, “You are making us subjects of men,” he added, “and to God the things that are God’s.” For it is possible both to pay men what they have a claim to and to give God the things we owe to God. That is why Paul too says, “Pay to all what is due them: tax to whom tax is due, revenue to whom revenue, fear to whom fear.”

But when you hear, “Give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,” understand that he means only those things that do no harm to godliness. If it is anything of that kind, it is no longer Caesar’s tax, but the devil’s. [i]

When they heard these things, their mouths were shut, and they “marveled” at his wisdom. Should they not, then, have believed? Should they not have been amazed? For he had given them proof that he was God, by revealing the secrets of their hearts, and he silenced them gently.

What then? Did they believe? Not at all. They “left him and went away,” and after them “the Sadducees came to him.”

What folly! When the others had been silenced, these made the attack, when they ought to have held back all the more. But that is what recklessness is like: shameless, stubbornly persistent, attempting the impossible. That is why the evangelist, amazed at their folly, pointed to this very thing by saying, “On that day they came to him.” On that day — which day? The day on which he had exposed the others’ cunning and put them to shame.

But who are these? A sect of the Jews different from the Pharisees and much worse than they, who said “that there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit.” They were of a coarser sort, eager for the things of the body. For there were many sects even among the Jews. That is why Paul too says, “I am a Pharisee, of the strictest sect among us.” [j]

They say nothing directly about a resurrection. Instead they invent a story and make up a case which, as I suppose, never even happened, thinking to drive him into perplexity, and wanting to overturn two things at once: that there is a resurrection at all, and that it is the kind of resurrection it is. And again, these too come at him with a show of courtesy, saying, “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies having no children, his brother shall marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.’ Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married a wife and died, and having no children, he left his wife to his brother. So too the second, and the third, down to the seventh. Last of all the woman died too. In the resurrection, then, whose wife will she be of the seven?”

See how he answers them like a teacher. Although they came to him out of cunning, their question came more from ignorance. That is why he does not say to them, “You hypocrites.”

Moreover, so that he could not find fault with them by saying, “Why did seven men have one wife?” they bring in the authority of Moses — although, as I said before, the story was a fiction, in my judgment at least. The third would not have taken her when he saw two bridegrooms dead; or if the third did, then not the fourth or the fifth; and if even these did, much more would the sixth or the seventh have refused to go near the woman and shrunk back from her. For such is the nature of the Jews. If many feel this way now, far more did they then — especially since, even without this, they often avoided marrying in this way, and that when the law was compelling them. So Ruth, that Moabite woman, was pushed off onto the kinsman who was more distant; and Tamar was driven to get offspring by stealth from her husband’s kinsman. And why did they invent seven, and not two or three? To heap all the more ridicule, as they thought, on the resurrection. That is why they add, “For they all had her,” as if driving him into a corner. [k]

What, then, does Christ say? He answers both points, taking his stand not against their words but against their purpose. On every occasion he reveals the secrets of their hearts, at one time exposing them, at another leaving the refutation of his questioners to their own conscience. See, for instance, how he proves both points here: that there will be a resurrection, and that it will not be the kind of resurrection they suspect. What does he say? “You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God.” Since they put forward Moses and the law as if they knew them, he shows that this question is the question of men who are quite ignorant of the Scriptures. Indeed their testing him came from this same source: from their ignorance of the Scriptures, and from not knowing the power of God as they should. [l]

He says: “Why, then, is it any wonder if you test me, whom you do not yet know, when you do not know even the power of God — which you have experienced so often — and have come to know it neither from common sense nor from the Scriptures?” For even common sense teaches us this: that all things are possible for God.

First he answers the question they asked. Since the reason they did not believe in a resurrection was that they imagined its order of things would be like this one, he heals the cause, and then the symptom as well (for that was where the disease came from), and shows what the resurrection will be like. “For in the resurrection,” he says, “they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.” But Luke says, “like sons of God.”

If they do not marry, then the question is pointless. Yet it is not because they do not marry that they are angels; it is because they are like angels that they do not marry. By this he cleared away many other difficulties as well, all of which Paul hinted at in a single phrase when he said, “For the present form of this world is passing away.” [m]

By these words he showed how great a thing the resurrection is; and he goes on to prove that there is a resurrection at all. This too had already been shown by what he had said; still, he adds more to his words by what he says now. For he did not stop at their question, but went on to their thought. So when people are not acting with great cunning but asking out of ignorance, he teaches them even beyond what they asked; but when they come out of pure wickedness, he does not even answer their question.

And once again he stops their mouths with Moses, since they too had brought Moses forward. He says, “But as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead, but of the living.” His meaning is: not the God of those who do not exist, who are wiped out entirely and will never rise again. For he did not say, “I was,” but, “I am” — the God of those who are, and who live. For just as Adam, though he went on living after the day he ate from the tree, died by the sentence passed on him; in the same way these men, though they had died, lived by the promise of the resurrection.

How, then, does he say elsewhere, “that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living”? This does not contradict it. Here he is speaking of dead who are themselves going to live. Besides, “I am the God of Abraham” is one thing, and “that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living” is another. He knew of another kind of death as well, the one of which he says, “Let the dead bury their own dead.”

“And when the crowds heard this, they were astonished at his teaching.” Not the Sadducees, though, even now. They go away defeated, while the unbiased crowd reaps the benefit. [n]

Since, then, the resurrection is like this, come, let us do everything we can to win the first honors there. And if you like, let us show you some who, even before the resurrection, are pursuing these blessings here and reaping them; once again we will make our way to the deserts. For I will take up the same subject again, since I see that you listen to it with more pleasure.

Today too, then, let us look at the spiritual army camps, and see their pleasure, with no fear mixed in. They are not encamped with spears like soldiers — that was the point where I ended my talk the other day — nor with shields and breastplates. You will see them stripped of all these, and yet achieving what soldiers do not achieve even with weapons.

If you are able to watch, come, give me your hand, and let us both go to this war and look at their battle line. For these men also fight every day. They kill their adversaries and conquer all the cravings that plot against us. You will see those cravings thrown to the ground, not even able to struggle, proving in very deed the apostle’s saying, “Those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and cravings.”

Do you see a multitude of dead lying there, slain by the sword of the Spirit? That is why there is no drunkenness there, no gluttony. Their table proves it, and the trophy set up on it. For drunkenness and gluttony lie dead, routed by the drinking of water — though drunkenness is a thing of many shapes, a many-headed monster. As in the fabled Scylla and Hydra, so in drunkenness one can see many heads: on one side sexual immorality growing up, on another anger; here laziness, there lawless cravings. But all of these are done away with. [o]

And yet all those other armies, though they win in ten thousand wars, are taken captive by these vices. Neither weapons nor spears nor anything else there may be can stand against these battle ranks. The very giants, the heroes, the men of countless brave deeds — you will find them bound without chains by sleep and drunkenness, lying like the wounded without any slaughter or wounds, or rather in a worse state. For the wounded at least struggle; these do not even do that, but give up at once.

Do you see that this army is greater and more to be admired? For the enemies who defeated the others it destroys by its will alone. These men so weaken the mother of all their evils that she cannot even trouble them anymore; and once the leader is overthrown and the head cut off, the rest of the body lies still too. [p]

And you can see every one of those who live there winning this victory. It is not as in these wars of ours, where an enemy who has taken a blow from one man and been overthrown is no longer a danger to anyone else. Here everyone must strike this monster, and whoever has not struck her and overthrown her is certainly troubled by her.

Do you see a glorious victory? Such a trophy as the armies of every part of the world could not raise if they all joined together, each one of these men raises. And everything from the army of drunkenness lies heaped together and wounded: the raving words of frenzy, the insane thoughts, the ugly arrogance. And they imitate their own Lord, at whom the Scripture marvels, saying, “He will drink from the brook by the way; therefore he will lift up his head.”

Would you like to see another multitude of dead as well? Let us look at the cravings that come from luxurious living, the ones fostered by the sauce makers, the cooks, the caterers, the pastry cooks. I am ashamed to speak of all of it; still, I will mention the birds from Phasis, the soups mixed from all sorts of things, the moist dishes and the dry, and the laws they have made about these things. As if they were governing a city and marshaling armies, these people too make laws and decree that this must come first and that second. Some serve first birds roasted over the coals and stuffed with fish; others make the opening of these lawless feasts from some other material. There is great rivalry over these things — over quality, over order, over quantity — and they pride themselves on the very things for which they ought to bury themselves in shame, some saying they have spent half the day at it, some the whole day, some that they have added the night as well. Look, wretched man, at the size of your belly, and be ashamed of your measureless zeal!

But there is nothing like this among those angels; all these desires too are dead there. Their meals are not for fullness and luxury, but for necessity. There are no bird catchers there, no fishermen, only bread and water. All this confusion, the uproar, the turmoil, is gone from there, from the house and from the body alike. Great is the calm harbor there; but among these others, great is the storm. [q]

Now in your mind cut open the belly of those who feed on such things, and you will see the mass of waste, the unclean sewer, the whitewashed tomb.

What comes after these I am ashamed even to tell: the unpleasant belching, the vomiting, the discharges below and above. But go and see these desires too lying dead there, and the more violent cravings that spring from them — I mean the cravings for impurity. These too you will see all overthrown, with their horses and their pack animals. For a filthy word is the pack animal, the weapon, and the horse of a filthy deed. There you will see horse and rider thrown down together, and their weapons with them; but here it is quite the opposite, and it is souls that lie cast down dead. And not at their meals only is the victory of these holy men glorious, but in everything else as well: over money, over glory, over envy, over every disease of the soul.

Does this army not seem to you mightier than that one, and this meal better? Who will deny it? No one, not even one of those people themselves, however mad he may be. For this table guides us toward heaven, while that one drags us down to hell. The table of luxury is laid by the devil, this one by Christ. At the table of luxury, luxury itself and lack of self-control make the laws; at this one, self-denial and sobriety. Here Christ is present; there, the devil. For where there is drunkenness, the devil is there; where there is filthy talk, where there is gorging, there the demons hold their dances. Such was the table of that rich man, and that is why he could not command so much as a drop of water. [r]

But these men have no such table; they are already practicing the life of the angels. They do not marry, they are not given in marriage, they do not sleep too much or live in luxury, and apart from a few things they are practically without bodies.

Who, then, overcomes his enemies as easily as the man who raises a trophy while he dines? That is why the prophet says, “You have prepared a table before me in the presence of those who trouble me.” One would not go wrong in repeating this saying about this table. For nothing troubles a soul so much as disorderly craving, and luxury, and drunkenness, and the evils that spring from them; and those who have had experience of them know it well.

And if you were to learn also where the one table comes from, and where the other, you would see well the difference between them. Where does the table of luxury come from? From countless tears, from widows cheated, from orphans robbed. The monks’ table comes from honest labor. The monks’ table is like a beautiful, well-formed woman who needs nothing from outside, but has her beauty by nature. The other is like some ugly, misshapen prostitute, wearing a great deal of paint but unable to hide her ugliness; the closer she comes, the more she is exposed. So too with that table: the nearer it is to the man sitting at it, the more it shows its ugliness. Do not look, I tell you, at the diners only as they arrive, but also as they leave, and then you will see its ugliness. [s]

The monks’ table, being freeborn, lets those who come to it say nothing shameful; the other, being a prostitute and disgraced, lets them say nothing decent. The one seeks the good of the man sitting at it, the other his harm. And the one … not; but at the other we cannot help offending God.

Let us go away, then, to those men. There we will learn how many chains bind us. There we will learn to set before ourselves a table full of countless blessings: very sweet, costing nothing, free from worry, free from envy and jealousy and every disease, full of good hope, and holding many trophies. There is no turmoil of soul there, no grief, no anger; all is calm, all is peace.

Do not tell me about the silence of the servants in the houses of the rich; tell me rather about the uproar of the diners. I do not mean the noise they make at one another (though that too deserves ridicule), but the uproar within, in the soul, which brings them into deep captivity: the tumult of their thoughts, the sleet, the darkness, the storm, by which everything is mixed up and thrown into confusion, like some battle at night. There is nothing like this in the monks’ tents, but great calm, great quiet. The table of luxury is followed by a sleep like death, the monks’ table by sobriety and wakefulness; the one by punishment, the other by the kingdom of heaven and rewards that never die.

Let us pursue this, then, so that we may also enjoy its fruits. May God grant that we all attain them, by the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and power forever and ever. Amen.