Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Matthew 9:10

"And it came to pass, as he sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and sat down with Jesus and his disciples." — Matthew 9:10 (ASV)

According to most scholars, this dinner at Matthew’s house likely occurred much later than his call in v.9. Jesus had said that even a tax collector has his friends (5:46), and Matthew’s dinner substantiates this. “Sinners” (GK 283) may include common folk who did not share all the scruples of the Pharisees. But certainly it groups together those who broke Pharisaic rules of conduct—harlots, tax collectors, and other disreputable people. Though eating with them entailed dangers of ceremonial defilement, Jesus and his disciples did so. The Pharisees’ question, put not to Jesus but to his disciples, was less a request for information than a charge; and they contemptuously lumped together “tax collectors and sinners” under one article. Jesus became known as “a friend of tax collectors and ‘sinners’ ” (Matthew 11:19).