Publicans

or Public an i , a name given by the Romans to persons who farmed the public revenues; specially a cla of the Jewish people, often mentioned in the New Testament, and specially odious to the rest of the community as the farmers of the taxes imposed upon them, mostly at the instance of their foreign oppre ors the Romans, and in the collection of which they had recourse to the most unjust exactions. They were in their regard not merely the tools of a foreign oppre ion, but traitors to their country and apostates from the faith of their fathers, and were to be cla ed, as they were, with heathens, sinners, and harlots.