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LUKE

(Gk. Loukás)

The name appears three times in the NT (Col. 4:14; 2 Tim. 4:11; Phlm. 24), evidently with reference to the same person, a companion of Paul, traditionally identified as the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles.

By way of characterizing Luke, 2 Tim. 4:11 highlights Luke’s faithfulness in comparison with some who are said to have deserted Paul. In Phlm. 24 Luke is identified as a “fellow worker,” not simply one of Paul’s “traveling companions” or “assistants,” but a person of comparable stature, a “missionary colleague.” Col. 4:14 refers to Luke as “beloved physician.” Apparently, his knowledge and skills as a healer had won him respect, placing him in the company of those physicians, known in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, who enjoyed high status as students of medicine and philosophy. Because Col. 4:10-11 refers to Aristarchus, Mark, and Justus as the only Jews who were present as co-workers with Paul, it emerges that Luke is a Gentile or, at least, a non-Jewish Semite. The scriptural intimacy and Jewish interests manifest in Luke-Acts do not require a hypothesis of Jewish authorship, but are equally compatible with significant exposure to Judaism by a non-Jew.

It is generally assumed that these two narrative documents were written by the same person (cf. Luke 1:1-4; Acts 1:1-2), and early traditions identify this person as Luke. The oldest Greek manuscript of the Third Gospel, Papyrus Bodmer XIV (𝔓75, ca. 200 c.e.), uses the title “Gospel according to Luke.” The Muratorian Canon (late 2nd century) also identifies Luke, a physician and companion of Paul, as the author of the Gospel, an identification further corroborated by the 2nd-century writings of Irenaeus (Adv. haer. 3.1.1; 14.1) and later writers (e.g., Eusebius HE). Until recently, the view that Luke-Acts was penned by a companion of Paul drew additional support from the so-called “we-passages” in Acts (16:10-17; 20:5–21:18; 27–28). Some now regard these passages as literary creations.

Like the other NT Gospels, Luke and Acts are anonymous documents. Even when involved in first person narration, the writer of Acts identifies himself not as an individual with a name, but as one of a group. He may at times be present as a participant-observer, but his focus is not his individual identity. That first person narration happens in only selected portions of the account underscores that the narrator makes no claim to being a constant companion of Paul and his circle. This speaks against the tradition that Luke and Paul were “inseparable” (Irenaeus Adv. haer. 3.1.1, 4), but also against those who deny that Luke could have written Acts because the author of Acts could not have been a regular companion of Paul. It also suggests that first person narration is more than a literary device calculated to enliven the narrative.

Little reason remains not to accept the traditional identification of Luke as the author of Luke-Acts; this would make Luke responsible for the largest portion of the NT (28 percent). If Lukan authorship of these books is accepted, additional information becomes available from their language and style — e.g., that Luke is educated, probably urban, with firsthand exposure to rhetorical training and to Israel’s Scriptures; a person of some economic means, writing from the social location of those who traffic in technical or professional writing; and one of the “people of the Way,” a “Christian,” either second- or third-generation (Luke 1:1-4).

Bibliography. J. A. Fitzmyer, “The Authorship of Luke-Acts Reconsidered,” in Luke the Theologian (New York, 1989), 1-26.

Joel B. Green

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

LUKE

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)