Rome executed Jesus for teaching his followers that taxes violates God’s law, Thou shall not steal.  The number of his disciples was increasing daily as he worked miracles of healing among the poor. Jesus was becoming a threat to Rome’s revenues in those territories, Judea and Galilee, where he had been preaching.

Pontius Pilate was the Roman governor responsible for tax revenues for Judea, a position analogous to a District Director of the Internal Revenue Service in the United States.  He dare not allow a notorious tax resister to continue preaching inflammatory anti-tax rhetoric in his imperial-tax territory, lest he lose his lofty position and perhaps even his head. So when, according to the Gospel of Luke, his enemies informed Pilate that Jesus,"opposes payment of taxes to Caesar," Pilate crucified him.