why did jesus change levi to matthew
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why did jesus change levi to matthew

Jesus believed that he had the same right to reassign a person's nameand therefore a person's life calling and destiny" (Cunningham). 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. Change the way you think and act, and believe (trust in, rely on, and adhere to) this Good News. High priest Aaron and his sons were descendants of Levi (Exodus 4:14), Levi being a son of Jacob (Genesis 29:34). Therefore, commentators often appeal to Matthew 9:9 and 10:3 as evidence that the Apostle Matthew was capable of composing either the Greek text of the first canonical Gospel or one of the literary sources incorporated into it. Jefferson himself believed that a person's religion was between them and their god. Ein Beitrag zur Lsung eines alten Problems ZNW59 (1968): 4056; Mark Kiley, Why Matthew in Matt 9:913Biblica65.3 (1984): 34751; Michael J. Kok, Re-naming the Toll Collector in Matthew 9:9: A Review of the Options JGAR (forthcoming). Why is Matthew called Levi? The fact of one man having two names is of frequent occurrence among the Jews. [33] For lexical discussion and debate about the term logion in Papiass vocabulary (cf. Calling of St. Matthew by Alexandre Bida, 1875. 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 [28] On the contrary, there are cases when dialektos is translated as a language even when it is not preceded by an article (e.g., Philo, Mos. Das Papiaszeugnis zur Entstehung des Matthusevangeliums ZNW 92 (2001): 257272; Nolland, Matthew, 3; Enrico Norelli, Papia di Hierapolis: Esposizione degli Oraculi del signore: I Frammenti (Milan: Figlie di San Paolo, 2005), 32829; David H. Sim, The Gospel of Matthew, John the Elder, and the Papias Tradition: A Response to R. H. Gundry HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 63.1 (2007): 290; Monte Shanks, Papias and the New Testament (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013), 196; Michael J. Kok, Did Papias of Hierapolis Use the Gospel according to the Hebrews as a Source? JECS 25.1 (2017): 32; Bauckham, Eyewitnesses, 223; Jeannine K. Brown and Kyle Roberts, Matthew (Two Horizons; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2018), 1516. 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. [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. Aelius Theon, Prog. Matthew was a Levite from the priestly tribe of Levi, making his role that of writing on Christ's priesthood. For criticism of their theory, see France, Matthew, 70. in Mt. Jerome may have anticipated that he would track down the Gospel according to the Hebrews in Pamphilus library in Caesarea (cf. The meaning in Hebrew of the word day always means a 24 hour period of time. Levi: Luke 5:27, "And after that He went out, and noticed a tax-gatherer named Levi, sitting in the tax office, and He said to him, 'Follow Me.' ". [22] Krzinger, Papias, 22; Gundry, Matthew, 619; Pre-Papian Tradition, xxi, 68; cf. Jesus was very popular in the Capernaum area where He and Levi lived and it is sure Levi had seen and heard the Nazarene. T/F, 3. had his name changed from Levi to Matthew likely by Jesus Himself who changed Simon's name to Peter. [13] The thesis that the first canonical Gospel was published under the name of a pseudonym is defended by George D. Kilpatrick, The Origins of the Gospel according to St. Matthew (Oxford: Clarendon, 1946), 13839. Matthew (also known as Levi) doubtless was one of the tax collectors who responded to John the Baptist's call to repentance. Key Verse: 6:13, "When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles". When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: 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. James E. Crouch; Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001), 32n.12; Ian Boxall, Matthew through the Centuries (Hoboken: Wiley Blackwell, 2019), 31, 172. 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. It is not surprising he watched Jesus carefully and wrote down the first of the four Gospels, the biographies of Jesus of Nazareth. 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. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 1089; cf. Teilband 1, ed. [15], The Original Language of Matthews Gospel, Unlike the modern deductions about Matthews level of literacy, Papias did not presuppose Matthews facility in Greek. 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. It is the contracted name of Mattathias. [39] James R. Edwards has revived the older position that Matthew was the author of the Gospel according to the Hebrews and postulates that our Greek Gospel according to Matthew was named in honor of an apostolic figurehead who preserved the Jewish Jesus traditions. Clement, str. T/F, 4. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. DepartmentBldg Tucson, AZ 85721 TEL 520-621-6897 FAX 520-626-9014. Band: Evangelien und Verwandtes. Maybe Jesus had seen Levi often as he sat in his chair with his table, papyrus, quill and ink made from carbon (soot or lampblack), water and gum arabic, a natural gum from the acacia tree used to control the inks viscosity when applied to the papyrus. They contend that the conjunction. 3.39.1, 15), which subtly contrasts with an exclusive interest in the Lords logoi or sayings (3.39.14). Based on Papiass title. These Jewish tax collectors were disdained by the Jews. haer. [34] The double tradition is mostly comprised of sayings, but there are a couple of narratives (e.g., Matt 4:111/Luke 4:113; Matt 8:513/Luke 7:110). There are sayings (Matt 13:3643) and stories. They were dishonest and were also seen as. [7] Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony, 2nd ed. Jesus speaking or understanding Greek is the least controversial of the three. Tax collectors at that time were known as dishonest and corrupt people. [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. Even Jesus acknowledges the hatred people had for tax collectors: " If they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector" (Matthew 18:17). Q. Say, Jesus saw Levi and knew that Levi and the other tax collectors needed to know the good news. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Band: Evangelien und Verwandtes. Follow me, Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him. 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. Matthew did follow Jesus for the rest of his life. ill. 2), but several of his quotations were lifted from previous Greek texts penned by figures such as Ignatius (cf. B. Matthew was an accurate counter. 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. Josef Krzinger and Robert Gundry have tried to line up Papiass testimony with the academic consensus. 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 . Matthew, or Levi, son of Alpheus, was one of the seven who received a call to follow Christ before the ordination of the Twelve. News and Interpretations on the Bible and Ancient Near East History. Answer (1 of 3): In Mark, the first New Testament gospel written, Matthew and Levi are very definitely two different people. For the range of theories accounting for the redactional changes in Matthew 9:9 and 10:3, see the helpful summaries compiled by Joachim Gnilka, Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity: Part I: Palestine 330 BCE 200 CE. [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. All the names for our week days come from Roman and Norse/Anglo-Saxon gods. [23] They render the verb hermeneuein as meaning to mediate or to interpret rather than to translate.[24] Hence, Krzinger identifies the each one (hekastos) who interpreted according to their ability as the evangelists conveying oral Jesus traditions in a new literary medium;[25] Gundry takes the referent to be the expositors who expounded on Matthews text. "And Peter was the chief . Frey, Die Fragmente des Nazorerevangeliums, 626; Gregory, Media, Video and Lectures From The Arizona Center for Judaic Studies of the University of Arizona, Teaching the Bible in Public Schools and Higher Ed, Scholars, Frauds, the Media and the Public, Essays on Minimalism from Bible and Interpretation, Final Reports on the Yehoash Inscription and James Ossuary from the Israeli Antiquities Authority, Essays on the James Ossuary and the Temple Tablet from Bible and Interpretation, University of Arizona, Center for Judaic Studies, Department of Archaeology and Art History, University of Evansville. The task of the present article is to explain these two variations in . Gundry, Matthew, xxii. [26], 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. [35] For the general consensus of Q scholars, see Nigel Turner, Q in Recent Thought ExpTim 80 (1968-69): 32428; John S. Kloppenborg, The Formation of Q: Trajectories in Ancient Wisdom (Harrisburg: Trinity Press International, 1987), 5164; Harry T. Fleddermann, Q: A Reconstruction and Commentary (Leuven: Peeters, 2005), 15557; Sarah E. Rollens, Framing Social Criticism in the Jesus Movement: The Ideological Project in the Sayings Gospel Q (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 9193. Curiously, Origen answered the philosopher Celsuss criticism that Jesus assembled a motley crew of toll collectors and sailors by stressing that Matthew was the sole toll collector within the apostolic circle and that Levi was not numbered among the twelve apostles except for in select manuscripts of Marks Gospel (Cels. There are a number of Patristic and Medieval quotations that purportedly derive from a text that was commonly dubbed as the, James R. Edwards has revived the older position that Matthew was the author of the, Conversely, Papias may not have known the. To follow Jesus requires renouncement. 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). Jesus casually says to Levi the tax collector,follow me and Levi got up and followed him. Just like that. A few scholars have likened Papiass oracles to a testimonium source or collection of prophetic proof-texts from the Hebrew Bible that were translated and integrated into the Gospel of Matthew. Of course, their hippy-dippy ways are . Some have also argued that he's the Apostle Matthew 's brother. You're right Zahid, the author of Matthew was a tax collector. CLICK HERE for Jesus and the Constant Crowds article. Omissions? 6.14.2; Epiphanius, Pan. He followed Jesus to his death. Mark 16:1). One theory is that Matthew went by the name Levi, or was simply of the tribe of Levi, and was re-named by Jesus as Matthew upon his call. [16] This English translation of the Greek text is taken from Michael W. Holmes, editor, The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations (rev. Teilband 1, ed. This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions. Papiass notice that Matthew addressed a Palestinian Jewish audience in their own vernacular language (i.e., Aramaic) was repeated in subsequent Patristic literature (e.g., Irenaeus, As for Jerome, he boasted that he translated the, The majority position among the experts is that the fragments Jerome inherited from the Nazarenes do not derive from the. Many think that just as Simon was named Peter (the rock) by the Lord, Levi was likewise renamed Matthew (the gift of God) by Jesus. The most natural reading is that a language was meant by the combination of the noun. T/F. Harris J. Rendel, The Logia and the Gospels, For lexical discussion and debate about the term. Ps. Vir. [23] Krzinger, Papias, 24, 3342; cf. 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, When Origen of Alexandria searched for a parallel for why Saul was surnamed Paul in the preface of his. summer | 4.2K views, 92 likes, 102 loves, 53 comments, 67 shares, Facebook Watch Videos from The Ramp: His presence is here, worship with us at Summer. Mark 3:18). The Patristic Traditions about the Evangelist Matthew. David: So, Matthew was one of Christ's disciples. Excessive. 1) The name of the collector whom Jesus summons is not "Levi, son of Alphaeus", but "Matthew" (9,9). Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. In Matthew 4:18-21, he tells them he will make them "fishers of men.". 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. h.e. [38] For the latter view, see France, Evangelist and Teacher, 64-66; Bauckham, Eyewitnesses, 224. Luke 6:12-26. The debate over the authorship of Matthews Gospel usually focuses on the replacement of Levi, the son of Alphaeus, with Matthew (Matt 9:9; contra Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27) and the addition of the descriptor the toll collector after Matthews name (Matt 10:3; contra Mark 3:18; Luke 6:15; Acts 1:13). In the late '60s, he runs a musty SoCal church turned upside-down by an unexpected deluge of flower children seeking peace and love of the Christly variety. [16] At first sight, this description seems like a poor match for the extant text entitled the Gospel according to Matthew, for it does not look like a translation of an Aramaic precursor. But let's hear Matthew's own account of his calling: How Did Jesus Spend the Last Week of His Life? Thus, some scholars who otherwise defend the traditional authorship of Matthews Gospel admit that Papias erred in his belief about the original language in which it was written. Both Eusebius and Epiphanius missed Irenaeuss point that schismatics rejected the fourfold Gospel canon and selected one of the four Gospels, but their doctrines were refuted by the very Gospels that they privileged. It was to that man, the most despised of the despicable, to whom Jesus said, "Follow Me!" They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. This is a depiction of a moment of spiritual awakening and conversion, which was something many Baroque artists were interested in painting, especially Caravaggio. (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. had his name changed from Levi to Matthew likely by Jesus Himself who changed Simons name to Peter.(Matt. Hence, Eusebius corrected Irenaeus by substituting the Gospel according to the Hebrews as the Ebionitess preferred Gospel (h.e. There were 12 men chosen to be disciples of Jesus Christ. 11.1-3; Pelag. All the names for our week days come from Roman and Norse/Anglo-Saxon gods. It is beyond the scope of this paper to determine why Matthew was substituted for Levi. 3.27.4). Jesus was becoming popular. 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. prol.) As a result, those who reject the academic consensus on Markan priority are often the most open to Papiass claim. There must have been at least 15-20 people eating in Levis spacious home. Matthew, the seventh apostle, was chosen by Andrew. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthews house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. Corrections? Wilhelm Schneemelcher, trans. There were what the Jews called publicans aka tax collectors like Matthew who collected taxes for customs or tolls on imports, exports, and merchants who came to buy or sell in Israel. March 2020. He it was who gave a feast, for attending which Jesus and the disciples were severely criticized by the Pharisees, k on the charge that it was unseemly for Him to eat with publicans and sinners. "Meet Nathanael in the Bible, the 'True Israelite'." Learn Religions, Dec. 6, 2021, learnreligions.com/nathanael-the-true-israelite-701068. News of his preaching and healing ministry was spreading far and wide. Christ redeemed the priesthood of Levi back unto himself and redeemed Matthew the . This is a quite different case from that of an individual having both a Semitic and a Greek or Latin name, as well as from that of an individual having a Semitic name and also a nickname or family name."[7]. Matthews Gospel has more quotations from and allusions to the Old Testament than any other New Testament author. [19] Josef Krzinger, Papias von Hierapolis und die Evangelien die Neuen Testaments (Regensberg: Pustet, 1983), 10-11, 4445; Gundry, Matthew, 614; idem, The Apostolically Johannine Pre-Papian Tradition Concerning the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, in The Old is Better: New Testament Essays in Support of Traditional Interpretations, WUNT 178 (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005), 56; cf. [30] For instance, see France, Evangelist and Teacher, 6466; Morris, Matthew, 14; Carson, Matthew, 13 Osborne, Matthew, 34; Brown and Roberts, Matthew, 16. [9] Lindars, Western Text,222; cf. There is a lot of controversy in recent centuries about that subject. He was honored that His Lord considered him such a gift, But as Levi he had immediately joined his life to Jesus and His Mission. Rudolf Pesch, LeviMatthus (Me 2.14/Mt 9.9; 10.3). [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.

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why did jesus change levi to matthew