Luke – doctor or priest?
Posted on | November 12, 2008 |
A recent translation of the Gospel of Luke has been published, together with some explanatory material, under the title of The Essential Jesus (Sydney, Matthias Media, 2008). The book is available in printed form, or may be downloaded in pdf format for individual reading (but not for printing or circulation) from the publisher’s website or from the website of the Connect09 evangelistic campaign of the Anglican Diocese of Sydney.
According to the introductory material, ‘The biography or ‘Gospel’ of Jesus’ life that you are about to read was written nearly 2000 years ago by a doctor named Luke’ (p. 3).
But was the author named Luke, and was he a doctor?
‘Luke the beloved doctor and Demas’ are mentioned in the (pseudo-Pauline) Epistle to the Colossians as sending greetings (4:14; some witnesses omit ‘beloved’). In the Epistle to Philemon, Demas and Luke are among those ‘fellow-workers’ of Paul who send greetings (24). The author of 2 Timothy writes that Demas has deserted him but Luke is still with him (4:10-11).
These passages all appear to refer to one and the same Luke. Is this Luke the same as the author of the ‘Gospel according to Luke’? Tradition gives that title to the Gospel, and tradition also identifies the author of the Gospel with ‘Luke the beloved doctor’. The idea that the author was a doctor seems to suggest that this Gospel must be accurate and reliable, just as a doctor needs to be accurate and reliable in giving a description and diagnosis.
The question of authorship has to be tested by examining internal evidence, the text of the Gospel itself, in the absence of other firm data. On this basis various proposals have been made for the identity and occupation of the Gospel’s author.
A recently published study has ruled out the possibility that the author was a doctor, and argues instead that he was a priest. Rick Strelan, Luke the Priest: The Authority of the Author of the Third Gospel, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2008, develops a detailed case. Strelan has written a number of articles and books on New Testament subjects, and draws on an extensive knowledge of relevant literature in investigating the evidence for the authorship of this Gospel.
Strelan’s argument is discussed in detail by Richard Anderson on his blog about the Gospel of Luke. Anderson has argued for some time that Theophilus, the addressee of the Gospel of Luke and of the book of Acts, was a High Priest, and he is accepting of Strelan’s identification of the author of the Gospel as a priest. In Strelan’s view, both author and addressee were Jewish, and the addressee could have been a priest as well. Strelan stresses the likelihood that the author was a priest in view of the consideration that in the period concerned the authoritative theologians and historians were mostly priests, and the author is claiming to be able to speak with priestly authority. Anderson regards Strelan’s case as ‘surprisingly strong’. There are many details in the Gospel and Acts that have to be weighed up. To take just one example, it is interesting that the expression ‘to do … and to teach’ in the prologue of Acts (1:1) can be paralleled from Ezra 7:10 – the work of a priest.
Readers of The Essential Jesus have the opportunity to examine with a critical eye this translation of the Gospel according to Luke and assess whether the work may reflect the views of an author with a priestly background and agenda.
According to information in The Essential Jesus, the translation was originally produced by Tony Payne, John Dickson, Greg Clarke and Kirsten Birkett in 2001, and reviewed and revised by Tony Payne, Peter Bolt, Darrell Bock, Evonne Paddison, Tim Thornborough and Anne Woodcock in 2008. The publication is not to be confused with John Dominic Crossan, The Essential Jesus: Original Sayings and Earliest Images (1994); Bryan W. Ball and William G. Johnsson (ed.), The Essential Jesus: The Man, His Message, His Mission (2002); or Whitney T. Kuniholm, Essential Jesus: 100 Readings through the Bible’s Greatest Story (2007).
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