Among the preceding personages, all those of whom we know anything had begun by being fishermen.  At all events, none of them belonged to a socially elevated class.  Only Matthew or Levi, son of Alpheus,[1] had been a publican.  But those to whom they gave this name in Judea were not the farmers-general of taxes, men of elevated rank (always Roman patricians), who were called at Rome publicani.[2] They were the agents of these contractors, employes of low rank, simply officers of the customs.  The great route from Acre to Damascus, one of the most ancient routes of the world, which crossed Galilee, skirting the lake,[3] made this class of employe very numerous there.  Capernaum, which was perhaps on the road, possessed a numerous staff of them.[4] This profession is never popular, but with the Jews it was considered quite criminal.  Taxation, new to them, was the sign of their subjection; one school, that of Judas the Gaulonite, maintained that to pay it was an act of paganism.  The customs-officers, also, were abhorred by the zealots of the law.  They were only named in company with assassins, highway robbers, and men of infamous life.[5] The Jews who accepted such offices were excommunicated, and became incapable of making a will; their money was accursed, and the casuists forbade the changing of money with them.[6] These poor men, placed under the ban of society, visited amongst themselves.  Jesus accepted a dinner offered him by Levi, at which there were, according to the language of the time, “many publicans and sinners.”  This gave great offense.[7] In these ill-reputed houses there was a risk of meeting bad society.  We shall often see him thus, caring little to shock the prejudices of well-disposed persons, seeking to elevate the classes humiliated by the orthodox, and thus exposing himself to the liveliest reproaches of the zealots.

[Footnote 1:  Matt. ix. 9, x. 3; Mark ii. 14, iii. 18; Luke v. 27, vi. 15; Acts i. 13.  Gospel of the Ebionites, in Epiph., Adv.  Haer., xxx. 13.  We must suppose, however strange it may seem, that these two names were borne by the same personage.  The narrative, Matt. ix. 9, conceived in accordance with the ordinary model of legends, describing the call to apostleship, is, it is true, somewhat vague, and has certainly not been written by the apostle in question.  But we must remember that, in the existing Gospel of Matthew, the only part which is by the apostle consists of the Discourses of Jesus.  See Papias, in Eusebius, Hist.  Eccl., III. 39.]

[Footnote 2:  Cicero, De Provinc.  Consular., 5; Pro Plancio, 9; Tac., Ann., IV. 6; Pliny, Hist.  Nat., XII. 32; Appian, Bell.  Civ., II. 13.]

[Footnote 3:  It remained celebrated, up to the time of the Crusades, under the name of Via Maris.  Cf.  Isaiah ix. 1; Matt. iv. 13-15; Tobit, i. 1.  I think that the road cut in the rock near Ain-et-Tin formed part of it, and that the route was directed from thence toward the Bridge of the Daughters of Jacob, just as it is now.  A part of the road from Ain-et-Tin to this bridge is of ancient construction.]