Tax Collector Quotes

Be wary of strong drink, it can make you shoot at the tax collector...and miss.

Muhammad brought the promise that anyone could find fulfillment and everlasting life through allegiance to the one true God. The Buddah held out hope that the suffering could be transcended. Jesus brought the message that even the last shall be first, that even the tax collectors and lepers - the outcasts - had cause for hope. And so that is the question I leave you with in this final: What is your cause for hope.

...new prejudices will serve as well as old ones to harness the great unthinking masses. For this enlightenment, however, nothing is required but freedom, and indeed the most harmless among all the things to which this term can properly be applied. It is the freedom to make public use of one's reason at every point. But I hear on all sides, 'Do not argue!' The Officer says: 'Do not argue but drill!' The tax collector: 'Do not argue but pay!' The cleric: 'Do not argue but believe!' Only one prince in the world says, 'Argue as much as you will, and about what you will, but obey!' Everywhere there is restriction on freedom.

I would have thought you'd import an English staff?" "Good heavens, no! I would not wish a British chef on anyone except the French tax collectors.

When unions get higher wages for their members by restricting entry into an occupation, those higher wages are at the expense of other workers who find their opportunities reduced. When government pays its employees higher wages, those higher wages are at the expense of the taxpayer. But when workers get higher wages and better working conditions through the free market, when they get raises by firm competing with one another for the best workers, by workers competing with one another for the best jobs, those higher wages are at nobody's expense. They can only come from higher productivity, greater capital investment, more widely diffused skills. The whole pie is bigger - there's more for the worker, but there's also more for the employer, the investor, the consumer, and even the tax collector. That's the way the free market system distributes the fruits of economic progress among all people. That's the secret of the enormous improvements in the conditions of the working person over the past two centuries.

All right. Maybe I can get you one soul. Perhaps a tax collector...'cept they ain't human. Would they work? Or would you need, like, three of them to make up one normal person's soul? -Lift

We're living in a funny world kid, a peculiar civilization. The police are playing crooks in it, and the crooks are doing police duty. The politicians are preachers, and the preachers are politicians. The tax collectors collect for themselves. The Bad People want us to have more dough, and the good people are fighting to keep it from us. It's not good for us, know what I mean? If we had all we wanted to eat, we'd eat too much. We'd have inflation in the toilet paper industry. That's the way I understand it. That's about the size of some of the arguments I've heard.

Christ surrounded himself with beggars, prostitutes, tax-collectors and fishermen. ... what he meant by this was that the divine spark is in every soul and is never extinguished ...

But who would build the roads if there were no government? You mean to tell me that 300 million people in this country and 7 billion people on the planet would just sit around in their houses and think “Gee, I’d like to go visit Fred, but I can't because there isn’t a flat thing outside for me to drive on, and I don’t know how to build it and the other 300 million or 7 billion people can’t possibly do it because there aren’t any politicians and tax collectors. If they were here then we could do it. If they were here to boss us around and steal our money and really inefficiently build the flat places, then we would be set. Then I would be comfortable and confident that I could get places. But I can’t go to Fred’s house or the market because we can’t possibly build a flat space from A to B. We can make these really small devices that enable us to contact people from all over the word that fits in our pockets; we can make machines that we drive around in, but no, we can’t possibly build a flat space.

Being in love is like being lit on fire and having your loved one morph into a marshmallow as she runs to embrace you. But not being in love feels so much worse, possibly like being a tax collector. Actually, nothing compares to the lowliness of a tax collector.


In all times and in all places, whatever may be the name that the government takes, whatever has been its origin, or its organization, its essential function is always that of oppressing and exploiting the masses, and of defending the oppressors and exploiters. Its principal characteristic and indispensable instruments are the bailiff and the tax collector, the soldier and the prison. And to these are necessarily added the time-serving priest or teacher, as the case may be, supported and protected by the government, to render the spirit of the people servile and make them docile under the yoke.

...at any time of the day, corduroy is a highly stressful fabric. Rent collectors wear it. Tax collectors, too. History teachers add leather elbow patches.

Then, there are the places you would rather not go-a tax collectors' convention, a sewage treatment plant, or maybe the home of someone who keeps spiders as pets and insists on taking them out of their cages and making you hold them.

Clock time is our bank manager, tax collector, police inspector; this inner time is our wife.

If most people looked for someone to love, she, like a tax collector, looked for those who failed to love her and made them pay up.

If the people of God were to transform the world through fascination, these amazing teachings had to work at the center of these peculiar people. Then we can look into the eyes of a centurion and see not a beast but a child of God, and then walk with that child a couple of miles. Look into the eys of tax collectors as they sue you in court; see their poverty and give them your coat. Look in to the eys of the ones who are hardest for you to like, and see the One you love. For God loves good and bad people.

Nawat grinned. “I was helping to steal soldiers who couldn't keep up.” “What do you do with them?” she asked, curious. “I haven't heard of bodies being found.” “Nor will you,” Nawat informed her, sitting on a corner of the worktable. “They were still alive when we gave them to my warriors at the edge of the jungle.” He picked up Aly's hand and laced his fingers with hers. “My warriors will be able to say they last saw the missing soldiers alive, when the troops went on a visit to the jungle.” Aly walked her free fingers over their entwined hands. “But why would Crown soldiers visit the jungle?” “They didn't think they would at first,” Nawat admitted. “So my warriors show them the beauties of the deep jungle. They take away all the things the soldiers have of the civilized world, such as clothes and weapons and armor, so the soldiers will appreciate the jungle with their entire bodies. But my warriors have seen jungle before, so they get bored and leave. The soldiers stay longer.” “Like the tax collectors,” Aly whispered, awed by the beauty of what he described. “Take away all they have and leave them to survive the jungle. If you're questioned under truthspell, you can say they were alive when you left them. And the only way they could survive naked out there . . .” Nawat was shaking his head. Aly nodded. “I take it you don't leave them near any trails.” “They are there to appreciate the jungle that has been untouched by humans,” Nawat told her, a teacher to a student who did not quite understand. Aly sighed. “I am limp with envy,” she told him. “Simply limp.

Good heavens, no! I would not wish a British chef on anyone except the French tax collectors.

I’ve never fully understood how Christianity became quite so tame and respectable, given its origins among drunkards, prostitutes, and tax collectors.

Jesus didn’t seem very interested in exposing symptomatic sinners—tax collectors, drunkards, prostitutes, etc. Instead Jesus challenged the guardians of systemic sin—the power brokers of religion and politics.

Henri Rousseau was a simple, poorly educated man with an air of innocent naïveté. The Montmartre crowd gave him the nickname “Le Douanier,” meaning “customs officer,” referring to his job as a tax collector.

Hard-hearted people may be no fun to sit next to at parties, but they are just as entitled to earn a living as the rest of us. Fortunately-for them, at least-the need for insurance adjusters, tax collectors, theater critics, and the like continues to this very day.

I've never fully understood how Christianity became quite so tame and respectable, given its origins among drunkards, prostitutes, and tax collectors....Jesus could have hung out in the high-end religious scene of his day, but instead he scoffed at all that, choosing instead to laugh at the powerful, befriend whores, kiss sinners, and eat with all the wrong people. He spent his time with people for whom life was not easy. And there, amid those who were suffering, he was the embodiment of perfect love.

I shall clasp my hands together and bow to the corners of the world. May your villages remain ignorant of tax collectors, and may your sons be many and ugly and strong and willing workers, and may your daughters be few and beautiful and excellent providers of love gifts from eminent families that live very far away, and may your lives be blessed by the beauty that has touched mine. Farewell.

Whether an old lady is robbed by an armed street thug or by a well-dressed, well-educated "tax collector" makes no difference, morally or in practical terms.

The Don Quixote of the twenty-first century will not be a knight-errant struggling to revive the glories of feudalism but a bureaucrat in a brown suit, a tax collector yearning for a citizen to audit.

Jesus had no trouble with the exceptions, whether they were prostitutes, drunkards, Samaritans, lepers, Gentiles, tax collectors, or wayward sheep. He ate with outsiders regularly, to the chagrin of the church stalwarts, who always love their version of order over any compassion toward the exceptions. Just the existence of a single mentally challenged or mentally ill person should make us change any of our theories about the necessity of some kind of correct thinking as the definition of “salvation.” Yet we have a history of excluding and torturing people who do not “think” right.

The Rakshasa," said Percy pedantically, "are a different breed altogether from our vampires. Much in the same way that poodles and dachshunds are different breeds of dog. Rakshasas are reviled in India. Their position as tax collectors is an attempts by the crown to integrate them in a more progressive and mundane manner." Rue said, "Oh, how logical. Because we all know ordaining someone as a tax collector is the surest way to get them accepted by society.

Islam, Christianity, and Buddhism each have founder figures— Muhammad, Jesus, and the Buddha, respectively. And in thinking about these founder figures, I believe we must finally conclude that each brought a message of radical hope. To seventh-century Arabia, Muhammad brought the promise that anyone could find fulfillment and everlasting life through allegiance to the one true God. The Buddha held out hope that suffering could be transcended. Jesus brought the message that the last shall be first, that even the tax collectors and lepers— the outcasts— had cause for hope. And so that is the question I leave you

What if...what if that is the price one has to pay for staying on? Perhaps that is how they look at it: perhaps that is how I should look at it too. They see me as owing something. They see themselves as debt collectors, tax collectors. Why should I be allowed to live here without paying?

Perhaps the universe should have deigned to provide such warnings, but scythes were no more supernatural than tax collectors in the grand scheme of things. They showed up, did their unpleasant business, and were gone.

Jesus’ life and ministry consistently reveal the humble character of a servant. Though he rightfully owned the entire cosmos, he, by choice, had no place to lay his head (Matt. 8:20). Though he rightfully should have been honored by the world’s most esteemed dignitaries, he chose to fellowship with tax collectors, drunkards, prostitutes, and other socially unacceptable sinners (Matt. 11:19; Mark 2:15; Luke 5:29–30; 15:1; cf. Luke 7:31–50). Though he rightfully could have demanded service and worship from all, he served the lame and the sick by healing them, the demonized by delivering them, and the outcasts by befriending them. This is what the kingdom of God looks like.

Higgledy piggledy, my black hen, She lays eggs for gentlemen. Gentlemen come every day To count what my black hen doth lay. If perchance she lays too many, They fine my hen a pretty penny; If perchance she fails to lay, The gentlemen a bonus pay. Mumbledy pumbledy, my red cow, She’s cooperating now. At first she didn’t understand That milk production must be planned; She didn’t understand at first She either had to plan or burst, But now the government reports She’s giving pints instead of quarts. Fiddle de dee, my next-door neighbors, They are giggling at their labors. First they plant the tiny seed, Then they water, then they weed, Then they hoe and prune and lop, They they raise a record crop, Then they laugh their sides asunder, And plow the whole caboodle under. Abracadabra, thus we learn The more you create, the less you earn. The less you earn, the more you’re given, The less you lead, the more you’re driven, The more destroyed, the more they feed, The more you pay, the more they need, The more you earn, the less you keep, And now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to take If the tax-collector hasn’t got it before I wake.

You knew the demons and those magicians were working for Apophis, right? It’s a conspiracy.” — “Of course it’s a conspiracy,” Neith said. “They’re all in on it—the mortals, the magicians, the demons, the tax collectors. But I’m on to them.

To say it was a dark and stormy night would be a gross understatement. It was colder than witch's kiss, wetter than a spring swamp, and blacker than a tax collector's heart. A sane man would have been curled up in front of a fire with a cup of mulled wine and a good boo-, ah, a willing wench.

Today the man who has the courage to build himself a house constructs a meeting place for the people who will descend upon him on foot, by car, or by telephone. Employees of the gas, the electric, and the water- works will arrive; agents from life and fire insurance companies; building inspectors, collectors of radio tax; mortgage creditors and rent assessors who tax you for living in your own home.

A common form of establishment, for much of Besźel’s history, had been the DöplirCaffé: one Muslim and one Jewish coffeehouse, rented side by side, each with its own counter and kitchen, halal and kosher, sharing a single name, sign, and sprawl of tables, the dividing wall removed. Mixed groups would come, greet the two proprietors, sit together, separating on communitarian lines only long enough to order their permitted food from the relevant side, or ostentatiously from either and both in the case of freethinkers. Whether the DöplirCaffé was one establishment or two depended on who was asking: to a property tax collector, it was always one.

It is not right for one person to steal. It is not right for two people to steal. It is still not right for 51% of a voting population to vote for a representative who will hire a tax collector to steal for them. One of the great government lies is that theft can be moral when performed by enough people and called taxation.

TULLIAN TCHIVIDJIAN   The best definition for grace I know comes from Paul Zahl: Grace is love that seeks you out when you have nothing to give in return. Grace is love coming at you that has nothing to do with you. Grace is being loved when you are unlovable…. The cliché definition of grace is “unconditional love.” It is a true cliché, for it is a good description of the thing.… Let’s go a little further, though. Grace is a love that has nothing to do with you, the beloved. It has everything and only to do with the lover. Grace is irrational in the sense that it has nothing to do with weights and measures. It has nothing to do with my intrinsic qualities or so-called “gifts” (whatever they may be). It reflects a decision on the part of the giver, the one who loves, in relation to the receiver, the one who is loved, that negates any qualifications the receiver may personally hold…. Grace is one-way love.1 Grace doesn’t make demands. It just gives. And from our vantage point, it always gives to the wrong person. We see this over and over again in the Gospels: Jesus is always giving to the wrong people—prostitutes, tax collectors, half-breeds. The most extravagant sinners of Jesus’s day receive His most compassionate welcome. Grace is a divine vulgarity that stands caution on its head.

Jesus intentionally brought together disciples who were very different - fishermen, tax collectors - not people who would naturally love one another. But he did this to show us what love looks like in practice. We have the privilege of putting this same kind of love on display as we love those in the body of Christ who don't look like us.

Notice that the Gospel does not say “former tax collectors” or “former prostitutes.

Clock time is our bank manager, tax collector, police inspector; this inner time is our wife. — J.B. Priestley, Man and Time

What kind of holiness does the Western Church manifest today? To answer this, we need only ask: Are the prostitutes and tax collectors of our day attracted to us or repelled by us?

Could Big Larry be a person of peace? Absolutely. If Jesus could work in the lives of tax collectors and sinners in the Gospels, why not in the lives of the neighborhood dealers?

…Jesus spent more time eating, drinking and lounging with 'tax collectors and sinners' than explaining the Roman Roadmap to Heaven or undermining their belief system.

You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour[a] and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

A library should fill our leisure with adventure. It is a refuge from the commonplace and the dull, a sanctuary where all the trials, the tribulations, and the boredoms of the outer world are forbidden and where such an evil thing as a tax-collector may be forgotten and, peradventure, forgiven.

We have seen some gatekeeping or fencing-the-table language already beginning to rear its head in this context. One needed to be baptized to take the meal; one needed to repent to take the meal; one needed a bishop or his subordinate to serve the meal. This was to become especially problematic when the church began to suggest that grace was primarily, if not exclusively, available through the hands of the priest and by means of the sacrament. One wonders what Jesus, dining with sinners and tax collectors and then eating his modified Passover meal with disciples whom he knew were going to deny, desert, and betray him, would say about all this. There needs to be a balance between proper teaching so the sacrament is partaken of in a worthy manner and overly zealous policing of the table or clerical control of it.

In so many ways, Jesus turned people’s expectations upside down. Who could have imagined the Creator of the universe invading the earth not in glory, but born to an unwed teenage mother who then placed Him in a feeding trough? Who could have imagined that when Israel’s Messiah appeared, He would be found among the prostitutes, tax collectors, and sinners of His day, gaining a reputation as a glutton and a drunkard (Matt. 11:19)? Who could have imagined that God would defeat death by dying? Or conquer evil by allowing its triumph on the cross? Or free humanity by bearing upon Himself the cost of human sin and evil?

This is disturbing news for all of us in the Christian community. Jesus wasn’t known for his disdain for people; he was known for his unconditional love for everyone, especially outcasts and sinners. One of the charges Jesus’ opponents had against him was that he was “a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.”2 Surely the faith he founded should never be known for looking down on anyone.

Where do you think the term ‘count’ came from, anyway?” “Earth, I thought. A pre-atomic—late Roman, actually—term for a nobleman who ran a county. Or maybe the district was named after the rank.” “On Barrayar, it is in fact a contraction of the term ‘accountant.’ The first ’counts were Varadar Tau’s—an amazing bandit, you should read up on him sometime—Varadar Tau’s tax collectors.” “All this time I thought it was a military rank! Aping medieval history.” “Oh, the military part came immediately thereafter, the first time the old goons tried to shake down somebody who didn’t want to contribute. The rank acquired more glamour later.

The real reason for withholding taxes is the unwillingness of workers to share their incomes with the government and the consequent difficulties of collection. To overcome this handicap, the government has simply impressed employers into its service as involuntary and unpaid tax collectors. It is a form of conscription. Disregarding the right of privacy, which is an essential of liberty, the government’s agents may, under the law, invade the employer’s office, demand his accounts, and punish him for any infraction which they believe he has committed; they can impound his property and inflict a penalty for not having collected taxes for the government.

Almost everything people did throughout history was fuelled by solar energy that was captured by plants and converted into muscle power. Human history was consequently dominated by two main cycles: the growth cycles of plants and the changing cycles of solar energy (day and night, summer and winter). When sunlight was scarce and when wheat fields were still green, humans had little energy. Granaries were empty, tax collectors were idle, soldiers found it difficult to move and fight, and kings tended to keep the peace. When the sun shone brightly and the wheat ripened, peasants harvested the crops and filled the granaries. Tax collectors hurried to take their share. Soldiers flexed their muscles and sharpened their swords. Kings convened councils and planned their next campaigns. Everyone was fuelled by solar energy – captured and packaged in wheat, rice and potatoes.

Those who fit in neatly at church, those who are hyper-focused on the “law” are told to repent, but the sinners, tax collectors, and prostitutes are invited to sit down for dinner, to share a glass of wine, and to build a friendship.

Moreover, many philosophers, being overcome with arrogance, have recommended seeking virtue for its own sake. They recommend seeking virtue only for the sake of pride. Yet God isn’t pleased with those who strive after fleeting praise. He isn’t pleased with those who have puffed-up hearts and who manifest to others that they have received their reward in this life (Matt. 6:5–6, 16). Prostitutes and tax collectors are nearer to the kingdom of heaven than such people.

For people who are poor at being spiritual (which is most people), this announcement really is good news. But do you see how counterintuitive this is? The kingdom of God is coming on earth, and who would we think would be the first ones invited in? The religious. The devout. The observant. The ones rich in spirituality. The ones good at being spiritual. But that’s not how Jesus issued the invitation, and it’s not what happened. It was the spiritual elites, the Pharisees, Sadducees, priests, scribes, and Torah lawyers who had the most trouble with Jesus. The company of Jesus’s followers was largely comprised of people for whom being spiritual was not their primary identity—fishermen, tradesmen, tax collectors, and a wide variety of sinners.

The gov’ment!” declares the caretaker, and his wrinkles rise like hackles, pulling his face into a surprisingly taut bristle of pure disgust. “Tax collectors, land grabbers, nosey do-gooders more self-righteous than any Bible-poundin’ preacher ever born!

It’s good and just that you practice on teachers and school principals, because one day you are going to have to live in a world of lawmakers and tax collectors, and you should have some sense of how to use your freedom of speech to claim control over your life.

Buddha held out hope that suffering could be transcended. Jesus brought the message that the last shall be first, that even the tax collectors and lepers—the outcasts—had cause for hope. And so that is the question I leave you with in this final: What is your cause for hope?

What the hell are you proud of? Proud to live in the country with the most intrusive, obnoxious, abusive tax collectors in the world? Proud to live in a country that has a higher percentage of people in prison than any other country in the world? Proud to be ruled by a government that has started and perpetuated more military conflicts in more areas of the world than any other in history? Proud to live in a country where the politicians and bankers have seen to it that you, your children, and your children’s children will forever be their indentured servants, to be forever herded and fleeced like sheep? Proud to live in a country where the biggest slimeballs on the planet tell you what you can eat, what you can drink, what you can drive, what you can build, where you can work, what you can produce, and what you can think?

There’s less and less love, and less and less daring, and time is a battering ram against my head. — Vladimir Mayakovsky, from “Conversation With a Tax Collector About Poetry,” The Bedbug and Selected Poetry. (Indiana University Press October 22, 1975) Originally published 1929.

We call these books Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John because they are named after two of Jesus’s earthly disciples, Matthew the tax collector and John the beloved disciple, and two of the close companions of other apostles, Mark the secretary of Peter and Luke the traveling companion of Paul.

Christ paints the Father in the most beautiful of hues!  According to Jesus, He is a God who is delighted at the sight of little children, goes out of His way to converse with the marginalized, turns water into wine to keep the party going, and who brushes aside religious laws in the name of showing mercy to sinners.  He pardons the adulterous without being asked, takes tax collectors as His disciples, and dines with scam artists and traitors.  He places His disciples’ wellbeing above the sacred nature of the Sabbath, brings healing to His nation’s foreign occupiers, and assures us that violence is never the way that God solves His problems. 

in general, religiously observant people were offended by Jesus, but those estranged from religious and moral observance were intrigued and attracted to him. We see this throughout the New Testament accounts of Jesus’s life. In every case where Jesus meets a religious person and a sexual outcast (as in Luke 7) or a religious person and a racial outcast (as in John 3-4) or a religious person and a political outcast (as in Luke 19), the outcast is the one who connects with Jesus and the elder-brother type does not. Jesus says to the respectable religious leaders “the tax collectors and the prostitutes enter the kingdom before you” (Matthew 21:31).

You endure the weight of love by being rooted in God. Your life energy needs to come from God, not the person you are loving. The more difficult the situation, the more you are forced into utter dependence on God. That is the crucible of love, where self-confidence and pride are stripped away, because you simply do not have the power or wisdom or ability in yourself to love. You know without a shadow of a doubt that you can’t love. That is the beginning of faith—knowing you can’t love. Faith is the power for love. Paul the apostle tells us that the I beam or hidden structure of the Christian life is “faith working through love” (Gal. 5:6). Faith energizes love. We handle the weight of love by rooting ourselves in God. Our inability to sustain love drives us into dependence on God. Then faith becomes a continuous cry. Like the tax collector in the temple, we cry out, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (Luke 18:13). In overwhelming situations where you are all out of human love, you discover that you are praying all the time because you can’t get from one moment to the next without God’s help. You realize you can’t do life on your own, and you need God and his love to be the center. You lean upon God because you can’t bear the weight of love. So faith is not a mountain to climb, but a valley to fall

Part of the miracle of the resurrection is that it so empowered a ragtag band of fishermen and tax collectors that they were emboldened to stand against all earthly authority and power, and ultimately would upend the once inviolable order of the mighty Roman Empire. History tells us that this happened. So what better explanation can be offered for how it happened? Unless we have missed something, there exists none. And if there exists none, we are invited to submit to the logic of what we now know: that this most celebrated and most scorned miracle of miracles actually happened—and, perhaps most miraculously of all, can even be understood to have happened.

We were looking for opportunities to share the message with people who wouldn’t be caught in a church— unless they were wheeled in via a casket! Matthew 11: 19 says this of Jesus: “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and “sinners.”’  ” Jesus didn’t get that kind of reputation from hanging out only in temples and church buildings. Going to a bar or pool hall doesn’t mean you’re a drunk, just like sitting in a henhouse doesn’t make you a chicken. It’s the same in the opposite setting. Sitting in a church building doesn’t make you a follower of Christ. In fact, Acts 17: 24 says: “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands.” God lives in heaven and in the hearts of men and women on earth. Misunderstanding this principle is one of the reasons so many people act one way in a church building and the total opposite everywhere else.

Thousands upon thousands of government employees take to the streets to protest the bill. Here is Greece’s version of the Tea Party: tax collectors on the take, public-school teachers who don’t really teach, well-paid employees of bankrupt state railroads whose trains never run on time, state hospital workers bribed to buy overpriced supplies.

What’ll happen is,” Alex McClean advises, “is you’ll get hammer’d paying double taxes, visits all the time from Sheriffs of both provinces looking for their quitrents, tax collectors from Philadelphia and Annapolis, and sooner or later you’ll have to decide just to get it up on some Logs, and roll it, one way or the other. Depends how your Property runs, I’d guess.” “. . . as North is pretty much up-hill,” Mr. Price is reckoning,” ’twould certainly not be as easy, to roll her up into Pennsylvania, as down into Maryland.” “Where I am no longer your Wife,” she reminds him. “Aye, and there’s another reason,” he nods soberly. “Well then, let’s fetch the Boys and get to it,— ’tis Maryland, ho!

God often uses failure to make us useful. When Jesus called the disciples, He did not go out and find the most qualified and successful people. He found the most willing, and He found them in the workplace. He found a fisherman, a tax collector, and a farmer. The Hebrews knew that failure was a part of maturing in God. The Greeks used failure as a reason for disqualification. Sadly, in the Church, we often treat one another in this way. This is not God's way. We need to understand that failing does not make us failures. It makes us experienced. It makes us more prepared to be useful in God's Kingdom -- if we have learned from it. And that is the most important ingredient for what God wants in His children.

Well, no, but it keeps him from doing it again.” “So would his death, and without the sensationalism and tax money.

He was formulating a plan. He would redeem the dream. I could understand that. It is the universal blessing—and curse—of those who dare.

Jesus’ ministry was not to the upper class, the educated, the elite or the most influential social figures. Jesus came and ministered among those who were poor, with the poor and as a poor man. His ministry was to the children, those who were begging, victims of leprosy, the woman at the well, the woman caught in the act of adultery, the tax collectors, the fishermen communities and those on the margins. Jesus came to the common people and lived alongside them. As a church, we must learn new ways to celebrate our faith inclusively so that those on the margins of society will feel welcome–and so that our love and acceptance of the other will aid in our paths to holiness. Jesus’ ministry was marked with a distinctive compassion for the oppressed poor.

a week;  j I give tithes of all that I get.’ 13But the tax collector,  g standing far off,  k would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but  l beat his breast, saying, ‘God,  m be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For  n everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

When Jesus asked His followers to remember Him in the meal, what if Jesus wasn’t referring to the steps taken in a ritual? What if Jesus was saying instead to organize your gatherings just like this one? Make sure you invite tax collectors, traitors, zealots, rough blue-collar workers, and loudmouths. And seat them all at the same table, indicating to them and everyone else that they are welcomed and cherished by God.

It seems that Jesus did that for us over and over again. He said yes to uncomfortable things — like being friends with tax collectors and eating in their homes. Like letting a “woman . . . who lived a sinful life” (Luke 7:37) break a bottle of expensive perfume over his feet in an act of love and gratitude. Like considering Judas one of his best friends, even when he knew, he knew, Judas would be the one to turn on him.

In their quest to be inclusive and tolerant and up-to-date, the accommodationists imitated his scandalously comprehensive love, while ignoring his scandalously comprehensive judgments. They used his friendship with prostitutes as an excuse to ignore his explicit condemnations of fornication and divorce. They turned his disdain for the religious authorities of his day and his fondness for tax collectors and Roman soldiers into a thin excuse for privileging the secular realm over the sacred. While recognizing his willingness to dine with outcasts and converse with nonbelievers, they deemphasized the crucial fact that he had done so in order to heal them and convert them—ridding the leper of his sickness, telling the Samaritans that soon they would worship in spirit and truth, urging the woman taken in adultery to go, and from now on sin no more.

Some equestrians were involved in the potentially lucrative business of provincial taxation, thanks to another law of Gaius Gracchus. For it was he who first arranged that tax collecting in the new province of Asia should, like many other state responsibilities, be contracted out to private companies, often owned by equestrians. These contractors were known as publicani – ‘public service providers’ or ‘publicans’, as tax collectors are called in old translations of the New Testament, confusingly to modern readers. The system was simple, demanded little manpower on the part of the Roman state and provided a model for the tax arrangements in other provinces over the following decades (and was common in other early tax raising regimes). Periodic auctions of specific taxation rights in individual provinces took place at Rome. The company that bid the highest then collected the taxes, and anything it managed to rake in beyond the bid was its profit. To put it another way, the more the publicani could screw out of the provincials, the bigger their own take – and they were not liable to prosecution under Gaius’ compensation law. Romans had always made money out of their conquests and their empire, but increasingly there were explicitly, and even organised, commercial interests at stake.

law enforcer," as part of his job, is required to commit acts of aggression himself. There are some who do almost nothing other than initiating violence, such as "tax” collectors, narcotics agents, and immigration agents. This makes it literally impossible, in almost all cases, to work for "government" without committing immoral acts of aggression. Being a "law enforcer" and being a moral person are almost always mutually exclusive.

Cooperation’ sounds very altruistic, but is not always voluntary and seldom egalitarian. Most human cooperation networks have been geared towards oppression and exploitation. The peasants paid for the burgeoning cooperation networks with their precious food surpluses, despairing when the tax collector wiped out an entire year of hard labour with a single stroke of his imperial pen. The famed Roman amphitheatres were often built by slaves so that wealthy and idle Romans

The parables of Jesus reveal a God who is consistently overgenerous with His forgiveness and grace. He portrays God as the lender magnanimously canceling a debt, as the shepherd seeking a strayed sheep, as the judge hearing the prayer of the tax collector. In Jesus’ stories, divine forgiveness does not depend on our repentance or on our ability to love our enemies or on our doing heroic, virtuous deeds. God’s forgiveness depends only on the love out of which He fashioned the human race.

And yet, for all its faults as a system of indirect government, the Union has certain interesting and original attributes. Decisions and laws may be passed at a trans-governmental level, but they are implemented by and through national authorities. Everything has to be undertaken by agreement, since there are no instruments of coercion: no EU tax collectors, no EU policemen. The European Union thus represents an unusual compromise: international governance undertaken by national governments. Finally,

When people come to the Table in the congregation you serve, do they remember that Jesus’ body was broken for all and that his blood was spilled for the whole world, and thus seek to be bearers of God’s saving purpose for his whole world (see Col 1:20; 1 Jn 2:2)? Or do they view themselves as exclusive beneficiaries of God’s grace? Jesus takes the table of fellowship and extends it to include the tax collectors, prostitutes and those left out by the religious system. How well does the congregation you serve do this?

Correcting Another Believer 15“If another believer* sins against you,* go privately and point out the offense. If the other person listens and confesses it, you have won that person back. 16But if you are unsuccessful, take one or two others with you and go back again, so that everything you say may be confirmed by two or three witnesses. 17If the person still refuses to listen, take your case to the church. Then if he or she won’t accept the church’s decision, treat that person as a pagan or a corrupt tax collector.

Faith is not some kind of spiritual energy. It’s realizing that we don’t have the resources for living. It’s turning to Jesus and saying, “I have no bread. I have no wine. I have no love.” It’s joining the tax collector in the temple, saying, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner. I can’t do life on my own anymore.” Faith goes to God with our weakness, just as Jesus wanted his disciples to come to him. That connection solves real problems—like forgetting to bring bread. Or not being able to love your mom or your roommate.

Always, always, he was holding something. He held his students' attention when they drooped, sleepy with cheap beer, sunlight, tennis. He held a dictionary in his lap. He held the Culhua Mexica in his head, the way a politician holds his constituents: he knew the provincial governors, the secretaries, the tax collectors, the high priests, and he tried to keep track of what they all wanted, so that he could read between the lines of their letters, which were full of strange formalities and equally strange abruptnesses.

Love your enemies and  j pray for those who persecute you, 45 k so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and  l sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 m For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47And if you greet only your brothers, [9] what more are you doing than others? Do not even  n the Gentiles do the same? 48 o You therefore must be  p perfect,  q as your heavenly Father is perfect.

The gospel does have many of the earmarks of a fairy tale. In fairy tales you have the poor boy who becomes rich, the leaden cabinet which turns out to have the treasure in it, the ugly duckling who turns out to be a swan, the frog who becomes a prince. Then we come to the gospel, where it's the Pharisees, the good ones, who turn out to he the villains. It's the whores and tax collectors who turn out to he the good ones. Just as in fairy tales, there is the impossible happy ending when Cinderella does marry the prince, and the ugly duckling is transformed into a swan, so Jesus is not, in the end, defeated. He rises again. In all these ways there is a kind of fairy tale quality to the gospel, with the extraordinary difference, of course, that this is the fairy tale that claims to he true. The difference is that this time it's not just a story being told-it's an event. It did happen! Here's a fairy tale come true. -Frederich Buechner, interview in The Door In a utilitarian age, of all other times, it is a matter of grave importance that fairy tales should he respected.

God’s Search for Sinners Tax collectors and sinners gathered to hear Jesus. Pharisees and other religious people grumbled: “Jesus welcomes sinners and even eats with them.” So Jesus told them this story: “Suppose you have a hundred sheep and lose one. Don’t you leave the ninety-nine to search for the lost sheep? When you find it you return with joy. You say to your friends, ‘Rejoice with me! I’ve found my lost sheep.’ So listen to me. There’s great joy in heaven when one sinner turns away from sin. Much more than ninety-nine lawkeepers like you.

The one who requests less than he deserves from God will surely obtain more than he deserves. This is clearly shown by the tax-collector who requested forgiveness but obtained justification. And the thief merely requested to be remembered in His Kingdom, but he inherited Paradise.

On July 4, in his sixth “Continentalist” essay, Hamilton, with a nod to Morris, applauded the appointment of federal customs and tax collectors to “create in the interior of each state a mass of influence in favour of the federal government.” This essay makes clear that, in the Revolution’s waning days, Hamilton had to combat the utopian notion that America could dispense with taxes altogether: “It is of importance to unmask this delusion and open the eyes of the people to the truth. It is paying too great a tribute to the idol of popularity to flatter so injurious and so visionary an expectation.

Here is revelation bright as the evening star: Jesus comes for sinners, for those as outcast as tax collectors and for those caught up in squalid choices and failed dreams. He comes for corporate executives, street people, superstars, farmers, hookers, addicts, IRS agents, AIDS victims, and even used-car salesmen. Jesus not only talks with these people but dines with them—fully aware that His table fellowship with sinners will raise the eyebrows of religious bureaucrats who hold up the robes and insignia of their authority to justify their condemnation of the truth and their rejection of the gospel of grace.

One author, in writing of the Bible’s uniqueness, put it this way: Here is a book: 1. written over a 1500 year span; 2. written over 40 generations; 3. written by more than 40 authors, from every walk of life— including kings, peasants, philosophers, fishermen, poets, statesmen, scholars, etc.: Moses, a political leader, trained in the universities of Egypt Peter, a fisherman Amos, a herdsman Joshua, a military general Nehemiah, a cupbearer Daniel, a prime minister Luke, a doctor Solomon, a king Matthew, a tax collector Paul, a rabbi 4. written in different places: Moses in the wilderness Jeremiah in a dungeon Daniel on a hillside and in a palace Paul inside a prison Luke while traveling John on the isle of Patmos others in the rigors of a military campaign 5. written at different times: David in times of war Solomon in times of peace 6. written during different moods: some writing from the heights of joy and others from the depths of sorrow and despair 7. written on three continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe 8. written in three languages: Hebrew… , Aramaic… , and Greek… 9. Finally, its subject matter includes hundreds of controversial topics. Yet, the biblical authors spoke with harmony and continuity from Genesis to Revelation. There is one unfolding story…

Just as the attempts to preserve the power of knights in armor were doomed to fail in the face of gunpowder weapons, so the modern notions of nationalism and citizenship are doomed to be short-circuited by microtechnology. Indeed, they will eventually become comic in much the way that the sixteenth century. The cherished civic notions of the twentieth century will be comic anachronisms to new generations after the transformation of the year 2000. The Don Quixote of the twenty-first century will not be a knight-errant struggling to revive the glories of feudalism but a bureaucrat in a brown suit, a tax collector yearning for a citizen to audit.

When he became a bishop he adopted as his episcopal motto miserando atque eligendo. It comes from a comment by the Venerable Bede on the gospel passage in which Jesus met the despised tax collector Mark. Translated it means unworthy but chosen, though Bergoglio likes to translate it rather more cumbersomely as ‘by having compassion and by choosing’. He now sees in that motto the moment he uncovered his vocation. ‘That was how I felt that God saw me during that conversation. And that is the way he wants me always to look upon others: with much compassion and as if I were choosing them for him; not excluding anyone, because everyone is chosen by the love

Just as the god Jupiter defended Rome and Huitzilopochtli protected the Aztec Empire, so every Christian kingdom had its own patron saint who helped it overcome difficulties and win wars. England was protected by St George, Scotland by St Andrew, Hungary by St Stephen, and France had St Martin. Cities and towns, professions, and even diseases – each had their own saint. The city of Milan had St Ambrose, while St Mark watched over Venice. St Florian protected chimney cleaners, whereas St Mathew lent a hand to tax collectors in distress. If you suffered from headaches you had to pray to St Agathius, but if from toothaches, then St Apollonia was a much better audience.

We had only one thing in common in our family in the Passage, and that was our terror of going hungry. We all had plenty of that. It was with me from my first breath. . . They passed it on to me. . . We were all obsessed with it. . . As far as we were concerned, the soul was fear. In every room the walls sweated fear of going without. . . It made us swallow the wrong way, it made us bolt our meals and run around town like mad. . . we zigzagged like fleas all over Paris, from the Place Maubert to the Etoile, for fear of being auctioned off, for fear of the rent, of the gas man, the tax collector. . . We were always in such a hurry I never had time to wipe myself properly.

It is here that we see a Jesus who abhors both passivity and violence, who carves out a third way that is neither submission nor assault, neither fight nor flight. It is this third way, Wink writes, that teaches that “evil can be opposed without being mirrored…oppressors can be resisted without being emulated…enemies can be neutralized without being destroyed.”7 Then we can look into the eyes of a centurion and see not a beast but a child, and then walk with that child a couple of miles. Look into the eyes of tax collectors as they sue you in court. See their poverty and give them your coat. Look into the eyes of the ones who are hardest for you to like, and see the One you love.

tax farming is absurdly inefficient. In the first place, it discredits the state, represented in the popular mind by a grasping private profiteer. Secondly, it generates considerably less revenue than a well-administered system of government collection, if only because of the profit margin accruing to the private collector. And thirdly, you get disgruntled taxpayers.

The cities, which had been the bearers of culture, were especially hard hit; substantial citizens, in large numbers, fled to escape the tax-collector. It was not till after the death of Plotinus that order was re-established and the Empire temporarily saved by the vigorous measures of Diocletian and Constantine. Of all this there is no mention in the works of Plotinus. He turned aside from the spectacle of ruin and misery in the actual world, to contemplate an eternal world of goodness and beauty. In this he was in harmony with all the most serious men of his age. To all of them, Christians and pagans alike, the world of practical affairs seemed to offer no hope, and only the Other World seemed worthy of allegiance. To the Christian, the Other World was the Kingdom of

Forsake All I ask you to remember that the disciples were men who had forsaken all to follow Jesus. The Lord Jesus went to a fisherman and said, “Leave your net behind and follow Me.” To another man He said, “Leave your position as a tax collector and come and follow Me.” They did it. They left those things behind and followed Jesus. They could later say by the mouth of Peter, We have forsaken all and followed thee (Matthew 19:27). They left their homes, their families, and their good names. Men mocked and laughed at them. Men called them the disciples of Jesus, and when He was despised and hated, they were hated too. They identified themselves with Him and gave themselves up entirely to follow Him. This is the first step to being filled with the Holy Spirit. We must forsake all to follow Christ.

Today we place lots of emphasis on increasing racial diversity in our churches. That’s a good thing. It’s needed. But there’s more to having a genuinely mosaic church than just racial and socioeconomic diversity. We also have to learn to work through the passionate and mutually exclusive opinions that we have in the realms of politics, theology, and ministry priorities. The world is watching to see if our modern-day Simon the Zealots and Matthew the tax collectors can learn to get along for the sake of the Lord Jesus. If not, we shouldn’t be surprised if it no longer listens to us. Jesus warned us that people would have a hard time believing that he was the Son of God and that we were his followers if we couldn’t get along. Whenever we fail to play nice in the sandbox, we give people on the outside good reason to write us off, shake their heads in disgust, and ask, “What kind of Father would have a family like that?”1 BEARING WITH ONE ANOTHER To create and maintain the kind of unity that exalts Jesus as Lord of all, we have to learn what it means to genuinely bear with one another. I fear that for lots of Christians today, bearing with one another is nothing more than a cliché, a verse to be memorized but not a command to obey.2 By definition, bearing with one another is an act of selfless obedience. It means dying to self and overlooking things I’d rather not overlook. It means working out real and deep differences and disagreements. It means offering to others the same grace, mercy, and patience when they are dead wrong as Jesus offers to me when I’m dead wrong. As I’ve said before, I’m not talking about overlooking heresy, embracing a different gospel, or ignoring high-handed sin. But I am talking about agreeing to disagree on matters of substance and things we feel passionate about. If we overlook only the little stuff, we aren’t bearing with one another. We’re just showing common courtesy.

It was precisely here that the Church was born, in the margins of the Cross where so many of the crucified are found….This is why they followed Jesus. He gave them dignity….To do this Jesus had to reject the mindset of the religious elites of his day, who had taken ownership of law and tradition. Possession of the goods of religion became a means of putting themselves above others, others not like them, whom they inspected and judged. By mixing with tax collectors and ‘women of ill repute,’ Jesus wrested religion from its imprisonment in the confines of the elites, of specialized knowledge and privileged families, in order to make every person and situation capable of God. By walking with the poor, the outcasts, and the marginalized. He smashed the wall that prevented the Lord from coming close to His people, among His flock. In showing God’s closeness to the poor and sinners, Jesus indicted the mindset that trusts in self-justification, ignoring what happens around them.

The faggots and their friends now live in Ramrod. The leader of Ramrod is Warren-And-His-Fuckpole. He is the leader of Ramrod because he is the most paranoid and therefore the most vicious man in the land. Warren wants to know who the leader of the faggots is so he can rationalize with him. But the faggots have no leader. They have only dead heroes. Ramrod is known to its neighbors for the fierceness of its weapons and the touchiness of its leaders. To support their violence, the rich men without color who own Ramrod send their tax collectors out to steal the people's work; they send their shifty-eyed ones out to sell the people machines which do not work and security which is not dependable; they send their thugs and goons out to take peacefulness away from the people. The more the rich men without color can steal from or take or sell to the people, the more violence they can buy. Ramrod is known to its neighbors for the elaborateness of its violence and its eagerness to use it.

When I recognized myself in Mark 2, I saw that Jesus invites everyone to experience Him. To sit down and have a meal with Him. To ask Him hard questions. And to do so before He requires our obedience. The church hasn’t done this well. I haven’t done this well. But Jesus’ example to us is to leave room for everyone. Jesus did not call Levi to the standard of being His follower before Levi got the chance to know Him. Therefore, I am not calling you to the standard of following Christ before you have gotten to know the person of Christ. What I am doing is extending an invitation to you to step into the room Jesus is offering you as you turn the pages of this book. I am saying, come inhabit this space, but not with gritted teeth or your fake, on-guard smile or “right” answers. Come with your mess and your unedited language flowing. Dare to be your full self, like the tax collector who shared a meal with the God-Man. Be willing to say that thing and ask that question. Be okay with causing the religious leaders to question, “What is happening?!

Layer upon layer it comes, dense and rich within the texts, echo upon echo, allusion and resonance tumbling over one another, so that for those with ears to hear it becomes un-missable, a crescendo of questions to which in the end there can be only one answer. Why are you speaking like this? Are you the one who is to come? Can anything good come out of Nazareth? What sign can you show us? Why does he eat with tax-collectors and sinners? Where did this man get all this wisdom? How can this man give us his flesh to eat? Who are you? Why do you not follow the traditions? Do the authorities think he’s the Messiah? Can the Messiah come from Galilee? Why are you behaving unlawfully? Who then is this? Aren’t we right to say that you’re a Samaritan and have a demon? What do you say about him? By what right are you doing these things? Who is this Son of Man? Should we pay tribute to Caesar? And climactically: Are you the king of the Jews? What is truth? Where are you from? Are you the Messiah, the son of the Blessed One? Then finally, too late for answers, but not too late for irony: Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us! If you’re the Messiah, why don’t you come down from that cross? … And Jesus had his own questions. Who do you say I am? Do you believe in the Son of Man? Can you drink the cup I’m going to drink? How do the scribes say that the Messiah is David’s son? Couldn’t you keep watch with me for a single hour? And finally and horribly: My God, my God, why did you abandon me? … The reason there were so many questions, in both directions, was that–as historians have concluded for many years now–Jesus fitted no ready-made categories

But the punishments! Imperial bureaucrats who accepted bribes were to have their hands cut off (Theodosian Code 1.16.7); ineffective guardians of girls who had been seduced were to have molten lead poured down their throats (Theodosian Code 9.24.1); tax collectors who treated women tax delinquents rudely were to “be done to death with exquisite tortures”; anyone who served as an informer was to be strangled and “the tongue of envy cut off from its roots and plucked out” (Theodosian Code 10.10.2); slaves who informed on their masters were to be crucified (Theodosian Code 9.5.1.1); How is one to account for such judicial cruelty from a Christian emperor? MacMullen suggests that by the fourth century Christianity was revealing an increasingly cruel streak. He notes in particular the heightened popularity of the Christian literature... in recounting in graphic detail the torments of hell for those who refuse to do God’s will. Possibly what applied to heaven applied to earth: If this is how God handles sin, then who are we to act differently? Religious beliefs may have made judicial punishment specially aggressive, harsh, and ruthless.

The compulsion to keep a pure, homogeneous table is an old one, reflective of ingrained social customs and taboos that surround communal eating. The English word companion is derived from the Latin com (“with”) and panis (“bread”).53 A companion, therefore, is someone with whom you share your bread. When we want to know about a person’s friends and associates, we look at the people with whom she eats, and when we want to measure someone’s social status against our own, we look at the sort of dinner parties to which he gets invited. Most of us prefer to eat with people who are like us, with shared background, values, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, beliefs, and tastes, or perhaps with people we want to be like, people who make us feel important and esteemed. Just as a bad ingredient may contaminate a meal, we often fear bad company may contaminate our reputation or our comfort. This is why Jesus’ critics repeatedly drew attention to the fact that he dined with tax collectors and sinners. By eating with the poor, the despised, the sick, the sinners, the outcasts, and the unclean, Jesus was saying, “These are my companions. These are my friends.” It was just the sort of behavior that got him killed. The

A careful reading of Scripture reveals that this is God's preferred way to make his presence known on earth - not chiefly through movers, shakers, and A-listers, but rather through out-casts, losers, those of ill repute, and those who were held in low esteem. If we examine Jesus' friendships, for example, we will notice a disproportionately low number of celebrities, powerful politicians, affluent business people, high-society people, prominent leaders, and the like. But if you were a known prostitute or a tax collector, an addict or an alcoholic, a no-name, a leper or a paralytic, or a despised and rejected sinner, your chance of being invited into Jesus' inner circle of friends would increase. So scandalous and unexpected were Jesus' associations that he was accused of being a glutton, a drunk, and a friend of tax collectors and sinners (Luke 7:34). The scribes and Pharisees shamed, scolded, and excluded such sinners for their failure to measure up. Yet these strugglers experienced Jesus as humble, gentle, and kind - attributes the scribes and Pharisees knew little to nothing about, because they were too busy separating the world between the good people and the bad people, the saints and the sinners, the virtuous and the scumbags, the insiders and the outsiders, the worthy and the unworthy. Meanwhile, Jesus was hanging out with, befriending, and welcoming religious society's choice rejects, thereby separating the world between the proud and the humble.

It was not without reason that Jesus acquired the scandalous reputation of fellowshipping with the dregs of society (Matt. 9:10–11; 11:19; Mark 2:15–16; Luke 7:34; 15:1). He loved and fellowshipped with prostitutes, tax collectors, and drunkards. He loved, gave attention to, and helped the “unimportant” people as well as the “important” people. Indeed, he even loved those who crucified him to the point of praying for their forgiveness (Luke 23:34). This is how we are to love, for this is how we are loved! God’s love is impartial and universal, and so must ours be (Deut. 10:17–19; 2 Chron. 19:7; Mark 12:14; John 3:16; Acts 10:34; Rom. 2:10–11; Eph. 6:9; cf. 1 Tim. 2:4; 1 Peter 1:17; 2 Peter 3:9; 1 John 4:8). Anyone in need whom we happen to come upon is our “neighbor” whom we are called to love (Luke 10:27–37). Nothing is closer to the heart of God than this kind of love. Indeed, love is the very heart of God. Hence, loving as God loves—manifesting the truth that we are in union with Christ and in fellowship with the triune community—must be the singular concern of the Christian. Whomever we encounter, whatever situation he or she may be in, whatever his or her lifestyle might be, however much we may approve or disapprove of the person’s appearance, words, or deeds, our one and only concern must be to affirm his or her unsurpassable worth with our words and deeds. This is the concern that must be above all other concerns. It is the concern we must wear and live in. With every person we encounter, the only question that should be on our mind is, How can I, right here and right now, affirm the unsurpassable worth of this person for whom Christ died?

Imagine, for instance, that all of Washington’s 100,000 lobbyists were to go on strike tomorrow.3 Or that every tax accountant in Manhattan decided to stay home. It seems unlikely the mayor would announce a state of emergency. In fact, it’s unlikely that either of these scenarios would do much damage. A strike by, say, social media consultants, telemarketers, or high-frequency traders might never even make the news at all. When it comes to garbage collectors, though, it’s different. Any way you look at it, they do a job we can’t do without. And the harsh truth is that an increasing number of people do jobs that we can do just fine without. Were they to suddenly stop working the world wouldn’t get any poorer, uglier, or in any way worse. Take the slick Wall Street traders who line their pockets at the expense of another retirement fund. Take the shrewd lawyers who can draw a corporate lawsuit out until the end of days. Or take the brilliant ad writer who pens the slogan of the year and puts the competition right out of business. Instead of creating wealth, these jobs mostly just shift it around.

Why, Dolly!" said Margaret, placidly kissing her. "Here's a surprise! How are the boys and the baby?" Boys and the baby were well, and in describing a great row that there had been at the Hilton Tennis Club, Dolly forgot her news. The wrong people had tried to get in. The rector, as representing the older inhabitants, had said—Charles had said—the tax-collector had said—Charles had regretted not saying—and she closed the description with, "But lucky you, with four courts of your own at Midhurst." "It will be very jolly," replied Margaret. "Are those the plans? Does it matter my seeing them?" "Of course not." "Charles has never seen the plans." "They have only just arrived. Here is the ground floor—no, that's rather difficult. Try the elevation, We are to have a good many gables and a picturesque sky-line." "What makes it smell so funny?" said Dolly, after a moment's inspection. She was incapable of understanding plans or maps. "I suppose the paper." "And WHICH way up is it?" "Just the ordinary way up. That's the sky-line and the part that smells strongest is the sky." "Well, ask me another. Margaret—oh—what was I going to say? How's Helen?" "Quite well." "Is she never coming back to England? Every one thinks it's awfully odd she doesn't." "So it is," said Margaret, trying to conceal her vexation. She was getting rather sore on this point. "Helen is odd, awfully.

The destruction of representative government and private capitalism of the old school was complete when Hitler came to power. He had contributed mightily to the final result by his ceaseless labors to create chaos. But when he stepped into the chancellery all the ingredients of national socialist dictatorship were there ready to his hand… The aim in which Bismarck had failed was accomplished almost at a stroke in the Weimar Constitution – the subordination of the individual states to the federal state. The old imperial state had to depend on the constituent states to provide it with a part of its funds. Now this was altered, and the central government of the republic became the great imposer and collector of taxes, paying to the states each a share. Slowly the central government absorbed the powers of the states. The problems of business groups and social groups were all brought to Berlin. The republican Reichstag, unlike its imperial predecessor, was now charged with the vast duty of managing almost every energy of the social and economic life of the republic. German states were always filled with bureaus, so that long before World War I travelers referred to the ‘bureaucratic tyrannies’ of the empire. But now the bureaus became great centralized organisms of the federal government dealing with the multitude of problems which the Reichstag as completely incapable of handling. Quickly, the actual function of governing leaked out of the parliament into the hands of the bureaucrats. The German republic became a paradise of bureaucracy on a scale which the old imperial government never knew. The state, with its powers enhanced by the acquisition of immense economic powers and those powers brought to the center of government and lodged in the executive, was slowly becoming, notwithstanding its republican appearance, a totalitarian state that was almost unlimited in its powers.

In the Temple the Pharisee is fully aware of the tax collector as he vainly poses before God. The tax collector, on the other hand, is aware only of his own sin and his desperate need for God’s mercy. And the tax collector is the only one who received God’s mercy.

The phrase here, “For John came to you in the way of righteousness,” speaks of the work of John the Baptist, the last High Priest of the Old Testament (Matthew 11:13), who passed-on all the sins of the world onto Jesus by baptism. Why do you think tax collectors and the harlots believed in the baptism of Jesus where John the Baptist passed-on the sins of the world onto Jesus?

Then, why so many suffered destruction by not having faith in this righteous ministry? The harlots and the tax collectors were the typical people who committed many sins.

Matthew (Levi) was one of Jesus’ 12 disciples. Once a despised tax collector, Matthew’s life had been changed by this man from Galilee.

It is in the great tradition of FALSE prophets who tell us to battle against earthly powers, when Scripture explicitly tells us that we are NOT fighting them, but spiritual powers and principalities (Ephesians 6:12). The only weapon that will avail is the Word of God, and that must be preached, taught, lived, and not exchanged for a mess of pottage (power). We are to serve, not to rule–to influence with our words and our lives rather than by force. As imitators of Christ, who came to serve rather than be served, we cannot hide and protect ourselves by living only among like-minded believers. We are to obey Jesus, who engaged sinners and tax collectors over meals.

There was an uprising in western Pennsylvania against the whiskey tax my husband had levied to pay the country’s war debt. Tax collectors had been tarred and feathered. Whiskey rebels had blown up the stills of their neighbors who paid the tax. They’d kidnapped a federal marshal. They’d even threatened to build a guillotine. Here. In America. President

Look at whom Jesus chooses to change the world: fishermen, tax collectors, prostitutes.

It was no use. She said it as many times, with as many details, statistics, figures, proofs, as she could force out of her weary mind into their evasive hearing. It was no use. They neither refuted nor agreed; they merely looked as if her arguments were beside the point. There was a sound of hidden emphasis in their answers, as if they were giving her an explanation, but in a code to which she had no key. “There’s trouble in California,” said Wesley Mouch sullenly. “Their state legislature’s been acting pretty huffy. There’s talk of seceding from the Union.” “Oregon is overrun by gangs of deserters,” said Clem Weatherby cautiously. “They murdered two tax collectors within the last three months.” “The importance of industry to a civilization has been grossly overemphasized,” said Dr. Ferris dreamily. “What is now known as the People’s State of India has existed for centuries without any industrial development whatever.” “People could do with fewer material gadgets and a sterner discipline of privations,” said Eugene Lawson eagerly. “It would be good for them.” “Oh hell, are you going to let that dame talk you into letting the richest country on earth slip through your fingers?” said Cuffy Meigs, leaping to his feet. “It’s a fine time to give up a whole continent—and in exchange for what? For a dinky little state that’s milked dry, anyway! I say ditch Minnesota, but hold onto your transcontinental dragnet. With trouble and the riots everywhere, you won’t be able to keep people in line unless you have transportation—troop transportation—unless you hold your soldiers within a few days’ journey of any point on the continent. This is no time to retrench. Don’t get yellow, listening to all that talk. You’ve got the country in your pocket. Just keep it there.

began with a dire prediction: someday, when Americans would be asked what had become “of the flower of their crop, and the rich produce of their farms,” they would answer as had the Man of La Mancha, “The Steward of my Lord has seized and sent it to Madrid,’ ” or more literally, tax collectors of the new national government had seized that produce and transmitted it to the “Federal City.

Most of the time we cannot help that child without getting ourselves messy too. Connecting ourselves to the vulnerable, the oppressed, the damaged and the suffering will connect us with their pain and trouble. Look at Jesus—he went to the prostitutes, the tax collectors, the outcasts, and it raised serious questions about his reputation. It raised questions about his theology! It should also force us to ask serious questions about his Father, whose truth and love his Son embodies. But Jesus remained unstained by taking to himself our chaos and sin. Paradoxically, his blood cleanses us.

Amen. The Jesus Prayer Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me. or Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. The Jesus Prayer is an invocation to the living Christ. In the Jesus Prayer we confess Christ as Lord and ask Him for His mercy. The Jesus Prayer combines St. Paul’s doxology (Phil 2:11), the tax collector’s spirit of repentance (Lk 18:33), and the blind man’s plea for enlightenment (Mk 10:47,51). “The divine name of Jesus Christ holds in itself the whole gospel truth,” wrote the author of The Way of a Pilgrim. The Jesus Prayer is appropriate for every Christian and may be recited in all circumstances-while kneeling, sitting, standing, walking, eating, traveling, working, or falling asleep. It may be offered at regular prayer times, during breaks at home and office, even in the bustle of commuting to and from work or while shopping and preparing meals. Its brevity makes it useful as a way of centering the inner consciousness on Christ, guarding against temptations and finding ready spiritual strength. The effectiveness of the Jesus Prayer comes from the power and the grace of Christ who hears our fervent invocation, cleanses our heart from evil and comes to dwell in us as personal Lord. The fruits of the Jesus Prayer are repentance, contrition, forgiveness, joy, peace and above all, as the pilgrim put it, “a burning love for Jesus Christ and for all God’s creatures. “Developed to maturity, the Jesus Prayer becomes a mystical prayer of the heart, an unceasing breath of the Holy Spirit praying within the believer, an inner spiritual fire energizing the Christian in all things. From the believer’s side the Jesus Prayer requires a sincere and humble spirit rather than a particular method. In quiet moments of concentrated prayer it may be recited rhythmically in order to establish inner attention. (Pray “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God,” while breathing in, and “have mercy on me,” while breathing out.) But far more important are the constant attention to the words of the prayer and the fervent personal appeal to Christ for whom the soul yearns. Trust in the love and mercy of God. Seek the presence of Christ in your heart. Pray to Christ calmly and unhurriedly by enclosing your thoughts and feelings in each word of the Jesus Prayer.

You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

29(All the people, even the tax collectors, when they heard Jesus’ words, acknowledged that God’s way was right, because they had been baptised by John. 30But the Pharisees and the experts in the law rejected God’s purpose for themselves, because they had not been baptised by John.)

In the spirit in which opinions are given, and work is undertaken, and faults are exposed, how often, though the garb be that of the tax collector, the voice is still that of the Pharisee: “God, I thank you that I am not like other men.

Jesus’ day, collecting taxes for the Romans or for Herod could make you a rich man; in fact, you had to be rich to even apply for the job. The right to collect taxes went to the highest bidder, who then had to recoup his costs and his profits from the people. It was a system that fed corruption and was a cruel reminder to the Jewish people of their oppression. To a Pharisee any house entered by a tax collector was defiled.

those with doctorates in theology. No, he chose fishermen, tax collectors, and other unlikely candidates. He taught them humility by washing their feet at the Last Supper and then told them, “I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you” (John 13:15). Jesus told his disciples, “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). This theme of humility is seen throughout the New Testament. The entire Christmas story is, in part, a story about the reversal

Once again, Jesus touches someone who shouldn’t be touched, for according to the law, contact with a corpse was also considered nonkosher and demanded a period of quarantine and ritual washing. In all three stories, the point isn’t just that Jesus healed these people; the point is that Jesus touched these people. He embraced them just as he embraced other disparaged members of society, often regarded as “sinners” by the religious and political elite—prostitutes, tax collectors, Samaritans, Gentiles, the sick, the blind, and the deaf.

19The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, “Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.” But

Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. ‘Follow me,’ he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.

While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, ‘Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?

Jesus said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. 32For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and

Nikephoros had to become an oppressive tax collector,

PHARISEE AND TAX COLLECTOR. [Lk. 18:9–14] To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.

If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. 16But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAY BE CONFIRMED. 17If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. 18Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.

Prayer assumes need. “Prayer and helplessness are inseparable.”116 Jesus described this in a parable of two churchgoers in Luke 18. One man, a religious leader, pronounced his self-sufficiency, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income” (Luke 18:11-12). The other, a tax collector, prayed a simpler prayer: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (Luke 18:13). The tax collector knew more about prayer than the religious leader did. Prayer requires a humble awareness of our need for God.

Seeking more information, I walked through the market listening to the gossip and discovered that our new general, the man sent to quell the unrest in the east, was the second son of a provincial tax collector whose only claims to recognition were that he had commanded some legions in Britain in the heady, early days of the invasion, that his brother had once stood for consul, and that he had been a governor in some African province, where the locals had thrown turnips at him. Despairing, I returned to the house, and that despair deepened later when Horgias came home with the news that our new paragon of martial virtue had until recently been hiding in Greece, in disgrace for having fallen asleep during one of Nero’s recitals in the theatre.

LUKEWARM PEOPLE gauge their morality or “goodness” by comparing themselves to the secular world. They feel satisfied that while they aren’t as hard-core for Jesus as so-and-so, they are nowhere as horrible as the guy down the street. “The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get’” (Luke 18:11–12).

Primarily, our action is to engage people and use the culture rather than to engage the culture and use the people. Christ lived in the culture. He did not isolate himself from sinners, regardless of how the religious leaders felt about it. He ate with a tax collector, touched a leper, forgave an adulterous woman, and spoke to a woman at a well. At the same time, Jesus did not allow the surrounding culture to change him. He used everyday objects to teach spiritual lessons, but on more than one occasion, he told sinners to sin no more. He was gracious and just—a combination that we should strive to achieve rather than settling for one swing of the pendulum or the other.

at any time of the day corduroy is a highly stressful fabric. Rent collectors wear it. Tax collectors, too. History teachers add leather elbow patches. To

Then he told another story. It’s for people who think they’re pure and look down on others: “A Pharisee and a tax collector were praying. The Pharisee stood and prayed: “Thank you I’m not like that tax collector. I always perform my religious duty.’ Far away the tax collector wouldn’t even look up to heaven. In grief he prayed: “Have mercy on me. I’m a sinner.” “Listen, God accepted him, not the Pharisee. Praise yourself and you’ll be humbled. Humble yourself and you’ll be honored.

The rich inevitably are going to organize their wealth to avoid government confiscation. They’ll do whatever the law allows to use their money as they see fit, out of reach of the tax collector.

Hundred years war between England and France. The term ok comes from the tax collectors in England. They needed to know how many people died in the house.

tax collector’s booth. Most people in the Roman Empire did not like tax collectors; Jewish people viewed them as traitors. Their job affected the poor most dramatically. In fact, when harvests were bad in Egypt, it was not unheard of for the population of an entire village to leave town and start a village somewhere else when they heard that a tax collector was coming. Some consider Matthew a customs officer charging tariffs on goods passing through. Like other tax collectors, customs officers could search possessions; customs income normally went to local governments run by elites who were cooperative with Rome. See note on Mk 2:14. Follow me. See note on 4:19.

tax collector’s booth. Most people in the Roman Empire did not like tax collectors; Jewish people viewed them as traitors. For assessment purposes, tax collectors were allowed to search anything except the person of a Roman lady; any property not properly declared was subject to seizure. In Egypt, tax collectors were sometimes so brutal that they were known to beat up aged women in an attempt to learn where their tax-owing relatives were hiding. Ancient documents reveal that when harvests were bad, on occasion an entire village, hearing that a tax collector was coming, would leave town and start a village somewhere else. People sometimes paid tax collectors bribes to prevent even higher fees being extorted. Some scholars consider Levi a customs officer who would charge tariffs on goods passing through Capernaum. Such tariffs were small by themselves (often less than 3 percent) but drove up the cost of goods because they were multiplied by all the borders they passed through. Customs officers could search possessions; customs income normally went to local governments run by elites who were cooperative with Rome. Others regard Levi as collecting taxes from local residents, likely working especially for agents of Galilee’s ruler, Herod Antipas.

,,Getting 80 percent of the taxes meant they could also collect 80 percent of the souls when their time came. So you were barely dead and a collector was already at the gate ready to suck the last breath out of you. Everybody hated them, absolutely everyone, no matter the clan they belonged to, or their lineage, or their social status. Nobody said their names and those who joined the League were consigned to oblivion. And yet, there was talk about soldiers who paid to get their freedom and came back from the League. But nobody knew how they had done that and the Journalists who had investigated the topic came back disappointed and quit the profession altogether. There was also much talk about some form of resistance, which seemingly had achieved more, about some sort of liberation movement, but nothing of what was going on in the lake area could be connected to the rumours.

First, notice the weather. “Our Father . . . makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matthew 5: 45). We need sun and rain in order to have food, and God doesn’t discriminate in doing basic good. Can you do that too? Second, notice how even bad people treat their friends right. “If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?”( Matthew 5: 46). Can you take it a step up from bad people? Third, notice how all people everywhere recognize a special bond between family members. “If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?”( Matthew 5: 47). Can you take it a step up from the us-them loyalty that comes naturally to everyone?

Jesus didn’t just tolerate the sinners that thronged to him; he reached out and touched them. He visited tax collectors in their homes; invited prostitutes to follow him; touched and cured the lepers, the blind, and the lame, all of whom were considered unclean. A holy Jesus reached out and touched these broken and rebellious image bearers, not to punish but to rescue. Their unholiness didn’t contaminate him; rather his holiness invaded their hearts and they were changed; they became clean. God solves the problem, not by destroying us, but by destroying our sin. We no longer need to hide behind fig leaves. We no longer need to cover ourselves to avoid the truth that we live naked and defiled in the world of a holy God. In Jesus, God says, in effect, “I see you and I don’t want you to be afraid. I’ll make you new again. You no longer have to hide. I’ll cover your sinfulness and shame with my Son’s perfection. Step out and be seen.

Luke 15 Jesus Tells the Parable of the Lost Sheep (159) 1Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach. + 2This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such sinful people—even eating with them! + 3So Jesus told them this story: 4“If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it? + 5And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders. 6When he arrives, he will call together his friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’ 7In the same way, there is more joy in heaven over one lost sinner who repents and returns to God than over ninety-nine others who are righteous and haven’t strayed away!

You have heard that it was said, “Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Do not even tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even Gentiles do the same?

Jesus' story of the two sons, one who said all the right words, but never acted on these words, and the other who said the wrong words, but in fact “went to work in the vineyard.” Jesus said that the person who finally acts and engages “does the Father's will,” even if he is a tax collector or she a prostitute and does not have the right “belief system” (Matthew 21:28–32).

The name Matthew means gift of Yahweh. Saint Matthew was one of the twelve apostles and he was a tax collector. Hurricane Matthew just delivered us a gift from God and collected taxes for our abysmal management of Mother Earth.

Ibn Sina was born in a tiny settlement called Afshanah, outside the village of Kharmaythan, and soon after his birth his family moved to the nearby city of Bukhara. While he was still a small boy his father, a tax collector, arranged for him to study with a teacher of Qu’ran and a teacher of literature, and by the time he was ten he had memorized the entire Qu’ran and absorbed much of Muslim culture. His father met a learned vegetable peddler named Mahmud the Mathematician, who taught the child Indian calculation and algebra. Before the gifted youth grew his first facial hairs he had qualified in law and delved into Euclid and geometry, and his teachers begged his father to allow him to devote his life to scholarship. He began the study of medicine at eleven and by the time he was sixteen he was lecturing to older physicians and spending much of his time in the practice of law. All his life he would be both jurist and philosopher, but he noted that although these learned pursuits were given deference and respect by the Persian world in which he lived, nothing mattered more to an individual than his well-being and whether he would live or die. At an early age, fate made Ibn Sina the servant of a series of rulers who used his genius to guard their health, and though he wrote dozens of volumes on law and philosophy—enough to win him the affectionate sobriquet of Second Teacher (First Teacher being Mohammed)—it was as the Prince of Physicians that he gained the fame and adulation that followed him wherever he traveled. In Ispahan, where he had gone at

After becoming president, Washington personally led a national army into western Pennsylvania to suppress a rebellion against the new federal tax on whiskey. Invoking the spirit of 1776, the “whiskey rebels” had tarred and feathered a federal tax collector, then held protest meetings where they threatened revolution. Washington was furious. In response, he marched with the army to Pennsylvania—the only time in American history a president has served as commander-in-chief in the field. In a subsequent message to Congress, he showed precious little sympathy for insurrectionary “Second Amendment remedies”: [T]o yield to the treasonable fury of so small a portion of the United States, would be to violate the fundamental principle of our constitution, which enjoins that the will of the majority shall prevail. . . . [S]ucceeding intelligence has tended to manifest the necessity of what has been done; it being now confessed by those who were not inclined to exaggerate the ill-conduct of the insurgents, that their malevolence was not pointed merely to a particular law; but that a spirit, inimical to all order, has actuated many of the offenders.

Chinese family businesses instinctively thought of ways of hiding income from the tax collector. The situation is quite different in Japan, where the family is weaker and individuals are pulled in different directions by the various vertical authority structures standing above them. The entire Japanese nation, with the emperor at the top, is, in a sense, the ie of all ies, and calls forth a degree of moral obligation and emotional attachment that the Chinese emperor never enjoyed. Unlike the Japanese, the Chinese have had less of a we-against-them attitude toward outsiders and are much more likely to identify with family, lineage, or region as with nation. The dark side to the Japanese sense of nationalism and proclivity to trust one another is their lack of trust for people who are not Japanese. The problems faced by non-Japanese living in Japan, such as the sizable Korean community, have been widely noted. Distrust of non-Japanese is also evident in the practices of many Japanese multinationals operating in other countries. While aspects of the Japanese lean manufacturing system have been imported with great success into the United States, Japanese transplants have been much less successful integrating into local American supplier networks. Japanese auto companies building assembly plants in the United States, for example, have tended to bring over with them the suppliers in their network organizations from Japan. According to one study, some ninety percent of the parts for Japanese cars assembled in America come from Japan or from subsidiaries of Japanese companies in America.43 This is perhaps predictable given the cultural differences between the Japanese assembler and the American subcontractor but has understandably led to hard feelings between the two. To take another example, while Japanese multinationals have hired a great number of native executives to run their overseas businesses, these people are seldom treated like executives at the same level in Japan. An American working for a subdivision of a Japanese company in the United States might aspire to rise within that organization but is very unlikely to be asked to move to Tokyo or even to a higher post outside the United States.44 There are exceptions. Sony America, for example, with its largely American staff, is highly autonomous and often influences its parent in Japan. But by and large, the Japanese radius of trust can be fully extended only to other Japanese.

Modern organizations have other characteristics as well. Samuel Huntington lists four criteria for measuring the degree of development of the institutions that make up the state: adaptability-rigidity, complexitysimplicity, autonomy-subordination, and coherence-disunity.16 That is, the more adaptable, complex, autonomous, and coherent an institution is, the more developed it will be. An adaptable organization can evaluate a changing external environment and modify its own internal procedures in response. Adaptable institutions are the ones that survive, since environments always change. The English system of Common Law, in which law is constantly being reinterpreted and extended by judges in response to new circumstances, is one prototype of an adaptable institution. Developed institutions are more complex because they are subject to a greater division of labor and specialization. In a chiefdom or early state, the ruler may be simultaneously military general, chief priest, tax collector, and supreme court justice. In a highly developed state, all of these functions are performed by separate organizations with specific missions and a high degree of technical capacity to undertake them. During the Han Dynasty, the Chinese bureaucracy ramified into countless specialized agencies and departments at national, prefectural, and local levels. While much less complex than a modern government, it nonetheless represented an enormous shift away from earlier governments that were run as simple extensions of the imperial household. The two final measures of institutionalization,

the hunter’s tools are deadly weapons, capable not only of feeding him and his family, but of defending his life, liberty, and property against predators and thieves—including tax collectors. Requiring more subtlety and dexterity than raw power, they can be wielded to good effect by women, or even children.

the tax collectors found no  more money to collect because there were no more people to pay  the tax.

A blanket could be used to barter with. I could trade my blanket for your sex, and everybody’s happy but the tax collector.


Actually it is hard to find “martyrs for science.” Though one can find examples under materialist, atheistic systems as, for example, during the French Revolution, the Academy of Sciences was closed for a year. And revolutionists did guillotine the groundbreaking chemist, Antoine Lavoisier. But Lavoisier was also an aristocrat, a Catholic and a tax collector, not correct affiliations to have during the Revolution.

It was tragic enough for the average citizen to know that bloodsucking monsters known as tax collectors already existed; to be informed that there were other inhuman bloodsuckers stalking the night as well, desiring to sink their fangs elsewhere than bank accounts, might simply have been too much for people to bear.

Jesus had disciples whose names are cited in the Gospels, though not always with consistency .. Luke refers to a tax collector called Levi (5:27-9). Mark identifies the same man as Levi the son of Alphaeus (2:13-14). In Matthew, the tax collector is called Matthew (9:9, 10:3), a name which is given by Mark (3:18) and Luke (6:15) to another disciple. Matthew (16:17) and John (1:42) identify Simon as Bar-Jona, or 'the son of Jona', when they relate how Simon came to be surnamed Cephas, or Peter; however John (21:15) calls the disciple 'Simon Jona', as if Jona was his surname.

If you are not drawing fire from both Pharisees and Sadducees, you are probably saying something other than what Jesus said. And if your message is not drawing both tax collectors (Roman collaborators) and zealots (anti-Roman insurrectionists) to repentance, you are probably speaking with a different voice than does he. Jesus wasn’t inconsistent. He saw the Roman Empire, despite all its pretensions to preeminence both in its own mind and in the mind of its opponents, as a temporary obstacle, not the defining point of his agenda. We stand and we speak, with reconciliation in view. We see, therefore, even our most passionate critic not as an argument to be vaporized but as a neighbor to be evangelized. This doesn’t mean that we back down one iota from the truth. But we proclaim the whole gospel of truth and grace, never backing down from either. That means taking seriously the arguments of our opponents, not merely caricatures of those arguments.

The Parable of the Two Sons 28[†] h “What do you think? A man had two sons. And he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in  i the vineyard today.’ 29And he answered, ‘I will not,’ but afterward he  j changed his mind and went. 30And he went to the other son and said the same. And he answered, ‘I go, sir,’ but did not go. 31Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you,  k the tax collectors and  l the prostitutes go into  m the kingdom of God before you. 32For John came to you  n in the way of righteousness, and  o you did not believe him, but  p the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterward  j change your minds and believe him.

The narrative and theological force of this story is analogous to that of the saying, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you” (Matt. 21:31); just as that saying does not necessarily commend extortionate tax-farming and prostitution as continuing practices, so these stories about centurions cannot be read as endorsements of military careers for Christians.

Shame wasn’t breathing hard, didn’t even seem like he’d broken a sweat. He did, however, shove his hands in the pockets of his coat and hunch up his shoulders like he was enduring a hailstorm. I gave him a questioning look. “It’s just . . . babies.” He said it like most people say snakes or spiders or tax collectors. I had no idea what his problem was. “You’re afraid of babies?” “Shut up.

Aside from France, I was baffled by the puzzle of Sweden and other Nordic states, which are often offered as paragons of the large state “that works”—the government represents a large portion of the total economy. How could we have the happiest nation in the world, Denmark (assuming happiness is both measurable and desirable), and a monstrously large state? Is it that these countries are all smaller than the New York metropolitan area? Until my coauthor, the political scientist Mark Blyth, showed me that there, too, was a false narrative: it was almost the same story as in Switzerland (but with a worse climate and no good ski resorts). The state exists as a tax collector, but the money is spent in the communes themselves, directed by the communes—for, say, skills training locally determined as deemed necessary by the community themselves, to respond to private demand for workers. The economic elites have more freedom than in most other democracies—this is far from the statism one can assume from the outside.

Coins and precious metals, food, slaves, and luxury goods flowed to Rome; little came back except tax collectors and soldiers.

IN BRAZIL, where the state collects a hefty 36% of GDP in taxes and offers mediocre public services in return, tax-dodging is a national sport. The latest scam unearthed by police, treasury and finance-ministry sleuths sets a record. On March 26th they revealed that over the past ten years the government had been cheated of at least 5.7 billion reais ($1.8 billion) in back taxes and fines from firms, and perhaps as much as 19 billion reais. That would be enough to pay three-quarters of the bill for last year’s football World Cup. It is nearly twice the suspicious payments in a separate corruption scheme involving Petrobras, a state-controlled oil company. Unlike the petrolão, the tax imbroglio does not implicate top politicians. It centres instead on the Administrative Council of Fiscal Resources (CARF), part of the finance ministry, which hears appeals by firms that feel wronged by the tax collectors. Some of its 216 councillors, who decide cases in teams of six, allegedly promised to slash companies’ bills for various taxes, including sales and industrial tax, or make them disappear altogether. In exchange they apparently received 1-10% of the value of the forgone revenue. The bribes were paid in the form of bogus consulting contracts with law firms. To deflect suspicion, the conspirators used firms that do not specialise in tax law. The identity of the suspects remains secret for now. But leaks published in the press suggest that some of Brazil’s biggest firms, in industries ranging from banking to manufacturing, are involved. So, apparently, are a handful of multinationals. There is also much speculation that the dimensions of the scandal will grow: CARF has 105,000 cases pending, with a total value of 520 billion reais.

Seen from this perspective, Luke-Acts becomes a paean of praise to the incomparable grace of God, lavished upon sinners. The thrust of this can only be grasped, and then only partially, if we see it against the background of the understanding of God at the time: omnipotent, terrifying, and inscrutable. He is not to be understood as a pleasant and innocuous God, who is always prepared to forgive even more than people are prone to sin (in the sense of Voltaire's contemptuous remark, “Pardonner, c'est son métier,” “to forgive is, after all, his profession”; cf Schweizer 1971;146). It is precisely as the omnipotent and inscrutable that he forgives—for the sake of Jesus. The initiative, throughout, remains God's (cf Wilckens 1963:183). And it manifests itself in ways that make no sense to the human mind. The prodigal son becomes the recipient of unfathomable and undeserved kindness; sinners are not only sought and accepted but receive honor, responsibility, and authority (Ford 1484:77). God answers the prayer of the tax-collector, not—as Jesus’ listeners have anticipated—that of the Pharisee. Salvation comes to a chief tax-collector, of all people, but only after Jesus has taken the initiative and invited himself to the house of Zacchaeus. A Samaritan—the most unlikely candidate imaginable-—performs an extraordinary deed of compassion. A contemptible criminal receives pardon and the promise of paradise in the hour of death, without any possibility of making restitution for his wicked deeds. The crucifiers of the innocent man from Nazareth hear him pray for forgiveness for what they are doing to him. And in Acts despised Samaritans and idol-worshiping Gentiles receive pardon and are incorporated into Israel, with whom they form the one people of God. What Jeremias said with reference to Jesus’ word that the tax-collector, rather than the Pharisee, went home “justified” (Lk 18:14), can be said about all the examples referred to above: “Such a conclusion must have utterly overwhelmed (Jesus’) hearers. It was beyond the capacity of any of them to imagine. What fault had the Pharisee committed, and what had the publican done by way of reparation?” (quoted in Ford 1984:75). The Jesus Luke introduces to his readers is somebody who brings the outsider, the stranger, and the enemy home and gives him and her, to the chagrin of the “righteous,” a place of honor at the banquet in the reign of God.

Amen, I say to you, tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God before you.

It’s not at all surprising that Luke 4:28 says the people in the synagogue, “when they heard these things, were filled with wrath.” Nothing is worse than spiritual pride, because it is a barrier people selfishly put up that separates them from their own salvation. The Lord had said, “You know I come to save, and this is it. But I can save only the poor, the prisoners, the blind, and the oppressed. It doesn’t matter whether one is a Gentile woman or a Syrian leper. It just matters that he sees his bankruptcy and destitution, and he comes to Me like the hated tax collector who pounded his guilt-ridden chest and cried: ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ (Luke 18:13), or the man who said, ‘Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!’ (Mark 9:24). He may not know everything there is to know, and his faith may not be full, but if he will just come in his desperation and say, ‘I don’t have a choice. I see what I am, and I see what You can do for me,’ then he will know I am the Messiah.

named for a man who became a saint but worked as a tax collector.

Those who are preoccupied with status must constantly expend their energy on sorting out the status of those around them. But Jesus, completely unconcerned with his own rank or place in the pecking order, shows a corresponding lack of interest in associating with the “right sort” of people. He meets procurators and prostitutes, tax collectors and zealots, synagogue leaders and women with twelve years of disabling medical troubles, with precisely the same care and truthful attention. He never fails to honor the image of God in each of these daughters and sons; he never pays the slightest compliment to the exaggerated images and roles they play.

15“If another believer* sins against you,* go privately and point out the offense. If the other person listens and confesses it, you have won that person back. 16But if you are unsuccessful, take one or two others with you and go back again, so that everything you say may be confirmed by two or three witnesses. 17If the person still refuses to listen, take your case to the church. Then if he or she won’t accept the church’s decision, treat that person as a pagan or a corrupt tax collector.

In each case, Jesus reaches out to the downtrodden or in the case of the parable, He highlights the righteousness of the tax collector verses the hypocrisy of the Pharisee. This is significant because tax collectors in Jesus’ day were the lowest of the low in their society.

Congress went beyond merely enacting an income tax law and repealed Article IV of the Bill of Rights, by empowering the tax collector to do the very things from which that article says we were to be secure. It opened up our homes, our papers and our effects to the prying eyes of government agents and set the stage for searches of our books and vaults and for inquiries into our private affairs whenever the tax men might decide, even though there might not be any justification beyond mere cynical suspicion.      “The income tax is bad because it has robbed you and me of the guarantee of privacy and the respect for our property that were given to us in Article IV of the Bill of Rights. This invasion is absolute and complete as far as the amount of tax that can be assessed is concerned. Please remember that under the Sixteenth Amendment, Congress can take 100 percent of our income anytime it wants to. As a matter of fact, right now it is imposing a tax as high as 91 percent. This is downright confiscation and cannot be defended on any other grounds.      “The income tax is bad because it was conceived in class hatred, is an instrument of vengeance and plays right into the hands of the communists. It employs the vicious communist principle of taking from each according to his accumulation of the fruits of his labor and giving to others according to their needs, regardless of whether those needs are the result of indolence or lack of pride, self-respect, personal dignity or other attributes of men.      “The income tax is fulfilling the Marxist prophecy that the surest way to destroy a capitalist society is by steeply graduated taxes on income and heavy levies upon the estates of people when they die.      “As matters now stand, if our children make the most of their capabilities and training, they will have to give most of it to the tax collector and so become slaves of the government. People cannot pull themselves up by the bootstraps anymore because the tax collector gets the boots and the straps as well.      “The income tax is bad because it is oppressive to all and discriminates particularly against those people who prove themselves most adept at keeping the wheels of business turning and creating maximum employment and a high standard of living for their fellow men.      “I believe that a better way to raise revenue not only can be found but must be found because I am convinced that the present system is leading us right back to the very tyranny from which those, who established this land of freedom, risked their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to forever free themselves….” T. Coleman Andrews Commissioner of Internal Revenue, 1953–1955

I’m writing my sermon about how faith should affect our everyday lives. Sam was quick to reply. “It should compel us to live like Jesus and love everybody—especially the poor and helpless. He sought out blind men, tax collectors, and Roman soldiers, and gave them sight and invited them to dinner and healed their households. When people were hungry, he had compassion on them and multiplied the loaves and fishes. When he saw the crippled man, he told him to take up his pallet and walk. He freed people from their demons and gave the living water to the thirsty.” Throughout

As Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, “If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” (Matt. 5:46). In other words, if I love only when I feel like it, then I’ve really not understood love.

Imagine instead of economic stagnation, booming economic growth. Instead of small businesses going out of business in record numbers, imagine small businesses growing and prospering. Imagine young people coming out of school with four, five, six job offers. Imagine innovation thriving on the Internet as government regulators and tax collectors are kept at bay and more and more opportunity is created. Imagine

In 1996, one study reported, “26 tax collectors were killed, 74 were injured in the course of their work, 6 were kidnapped, and 41 had their homes burnt down.

All preferments (of the emperor) were dependent upon the outstanding size of member of those recommended. He appointed as collectors of the five per cent inheritance tax a muleteer, an athlete, a cook and a locksmith.

One of the things that helped my relationships with those we were reaching out to was that I was not afraid to go to rough places or hang out with people who were cutting up. We were looking for opportunities to share the message with people who wouldn’t be caught in a church—unless they were wheeled in via a casket! Matthew 11:19 says this of Jesus: “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and “sinners.”’ ” Jesus didn’t get that kind of reputation from hanging out only in temples and church buildings. Going to a bar or pool hall doesn’t mean you’re a drunk, just like sitting in a henhouse doesn’t make you a chicken. It’s the same in the opposite setting. Sitting in a church building doesn’t make you a follower of Christ. In fact, Acts 17:24 says: “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands.” God lives in heaven and in the hearts of men and women on earth. Misunderstanding this principle is one of the reasons so many people act one way in a church building and the total opposite everywhere else.

Our daily experience of this world is almost nothing like Plato's world of universal and perfect forms and ideas; it is always filled with huge diversity, and variations on every theme from neutrino light inside of darkness, to male seahorses that bear their young, to the most extraordinary flowers that only open at night for no one to see. Jesus had no trouble with the exceptions, whether they were prostitutes, drunkards, Samaritans, lepers, Gentiles, tax collectors, or wayward sheep. He ate with outsiders regularly, to the chagrin of the church stalwarts, who always love their version of order over any compassion toward the exceptions. Just the existence of a single mentally challenged or mentally ill person should make us change any of our theories about the necessity of some kind of correct thinking as the definition of “salvation.” Yet we have a history of excluding and torturing people who do not “think” right.

And for their part, the Abruzzese had a popular saying: “It is better to have a dead man in your house than a Marchegiani at your door,” because the men of Marche had been used as tax collectors by the Romans, and so were universally hated.

signs of religion, the Pharisee self-righteously thanked God that he was not a sinner like other men. In contrast, the tax collector bowed his head and beat his chest, saying, “God be merciful to me, a sinner!” (v.I3) It was the tax collector who was justified, according to Jesus, because “everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted” (v.I4).

Step One necessitates the admission of fault that has caused powerlessness and unmanageability in our lives. We must admit we have been wrong. Recognizing a state of wrongness or sin in himself, the tax collector defeated ego and false pride when he humbly asked for mercy. Because of this admission, Jesus said that he would be exalted. The far simpler and much more common

Salvation is not a mere change in our status, but a real transformation of our lives. Jesus brought salvation to a tax collector by simply alerting him to his true identity. At his core Zacchaeus wasn’t really a con and a cheat; that was a corruption of his true identity. Zacchaeus was really a wayward son of Abraham who needed to be sought out in love and restored to the table of fellowship. Zacchaeus was a real life prodigal son redeemed by love.

If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even corrupt tax collectors do that much. 47 If you are kind only to your friends,[*] how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that. 48 But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.

Arrived at Scotland Yard, feeling very conspicuous and more than a bit of a fool, Elizabeth asked the uniformed man at the entrance how she should set about finding Chief Inspector Macdonald, and was surprised to find herself led, without further question, through corridors and up stairs in a building which reminded her of a tax-collector’s office which had got confused with the County Hall. Nothing sensational, she decided, and policemen without their lids looked rather like lambs.

Having been brought to the brink of insolvency, Switzerland’s largest banks had been forced to suffer the indignity of a government bailout. Sensing weakness, foreign tax collectors were now clamoring for Swiss financial institutions to lift the veil of secrecy that had shielded their clients for centuries. The gnomes of Zurich, among the wiliest of God’s creatures, had instinctively taken shelter and were waiting patiently for the inclement weather to pass.

[He] had introduced himself as a tax collector, and the conversation had gone downhill from there.

If Baker's expedition should succeed in annexing the valley of the Nile to Egypt, the question arises,—Would not the miserable condition of the natives, when subjected to all the atrocities of the White Nile slave-traders, be worse under Egyptian dominion? The villages would be farmed out to tax-collectors, the women, children and boys carried off into slavery, and the free thought and feeling of the population placed under the dead weight of Islam. Bad as the situation now is, if Baker leaves it matters will grow worse. It is probable that actual experience will correct the fancies he now puts forth as to the proper mode of dealing with Africans

Bradaigh, his advisor on external affairs; Earnan, his tax collector; Duwayne, his advisor on the masses; and Kelvin, the representative of the nobles.

A brick could be used to cook with, as a thickening agent in gravy. But as history proves, the thickest agents work for the government as tax collectors. 


Someone in the women's cell was crying and cursing the fleas. Some whore probably, the kind that would take on anybody. She was no good either. Fabiano wanted to yell to the whole town, to the judge, the chief of police, the priest, and the tax collector, that nobody in there was worth a damn. He, the men squatting around the fire, the drunk, the woman with the fleas —they were all completely worthless, fit only to be hanged.

Horizontal comparisons tend to stimulate self-righteousness. Think of the contrast between the words of the Pharisee and the tax collector in Jesus’s parable in Luke 18. He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:9–14) In comparing himself to other people who are obviously more sinful than he is, the Pharisee essentially tells God that he doesn’t need him, and he surely doesn’t need his forgiveness. How ironic it is to tell the One to whom you are praying that you don’t need him. How strange is it to turn prayer into an argument for your independence rather than a humble confession of personal need. The argument of the Pharisee has two parts. First, he compares himself to others, and then he offers evidence that he is really quite righteous. Sadly, in this man’s prayer, he is participating in his own deception—​​​a deception that will be his doom. The tax collector does just the opposite. Why is he so quick to cry out for God’s mercy? He’s quick to do so because he’s looked into the mirror of God’s Word. You cannot read God’s Word without becoming deeply aware that you are a person in desperate need. You cannot read God’s Word without being confronted with the sin that lives in your heart. You cannot read your Bible without facing the fact that you constantly fall beneath God’s wise and holy standard. You cannot properly celebrate the Christmas story without also being willing to receive its clear and loving rebuke.

[Pope Francis] chose the motto that. he now bears as pope: Miserando atque eligiendo, that is, "Having mercy, he called him." The phrase references the Gospel story in which Jesus. calls Matthew, a tax collector, one of a detested breed who enriched themselves by squeezing pennies from near-pennliess peasants. Matthew was therefore a shocking choice as an apostle, a flawed man pursuing a morally reprehensible occupation. Yet Jesus, "having mercy," calls him to contribute his talents in some special way (Matthew (9:9).