This passage introduces us to a
figure named Levi, who left his profession as a tax collector to follow Jesus.
Interestingly, whereas Luke follows Mark in identifying this tax collector as Levi, the
Gospel of Matthew gives him the name Matthew. It's possible that Matthew and
Levi were simply two names referring to the same individual, just as Paul was
previously known as Saul. But it's also possible that the author of Matthew
removed the reference to an otherwise unknown Levi and replaced it with the
name of a well-known member of the twelve apostles, exchanging the foreign for
the familiar. To be honest, we really don’t know. While the identity of Levi remains
uncertain, one thing is clear: it was no compliment to call someone a tax
collector. In fact, the pairing of “tax collectors and sinners” is one we see
on multiple occasions in the Gospels, and the use of these terms together seems
to imply that tax collectors were considered particularly sinful. As much
as you and I might dislike paying taxes, this identification of tax collectors
with sinners might seem a bit strange to us today. Why such disdain? Earlier in his Gospel when Luke
writes
of John the Baptist, he provides a detail that the other Gospel writers
leave
out. He states, “even the tax collectors came to be baptized” (3:12).
And in response to their question, “Teacher, what should we do?” John
commands
them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you” (3:13). In
adding
this detail to the story, Luke reveals what was so problematic about tax
collectors. They were known to abuse their positions by overcharging those from
whom they were collecting, and they greatly profited from the surplus. Even worse,
they did this at the expense of their fellow Jews and on behalf of the
occupying Roman Empire.
So what does Jesus do with Levi the
despised tax collector? He goes to his house for dinner. Unlike the Pharisees,
whose purity laws prohibited them from eating with the unrepentant, Jesus sits
down to a meal with a whole host of social outcasts. This practice of open table
fellowship appears to have been a defining feature of Jesus’ ministry. Through meals like this he
symbolically enacted his vision of a radically inclusive heavenly feast
known as the messianic banquet (see Jesus' parable in Luke 14:15-24). |
