>Matthew in the New Testament is a tax-gatherer,
a 'publican' which in British usage means the licensee of a pub.
In Church Russian, Matthew's profession is not
tseloval'nik, but mytar', of "mytit'," to impose/collect taxes (one of this
obsolete verb's many meanings).
Re DN's disappointment expressed in his post, I
did recognize the excerpt from the Vtoroe Dobavlenie k
"Daru."
Incidentally, I can swear that I never make
deliberate mistakes in English. One should be a Nabokov for that, and I am more
of a Pnin.
Alexey