Commontide
Liturgical Color: Red
The 15th Sunday after Trinity
O God, because without you we are not able to please you, mercifully grant that your Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
Most liturgical texts are from the Book of Common Prayer (2019) of the Anglican Church in North America.
The New Coverdale Psalter, © 2019 by the Anglican Church in North America. Used by permission.
Apostle and Evangelist
Red Letter Day
Matthew, called Levi in Mark and Luke, was a Galilean tax collector summoned by Jesus from his customs booth and numbered among the Twelve Apostles. The universal early tradition, attested by Papias around 130 and by Irenaeus around 180, records that he composed a Gospel in Hebrew for Jewish believers before carrying the apostolic preaching to other peoples. The church remembers him on September 21 as the apostle who put the Lord's deeds and sayings into writing for the household of Israel and, through that writing, for the world.
Matthew's call is narrated in all three Synoptic Gospels. In the First Gospel, 'Jesus saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, "Follow me." And he rose and followed him' (Matthew 9:9). Mark and Luke call this figure 'Levi son of Alphaeus' (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27). The identification of Matthew with Levi is traditional and early but not explicitly stated in any Gospel — the First Gospel simply names 'Matthew' where Mark and Luke name 'Levi.'
Matthew appears in all four apostolic lists (Matthew 10:3, Mark 3:18, Luke 6:14, Acts 1:13). In Matthew 10:3, he alone is identified as 'the tax collector' — a detail absent from the parallel lists in Mark and Luke. Beyond his call and listing among the Twelve, the canonical text records nothing further about Matthew's individual activity.
Traditionally, Matthew is credited with authorship of the First Gospel. Papias (c. 130), quoted by Eusebius, states: 'Matthew compiled the logia in the Hebrew dialect, and each interpreted them as he could.' The meaning of this statement — particularly what 'logia' refers to and what 'Hebrew dialect' means — has been debated since antiquity. Irenaeus and subsequent tradition took it to mean that Matthew wrote the First Gospel originally in Hebrew or Aramaic. Eusebius, Clement of Alexandria, and later sources also report that Matthew preached among the Hebrews before departing for other nations. His missionary field and manner of death vary widely across sources — Ethiopia, Persia, Parthia — without convergence.