To viewers who are only familiar with the more tradition visual narratives of the New Testament, this scene must remain obscure. Before a walled city gate, where a solitary individual stands with an outstretched hand, holding a purse. Next to him an older disciple, presumably Peter (conventionally represented, as here, both bald and wearing a short white beard) stands near the center of the composition, holding a large fish. This is the scene (famously represented in the mid 1420s by Florentine painter Masaccio on a large fresco in Brancacci Chapel of the Church of the Discalced Carmelites) usually called the Tribute Money (Matthew 17: 24-27).

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In this scene, the required taxes for the temple are obtained through a miracle: a coin found in the mouth of a fish, newly hooked by the former fisherman, Peter. Jesus stands at the lower left corner, juxtaposed with the demanding tax-collector as he gestures with both hands, presumably enacting the miracle. The significance of this choice of subject had topicality for Luther and Cranach, because their religious movement had arisen out of protests against fund-raising by the pope in Rome through indulgences in order to pay for the extravagance of the construction of a grandiose, new St Peter’s church. Since the Lutheran church identifies with the apostles rather than with the pope, their indifference to such fees should free them from requirements to pay out for indulgences to fill Catholic coffers.

Works Cited

• Turner, A. Richard. Renaissance Florence. New York: Harry Abrams, 1997.