God’s faithfulness to love Israel, despite Israel’s unfaithfulness to God. The Pharisees were good at their job. They were trained in both rhetoric and the Scriptures and were skilled in argumentation. In this text they pose a question, seeking to “entrap him” (v. 15). Jesus is faced with two choices: he can agree to the tax, casting his lot with the Herodians, in which case he is a traitor to the nationalistic movement; or he can rebuke the tax, in which case he is an insubordinate rebel against