Matthew —

That’s why one scholar quips that “If Jesus had one ounce of political correctness he never would have called Matthew to follow him.”[4] Probably, no one was more surprised than Matthew himself who was sitting at his tollbooth in Capernaum when he received his call to discipleship. Interestingly, Luke informs us in his Gospel that Matthew was not the only prominent publican to follow Jesus. Zacchaeus also holds this distinction (Luke 19:1-10). However, Matthew was more than just a follower of Christ. He was one of the twelve disciples, a direct eyewitness to the life of Christ, and almost certainly one of the four evangelists, as Church leaders in the AD 100s ascribe the Gospel of Matthew to him.

Certainly, he had the credentials to write such an account which was originally penned in Greek. As Ann L. Bowman observes, although Matthew was Jewish by birth, his duties as a Roman tax collector in Capernaum (Matthew 9:9; 10:3) would have made fluency in Greek necessary as a complement to his Aramaic.[5] Although a fair amount is known about his professional life, his personal details are sparser. The Gospel of Mark does identify him as the son of Alphaeus (Mark 2:14), and though he is best remembered as Matthew (a name meaning “gift of the LORD”) both Mark and Luke call him Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27)—which means “attached”. While no one knows for sure why Matthew was called by both names, Bible scholars speculate that Levi may have been a tribal name – meaning that Matthew may have belonged to the tribe of Levi, and that Matthew was a personal name.[6] Another possibility is that Matthew was his Greek name while Levi was his Hebrew name. Still others think that Jesus changed his name from Levi to Matthew or vice versa.