From Edersheim

A whole mob of people ends up that night at Levi's house- Jesus is having dinner there- with his disciples – what was this like for Peter, Andrew, James and John – and Levi? I'd think a fair bit of joy. There were many tax collectors and sinners there as well- I wonder if this was a fairly normal sort of phrase – you're like a pack of tax collectors and sinners- catchy- Galileans were fiercely patriotic to the true Israel as a general rule- according to Tommo, there numerous uprisings in Galilee over the years- appropriate for tax collectors to be uttered in the same breath as sinners.

On the religious makeup in Galilee- Edersheim does seem to say there was a snobbish attitude to the galileans from the Jerusalem establishment- where they were looked down on for their 'hill billiness- accent. The travelling teacher (perhaps coming from Jerusalem?)- common, Due to a bit of a lack in the country areas. Still. I think the synagogue schools would have been operational in most places (where do I check that- Edersheim?) Was it 12 when if they showed real promise they would be shipped off to Jerusalem to one of the prestigious schools, following a particular rabbi- Not sure don't know enough. The point is, there was a divide between the Jerusalem with the temple and the Sanhedrin and the outlying areas- but in terms of the religious atmosphere- I'm not sure if this would have been much less. Thousands went down for the festivals in Jerusalem. Scribes and Pharisees are turning up regularly as part of the crowds- at this stage I suppose most of them are local rather than from Jerusalem.
If anyone wishes to be rich, let him go North; if he wants to be wise, let him come South. Such was the saying, by which Rabbinical pride distinguished between the material wealth of Galilee and the supremacy in traditional lore claimed for the academies of Judea proper. (p.30) -hence, can any good thing come out of Nazareth.

The Talmud, on the other hand, charges the Galileans with neglecting traditionalism; learning from one teacher, then from another (perhaps because they had only wandering Rabbis, not fixed academies); and with being accordingly unable to rise to the heights of Rabbinical distinctions and explanations. That there hot blood made them rather quarrelsome, and that they lived in a chronic state of rebellion against Rome, we gather not only from Josephus, but even from the New Testament (Luke 13:2 ; Acts 5:37). (p.40)

Their mal pronunciation of Hebrew, or rather their inability properly to pronounce the gutturals, formed a constant subject of witticism and reproach, so current that even the servants in the High Priests Palace could turn round upon Peter, and say, “Surely thou also art one of them; for thy speech betrayeth thee” (Matt 26:73) – a remark this, by the way which illustrates that the language commonly used at the time of Christ in Palestine was Aramean not Greek. Josephus describes the Galileans as hardworking, manly and brave; and even the Talmud admits (Jer. Cheth. iv. 14) that they cared more for honour than for money.

...north eastern or Upper Galilee was in great part inhabited by the gentiles- Phoenicians, Syrians, Arabs and Greeks, whence the name “Galilee of the Gentiles”. (Matt 4:15) (p24 – sketches of Jewish social life).