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JWs in the News: Convicted of whipping daughter to death

JWs in the News: Convicted of whipping daughter to death

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Items like these show the outer limits and effects of JW family involvement, which includes a rationalization of childbeating (from a common mistranslation and misapplication of a biblical verse that children will become “spoiled” if not physically beaten). Parents, who envision themselves in a power pyramid, will sometimes take out their frustrations on those with less power. It is a chain of domination and submission to authority. Here is one result.

Larry Slack has been convicted of flogging his 12-year old daughter to death with an electrical cord (as well as aggravated battery to a child in the beating of her brother).

All six children were beaten, but Slack was especially furious that the murder victim – tied to a bare metal futon frame and gagged – “wouldn’t take the beating quietly.”

Prosecutors have said the couple were strict Jehovah’s Witnesses who practiced corporal punishment.

Leon Slack said the electrical-cord beatings were routine:

You felt it not only in your back, but in the front of your chest,” Slack said. He then described the force his father used–like “you were hammering a nail into wood.”

The couple loved their children but did whip them as a form of discipline, just as their own parents had, Streff said.

Larry Slack worked as a Chicago Transit Authority machinist and Constance Slack worked as a nurse.

Constance Slack has already pleaded guilty.

In his videotaped statement to prosecutors played in court Thursday, the corpulent Slack said, “I bought [a knife] for the purposes of killing myself. I hid it under the fat folds of my stomach.”

Prosecutors called the suicide attempt “self-serving.”

Former Jehovah’s Witness Speaks

Former Jehovah’s Witness Speaks

Comments 5 comments

This testimony letter gives a glimpse into some of the recurring issues. Thanks for sending and giving your permission to post, Angela!

I was raised by parents who converted to Jehovah’s Witnesses (from the Catholic religion) when I was five years old (I am now 32). My father is an elder and he and my mother are very active. I have six younger brothers and sisters who are all active JW’s.

When I was 18, I married a “brother” I had met at a quick-build. Five years later we had a daughter. After seven years of marriage, I found myself very unhappy and I decided to leave. My husband (a Ministerial Servant), along with the elders help, tricked me into signing custody papers that were not as they were presented. My ex and his wife have primary physical custody of my daughter. I see my child every other weekend and six weeks during the summer (they moved 3 hours away). I tried to regain custody of her, only to fail. Can you say “Parent Alienation?”

After I remarried, I tried to return to the Kingdom Hall in 2003 to be reinstated. I attended meetings faithfully for six months. I decided to write my letter in order to be reinstated. The elders on my committee told me that everything seemed to be going well and it would only be a couple of weeks before they made the announcement of my reinstatement. When I met with the elders a week later, they informed me that my ex-husband did not think I was ready to be reinstated… and the elders wanted me to drop my appeal that was currently in progress for custody of my daughter. I gave up and almost went crazy with grief for the sudden loss of my daughter, my family and all of my friends. I had to receive intense counseling to deal with the emotional pain.

Since 2003, I had allowed my daughter to attend meetings with my family during my weekend and summer visits with her. Things have recently taken a turn. I told my seven year old daughter that Jehovah’s Witnesses do not know if they have the only true religion… no one knows. Well, apparently she told one of my sisters who in turn retaliated with a very nasty letter that stated, “you are basically trying to kill her (my daughter) by telling her or trying to convince her that she does not have the true religion!” and “you now have the name of an apostate in my eyes.” That letter made me sick. My sister who had been my best friend had written these horrible hurtful words. She had been disfellowshipped at one time, but I took her in despite being chastised by the elders.

Since that letter was written, I have not allowed my daughter to attend a meeting at the Kingdom Hall while she is with me. She is around those people enough with her father. This decision that I have made will probably result in another nasty custody battle because my ex husband will not respect my decision… he will try everything in his power to program our daughters mind. She has already started asking me why she can’t go to the Kingdom Hall this summer. Her father must have her convinced that God will look unfavorable upon her if she doesn’t persuade me to let her attend the meetings. He’s making her feel torn between two worlds.

I too am in limbo. No one seems to understand how it feels to lose all of your friends and family in one day. No one understands how it feels to be treated like dirt on someone’s shoe. I have never done drugs, been a drunkard, beat my children, or murdered anyone… yet I am treated (by JWs) as someone who is beneath those type of people. The lowest scum of the earth. What gives those imperfect humans the right to judge me as unworthy of God’s love??

I have just begun to explore websites that are created by former Jehovah’s Witnesses. In the past I was afraid. I am only full of anger now. I want to relate to someone. I want to talk to people who understand what I’ve been through and what I am still going through. Thank you for taking the time to read about what I’ve been through.

Angela, I hope you know that you are not unworthy of God’s love, which is endless and does not depend on human organizations like the one in Brooklyn. Show your daughter better examples of caring, compassion, and kindness. She will remember, and in the long run, it is the best thing you can do for yourself and for her.

You are not alone in this, but it is a difficult path to navigate. Start building a more authentic life for yourself, and let go of some of your anger if you can. Document everything that happens (and do not respond in kind, no matter how tempting it might be). Take control of your own religious path and your relationship to God – prayer helps a lot, if only to focus and meditate. If you can, turn your focus outward toward acts of friendship and service – not door-to-door service, but the kinds of “helping” gestures that can mean so very much to others. This will help lift you up, stabilize you, and help you to rebuild a sense of yourself that brackets out these unfair judgments.

There are some JW boards where you can thrash some of this out if you want to, but ultimately it’s up to you to find inner strength (if not for yourself, for your daughter). Think of the mommy you’d most like to be, and start moving in that direction. The more you act out of the center of your soul, the more it becomes habitual. Take the good things you’ve learned, and dump the rest. God is bigger than their vision – explore your ethics and your spirituality for yourself.

As for your family and “friends” – I can only mourn with you. It’s heartbreaking, and I’m so sorry. Again, the best thing you can do, when you can manage to do it (it’s not easy sometimes) is to set an example of ethics, compassion, caring, and love. It is the only thing that might make any difference at all.

I have a good feeling about you because you took in your sister when she had been cast out. That means you have a sense of ethical priorities, which JWs usually have trouble ordering. You already know that the highest priority is not following the rules of an organization, but rather caring for others (and for yourself, too! don’t forget that). Take care of yourself first, so that you may then care for your daughter.

Arm your lawyer with any documentation that you have of any of this. Alienation of a child’s affection is a serious matter. That the JW elders sat down with you (!), misrepresented the agreement, and so on may be basis for coercion, and the judge may take that into consideration. Also, your situation is changed now, and that also has to be taken into account. As you have discovered, JWs will hit hard for children to remain in the custody of the JW parent. They could even lend your ex one of their own lawyers. I recommend that you do a little web research on Jehovah’s Witnesses and custody battles – there are perhaps some previous cases that may be of help to you and your lawyer.

Keeping you in my daily meditations, and sending you waves of healing and love.

Call In to High Spirits Radio

Call In to High Spirits Radio

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My dear friend (and fellow exJW) Richard Shining Thunder Francis has a radio show called “High Spirits” and I’m sending out a call for people to call in with questions, since questions and calls are the center and theme of the show.

Our goal is to present a happy, positive view of spirituality, and to encourage its practical applications. To do this, each week, we will discuss metaphysics, psychology, philosophy, cults and odd beliefs, dogma, history, kabbalism (generic), gnosticism (generic), sufism (generic), and other fascinating forms of the Way of compassion. Love, or compassion will, of course, be a theme, and we shall look together into the bright mysteries of agapology (the psychology of Love). Take a break from your frenzied week. Have a warm cup of coffee or cold drink, sit back, and listen to the most important, and most captivating, subjects in the universe!

Listen to “High Spirits” Online
at 1530AM WCKY
Cincinnati
Sat 8 PM
Call in from 8-9 PM EST
Local: 749-1530
Out of area: 877-345-3779

You do not have to receive the station over radio to call. You can listen online, and you will be able to hear the show on the telephone as well. You can also help other people by making this call. Don’t worry; you will be on the air for only a few seconds to ask your question. Just have it ready to go and call 877-345-3779, after 8 pm (it’s free). You can ask about the “new age,” fundamentalism, religion, metaphysics, spirituality, philosophy, psychology, parapsychology, God, nature, cults, or anything related to any of these.

Teacher, author, psychospiritual advisor, life-design consultant, and practicing mystic, Richard’s point of view is centered on love mysticism. He is the founder of agapology, the science of love-psychology, spokesperson for the Universal Love Movement (not a religion, but a Way) which challenges society to live by the principles of compassion, acceptance, and tolerance. He is not a “guru.”

I called in about two weeks ago, and the discussion really helped me to refocus in a more positive direction.

His sites:

Love Ministries
Blog

Richard is one of the most lucid, giving, and compassionate people I’ve ever known.

He has written several books, many of which are available for download.

My favorite is Journey to the Center of the Soul: Mysticism Made Simple, but I first stumbled across his work while searching for good books on Jehovah’s Witnesses. The JW books are very helpful for understanding how and why the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses can be so psychologically and spiritually destructive. When I read these two books, everything that I had sensed and felt really clicked into place. His style is quite different from my own, and his way of framing things gave me a new kind of conceptual and emotional “niche” in a heart/mind space that had been empty. I’ve been recommending the JW books on my site for some time:

Jehovah Lives in Brooklyn – Richard S. T. Francis
An extremely helpful book for ex-JWs (and for those who love them) that succeeds in capturing the thought patterns, assumptions, mindset, destructive consequences, spiritual distortions, and psychosocial dynamics of the “organization.” A very readable narrative of such issues as personality dismantling, satanic projection, sense of uniqueness, persecution, conformity and masks, and censorship. “Thus, in cases I have witnessed personally, parents have totally rejected and turned their backs on wayward children, brothers have become the fiercest of enemies, and lovers are separated with a ferocity and mutual hatred. Every form of sentimentality is despised as a weakness when it comes to the question of loyalty to Jehovah’s organization. Every human being is disposable. …This is an underlying flaw in much of fundamentalism, including JWs: ideas and concepts are more sacred even than human life. It is due to this distortion that JWs refuse blood transfusions even to save the lives of their children–a teaching for which they have become monsterously notorious.” (p.73).

Jehovah Good-Bye: The New Theism of Love – Richard S. T. Francis
Ex-JW Francis moves from criticism to a constructive analysis of what he calls the “New Theist,” who is reconnecting to the agapic god of love and forgiveness. “The New Theist has arisen in specific response to the intellectual and spiritual starvation so often promoted by traditional religion. Far too often, religion, whose job it is to feed the masses, wrenches from their hands the tiniest morsels of substantial spiritual food, and tries to replace them with the non-nutritive ‘straw’ of organizationalism and dogma, doctrine and administration. Worse, some groups are monomaniacally obsessed with only money, and religion is only a front” (p.11). ” “The God of revealed by Jesus was no primitive anthropomorphism, no historical product of evolution from the proto-Jehovac images of the old god. This God did not dribble out forgiveness in parsimonious, unwilling, reticent microparticles; this God deluged and immersed his children in purest Love, and was eager and delighted to forgive. And according to grace, he did not forgive becuase of his children’s attitudes or behaviors; he forgave because of the quality of his love” (p. xix).

Jehovah Lives in Brooklyn Jehovah Goodbye: The New Theism of Love

JWs and Armageddon

JWs and Armageddon

Wayne Jackson has an interesting biblical analysis of the JW position on Armadeddon at Christian Courier.

A sample:

In Matthew 24:5ff, Christ set forth a number of “signs” that would herald the impending destruction of Jerusalem. He plainly declared: “this generation shall not pass away, till all these things be accomplished” (v. 34). Of special interest are the expressions “this generation,” and “all.”

The word “generation” (genea) refers to “the sum total of those born at the same time, expanded to include all those living at a given time and freq[uently] defined in terms of specific characteristics, generation, contemporaries” (F.W. Danker, et al., Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, Chicago: University of Chicago, 2000, p. 191).

The expression “this generation” (he-genea-aute) is found five times in Matthew’s Gospel record, and never is it employed in any sense other than that of the “generation” contemporary with Jesus Christ (cf. 11:16; 12:41-42; 23:36).

The “Witnesses,” however, assign a most strange interpretation to the phrase. They contend: “It is the generation of people who saw the catastrophic events that broke forth in connection with World War I from 1914 onward” (Watchtower, op. cit., p. 31).

The fact of the matter is, however, the “Watchtower” folks concede that Christ’s application was to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in A.D. 70. “[Christ] outlined things that would befall the Jewish nation during the execution of Jehovah’s judgment upon Jerusalem at the hands of the Roman general Titus (Dan. 9:26)” (Aid to Bible Understanding, Brooklyn, NY: Watchtower Society, 1971, p. 642).

Incredibly, however, they manipulate the expression “this generation” across more than 2,000 years of history to embrace the modern era. Further, they totally ignore the Lord’s declaration that “all” the signs of Matthew 24:5-33 were to be fulfilled in the A.D. 70 event. The common-sense rules of responsible exegesis are thrust aside with reckless abandon.

I have one quibble with the piece. Anyone who refers to the JWs as a “non-prophet” enterprise is correct only in the literal sense. Lack of prophetic vision, yes.

But it’s no fun without the pun, and JWs are not non-profit – far from it.

Note for researchers – “Watchtower” is written as a single word in the name of the sect’s New York corporation, but as two words in the name of the Pennsylvania parent corporation.

JW Chronicles: Disfellowshipped Apologist

JW Chronicles: Disfellowshipped Apologist

Comments 28 comments

Disfellowshipped Jehovah’s Witness Scotty writes:

Sister or Brother???? I am actually in tears right now… Why, you may ask. Ill tell you. I am currently disfellowshipped right now and i now that i was disfellowshipped for my own willingful wrong doings. While i was commiting my sins, i didn’t care and i went along with everything that THE BIBLE says not to do,,,,,not just the WITNESSES. I hope Jehovah will be able to forgive you for blaspheming like your doing. I will pray for you tonight even though i don’t pray for my self because of feelings of unworthyness.

I read some of your advice to ex-witnesses. and i beg you to stop this. I knw that you know in the back of your mind, that this is the true religion, but you constantly battle try not to afirm it.

The US and Russia are about to go back to a cold war and just like daniel prophecy says, things will come to pass. Jehovah won’t lie and just like he says that you reap what you sown……..what your sowning right now is very rotten and wrong. I didn’t beleve a lot of things that the witneesss say but ive come to see what is truth. And this organization is absoulutely the truth. Children need to be disciplined sometimes in order to mold them into something dignifyable. Whether you parent does it (Jehovah) or you parent tells your older brother to whip you (the elders) its all for our benefit. If something is handled wrongly, then LET JEHOVAH DEAL
WITH IT IN HIS OWN TIME. I beg of you sisiter of brother, shut this website down, and truly repent!!!!!!!!!!! Please, please, please, stop playing GOD

This is a nearly perfect example of the kind of thing that appears in my mailbox on a regular basis.

First off, my heart really goes out to Scottie, although he would never believe it. I recognize this mind-space that he is in, with all its agonized and agonizing contradictions. He is currently being shunned by everyone he knows and loves, and his reaction is both to judge others very harshly and also to be plagued by an even deeper insecurity. Scottie, you’re right where you are intended to be, feeling horrible, judging others, trying to make yourself feel better, and ready to come back for more indoctrination. He doesn’t believe a lot of what they say, yet he believes it is the truth. He can’t see the contradiction. What Scottie needs right now is a friend, and I hope he has one. I’m the last person he would listen to if he considers my advice to recovering JWs to be blasphemous, so I’ll (reluctantly) have to leave that to others. I hope the prayers will help him – you never know when grace might happen.

For the record… No, in fact I do not in any way believe that this is really the true religion, neither in my mind, nor in my heart (nor even in my deepest paranoid fears). Amazingly enough, I’m not wrestling with the meme of the Watchtower as the “Truth” anymore – it is a very pernicious virus, to be respected, but it is survivable. I don’t believe in the idea of a “true religion.” I’m not sure how many of us religious non-absolutists there are. I think that different religions have their strengths and their faults and blind spots too, just like human beings do. I think that words about God are flawed – by definition, they have to be. Humans are not God, nor do we have the heart-mind of God (or gods). What we have are strengths (gifts) in different areas – as prophets and judges and thinkers and mystics and healers and scientists and teachers and lots more. Our religious traditions, at their best, are attempts to codify and disseminate religious insights. But none of us is God, and none of us is perfect, and our texts and traditions are based on human realities, not the life of God.

One of the common themes in the JW letters is the idea that I’m “playing God.” It is so drummed in that you must never think for yourself – not even to become closer to God, not even to let your spiritual gifts (whatever they may be) grow and thrive, not even to discern better ways of handling situations. JWs are not allowed to think or grow – they are only allowed to be submissive sheep, ready for Jehovah (the abusive father) to tell the older brother (the elders) to whip them again and again. But no matter how often they are whipped, they can never be good enough – hence the pervading sense of unworthiness, which is not to be confused with genuine humility or meekness.

Here is someone who really truly is unable to digest or process any of the information. Maybe I should add questions at the end of each paragraph, for repetition and emphasis, like they do with the publications. He knows (however dimly or incompletely) that he needs help (either that or he was being naughty when he sought and found the recovering JW advice page). Yet he is not able to confront the idea that there may another perspective. He immediately feels guilty. He sees blasphemy. That’s how tightly controlled the psychology is. This dynamic will loop back on itself until the very experience of reading another perspective will lead him back to more comfortable terrain. For now. Perhaps some small point will be retained somehow and may help him at another time.

While he asks me to wait on Jehovah to deal with any injustice – or is it to order someone else to be whipped? – he intervenes to ask me to close the website. Well, perhaps God will sort it out in time. But I think the gift of freedom is a valuable gift, and one’s use of one’s free choice is the foundation for the development of character as well as one’s religious path.

No person, no organization has the authority to take God’s place in anyone’s heart-mind-spirit-soul – and especially not as some sort of dictator of the soul. God is no dictator.

Dictators are interested in total control, power, their own gain.
Dictators are not interested in freedom, love, or compassion.

Scottie will most likely go back again and again until they “whip” the soul and spirit right out of him. In a worst case scenario, he might even have brought himself to this point willingly in order to undergo a religious trial, and thus create a deeper sense of conviction.

My feelings for the great majority of JWs are swirled in a big mixing pot, the main ingredients of which are empathy and sorrow – admittedly also with an occasional a dash of impatience, such as what you might feel while witnessing a successful con game and being unable to rescue the mark. Most of the JWs are trying to do good, to follow biblical principles – but they get entangled with the controlling psychology and its reinforcements and they lose their sense of priorities as well as their sense of self.

I criticize the behavior of the leadership because of its destructiveness to their people. I offer support for those who wish for it. You see above the standard product that is reaped from the sowing of the Watchtower Society. Is this what God intends for humanity? Dwell on that question. Everyone has their own path, if they wish to feel for it.

The biblical text is not a threat. It’s a simple statement: What you sow, that also you shall reap.

If you plant corn, you get corn. Cause – effect.

What you nourish in yourself or in the world is what grows.

Stand against destructiveness and hate. Nourish kindness and love.

Plant a seed.

Ex-JW Rebuttal to a Jehovah’s Witness

Ex-JW Rebuttal to a Jehovah’s Witness

Comments 4 comments

I’ve been having an extended discussion/argument with a Canadian Jehovah’s Witness in the comments of an old post. Feel free to read the whole thing if you can bear it. Yes. It’s long. I know. There were some resources in my latest reply that I thought might help others – so here’s a piece:

Most of what I posted from JW publications (not my own opinion, but actual arguments made by JWs themselves) show pretty clearly that JWs believe that you have to be a JW to live through Armageddon. Isn’t that a direct refutation of your claim? It is illuminating that criticism has forced the organization to change its rhetorical tactics – where is the standard line: "Only Jehovah’s Witnesses….." do such and such – refuse to salute idolatrous flags, refuse to partake of blood (again, why not kosher meat, which is where the Jews do honor the blood prohibition?), refuse to vote, etc etc?

OK, on blood. I don’t disagree with any of the arguments about medical risks. Yes, there are new things to test for every year. Blood transfusion is riskier than most people realize, and it’s good to have this information out there. Incidentally, did you know that JWs used to be prohibited from vaccinations as well? In an actual life and death situation, however, a doctor or team of doctors has to weigh the risks. I would be dead myself without a blood transfusion given after massive internal bleeding from a ruptured ectopic pregnancy, so I’m not unbiased on the issue. As for it not being a current issue, that’s simply not true on either side. The Society’s own positions are constantly changing and often contradictory, and they reassessed their teachings again just last month. There is almost always a lawsuit in the works somewhere. Here’s the most recent one from your own country. I’m sure you’re aware of it. And please check out the Watchtower Victim’s Memorial, including the Library of Watchtower Blood Quotes and archival images that illustrate their views of the medical profession. On the other side, there are important advancements in no-blood alternatives – certainly worth consideration and I am happy to see it.

You have not given any real argument here as to why a corporation formed in the last century could have any connections whatsoever to the Pentacostal outpouring of holy spirit. As you say, the last surviving member of Jesus’ original followers has been dead for a long time. The JW interpretation of the governing body’s authority is the single most destructive aspect of their teachings. I refer interested parties to Captives of a Concept by Don Cameron, Jehovah Lives in Brooklyn, by Richard Francis and Apocalypse Delayed: The Story of Jehovah’s Witnesses by James M. Penton.

Captives of a Concept (Anatomy of an Illusion) Jehovah Lives in Brooklyn Apocalypse Delayed: The Story of Jehovah's Witnesses

Suppose the JWs are right, and that there is a literal remnant of a literal 144,000 that still lives on earth – what relation do those people have to the multiple corporations of the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society? Who directs the "new light" then, the remnant or the guys in Brooklyn? JWs never question the connections and disconnections of the structure here – they only know they must obey. What is funny to me is that former JWs are described as the "evil slave class" in opposition to the "faithful and discreet slave" putting them at the same level of importance. A few whistleblowers are so threatening as to be put at the same level…

Why would I think that the organization’s protection of known pedophiles and abusers would be the reason you are doing this? That’s really a desperate kind of charge. In any case, it’s all well-documented and the Society has spent a lot of JW money on lawyers. Consult http://www.silentlambs.org/ for news on lawsuits and the history of JW policies on this matter. The Society has protected sex offenders, hidden their records from "worldly authorities" as well as from members of congregations, failed to report accusations to the police and even punished children and families making accusations. The Watch Tower Society defends keeping the database of self-confessed and accused offenders secret as part of its strategy of dealing with abuse without referring to the judicial system – ie, the "theocratic war strategy" (do a search on that phrase – it’s basically a justification for lying). You can keep up with JWs in the news – on this and a range of other topics such as those I mentioned – at Watchtower News and the Watchtower Information Service (note: Here’s another source I just found at the About Guide).  With the internet, people can research and discover for themselves the actual dealings of the corporation you worship. A simple search is sufficient to disprove your statements.

You use your words about the Bible to distract from difficult issues into vague feel-good information that most Christians might agree with. I remember the strategy from the so-called Theocratic Ministry School. While I was never baptised, I sure did go to about 5 hours of weekly indocrination at the Kingdom Hall. I did go out in "service." I recognize the language and the strategies you employ because I’ve actually made a study of discourse analysis and applied it to my own experience. I teach my students how it’s done – it helps them read the news.

Normally, I resist being sucked into doctrinal argument. I think these are things that people are empowered by God to decide for themselves. However, I do have my own opinions. I am a contextual ethicist and a scholar of religion to some degree – although my most advanced training (and interests) moved into other topics as well. I’ve taught religion at the college level, including Judeo-Christian Traditions. It was quite a revelation to me to read the "meaty" work of real scholars and to compare that to the "skim-milk" of JW pseudo-scholarship. I recommend that those who are interested in any of these topics to read widely and to consider various arguments.

The JWs are largely unaware that there are multiple interpretations for many of these texts. Some of the considerations of interpretion include the actual meanings of biblical worlds and phrases in the original languages, the cultural and historical context, the genre and purpose of each kind of text, literary methods and theories, anthropological, psychological, linguistic, archaeological questions, the way the texts were actually selected for biblical inclusion, and a host of other perspectives and questions. Good interpretation comes from asking better questions from a better-informed perspective, not from rote repetition. JWs do not allow question-based analysis of any kind among their members, although they have to tolerate it from newbies and people at the door. What they generally will do is exactly what you’re doing – deflect, distract, and get back on script. JWs are not trained in the interpretation of texts – they have no methods for doing so because it is not allowed. The rank and file JW is simply force-fed the interpretation of the mysterious few at the top (while criticizing the Pope and priests for doing the same thing).

Just one example. You earlier interpreted Jesus as refusing to be drawn into an argument over the paying of taxes. I would argue just the reverse because I think his response was one of the most brilliant rhetorical accomplishments I have ever seen. What he actually said addressed a very complex religious and political situation of conflicts between multiple audiences – yet his words had a message for each one of them. The Herodians and Pharisees wanted to trap Jesus with a no-win answer: Neither group really wanted Jesus to agree with them. The Herodians were hoping that Jesus would say you should not pay taxes – that would put him big trouble with the Roman authorities. He would be guilty of sedition, a capital offense. If he so agreed with the Pharisees, the Herodians could charge him with revolution against the Romans. But the Pharisees were hoping Jesus would take the Herodians’ position and support the payment of taxes. Then Jesus would have lost the support of the people who hated Roman occupation of Israel – and if he agreed with the Herodians, the Pharisees could charge him with idolatry.

But Jesus countered with "why tempt me you hypocrites?" He called attention to the likeness of Caesar on a coin – and made a simple distinction: to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s (translations vary: compare the different gospel versions as well). In one cryptic sentence, he addressed several audiences. The Romans "heard" that these new followers would continue to pay their taxes, and that this rabblerouser wasn’t in fact interested in taking political power or challenging them on this topic. The Pharisees couldn’t fault him for prioritizing God’s law or separating the realms of heaven and earth and the Herodians couldn’t align him with the revolutionary movement. Those who wanted to trap Jesus were foiled and dared not question him that way again.