'Weasel Words!' - Matthew 22.15-21

Weasel Words!

The expression “Weasel Words” popularized by Don Watson in his book of the same name has passed into our language. But it is far from a 21st century concept.  It comes from the belief that weasels can suck eggs devoid of their contents leaving an empty shell and this is what he says is often done with words, especially by politicians. They give the illusion that they are something other than what they really are. The origin of the phrase actually goes back to Shakespeare where in Henry V there is an image of a weasel sucking an egg dry. The practice though goes back even further and a prime example is found in the trap that the Pharisees try to set for Jesus in this morning’s gospel.

Weasel words! That’s what they tried to trap him with. Flattering him “Teacher, you show  deference to no one” and pretending that they respect him and were genuinely seeking his advice on whether to pay tax to the Romans. If he said “Yes” then they had him, he would lose the support of the people, for they hated the Roman occupiers and the tax was a symbol of their enslavement.

If Jesus said “No, don’t pay the tax” then they still had him, for he would be reported by the Herodians who supported the Romans and   accused of sedition and fomenting unrest. If Jesus tried to avoid the question – sit on the fence, then he would look weak.

They thought they were so clever. They’d known Jesus was a formidable opponent so they’d given it careful planning. The Herodians who collaborated with the Romans were there if he answered one way, the Pharisees (who despised the Herodians) if he went the other. The fact that they conspired together indicated just how seriously they took the threat from Jesus. It seemed a no win situation for him. And even if it did go wrong they had sent along their lesser lights, their “disciples” so that they would not be personally caught up in any backlash. It was politics at its ugliest.

Jesus slips their knots very easily. He asks to see the coin used to pay the tax. His opponents produce one, showing that they do in fact pay the tax, for it was Roman coinage used to deal only with the Romans. The coin proclaimed Caesar to be God and carried his image – both of which for a religious Jew were a source of scandal, yet despite this they carried the coin into the temple in their pockets. They are exposed as lacking credibility, they are part of the system. Hence “give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s” is sufficient to their cynical question.

But they are also reminded that all things belong to God and that it is within this context that the complexities of political judgments and decision making must be carried out. For people of Jesus’ time, and for us, if we get the balance right with God, then the rest will follow.

Politics and religion mix rather uncomfortably, yet politics and religion there will always be. It is not a question of naively forgetting one or the other. It is a question of putting first things first.

This encounter between Jesus and representatives of both religious authority (the Pharisees) and political authority (the Herodians), in our time challenges the State to allow God to be God and challenges the Church to preach and live the gospel of Jesus Christ, rather than the gospel of political convenience.

We live in difficult times of high levels of anxiety. Many things make us anxious. The social commentator Hugh Mackay writes “We see ourselves from a different kind of society from the one we used to be – more media-driven, more drug-saturated, more commercialized, more competitive, less egalitarian, more closely engaged with Asia, more multi-cultural . Is it any wonder so many Australians now talk about their yearning for “balance”, or describe their lives as being “out of control”?”

These are dangerous times for us. They were fraught times before the pandemic and even more so now. So much of what is happening speaks of physical danger but perhaps more deeply there is spiritual danger. That we will be lost, swamped as individuals and as a society. An ancient prophet wrote “without a vision the people perish”, a more modern one, TS Eliott wrote “things fall apart the centre cannot hold – mere anarchy is loosed upon the world”

What is to be the Church’s response to these things – more to the point, our response to these things? That we will expire into hopelessness and despair, put the drawbridge up? It is as individuals and as Christians wherein lies our only hope, just as it has been for Christians throughout all time, that it is only in Christ that we can choose how we are to live – where we have the responsibility for our choice – whatever others do.

There is a timelessness about all this. In the Book of Genesis we read “So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them”. Caesar’s image was found upon the coin, but the image of God is found in the human being. We belong to God, our lives and everything we are and have. It also means we belong to each other and have responsibilities to others and to the whole created order.

Sorting this out and making decisions is far from easy. The gospel reading though gives us some 3 pointers :

Firstly beware “weasel words”. Be alert to words that are “tinny” and don’t bear close examination. Words that don’t give answers to questions asked. Words that twist the truth, obscure the truth, provide only half truths, and leave plenty of “wriggle room” for later when the full truth emerges. Such words are often found in politics advertising and other forums of “spin”

Secondly be aware of the character of who you are dealing with. Have they been found to be trustworthy on previous occasions? We might disagree on the detail and the perspective but does this person have a good heart?

Thirdly as the backdrop to any Christian involvement in a social justice issue there is the imperative to care for the most vulnerable in society. These are the people God wants us to protect and stand up for, the little ones of the earth, just as Jesus did. We betray our faith and ourselves if we do not prioritise them.

And What do we do when we find that others hearts, like ours, are a complex mix of lots of different shades?

I read somewhere that we are something like 98% dog in our genetic structure – I guess the percentage is fairly high for weasel too. So be aware of our own capacity to be weaselish. Look at what really lies behind our beliefs, especially our passionate ones. Is anger appropriate or inappropriate? Is it thinly veiled judgmentalism and a desire