Original Research - Special Collection: Foundation subjects - Old and New Testament Studies
The Things of Caesar: Mark-ing the Plural (Mk 12:13–17)
Submitted: 13 March 2014 | Published: 02 September 2014
About the author(s)
Warren Carter, Brite Divinity School, Texas Christian University, United States of America; Department of New Testament Studies, Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria, South AfricaAbstract
This article observes the rarely-discussed phenomenon that the Marcan paying-the-tax scene refers to tax in the singular, whilst the concluding saying uses the plural ‘the things of Caesar and of God’. The article accounts for this phenomenon by means of developing traditions. The section under the heading ‘Mark’s scene and saying about taxes (12:13–17)’ counters the common claim that scene and saying originated as a unit from the historical Jesus. It proposes that whilst the saying may have originated with Jesus, the scene as we have it did not. The section under the heading ‘Social memory, orality, and a multi-referential saying?’ suggests some contexts that the saying about the things of Caesar addressed pre-Mark. And under the section ‘Trauma and Mark’s scene’ it is argued that Mark created a unit comprising scene and saying to negotiate the ‘ trauma’ of the 66–70 war. The unit evaluates freshly-asserted Roman power as idolatrous and blasphemous whilst simultaneously authorising the continued involvement of Jesus-believers in imperial society.
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Crossref Citations
1. ‘Render to Caesar the Things of Caesar and to God the Things of God’: Recent Perspectives on a Puzzling Command (1945–Present)
Simeon R. Burke
Currents in Biblical Research vol: 16 issue: 2 first page: 157 year: 2018
doi: 10.1177/1476993X17742292