The Unthinkable

In tomorrow's Gospel reading Jesus does the unthinkable—he names a hated tax collector as one of his inner circle of disciples. John J. Pilch writes this of tomorrow's reading,

The scene is Capernaum, Jesus' own town (9:1). Capernaum was located on the northwest corner of the Sea of Galilee along the major road of international trade between Damascus and Egypt. Domestic trade among the towns and villages on the shores of the Sea of Galilee also had to pass through Capernaum.

Capernaum was well situated for collecting tolls which were levied on all goods in transit whether entering, leaving, or simply being transported across a district. Tolls also had to be paid for goods crossing over bridges or gates, or landings. Matthew was a toll collector who worked in the Capernaum custom house.

In Jesus' time, a toll collector was a native who contracted with Rome to collect the allotted tolls but paid them personally to Rome in advance and hoped to collect enough to make a profit. Historical evidence indicates that the gamble rarely paid off. The rich and the educated, a minuscule minority in Jesus' day, routinely criticized toll collectors. The poor rarely had anything on which duties could be levied and would likely sympathize with rather than criticize those who, like themselves, were trying to eke out a subsistence.

Jesus draws an analogy between his association with toll collectors and sinners and the association of healers with sick people. Knowledge of the history of medicine helps a modern reader appreciate the analogy. In antiquity, healers preferred not to treat sick people because if the sick person died the healer might be put to death as well.

Jesus' activity contrasts with this cultural view because he touched the untouchables and associated with the outcasts in a way that good healers should have done but didn't.

Moreover sickness in ancient Israel nearly always entailed separation from the community until health returned. This was part of the understanding of purity and wholeness. In a group-oriented culture, separation from the community is a fate worse than death. Jesus' healing ministry in general always includes a restoration of the person to community, whether someone with repulsive scaly skin conditions (called "leprosy") or toll collectors who in general were a remarkably fair and honest group of people routinely stereotyped, condemned, and shunned by their peers.

Whom do contemporary American believers stereotype, condemn, and shun? How would Jesus respond?