When the scribes and the Pharisees saw that he was eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they said to his disciples, “Why does he eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”
The Pharisee stood and prayed about himself like this: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other humans: extortionists, law breakers, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.
There was a great uproar, and some of the scribes of the Pharisees rose up and began to argue, “We find no evil in this man. What if a spirit or angel has spoken to him?”
If they refuse to listen, tell it to the church, and if they refuse to listen to the church as well, let them be to you as another ethnic group or a tax collector.
He was reclining at the table in his house, and many tax collectors and sinners sat down with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many, and they followed him.