As with John the Baptist, there is an indication that people were being impelled to listen to Jesus, as it is “all the people”. If this is the case, again, we are talking about the authority of Jesus to summon everyone. And this seems to be what is indicated with Jesus able to summon a tax collector away from his official desk. Tax officials were an integral part of Imperial functioning, and would have been answerable to few higher officials. Not just anyone could call them away from their jobs, but Jesus does so easily.

There are a couple of problems with Levi, son of Alphaeus. The first is that he’s not mentioned again in Mark. Luke agrees that Jesus calls Levi here, and adds the detail that the following verses in Mark took place in Levi’s home. However, Matthew names the tax collector called by Jesus “Matthew”. Levi doesn’t show up in the list of apostles. Levi wasn’t discussed by Origen when he wrote about these verses – his version showed the tax collector’s name to be Jacobus/James and appeared unaware of a version with Levi. 

The name Alphaeus isn’t much more help. Only in Luke is he associated with Levi. In every over reference, even in Mark, his fatherhood to Jacobus/James is his singular characteristic. The same situation seen in 2:14 is echoed in Matthew, only there, the tax collector is named Matthew. Because of this, the ASB translation I’m using helpfully notes that Levi is “also called Matthew”.

και παραγων ο ιησους εκειθεν ειδεν ανθρωπον καθημενον επι το τελωνιον ματθαιον λεγομενον και λεγει αυτω ακολουθει μοι και αναστας ηκολουθησεν αυτω

As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man called Matthew, sitting in the tax collector’s booth; and He said to him, “Follow Me!” And he got up and followed Him.

Matthew 9:9

Yet beyond this reference in Matthew, and his appearance in the Apostles list in all four Gospels, plus the one in Acts, nets this name not a great deal more meaning than had it simply be Levi. The fact that the same story is told in the two Gospels with different names is the message – there was a lot of that kind of thing going around.

Many of the names in the Gospels are drawn directly from the names of the rebellion leaders, and Levi may represent one such leader. Alternatively, the name may represent a kind of joke. 

“Alphaeus” is a combination of ‘alpha’, which is the first Greek Letter, and the suffix “-eus” which usually makes a noun of an adjective, so perhaps this is not a name but a referent.  “Alphaeus” could be a reference to the “First One” – perhaps someone in charge. The house of “Levi” was the family associated with priesthood in the Old Testament, so maybe there’s a joke here about a priestly son of a local king or governor. In any case, for Mark, it’s an introduction to the sorts of crowds Jesus liked to hang around – Romans!

“2 Jesus”: Zealot Jesus, having been disgorged from the synagogue by Anointed Jesus, and heads back to the seashore. Again, crowds follow him for his “teaching”. This time, he gains a local tax collector in his retinue.