3.11.7), which is hard to reconcile with the Ebionitess denial of the virginal conception of Jesus (1.26.2; 3.21.1; 5.1.3; contra Matt 1:23). F. C. Burkitt, Levi Son of Alphaeus JTS 28 (1927): 27374; Metzger, Textual Commentary, 78; Brent Nongbri, Matthew and Levi. Benjamin Bacon (Studies in Matthew [New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1930], 3940) conjectures that the textual variant in Mark 2:14 predated the composition of Matthews Gospel, leading a pre-Matthean scribe who was transmitting a list of the Twelve that was originally independent of Mark 3:1619 to preface the name James the son of Alphaeus with the title the toll collector. The author of Matthews Gospel, however, copied this list in Matthew 10:24 and wrongly took this scribal insertion in reference to Matthew since James was immediately preceded by Matthew in the list of names. The account in the three Synoptics is identical, the vocation of Matthew-Levi being alluded to in the same terms. Jennie Ebeling --Department of Archaeology and Art History, University of Evansville, Copyright 2000-2023 The Bible and Interpretation| All Rights Reserved |The University of Arizona | Developed bySBS Tech As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collectors booth. The Calling of Saint Matthew depicts the moment from Matthew 9:9 when Jesus passes by Matthew, a tax collector, and says 'Follow me.' Matthew (also called Levi) did so and became one of Jesus . Jesus Calls Matthew to Follow Him (Matthew 9:9-13; Mark 2:13-17; Luke 5 He left Judea and carried the Gospel to Ethiopia where he was martyred while celebrating a mass at the altar of a small church he had started. 12.13; Is. Q. h.e. 40.9; Ezech. The important take-away from this detour through the Patristic testimonies was that the oldest tradition was that the evangelist Matthew published a text in Aramaic and left it to more qualified translators to translate it into the form that we have today as the Greek. Epiphanius and Jerome later confused the traditional account of the authorship of Matthews Gospel with the origins of the Gospel according to the Hebrews. In Matthew's parabolic aside, the wisest advice Pilate got that day -- our Good Friday -- was from his wife: "Have nothing to do with that innocent man" (27:19). This makes it doubtful that Matthew 9:9 was intended as either the evangelists self-reference or as a pseudonymous literary device supplementing the ascription of this Gospel to Matthew. According to Matthew 9:9 and Mark 2:14, Matthew was sitting by the customs house in Capernaum (near modern Almagor, Israel, on the Sea of Galilee) when Jesus called him into his company. Th. For an alternative approach, W. F. Albright and C. S. Mann speculate that an Aramaic source identified the toll collector as a Levite and that this was mistranslated as the personal name Levi in the Greek texts of Mark and Luke. Brian McNeil (London: T&T Clark, 2003), 40; Jennifer Wright Knust, Early Christian Re-writing and the History of the Pericope Adulterae, JECS 14 (2006): 495n34; Norelli, Papia, 33132, 335; MacDonald, Two Shipwrecked Gospels, 14, 1922, 24653; Jrg Frey, Die Fragmente des Hebrerevangeliums, in Antike christliche Apokryphen in deutscher bersetzung. nor any utilization of the first-person voice to present Matthews perspective on the unfolding events (contra Acts 16:1017; 20:515; 21:118; 27:137; 28:116; Gos. [20] Matthew Black, The Use of Rhetorical Terminology in Papias on Matthew and Mark JSNT 37 (1989): 32; Bauckham, Eyewitnesses, 222. The Pharisees asked them, Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners? On hearing this, Jesus said to them, It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. [38] There are a number of Patristic and Medieval quotations that purportedly derive from a text that was commonly dubbed as the Gospel according to the Hebrews. 16.13). Among these repetitions are: variations of Mattathias (five times), Jesus (twice), Joseph (three times), Simeon (Semein), Levi (twice), and Melchi (twice). And many followed him ( Mark 2:15 ). The Calling of Matthew is an episode in the life of Jesus which appears in all three synoptic gospels, Matthew 9:9-13, Mark 2:13-17 and Luke 5:27-28, and relates the initial encounter between Jesus and Matthew, the tax collector who . Ultimately, the identification of Matthews oracles. 1.7; Irenaeus, haer. They were considered traitors because they worked for the despised Roman rulers. B. Rather, he plainly states, So Matthew composed the oracles in the Hebrew language and each person interpreted them as best he could (in Eusebius, At first sight, this description seems like a poor match for the extant text entitled the. This quote from Powerss monograph on the Synoptic Problem may presume too much about the literary skills, and psychological motivations, of a relatively low-level functionary operating a toll booth on the outskirts of the Galilean village of Capernaum (Matt 9:1, 9; cf. This is very possible, as scholars point to Simon (Peter) and Saul. Consequently, the evangelist wrote Matthew into the Markan story of the toll collector in Matthew 9:9. http://www.brentcunningham.org/?p=316 1.9.9). [45] Luomanen, Jewish-Christian Sects, 100101; Kok, Gospel according to the Hebrews, 41; Gregory, Gospel according to the Hebrews, 47, 47n.28. CLICK HERE for Jesus and the Constant Crowds article. Impossible!"[3]. Scripture both prohibits and mocks astrology (Jer. Some scholars believe that the tax-collector simply had two names, one in Greek (Matthew) and the other in Hebrew (Levi). 16:18) Mark and Luke were probably stunned by Jesus inclusion of a hated tax collector in His Twelve. Matthew was an accurate counter. Krzingers and Gundrys proposals have varying degrees of persuasiveness, but most scholars have not been swayed by their contention that Papiass words on Matthew have been misread through the centuries. The "Strange" Ending of the Gospel of Mark and Why It Makes All the 5. It is beyond the scope of this paper to determine why Matthew was substituted for Levi. David: So, Matthew was one of Christ's disciples. [32] The diversity of text-forms evident in Matthews biblical citations and allusions, however, disproves the notion that the evangelist was reliant on one testimonium source. For example, the Valentinian theologian Heracleon differentiated Levi from Matthew (cf. Jesus came to give us the same choice he gave . Why Did Jesus Say, "On This Rock I Will Build My Church"? (Matthew 16) This is not a solitary occurrence within Matthews Gospel: the evangelist inserted the mother of the sons of Zebedee into one pericope (Matt 20:20; cf. Why Did Jesus Go To Jerusalem? A Holy Week Reflection Harris J. Rendel, The Logia and the Gospels, For lexical discussion and debate about the term. But Levis guests were of his social ilksinners and other tax collectors.The Pharisees (we get our word pharisaical meaning self-righteous; hypocritical from this sect in ancient Judaism) were always watching whatever Jesus did and said and they followed him to Levis house and were appalled to see Him eating and talking with tax collectors and sinners.Several of Jesus other disciples were near. He was thirty-one years old and married and had four children. The thesis that the first canonical Gospel was published under the name of a pseudonym is defended by George D. Kilpatrick. Vir. h.e. [8] Alternatively, the textual variant that has James instead of Levi as the son of Alphaeus in Mark 2:14 in a handful of manuscripts was plausibly motivated by a desire for uniformity by having a single son of Alphaeus (cf. Jesus went out again by the sea. The other Eleven were ordinary men. It is not surprising he watched Jesus carefully and wrote down the first of the four Gospels, the biographies of Jesus of Nazareth. Matthew, of course. Who was Zacchaeus? 5 Things To Know from His Bible Story - Crosswalk.com Matthew did follow Jesus for the rest of his life. Jesus was becoming popular. Luke, also, describes his calling: After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. [20], Krzinger and Gundry re-read the Papian fragment through the lens of rhetorical categories. In spite of this, Jesus went to Levi and invited him to join Jesus' disciples. Band: Evangelien und Verwandtes. Watchthe video below. Based on Papiass title Exposition of the Oracles of the Lord and his summary of Marks account of the oracles of the Lord, Papiass usage of the term logion encompassed both teachings and short narrative episodes (cf. Or Levi was having a lot of friends over for dinner that night and asked Jesus if He would come, too. [35] This leads Dennis MacDonald to maintain that Papiass supposition about the multiple translations of Matthews oracles was an explanation for the dissimilar Greek texts of Q and Matthew. [40] Conversely, Papias may not have known the Gospel according to the Hebrews at all, instead learning about the woman who was accused of many sins before the Lord from his oral informants in Asia Minor, and Eusebius may have been the one who discovered that this tale was included in the version of the Gospel according to the Hebrews that circulated in his own day. The text of Matthew in its final form, on the other hand, may be a better point of contrast for Marks narrative, and Q would not have an advantage over it if Q originated in Greek as well. 135). Levi - Wikipedia [10] For the debate over whether Mark 2:14 and 3:18 refer to the same individual or to two different individuals named Alphaeus, see Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, 87n.17. [46] Vielhauer and Strecker, Jewish Christian Gospels, 15465; Klijn, Jewish Christian Gospel Tradition, 29-30, 3132; Klauck, Apocryphal Gospels, 4351; Frey, Die Fragmente des Nazorerevangeliums, in Antike christliche Apokryphen in deutscher bersetzung. Other than naming Matthew in the list of Apostles, usually pairing him with St. Thomas, the New Testament offers scant and uncertain information about him. 6.25.4; Epiphanius, Pan. For a recent effort to argue that plural Aramaic and Greek sources underlie the double tradition, see Maurice Casey, An Aramaic Approach to Q: Sources for the Gospels of Matthew and Luke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002). Because Matthews original purpose was to prove to his Jewish brethren that Jesus is their Mashiach/Messiah, he included in his Gospel nine proof texts from the Old Testament which Jesus fulfilledMatthew 1:22,23; 2:15; 2:17,18; 2:23; 4:14-16; 8:17; 12:17-21; 13:35; 27:9,10. Likewise, Jerome prematurely announced that he had finished his translations of the Old and New Testaments when he just started the task (Vir. 3.1.1; Pantaenus, in Eusebius, h.e. - And it came to pass - seems the best reading - as he was sitting at meat in his house.This was the house of Matthew. Matthew, who is also Levi, and who from a publican came to be an apostle, first of all composed a Gospel of Christ in Judaea in the Hebrew language and characters for the benefit of those of the circumcision who had believed. 2. [3] Powers, Progressive Publication, 29 (emphasis original). Jerome may have anticipated that he would track down the Gospel according to the Hebrews in Pamphilus library in Caesarea (cf. ; ; ; ; () Brezhoneg; Catal; etina; Dansk; Deutsch; Eesti 3.2).[48]. Perhaps most plain is the calling of the disciple Matthew, also known as Levi the tax collector. Who Was Matthias in the Bible and Why Did He Replace Judas? What Did Jesus Mean When He Said 'Eloi Eloi Lama Sabachthani'? Friedrich Schleiermacher, ber die Zeugnisse des Papias von unsern beiden ersten Evangelien, TSK 5 (1832): 73568; Manson, For the general consensus of Q scholars, see Nigel Turner, Q in Recent Thought, Daniel A. Bertrand, Lvangile des Ebionites: une harmonie vangelique antrieur au. Jesus Chooses the Twelve Apostles (Lk 6:12-26) - UBF For two reasons *Jews did not like the men who did that work. [17] Additionally, specialists on the Synoptic Problem generally hold that Matthews Gospel reproduced over 90 percent of Marks content, improved Marks grammar and style, and edited out Marks transliterated Aramaic terms. However, Mark . If Jesus proclaimed the 'Kingdom of God," sneered Pilate, let him die as "King of the Jews" (Mark 15:2,9,12,18,26). Who translated it after that in Greek is not sufficiently ascertained. As Jesus was having a meal in Levi's home, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with Jesus and his disciples . PDF JESUS CALLED MATTHEW (LEVI) - Bible Storytelling Matthew authored the first Gospel of the . Here's What History Can Tell Us About the Magi | Time For example, the Valentinian theologian Heracleon differentiated Levi from Matthew (cf. 6:25 (300s AD). But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners? Jesus answered them, It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Luke 5:27-32. The meaning in Hebrew of the word day always means a 24 hour period of time. Excessive. He was a tax collector who was sitting at his booth. In both instances, certain copyists of Marks Gospel were unaware of the conflation of Levi with Matthew in Matthew 9:9 and 10:3, yet still turned the character in Mark 2:14 into an apostle. John P. Meier even entertains the option that the evangelist wanted to replace Levi with any of the apostles and Matthew was chosen at random for this aim. However, Bacons hypothesis depends on his suppositions that the source of Matthew 10:24 was not simply Mark 3:1619 and that the author of Matthews Gospel did not just alter Marks order by moving Thomas before Matthew. 3.27.4; 3.39.17; 4.22.8). Matthew is spoken of five times in the New Testament; first in Matt., ix, 9, when called by Jesus to follow Him, and then four times in the list of the Apostles, where he is mentioned in the seventh (Luke, vi, 15, and Mark, iii, 18), and again in the eighth place (Matt., x, 3, and Acts, i, 13). There are many examples of irresistible grace in God's Word. Who Were the Magi, and Why Did They Worship Jesus? (Matthew 2) He is mentioned in Matthew 9:9. Some Patristic interpreters guessed that the evangelists Mark and Luke called Matthew by his less popular name Levi out of deference for his apostolic status, while Matthew himself had the humility to confess that he was once employed in a disreputable profession under his better-known name (e.g., John Chrysostom, hom. One did not give up collecting taxes for the Romans on a whim and expect to ever return. This is a painting of the Calling of Saint Matthew in San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome. Moreover, the Hebrew itself is preserved to this day in the library at Caesarea, which the martyr Pamphilus so diligently collected. [26] Gundry, Matthew, 619; idem, Pre-Papian Tradition, 67. [5] On the other hand, after scrutinizing the onomastic data compiled by Tal Ilan,[6] Richard Bauckham makes it clear why these examples may be irrelevant to this case: "[I]f Matthew and Levi were the same person, we should be confronted with the virtually unparalleled phenomenon of a Palestinian Jew bearing two common Semitic personal names (Matthew: ninth most popular, 62 occurrences; Levi: seventeenth most popular, 25 occurrences). Beth: And it's in a chapel with two other paintings by Caravaggio all about Matthew. Christ's Call To Matthew - Follow Me - Discover the Book Ministries with Q or M may depend on a given scholars acceptance or not of the Four Source theory as classically formulated. Jesus Christ and Saint Peter have entered the room, and Jesus is pointing at Matthew. Matthew Levi - TruthBook Indeed, Papias commented on a story about the Lords encounter with a condemned woman that Eusebius located in this Gospel (cf. [17] W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison (A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on The Gospel According to Saint Matthew. It felt "weird," Carr said. CHICAGO (RNS) The first time the Rev. , TSAJ 91 (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002). In the Christian Bible, he was cited as one of the Jesus' apostles. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners., CLICK HERE for Jesus and the Pharisees article. Mark Book of Week - Part 1 | PDF | John The Baptist | Jesus 10 Facts about Matthew the Apostle | Less Known Facts Rudolf Pesch, LeviMatthus (Me 2.14/Mt 9.9; 10.3). [2] For some examples, see Robert Gundry, The Use of the Old Testament in St. Matthews Gospel: With Special Reference to the Messianic Hope(Leiden: Brill, 1975), 183; David Hill, The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972), 1; R. T. France, Matthew: Evangelist and Teacher (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1989), 6768; Leon Morris, The Gospel according to Matthew (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992), 14; Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 113 (Dallas: Word, 1993), lxxvi; D. A. Carson, Matthew: Chapters 1 through 12 (EBC; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995), 1819; Grant R. Osbourne, Matthew, ECNT (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010), 34; B. Several theories have been offered to account for why the toll collector Levi was re-named Matthew in Matthew 9:9 (cf. March 2020. Religion is "a matter between every man and his maker, in which no other, & far less the public, [has] a . Gospel According to Matthew | Description, History, & Facts Of course, their hippy-dippy ways are . Wright --University of Arizona, Center for Judaic Studies Nevertheless, it is conceivable that the two verses in Matthew 9:9 and 10:3 were the basis for why this Gospel was later ascribed to Matthew. The Identification of the Toll Collector as Matthew. had his name changed from Levi to Matthew likely by Jesus Himself who changed Simon's name to Peter. While He was on the cross, He cried out, "Eloi Eloi Lama Sabachthani," which means "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?". Why does St. Matthew have two names in the Bible? - Aleteia But go and learn what this means: I desire mercy, not sacrifice. For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners. Matthew 9:9-13, Matthew is the ONLY one of the Gospel writers who uses his changed name from Levi to Matthew. (1) Repetition of names in the list after David, some of which appear to be anachronisms, possibly suggesting that this list had its own history. Krzinger and Gundry re-read the Papian fragment through the lens of rhetorical categories. They contend that the conjunction oun (therefore) in Papiass statement about Matthew (3.39.16) was connected to his prior statement about Mark (3.39.15), entailing that Matthew published his narrative of Jesuss life in response to the perceived shortcomings of Marks account. Christoph Markschies und Jens Schrter (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck 2012), 606; Kok, Papias of Hierapolis, 4752; Andrew Gregory, The Gospel according to the Hebrews and the Gospel of the Ebionites (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 34, 78. Christoph Markschies und Jens Schrter (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck 2012), 6089; Kok, Gospel according to the Hebrews, 5253; Gregory, Gospel according to the Hebrews, 181. Mich. 7.6; Is. [10] Even so, most readers of the New Testament throughout history have taken the identification of Levi with Matthew for granted. Follow me, he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. [34] Friedrich Schleiermacher, ber die Zeugnisse des Papias von unsern beiden ersten Evangelien, TSK 5 (1832): 73568; Manson, Gospels and Epistles, 7787; Hill, Matthew, 2427; Davies and Allison, Matthew IIV, 1.17; Black, Rhetorical Terminology, 3235; Hagner, Matthew 113; xlvxlvi; Nolland, Matthew, 3; Carter, Storyteller, Interpreter, Evangelist, 1617; Sim, R. [9] In both instances, certain copyists of Marks Gospel were unaware of the conflation of Levi with Matthew in Matthew 9:9 and 10:3, yet still turned the character in Mark 2:14 into an apostle. Following Jesus Meant Matthew Lost His Lucrative Tax Collector Career. This could be a good possibility for the changing of the names. The whole crowd came to him, and he taught them. R. McL. The Calling of Levi Sunday School Lesson - Children's Ministry Deals [4] See Manlio Simonetti, Matthew 113, ACCS New Testament 1a (Downers Grove: IVP, 2001), 177; Ulrich Luz, Matthew 820, trans. 13:4; 19:1; 53:1; 62:3; 2 Clem. Matthew's Gospel was written in approximately A.D.___, before the destruction of Jerusalem. [47] Luomanen, Jewish-Christian Sects, 103119; Kok, Gospel According to the Hebrews, 4143; Gregory, Gospel according to the Hebrews, 1417; 4352. How can Jesus Christ be a priest if He is of the non-priestly tribe of Jesus Said, "Follow Me" - FaithGateway Store Magi, or "wise men," were royal counselors. Acts 1:19; 2:6, 8; 21:40; 22:2; 26:14);[22] Krzinger enlists Irenaeus in support of his reading of Papias, despite the fact that Irenaeus used the article when affirming that Matthew wrote to the Hebrews in their dialektos (cf. This writer will explore what the ancient writers who were closer in time to Matthew had to say about the language in which Matthew was originally written: Matthew also issued a written gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect. Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3:1 c.175-185 A.D. The first (Gospel) is written according to Matthew, the same that was once a tax collector, but afterwards an emissary of Yeshua the Messiah, who having published it for the Jewish believers, wrote it in Hebrew. Origen circa 210 CE, quoted by Eusebius, Eccl. Epiphanius added to the confusion when he imagined that the Gospel that he managed to get a hold of, which skips over the virgin birth and commences at Jesuss baptism (Pan. It is the contracted name of Mattathias. Follow me, Jesus said to him, and Levi got up, left everything and followed him. 7.2627; 14.5960). Jesus invited Matthew (Levi) to follow him (Lk 5:27-32). Jesus came with some of His disciples. [18] Josef Krzinger and Robert Gundry have tried to line up Papiass testimony with the academic consensus. Many commentators compare Matthews two names with other first-century Jews who had a Greek or Latin cognomen. I. For the debate over whether Mark 2:14 and 3:18 refer to the same individual or to two different individuals named Alphaeus, see Bauckham. The fact of one man having two names is of frequent occurrence among the Jews. News of his preaching and healing ministry was spreading far and wide. He was a man of moderate wealth, the only one of any means belonging to the apostolic corps. People had to pay taxes to the *Romans. Jesus sent out 70 Disciples to preach His Good News. Caseys efforts have been critiqued by Peter M. Head and P. J. Williams, Q Review TB 54.1 (2003): 13144. (Matt. He offered something infinitely better. Wilson (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1991), 138; A. F. J. Klijn, Jewish-Christian Gospel Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 1992), 11, 119, 138; Hans Josef Klauck, Apocryphal Gospels: An Introduction, trans.