“Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Mark 12:17

Saint Mark tells us today that Jesus is already in Jerusalem to carry out his mission as the suffering Messiah. After having triumphantly entered Jerusalem and cleansed the Temple, the Lord has a series of controversies with the Leaders of the Temple and Israel (who agreed to kill him) and unmasks them with the parable of “the murderous vinedressers”, read yesterday. Defeated, Jesus’ enemies send the Pharisees and Herodians to set a trap for him, some nationalists and others collaborators. They, as the “flatterers” that they are, praise him and then set a trap with their tricky and hypocritical question: Should the tax be paid to Caesar? Jesus unmasks them by asking them to show him the coin (a denarius); they, falling into their own trap, show him the coin with the figure of Caesar, thus showing themselves impure before the people for having and touching a pagan coin with the image of a false god (Caesar). Jesus simply tells them to return their coin to Caesar, since duties to God do not exempt them from duties to society; that Caesar receives his tribute, but more importantly, that God receives his tribute in true worship: making restitution to the poor, to the exploited, to the excluded, to the crushed, to the victims of injustice.