My LORD’s BibleWho Were the Publicans (Tax Collectors)?
No group in the Gospels better shows who Jesus was willing to eat with — Jewish men who worked for Rome collecting taxes from their own neighbors, widely regarded as traitors, and repeatedly named as exactly the company Jesus kept.
Collecting Rome's taxes from their own people
"Publican" translates a Roman term for a tax collector — in Judea, typically a Jew contracted to collect duties and tolls for Rome, often with the right to add a personal cut on top of what Rome required. That combination made publicans doubly hated: seen as collaborators profiting from Roman occupation, and suspected, often rightly, of extortion.
John the Baptist's specific instruction to publicans who came to him, implying the abuse was common enough to need naming:
Luke 3:12–13
Read in full chapter →12Then came also publicans to be baptized, and said unto him, Master, what shall we do?
13And he said unto them, Exact no more than that which is appointed you.
See also: Luke 19:8, Ephesians 4:28
Grouped with "sinners"
The Gospels repeatedly pair "publicans" with "sinners" as a fixed phrase — a social category, not just a job description, roughly meaning those excluded from respectable religious company. Jesus's willingness to sit at table with them scandalized onlookers precisely because the category was so fixed.
At the meal following Matthew's own calling:
Matthew 9:10–11
Read in full chapter →10And it came to pass, as Jesus sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and sat down with him and his disciples.
See also: Luke 15:1, Matthew 11:19
11And when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your Master with publicans and sinners?
See also: Luke 15:2, Matthew 11:19
The accusation leveled at Jesus directly, which he does not deny:
Luke 7:34
Read in full chapter →34The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners!
See also: Luke 19:7, Matthew 11:19
Matthew and Zacchaeus
Two publicans are named individuals in the Gospels, not just a faceless class. Matthew (also called Levi) was collecting tolls when Jesus called him to be one of the Twelve.
His calling:
Matthew 9:9
Read in full chapter →9And as Jesus passed forth from thence, he saw a man, named Matthew, sitting at the receipt of custom: and he saith unto him, Follow me. And he arose, and followed him.
See also: The Gospel of the Ebionites (Fragments) 1:1, Luke 5:27-38
Zacchaeus, "chief among the publicans" of Jericho — meaning he oversaw other collectors and profited from a whole district's traffic — climbs a tree to see Jesus and ends the encounter giving away half his goods and repaying anyone he had cheated fourfold.
Zacchaeus's response to Jesus:
Luke 19:8
Read in full chapter →8And Zacchaeus stood, and said unto the Lord: Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.
See also: 2 Samuel 12:6, Numbers 5:7
The parable that ranks a publican above a Pharisee
Jesus goes further than simply associating with publicans — in one parable he makes a publican's humility the model of right standing before God, against a Pharisee's confident self-comparison.
The publican's prayer, and Jesus's verdict on it:
Luke 18:13–14
Read in full chapter →13And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.
See also: Micah 6:8, Matthew 6:5
14I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.
See also: Matthew 5:3, Proverbs 29:23
Common questions
- What exactly was a publican?
- A tax collector — typically a Jew contracted by Rome to collect taxes and tolls from the local population, often permitted to add a personal surcharge, which made the role both lucrative and widely resented as extortion and collaboration.
- Why were publicans grouped with "sinners" in the Gospels?
- The phrase "publicans and sinners" functioned as a fixed social category for those excluded from respectable religious company — not a claim that every publican had committed a specific sin, but a marker of the group's low social and religious standing.
- Which of Jesus's twelve apostles was a former publican?
- Matthew, also called Levi, who was collecting tolls when Jesus called him in Matthew 9:9.
- What did Zacchaeus do after meeting Jesus?
- He gave half his goods to the poor and pledged to repay fourfold anyone he had overcharged — recorded in Luke 19:8, immediately after Jesus invited himself to Zacchaeus's house.