Luke 20:20–38

Paying Taxes to Caesar

20:20–26pp—Mt 22:15–22; Mk 12:13–17

²⁰Keeping a close watch on him, they sent spies, who pretended to be sincere. They hoped to catch Jesus in something he said,^u so that they might hand him over to the power and authority of the governor.^{v 21}So the spies questioned him: “Teacher, we know that you speak and teach what is right, and that you do not show partiality but teach the way of God in accordance with the truth.^{w 22}Is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”

²³He saw through their duplicity and said to them, ²⁴“Show me a denarius. Whose image and inscription are on it?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

²⁵He said to them, “Then give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s,^x and to God what is God’s.”

²⁶They were unable to trap him in what he had said there in public. And astonished by his answer, they became silent.

The Resurrection and Marriage

20:27–40pp—Mt 22:23–33; Mk 12:18–27

²⁷Some of the Sadducees,^y who say there is no resurrection,^z came to Jesus with a question. ²⁸“Teacher,” they said, “Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies and leaves a wife but no children, the man must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother.^{a 29}Now there were seven brothers. The first one married a woman and died childless. ³⁰The second ³¹and then the third married her, and in the same way the seven died, leaving no children. ³²Finally, the woman died too. ³³Now then, at the resurrection whose wife will she be, since the seven were married to her?”

³⁴Jesus replied, “The people of this age marry and are given in marriage. ³⁵But those who are considered worthy of taking part in the age to come^b and in the resurrection from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage, ³⁶and they can no longer die; for they are like the angels. They are God’s children,^c since they are children of the resurrection. ³⁷But in the account of the burning bush, even Moses showed that the dead rise, for he calls the Lord ‘the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’^{bd 38}He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive.”