Reinterpretation of King: To pay taxes or not Matthew 22:15-22,
Roman Empire. That is why Jesus‟ reinterpretation is being called into problem. If Jesus preaches the Jews to love the enemies then it can be said that he wants the
Jews to love the Roman Empire who for a long period colonizes their land. For the Jews, to love the colonizer means to give the loyalty to the colonizer. To be
loyal to the colonizer will of course make no struggle to a resistance. In his preaching about this, Jesus uses the figure of Father in heaven, the Jews‟ God as
the role model. Jesus presents Yahweh as the one who love both friends and enemies. Jesus makes this in order to make the Jews understand and follow what
he says as he knows that most of the Jews are religious people so they must
consider Yahweh as a figure and a source of righteousness. This will of course be
the justification for Jesus to justify his reinterpretation about to love the enemies. Jesus also adds that
If you love only the people who love you, why should you receive blessing? Even sinners do that …No Love your enemies and do good to
them… You will then have a great reward, and you will be the children of the Most High God Luke 6:32, 35.
From this statement, Jesus wants to say to the Jews that to love those who love them brings no blessings as it is just the same with what the sinners do. This
means that to get the blessings from God, people have to love their enemies and be kind to them. Again, Jesus presents the figure of God as the role model for
people to be followed. From the context of the people at the time, this kind of reinterpretation shows its paradoxical meaning. From the context of the colonial
reality, it can be said that Jesus wants people to give no resistance to the colonizer. This is because Jesus changes the way of thinking of the Jews as the colonized
people. For the Jews as the colonized people, to resist the colonizer is a very
important thing in order to defend their national identity as the blessing from God. However, Jesus in his reinterpretation, by using the figure of God as the role
model, says that the best thing to do in order to get blessings is by loving the enemies. He asks the Jews to be as perfect as their God and the way to be perfect
is to love the enemies. Here, Jesus affects the superstructure of the Jews; the religion and the concept of God as the ideology. By affecting the superstructure,
Jesus makes the Jews to sooner or later and unconsciously accept the fact that they have to always be dominated by the colonizer. This kind of reinterpretation is
different from what the Jews expect at the time.