The Ironic Meaning Behind Zacchaeus' Name In The Bible

Publish date: 2024-04-09

Back in Jesus' day, Palestine was occupied by the Romans and the job of collecting taxes was — to use a 20th-century word to describe a 1st century practice — outsourced to locals rather than managed themselves. As BBC News explains, these tac collectors didn't receive a salary but rather were expected to take some extra from their victims as their payment.

This was problematic for two reasons. First, Jews who engaged in tax collection -– like Zacchaeus –- were seen as traitors, effectively impoverishing their own people for the sake of an occupying foreign government. Secondly, some of them made themselves rich by taking extra taxes: Zacchaeus was Exhibit A.

That Jesus forgave and befriended a tax collector such as Zacchaeus would have been shocking to his countrymen, if not seen as traitorous in itself. But it was also in keeping with Jesus' message of loving your enemy and doing good to those who persecute you (Luke 6:27, via King James Bible Online).

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