I'll acknowledge that spin's brilliance solves his own conundrums about other proofs of ahistoricity, but this one escaped even his vigilant research. For starters, "denarius" is the word used not just in Mark 12:15, but in Luke 20:24 as well. Apologists can't claim that GMark is known to have been published in Rome with lots of interloping Roman words (of course Luke would have been as well?), but does Matthew 22:19 help? Oddly enough, it does.spin wrote: ● Then there's the give unto Caesar denarii that Jesus calls for, even though denarii weren't used in Judea, now were Greek coins (leptas) two of which were equivalent to one Roman quadrans (in the widow's mitres story). We get clever dudes suggesting that they got Roman and Greek coins from soldiers, but if one perused the pages of Meshorrer's Judean coin catalogs you would not find any sizable number to suggest that ordinary people recognized such coins....
These are prime candidates for ahistoricity.
So this version is so close to the original that it quotes Jesus, and it teaches that for this tax a Roman coin was used. The authorities loved that, for sure, with the opportunity to profit from unfair exchange rates. Probably all the more reason that the people hated to use the denarii and could not afford to if they wanted. And thanks, spin, for already explaining away your other examples of "ahistoricity". I could add also that the young man who fled away naked at Mark 14:51,52 might have been Jesus's "man" who accompanied him all the time, even when praying. He is often said to have been John Mark, the author.GMatthew wrote:'Show me the coin that pays the census tax.' Then they handed him the Roman coin.