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I'm grieved each time I see people interpret the end of Matt 18, "treat them like Gentiles and tax collectors," as Jesus pulling a reversal on people who were sinned against and making them sit down to eat and fellowship with their abusers and oppressors.
If we pay attention to the NT, Jesus' Jewishness and not our liberal penchant for tolerance is at the heart of this instruction. It's not clear, from my understanding, that there was a hard stop on interacting with either tax collectors or Gentiles.
In fact, it's very unlikely you could have gotten by in Jewish society without interacting with these people. And, of course, tax collectors were also Jewish (like Zacchaeus). It is not the purity law that separates the righteous from tax collectors -- it is their dishonesty
b. B. Qam. 94b “(tax coll.) repentance is difficult, since they steal from the public. It is difficult for them to find every one of their victims in order to pay them restitution, and they must return what they have stolen to whomever they recognize as victims of their theft.”
So acting like this is an issue of purity or legal boundary breaking doesn't actually square. This isn't Jesus upending our expectations of purity. Let's also remember that Jesus hangs out with tax collectors because they are in BIG TROUBLE:
Jesus explains to the Pharisees in Matthew that he goes to the Pharisees for Hosea-reasons: – the tax collectors are up to “swearing, lying, and murder, and stealing and adultery break out; bloodshed follows bloodshed” -- and Jesus is trying to help them out of this life
Also, the mission to the Gentiles does not kick in until the very end -- with the Great Commission. In fact, Jesus is explicit in Matt 10 to NOT go to the Gentiles. There are exceptions (the Centurion in ch 8) but those only serve to contrast with Israel.
I can't find any place in Matthew where he eats with Gentiles (maybe?). There are only exceptions but this is the gist of Jewish Jesus' assessment: the Gentiles and tax collectors live outside the order of God's love and care as given in the Torah.
To treat someone in the fellowship of Jewish-Jesus followers like a Gentile or tax collector is to treat them within the system to which they've assigned themselves -- the gods of Rome, the god of Mammon, the logic of the order of destruction.
This doesn't mean that you shun that person (necessarily) or hurt them or never interact with them. It does mean that this person is simply not working off the same logic as Jewish Jesus-people. They've proven it! You've tried. And they refuse to be brought to reconciliation
This seems like the best biblical reading. But let me add that it is a Very Big Ethical and Moral Problem to tell people they have been sinned against, who have sought reparation and been denied, that Jesus wants them to sit down and eat with their oppressors like no big deal
Being "sinned against" is not a feigned state or misunderstanding. This reflects real abuse, real trauma, real harm. And ending an accountability process with "well Jesus says to eat at the table with them" is a profound denial of the good news of liberation.
fin.
