Thomas R. Schreiner - Commentary on Luke: From The Baker Illustrated Bible Commentary

Thomas R. Schreiner

Introduction

Authorship

Nowhere does the Gospel of Luke reveal its authors identity. To ascertain the author, therefore, one should first of all examine the Gospels internal evidence to find clues about its authorship. Unfortunately, the Gospel does not supply the reader with much information. We do learn, however, that the author was not an eyewitness (Luke 1:2), and thus anyone who observed Jesus in his public ministry can be eliminated. Furthermore, the writer of Luke clearly was intelligent and well educated, for he displays an ability to write in excellent Greek and is well acquainted with the Old Testament.

Also, scholars almost universally agree that the author of the Gospel of Luke is the same person as the author of the Acts of the Apostles for the following reasons: (1) Both books are dedicated to the same personTheophilus (Luke 1:3; Acts 1:1). (2) The author refers to my former book, and says that the former book contains all that Jesus began to do and to teach (Acts 1:1). This former book is most naturally the Gospel of Luke. (3) Last, many of the themes with which Luke ends his Gospel (24:3653) are picked up again in Acts 1:111, which suggests that the same author is continuing his former work, briefly tying together the two works so that the reader of Acts can pick up where the Gospel left off.

Clearly, then, the same author wrote both Luke and Acts. But Acts, unfortunately, is also anonymous. Are there any hints in Acts about the identity of the author? The chief clue is found in the we sections of Acts (Acts 16:1017; 20:515; 21:118; 27:128:16). The careful reader notices that the author speaks of Paul and his companions as they (e.g., Acts 16:78), and then he suddenly starts using the first-person plural we (Acts 16:1013, 16), probably because he is now participating in the Pauline mission. Indeed, in these sections he may be referring to a diary he kept of these events. By comparing these we sections with the rest of the book, the reader can begin to eliminate certain names from authorship (cf. Acts 20:4). Although other solutions are possible (e.g., that the author was Titus), it is most likely that the author of the Gospel was Pauls traveling companionthe physician Luke.

Luke is mentioned three times in Pauls letters. In Colossians 4:14 he is called our dear friend Luke, the doctor. In Philemon 24 he is mentioned as one of Pauls fellow workers. In 2 Timothy 4:11 Paul says that only Luke is with me. This reference to Lukes loyalty is especially poignant because the context of 2 Timothy 4 reveals that Paul is about to be executed by the Romans, and many of Pauls companions abandoned him in such a perilous situation. If Philemon and Colossians were written by Paul from Rome (and this theory is still the most probable), then the references to Luke in these letters fit with Acts 27:128:16, where the author of Acts accompanies Paul to Rome.