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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 2082835, member: 19463&quot;]Two facts you can deny if you must:</p><p>1. The Tiberius coin is the one that carries the add-on demand from people who want a coin to go with the Bible story.&nbsp; You can prove to your satisfaction anything you wish and you will not change the association of that one coin with the story (real word for word or a parable).&nbsp; The Tiberius has been the Tribute Penny of the numismatic trade long enough that any degree of science or truth will not be able to change it.</p><p><br /></p><p>2.&nbsp; There are two very separate taxes that seem to get confused here.&nbsp; Every Jewish male was required to pay a tax to the temple of one didrachm or half a tetradrachm.&nbsp; This supported the Jewish Temple activities and was not collected from non-Jews.&nbsp; Augustus changed the tax structure for money owed to Rome collected from Provincials but this money was completely separate from the Jewish tax and was paid according to a person&#039;s wealth on top of a &#039;head tax&#039; based on the number of people in the Province.&nbsp; I do not know what form this money was paid in but it would not have been limited to the Tyrian silver required by the Temple.&nbsp; This is discussed here:</p><p><a href="http://www.unrv.com/economy/roman-taxes.php" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.unrv.com/economy/roman-taxes.php" rel="nofollow">http://www.unrv.com/economy/roman-taxes.php</a></p><p>Do note that the hated wealth tax was 1%.&nbsp; I do not know what the tax per person was.&nbsp; I rather suspect that there were other taxes not mentioned here that supported the king, local government and extortionists of any kind so I have no good idea on how oppressive or light was the burden on a guy like me in the First Century AD.&nbsp; The only tax referencing coin I am aware of is the RCC quadrans of Caligula honoring his repeal of a 1/200th tax.&nbsp; In general, the emperors owned property (like all of Eqypt) and gave donatives to the poorer citizens.&nbsp; Taxes were on Provincials and rich people.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>I do not know how people &#039;prove&#039; that a certain coin was or was not in a certain hand at any given time but all this makes no difference unless your religious views require the story to be literal rather than a parable (a literary form much used by Jesus).[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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