Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Acknowledgments
- List of abbreviations
- 1 Background and methodology
- 2 Authorial data: seams and summaries
- 3 Authorial criteria: Greek prose compositional conventions
- 4 Authorial unity: analysis results and probabilities
- 5 Final considerations and future directions
- Appendix
- Bibliography
- Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources
- Index of Modern Authors and Subjects
- References
1 - Background and methodology
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 June 2009
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Acknowledgments
- List of abbreviations
- 1 Background and methodology
- 2 Authorial data: seams and summaries
- 3 Authorial criteria: Greek prose compositional conventions
- 4 Authorial unity: analysis results and probabilities
- 5 Final considerations and future directions
- Appendix
- Bibliography
- Index of Biblical and Other Ancient Sources
- Index of Modern Authors and Subjects
- References
Summary
Today, the discussion on the common authorship of [Luke] and Acts, which is to be distinguished from that on the identity of the author, is closed. Of course, “resolution of this basic issue does not determine that the same author could not have written in different genres, employed different theological constructs in the two volumes, or used different narrators” (Parsons-Pervo, Rethinking, p. 116). But it is a necessary condition to allow for a reflection on the way Luke has composed both writings [emphasis added].
Rarely do scholars make the startling and uncompromising declaration that a topic is closed to further investigation. Such a statement defies the search and research objectives of any systematic, critical inquiry. So universally held is the above opinion that few have opted to challenge the hypothesis – and it is a hypothesis – that Luke and Acts were written and compiled by a unitary author-editor. Here “author-editor” denotes a writer who not only composed independently but also redacted and compiled inherited sources and traditions, be they written or oral.
Although few, challenges to the single authorship of Luke and Acts follow two trajectories. The first understands Luke and Acts as the fulfillment of different writers' theological agendas, a proposition with little currency among scholars. On this trajectory, which is profiled later, are examples of two nineteenth-century exegetes, F. C. Baur and J. H. Scholten, whose complex theological interpretations of the early Christian religious milieux treat the possible extenuating historical circumstances from which conflicting theologies emerged.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Assumed Authorial Unity of Luke and ActsA Reassessment of the Evidence, pp. 1 - 42Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009
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