The Life

Tradition has it that St Matthew was born in Galilee around 1 BC and was known as Levi, the son of Alpheus. Before his encounter with Christ he was a tax collector by profession in and around Capernaum collecting taxes from the Hebrew people for Herod Antipas, the tetrach of Galilee. Tax collecting was not the most popular of occupations - vilified by their own people for compromising with the Romans,' publicans' like Matthew were often corrupt and harsh. Matthew was in need of God's healing and mercy. He was to take special note of Jesus' words towards tax collectors - 'It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick' and, 'I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.'

St Matthew
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The Call
When Jesus meets Matthew at the tax collector's booth (Matthew 9:9) he bids him to come and follow him, to leave his former life and become one of the first disciples of Jesus . His own gospel account records that he immediately got up and followed. In Caravaggio's depiction of the scene (see over) Christ holds up a beckoning hand and light pours into Matthew's dark life.

The Gospel
Thanks to St Matthew this new life of intimacy with Jesus was recorded for all of us in his gospel of the same name, the first book of the New Testament. Scholars dispute the date when St Matthew wrote his gospel, some date it as early as 42 AD written to encourage the early Church in the face of the persecution of Herod Agrippa I; other maintain it was written later not only to encourage the early Jewish Christians away from Judaism, but also to convince others that the promised Messiah had come in the person of Jesus. Most agree that it was written before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD.

As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collectors booth. Follow me, he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. The Gospel according to St Matthew

The Saint
St Matthew's focus in his gospel is on the life of Jesus, who he was, his kingdom, what Jesus' coming meant for the world and what it means to be his disciple. It is said that after preaching the gospel to the Jewish community in Judea for 15 years St Matthew took the message of Jesus to Ethiopia where he died a martyr. His feast day is celebrated on the 21 September in the West.

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The picture to the left is St Matthew and the Angel painted c. 1635 - 1640 by Guido Reni Like the other evangelists, Matthew is often depicted in Christian art with one of the four living creatures of Revelation 4:7. For Matthew the creature is in the form of a winged man or angel.

The picture below is an front-piece from The Lindisfarne Gospels showing the first page from the Gospel of St Matthew.

St Matthew is recognised as a Saint in the Roman Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican Churches. His relics are said to be preserved in the Salerno Cathedral in southern Italy.

He is the Patron Saint of accountants, bankers, bookkeepers, stock brokers and tax collectors.

The Calling of St Matthew by Caravaggio was completed around 1600 and is one of three paintings, the other two depicting the martyrdom of St Matthew and the Inspiration of St Matthew. All three pictures are located in the Contarelli Chapel, San Luigi dei Franseci in Rome.

St Matthew's Church | Marlborough Road | Oxford | Tel: 01865 798587 stmatzoxford@gmail.com