Whose Head Is This?

“Whose head is this?”

Out of context, that’s an odd question!

But it is precisely that question — it’ll be obvious why my why memory of this has been jogged — that I distinctly remember asking my parents quite often when I was a little child.

I doubt I’m the only person who, in many parts of the world, either asked or was asked some variant of this question repletely during a period of childhood.

“Whose head is this?”

Over time, I learned that, at least where and when I was growing up, the potential answers to my question were limited to nine possibilities: Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, George Washington, John F. Kennedy, Alexander Hamilton, Andrew Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, and Benjamin Franklin.

If you are from or have spent much time in the United States, you probably know what these nine people have in common (other than all being white males): theirs are the portraits on the currency — whether coins or notes — of the United States.

Rather quickly, well before I started kindergarten, I had come to recognize those nine faces just about anywhere I saw them depicted.

And, interestingly (even if my childhood self was confused about why Washington was worth more than Lincoln in metal form but Lincoln worth more than Washington in paper form), I had begun to associate the image that I recognized with value.

“Whose head is this?”

At this point, it should probably be noted that “head” is really a horrible translation.

But more about that later. For now, we’ll just go with it…

“Whose head is this?”

It is a simple question and, frankly, it is kind of an annoying question.

The Pharisees’ disciples and the Herodians have just put to Jesus what they think is a very clever, intricate inquiry about an incredibly complex issue facing the Jews of Jesus’s day.

And not only does Jesus answer their question with a question (how infuriating!), it is one he asks about an extremely common coin; it is a question so basic, it could have easily come from a child — not that I was ever an annoying child!

But Jesus clearly was annoying.

He was!

He was annoying everyone who was comfortable with the status quo.

It’s evident by just how much “dealing with him” preöccupied so many of those who possessed the authority and power of law and religion.

So disturbing was Jesus that the Pharisees — who opposed Roman occupation — and the Herodians — who were Roman sympathizers — are brought together in their common goal of subverting him!

Their question, which we’ve just heard in today’s gospel[1], is carefully crafted: “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor?”

They leave no way out other than a “yes” or a “no.”

A positive answer would alienate Jesus from the Jews, who largely opposed Roman taxation; a negative answer would be sufficient to incriminate him against Rome.

But, for the Jews, the issue goes deeper than just not liking more taxes (who really would?).

Their opposition to paying the tribute to the emperor has two important aspects that should not escape our attention: political and religious.

Politically, paying the tax was seen as being compliant with — even legitimizing — the presence of their invader, whose army and government occupied their land illegitimately.

Religiously, for the Jews, who had long been accustomed to paying their own temple taxes, the Roman worship of the emperor as a god, underscored by his image on coins, was an insult to the God of Israel.

Indeed, the very “denarius” usually thought by scholars to be the one in question here — the so-called “tribute penny” — bore the head of the emperor Tiberius on the front with the inscription «Ti[berivs] Cæsar Divi Avg[vsti] F[ilivs] Avgvstvs» (“Cæsar Augustus Tiberius, son of the Divine Augustus”) and, on the reverse, a seated female, depicted as pax, with the encircling inscription — still so familiar and religiously-charged in this city of Rome today — «pontifex maximus».

Thus, much like that of their forbearers in the wilderness — about whom we heard in the first lesson from Exodus last Sunday — who exchanged the God of glory for the molten image of an ox that feeds on grass[2], the whole dilemma at hand is very much one of idolatry.

And besides all this, since Jesus’s central message was that the kingdom of God had arrived, a question about paying taxes to another kingdom — the Roman Empire — could not have been more relevant.

“Whose head is this?” is, however, the answer they get.

Simple. Annoying. Even childish.

But Jesus’s response constitutes a total revaluing of the whole system that undergirds the insidious, dichotomous “yes or no” trap laid for him in his adversaries’ inquisition: “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Cæsar, or not?”

Besides making space for a differentiation between the political sphere and the religious sphere, in which complying with the just laws of the state can coëxist with affirming God’s primacy in human life and history, Jesus turns the whole idea of indebtedness on its head.

Ultimately, at the heart of his question about the denarius — “Whose head is this?” — is a more fundamental question: “Whence did you get this?” («Da dove avete ricevuto questo?»).

Almost certainly, you did not get it from yourself; you did not mint the coin.

And even if you did happen to know how to make a coin and did so, what value would that coin have?

Would it be recognized as authoritative currency, as “legal tender”?

And here we arrive at a major but easy-to-miss point: there is a relationship between recognition and value.

I’ll say that again, because very often the Church needs to hear it: there is a relationship between recognition and value.

Real recognition.

In practice.

And so, really, if I am forced to answer the Lord’s question — “Whose head is this?” — I’m forced to confront the matter: “To whom am I a debtor?”

Whence did I get all this in the first place?

At the political level, a quip made some years ago by Rowan Williams might serve as a sort of summarizing perspective: “If you are profiting from Cæsar’s government, don’t grumble about paying Cæsar’s taxes.”

That — the paying your taxes bit — is probably the easier side of this scene to digest.

But what about the part at the spiritual level?

Jesus says, “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

What does that even mean?

And how is the question “Whose head is this?” helpful?

Well, presumably, we recognize the things that are God’s in the same way we recognize the things that are Cæsar’s.

“Whose head is this?”

Remember when I said a few minutes ago that “head” is a bad translation?

Let’s talk about that.

Most English translations render the word as either “image” or “likeness,” with many Italian translation using «immagine».

And indeed, in the original Greek, the word is εἰκών.

That’s right, εἰκών!

It could be mispronounced like its Modern English direct descendant: “icon.”

It’s a very rich term, meaning “image,” “likeness,” “similitude,” “semblance,” even “reflection.”

It’s the same term that the Septuagint — the Greek translation of the Old Testament — uses for the Hebrew צֶלֶם, the very word found in Genesis’s description of the human person as made in the image and likeness of God[3].

So, with a better translation, let’s hear Jesus ask the question again: “Whose image,” or, “whose likeness is this?”

Cæsar’s εἰκών is on the denarius.

But where is God’s εἰκών?

Where is God’s image and likeness?

I think — or at least I hope — that the answer is clear.

If not, well, you can google it…

And, yes, that answer is great and it is beautiful and it is profound.

But what on earth does it mean to “give to God the things that are God’s” — even if we know what, or rather who, they are?

Too easily could this be shallowly interpreted to as an appeal to a “transactional” sort of Christianity: I attend my one-hour-a-week liturgy, I tithe enough not to look too stingy, I basically follow the rules, and therefore I’ve “given God the things that are God’s.”

While attending Church is good to do (we are glad you’re here, and experiencing faith in community is hugely important!), and while tithing is also good to do (all “this” that we do here does take a lot of money!), Christianity is not a mathematical formula that, if followed carefully enough, equals salvation.

No, Christianity is a relationship.

So, perhaps, “to give God what belongs to God” is about recognizing the infinite value of the εἰκών we see; about setting human beings free to know God and to fulfil their calling, as image and likeness of the Creator, to be creative in the world.

“Giving” humanity to God is acting in such a way that the image is made more visible.

It is bringing human dignity to light[4].

In other words, perhaps “giving to God the things that are God’s” means to live the Gospel; quite frankly and quite simply, it means to be Church — hic et nunc! — to the people, and among the people, of our own time and place.

It is a question of making one’s own contribution to building the civilization of love where dignity reigns[5].

“It means going to those who have no status and no power from which they can profit: to those who have been marginalized and rejected, acknowledging their infinite worth; to the suffering and grieving, giving them relief and comfort; to those who have hurt us, forgiving them; to those we have demonized (often in the name of religion), proclaiming to the world — and to the Church — ‘these too are God’s beloved!’”[6]. For they bear God’s image.

“Giving to God the things that are God’s” means that when my life is unexpectedly intersected — just at the worst possible moment — by an “other”who inconveniently seeks to be seen, heard, recognized, understood, accepted, valued, cherished, loved; that when the smug and self-indulgent illusions of my own status quo (which are ultimately nothing more than “worshipping myself as my own god) are annoyed, disturbed, threatened by the presence of this “other,” this human face (known to me or not); that I know the answer… if only I allow myself to hear the Lord ask that terrible question once again: “And whose image is this?”

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[1] Matthew 22:15-22 (N.R.S.V.).

[2] Cf. Psalm 106:19-20.

[3] Cf. Genesis 1:27.

[4] Cf. Williams, R., Sermon given at St Margaret’s, Westminster, 8 June 2010.

[5] Cf. Franciscus, Angelus address, Piazza San Pietro, 18 October 2020.

[6] Denson, J., Predigt zur Klosterprimiz von Matthäus Konieczny (English translation by the author), Benediktinerstift Admont, 25 July 2023.