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Mat_17:24 ff. Peculiar to Matthew.
After the return from the Babylonian captivity, all males among the Jews of twenty years of age and upwards (on the ground of the command in Exo_30:13 f.; comp. 2Ch_24:6 : Neh_10:32; 2Ki_12:4 ff.) were required to contribute annually the sum of half a shekel, or two Attic drachmae, or an Alexandrian drachma (LXX. Gen_23:15; Jos_7:21), about half a thaler (1s. 6d. English money), by way of defraying the expenses connected with the temple services. See Saalschütz, Mos. R. p. 291 f.; Ewald, Alterth. p. 403; Keim, II. p. 599 f. After the destruction of the temple the money went to the Capitol, Joseph. 7:6. 6. The time for collecting this tax was the fifteenth of the month Adar. See Tract. Schekalim i. 3, ii. 7; Ideler, Chronol. I. pp. 488, 509. Certain expositors have supposed the payment here in question to have been a civil one, exacted by the Roman government—in other words, a poll-tax (see Wolf and Calovius; and of modern writers, consult especially, Wieseler, Chronol. Synopse, p. 265 ff., and Beitr. p. 108 ff.). This, however, is precluded, not merely by the use of the customary term τὰ δίδραχμα , which was well known to the reader as the temple-tax, but likewise by the incongruity which would thereby be introduced into the succeeding argument, through making it appear as though Jesus had strangely and improperly classed Himself among the kings of this world, with a view to prove with how much reason He could claim to be free. Even had He regarded Himself as David’s son, He would have been wrong in arguing thus, while, so far as the case before us is concerned, He was, to all intents and purposes, one of the ἀλλοτρίοι .
οἱ … λαμβάνοντες ] used as a substantive: the collectors. That there were such, though Wieseler denies it, is not only evident from the nature of the case, seeing that it was not possible for everybody to go to Jerusalem, but is also proved by statements in the Tr. Schekalim (“trapezitae in unaquaque civitate,” etc.); see also Lightfoot. The plural τὰ δίδραχμα indicates the large number of didrachmae that were collected, seeing that every individual contributed one; and the article points to the tax as one that was well known. In the question put by the collectors (which question shows that this happened to be the time for collecting, but that Jesus had not paid as yet, though it is impossible to determine whether or not the question was one of a humane character, which would depend entirely upon the tone in which it was put) the plural τὰ δίδραχμα indicates that the payment had to be repeated annually, to which the present τελεῖ likewise points. That the collectors should not have asked Jesus Himself, and that Peter should have happened to be the particular disciple whom they did ask, are probably to be regarded merely as accidental circumstances. But why did they ask at all, and why in a dubious tone? They may have assumed or supposed that Jesus would claim to rank with the priests (who did not consider themselves liable for temple-tax, Tr. Schekal. i. 4), seeing that His peculiarly holy, even His Messianic, reputation cannot certainly have remained unknown to them.