Historic Jesus

5:27 After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting his tax booth. "Follow me," Jesus said to him, Luke 5:28 and Levi got up, left everything and followed him. Luke 5:29 Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus his house, and a large
of tax collectors and others were eating with them. Luke 6:13 When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles: Luke 6:14 crowd
(whom he named Peter), his brother Andrew, James, John, Simon
Bartholomew, Luke 6:15 Matthew, Thomas, James Alphaeus, Simon who was called the Zealot, Luke 6:16 Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. Philip,
we can see that all the three gospels identify Matthew as one of the disciples. Matthew identifies himself as the tax collector. (Tax collectors were outcasts of the Jewish community and were scorned at. So the other gospel writers omitted this reference) So
who was deeply rooted in the Jewish traditions, addressed Matthew
gospel to the Jews in dispersion around the world who were looking forward to a Messiah. He wanted to show that Jesus was indeed the Messiah as foretold in the scriptures and that fulfilled all
rigid criteria that were laid down by the scriptures for the three fold his
of Prophet, Priest and King. Jews were highly conscious of their origin from Abraham. "We are the children of Abraham" was the hallmark of Jewish nation. Hence Matthew starts off with Abraham and traces the line to David. Here is the line of fourteen generations anointing
Abraham to David. from
THE HISTORIC JESUS
M.M.NINAN
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