tax collector

Definition

The job of tax collectors was to receive the money that people owed the government and to deliver it to the government.

In the time of Jesus and and the apostles, the Roman government required taxes from the Jews.
The people who collected taxes for the Roman government would often demand more money from the people than the government required. The tax collectors would keep the extra amount for themselves.
The Jews considered tax collectors to be some of the worst sinners because they cheated people, and because they worked for the foreign Roman government. This made the tax collectors traitors to their own people.