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.

3. Reinterpretation of Sabbath

It is obviously written in the Jewish Law that Sabbath is a holy day. During the day, the Jews and all people in the Jewish land including their animals are not allowed to work Exodus 20: 8-10, Deuteronomy 12-14. The Jews consider this as their holy covenant with their God and therefore, they keep this covenant very much since it is written in their law to obey all Yahweh‟s commandments Deuteronomy 11:18-21. Jesus, in other hand, seems to share his own idea about how to recognize the Sabbath. This action then bears a conflict with the society. In many cases in the bible, Jesus many times heals people during the Sabbath. Healing a paralyzed man in synagogue Matthew 12:9-14, Luke 6: 6- 11, Mark 3: 1-6, healing a crippled woman Luke 13: 10-17, healing a sick man in a home of a leading Pharisee Luke 14:1-6, healing some men at the pool of Bethzatha John 5: 1-18 and allowing his disciples to eat grain Matthew 12:1, Mark 2:23-28, Luke 6: 1-5. In every one of the cases, there is a concept Jesus actually wants to share. From his question “If any one of you had a child or an ox that happened to fall in a well on a Sabbath, would you not pull it out at once in a Sabbath? Luke: 14:5” Jesus implicitly wants people to know how important the life of human being is than life of any other creatures in the world. The Sabbath, from Jesus‟ reinterpretations, should be the day where people are allowed to work; to save the life of human being Mark 3:4. For Jesus, The importance of human being is the reason of the Sabbath establishment. Therefore, human being is the Lord of the Sabbath Matthew 12:1-8, Mark 2:23-27, Luke 6:1-5. Jesus also asks “What does our Law allow us to do on the Sabbath? To help or to harm? To save someone‟s life or to destroy it? Mark 3: 4”. From this question, Jesus implicitly wants to challenge people especially the Jewish authorities about their understanding of Sabbath. The implication of this question is that Jesus wants people know that letting someone suffer in sickness during the Sabbath is equal with destroying human being‟s life which is categorized as sin. The Jews, in contrary, understand it as a profanation to Sabbath as a holy day. What they understand about the Sabbath is that Sabbath is the day when no one in the land, neither the foreigners nor the animals is allowed to work Exodus 20: 8-10, Deuteronomy 12- 14. The one who oppose against Jesus‟ reinterpretation about the Sabbath is the Jewish authorities. In many cases, the Jewish authorities try to kill Jesus because of this matter Matthew 12:14, Mark 3:6, John 5:18 The Jewish authorities‟ plan to kill Jesus is the embodiment of the clash of two different ideas about Torah. The different ideas then makes the Jewish authorities plan to kill Jesus because Jesus‟ idea is different from theirs.