Zacchaeus #88

Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector in Jericho, a wealthy man who met Jesus on his last journey to Jerusalem. His story appears only in Luke’s Gospel (Luke 19:1-10) and is a favorite with children because of the tree he climbed, but it is also one of the Bible’s clearest pictures of repentance leading to changed behavior. The name is commonly understood to mean “pure” or “innocent,” which gives the story a certain irony.

Biblical Significance

Luke says Zacchaeus was small in stature and could not see over the crowd, so he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to catch sight of Jesus as he passed through Jericho (Luke 19:2-4). Tax collectors were widely despised in first-century Judea because they worked for the Roman system and often took more than they were owed (compare Luke 3:12-13). As a chief tax collector, Zacchaeus would have had others working under him. Jesus stopped, looked up, and said, “Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house” (Luke 19:5). The crowd grumbled that Jesus had gone to be the guest of a sinner.

Zacchaeus received Jesus joyfully and then said, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold” (Luke 19:8). This goes beyond what the law required in most cases of fraud. Leviticus 6:5 asked for repayment plus a fifth, and Exodus 22:1 sets fourfold restitution for the theft and slaughter of a sheep, so Zacchaeus imposed on himself the heavier penalty. Jesus responded, “This day is salvation come to this house, forsomuch as he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:9-10).

Legacy

The account is often used to show that genuine faith produces visible change, especially in how a person handles money. It also shows that Jesus took the first step, calling Zacchaeus by name before Zacchaeus had done anything to earn it. That pattern fits the larger movement of Luke’s Gospel, which repeatedly pictures Jesus welcoming tax collectors and outcasts (Luke 5:27-32; 15:1-2).

Beyond Luke, little is known. A later tradition preserved in the Apostolic Constitutions says he became the first bishop of Caesarea, but this is tradition and cannot be verified. Zacchaeus remains a memorable example of someone whom respectable society had written off, and whom Jesus deliberately sought out.