The Middle Man

Sometimes I think Tax Collectors get a bad name in the Gospels.

After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up, left everything, and followed him. Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house; and there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others sitting at the table with them. The Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance.” Then they said to him, “John’s disciples, like the disciples of the Pharisees, frequently fast and pray, but your disciples eat and drink. Jesus said to them, “You cannot make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them, can you? The days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.” He also told them a parable: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment; otherwise the new will be torn, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the new wine will burst the skins and will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new wine, but says, ‘The old is good.’” - Luke 5:27-39

Tax collectors were Jews who worked for the Romans, so right off the bat, they were foul balls by most accounts.

They worked for the enemy, the oppressors of the people.

But people had to pay taxes to Rome, and someone needed to collect them.  

In addition to being angry at having to pay Rome anything at all, the taxes or tariffs on goods transported and sold cut into the profits of those trying to make a living.

Who hasn't heard business owners complain about the fees and taxes one has to pay to local governments just to open up shop?

Rome really had no choice but to use Jews to get money from Jews, since they understood and spoke the language.  Many merchants could speak Greek.  It was the language of business, but only Jews spoke Hebrew, so you needed a middle man, a Jew, to get money from other Jews.

Thus the Jewish Tax Collector was born.

Now, we will learn from Zacchaeus, in Luke, chapter 19, that some tax collectors extorted more than they were authorized to take.

It doesn't take many of those for all to painted as thieves.  Add to that the use of strong arm tactics, like the characters we all know and love from the movies, and you have the perfect bad guy.

Bad guys, sinners and others like them, were just the people Jesus came to help.

The badder, the better, I guess.

So, Levi, aka Matthew, joins the team.

Now here is a question for you.  With all of Matthew's experience in extorting and strong arming folks for money, how is it that Judas winds up managing and stealing from the treasury?

Maybe there is more to that story that we don't know.

More to come...