LUSK
422
LUXX
Ehrangelist who was not an Apostle (Plummer); and
it is ctear from his Gospel that he was well acquainted
witii the Gospel acconiing to St. Mark; and in the
Acts he knows all the details of St. Peter's delivery —
what happened at the house of St. Mark's mother, and
the name of the girl who ran to the outer door when St.
Peter knocked. He must have frequently met St.
Peter, and may have assisted him to draw up his
First Epistle in Greek, which affords many reminis-
cences of Luke's style. After St. Paul's martyrdom
practically all that is known about him is contained
m the ancient "Prefatio vel Areumentum Luccb",
dating back to Julius Africanus, who was bom about
A. D. 165. This states that he was unmarried, that he
wrote the Gospel, in Achaia, and that he died at the
age of seventy-four in Bithynia (probably a copyist's
error forBoeotia), filled with the Holy Ghost. Epi-
phanius has it that he preached in Dalmatia (where
there is a tradition to tnat effect), Gallia (Galatia?),
Italy, and Macedonia. As an Evangelist, he must
have suffered much for the Faith; but it is contro-
verted whether he actually died a martyr's death. St.
Jerome writes of him (De Vir. 111., yii): "Sepultus est
Constantinopoli, ad quam urbem vigesimo Constantii
anno, ossa ejus cum reliquiis Andrc^e Apostoli trans-
lata sunt [de Achaia?]." St. Luke is always repre-
sented by the calf or ox, the sacrificial animal, because
his Gospel begins with the account of Zachary. the
priest, tnc father of John the Baptist. He is called a
painter by Nicephonis Callistus (fourteenth century),
and by the Menology of Basil II, A- d. 980. A picture
of the Virgin in S. Maria Maggiore, Rome, is ascribed to
him, and can be traced to a. d. 847 It is probably a
cppv of that mentioned by Theodore Lector, in the
rixtn century. This writer states that the Empress
Eudoxia foimd a picture of the Mother of God, at
Jerusalem, which she sent to Constantinople (see
"Acta SS.", 18 Oct.). As Plummer observes, it is
certain that St. Luke was an artist, at least to the ex-
tent that his eraphic descriptions of the Annimciation,
Visitation, Nativity, Shepherds, Presentation, the
Shepherd and lost sheep, etc., have become the in-
spirme and favourite themes of Christian painters.
St. Luke is one of the most extensive writers of the New Testament. His Gospel is considerably longer than St. Matthew's; his two books are about as long as St. Paul's fourteen Epistles; and Acta exceeds in length the Seven Catholic Epistles and the Apocalypse. The style of the Gospel is superior to any N. T. writ- ing except Hebrews. Renan says (Les Evannles, xiii) that it is the most literary of the Gospels. St. Luke is a painter in words. "The author of the Third Gospel and of the Acts is the most versatile of all New Testament writers. He can be as Hebraistic as the Septuagint, and as free from Hebraisms as Plu- tarch. . . He is Hebraistic in describing Hebrew society and Greek when describing Greek society" glummer, introd.). His great command of Greek IB dbown by the richness of his vocabulary and the freedom of his constructions.
11. Authenticity of the Gospel. — A. Internal Evidence. — ^The internal evidence may be briefly summarized as follows: The author of Acts was a companion of Saint Paul, namely. Saint Luke; and the author of Acts was the author of the Gospel. The arguments are given at length by Plummer, "St. Luke" in "Int. Crit. Com." (4th ed., Edinburgh, 1901); Hamack, "Luke the Physician" (London, 1907); "The Acts of the Apostles" (London, 1909); etc.
(1) The Author of Acts was a companion ot Samt Paul J namely. Saint Luke. — ^There is nothing more certain in Biblical criticism than this proposi- tion. The writer of the "we" sections claims to l)e tt companion of St. Paul. The "we" begins at Acts, xvi, lOj and coiitiriuos to xvi, 17 (the action is at Jfu/ippi) It renppcnrs at xx, 5 (Philippi), ami con-
tinues to xxi, 18 (Jerusalem). It reappears again at
the departure for Rome, xxvii, 1 (Gr. text), and con-
tinues to the end of the book.
Plummer argues that these sections are by the same author as the rest of the Acts: (a) from the natural way in which they fit in; fb) from references to them in other parts; and (c) from the identity of style. The change of person seems natural and true to the narrative, but tnere is no change of language. The characteristic expressions of the writer run through the whole book, and are as frequent in the " we " as in the other sections. There is no change of style penseptible. Hamack (Luke the Physician, 40) makes an exhaustive examination of every word and phrase in the first of the "we" sections (xvi, 10-17), and shows how frequent they are in the rest of the Acts and the Gospel, when compared with the other Gospels. His manner of dealing with the first word (wf) will indicate his method: "This temporal ws is never found in St. Matthew and St. Mark, but it occurs forty-eight times in St. Luke (Gospel and Acts), and that in all parts of the work." When he comes to the end of nis study of this section, he is able to write: "After this demonstration those who declare that this passage was derived from a source, and so was not composed by the author of the whole work, take up a most diflicult position. What may we suppose the author to have left unaltered in the source r Only the 'we'. For, in fact, nothing else remains. In regard to vocabulary, syntax, and style, he must have transformed everj-thing else into his own language. As such a procedure is absolutely unimaginable, we are simply left to infer that the author is here himself speaking." He even thinks it improbable, on account of the uniformity of style, that the author was copying from a diary of his own, made at an earlier penod. After this. Harnack pro- ceeds to deal with the remaining " we ' sections, with like results. But it is not alone in vocabulary, syn- tax, and style, that this uniformity is manifest. In "Tne Acts of the Apostles", Hamack devotes many pa^ to a detailed consideration of the manner in which chronological data, and terms dealing w^ith lands, nations, cities, and houses, are employed throughout the Ac^, as well as the mode of aealing with r^rnttrjC'j^^t*" ^^"" * and he everywhere shows !vj£w, Jteorship cannot be denied except l?i^9n the facts. This same conclusion is corroboratedlSjr the recurrence of medical language in all parts of the^Acts and the Gospel.
That the compamol^^f St. Paul wno wrote the Acts was St. Luke is the unanimous voice of antiquity. His choice of medical languStge proves that the author was a physician. Westein, in his preface to the Gospel ("Novum Test. Graecum", Amsterdam, 1741, 643). states that there are clear indications of his medical profession throughout St. Luke's writings; and in the course of his commentary he points out several tech- nical expressions common to the Evangelist and the medical writings of Galen. These were brought to- gether by the Bollandists (" Acta SS.", 18 Oct.) . In the "Gentleman's Marine" for June, 1841, a paper ap- peared on the medical language of St. Luke. To the instances given in that article, Plummer and Hamack add several others; but the great book on the subicct is Hobart, "The Medical Language of St. Luke" (Dublin, 1882). Hobart works right through the Gospel and Acts, and points out numerous words and phrases identical with those employed by such medi- cal writers as Hippocrates, Arcta?us, Galen, and Dioscorides. A few are found in Aristotle^ but he was a doctor's son. The words and phrases cited are either peculiar to the Tliird Gospel and Acts, or are more frequent than in other New Testament writings. The argument is cumulative, and does not give way with its weakest strands. When doubtful cases and expressions common to the Septuagint, are set aside, a
