Was Luke Written by Luke? And Why Should We Care?

The Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts were both allegedly written by a companion of Paul, Luke "the gentile physician." But the books never name their author. So why Luke? Are are there any good grounds for naming him in particular? Or any grounds at all? Were the books probably written by a doctor? Was he probably a gentile? *Was* there a Luke? If picking his name was just guesswork -- would it affect how we interpret the books or understand their reliability?

-Readers have long thought that the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts were written by the same person, Luke, a gentile physician who was a traveling companion of Paul. Do the books claim to be written by that person?

-Why would anonymous books later be named by Christian readers?

-Why would anyone choose Luke in particular to be the author of these books

-Why is Luke specifically identified, instead of another travelling companion?

-Who first identified Luke as the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts?

-Why has this attribution persisted?

-Is there any reason to think that the author actually was a medical doctor?

-What are some problems with this attribution?

-Why do scholars think that Luke and Acts were written by the same author?

-What was the author trying to achieve with these two books?

-If Luke is unlikely to be the author of the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts, do the books give us any insight into who may have written them?

-Do the genres of the books offer any insight into this question?

-Would you say that Luke and Acts are better works of literature than some of the other books of the canonical NT?

[roeliethegoat]

Can I just say thank you for making these podcasts and all this knowledge readily available? I was taught that the Bible was inerrant and that the gospels were written by the disciples. I've known that's not true for a long time now. And that inspired this thirst for bible history. I can't seem to get enough. So thank you!

[khaleelorwhatever]

Most videos I watch at 1.5x speed. Music and Bart Ehrman content gets the normal speed respect.

[MichaelYoder]

One of the things I love about this podcast is the informality between Megan and Bart (especially the catch up at the beginning). AND - I'd love to see Bart do a collab with Josh about the Old Testament. I think that would be fascinating. Thanks all.

[dbarker]

This is the first time I've heard someone explain how these writings were attributed to Luke the gentile physician.
Thanks!

[JohnMichaelVoudouris]

@40:15
I very much appreciate this scholarly response to the question concerning the understanding of the Greek word "stauros."

Thank you for your insight 👍

[r.the.mazzochist]

I want Bart to do a serious investigation on the scholarship done on Marcion and his connection with Luke.

[mindfulskills]

Thank you, Bart, for these wonderful podcasts! Could you do an episode on so-called "oral tradition, " especially in Orthodox Christianity? I was raised Orthodox, and in that church much importance is placed on the so-called "Three Pillars" -- scripture, apostolic (oral) tradition, and the teachings of the apostles' successors. This is a tacit acknowledgement that most apostolic teaching did not make it into the Bible, and yet was cherished by early Christians in the form of oral tradition. Irenaeus himself stressed the three pillars. In that context, it's unlikely that he would have just made up the Luke attribution out of whole cloth; there's a high probability that it was based on an oral tradition, whether factually true or not. If Irenaeus is writing in the mid to late 2nd century, then the life of Christ was no more distant to him than the Civil War is to us. 2nd and 3rd-hand memories were still available, at least enough to form a consensus about what happened. What can you tell us about the oral traditions that preceded and co-existed with scripture, and the process whereby they came to be accepted? Thanks again for your great work!

[duderama]

That's the first time I've seen a commercial interrupted by another commercial.

[mattbrown]

Man, I start watching and Megan is like “I’ve been building custom library shelves while parenting 5? kids and running multiple YouTube channels while presumably staying on top of academic pursuits and keeping the house from falling apart.”

My weeks have been significantly less busy and I’m still exhausted more often than not!

[badhrulislam]

Interesting as always. I'd love a talk on how the gospels were influenced by Paul. Matthew for example seems to refute Paul in parts but need an expert take on this.

[jefffarris]

I’m curious why early church fathers thought Luke could have direct knowledge of Jesus’ ministry, death and resurrection if he was a companion of Paul, who himself never knew Jesus?

[TacyTerryLady]

Great podcast….i signed up for the new course. 🎉

[JackRT]

I think you’re on the right track when you describe Luke-Acts as ancient literature. I am inclined to believe that Luke-Acts was written first and foremost for ‘Luke’s’ patron, an actual person whom he refers to as ‘Theophilus’, rather than for any particular Jesus group or community. Apparently ‘Luke’ thought of Jesus, Peter and Paul as legendary heroic characters and was quite taken with what he had heard about them, and so set out to produce a great Hellenic heroic novel for his patron, ‘better than all the others’ as he boasts, a two-part story with Volume One featuring Jesus and ending in his tragic death, but with a miraculous twist that points forward to Part Two, a triumph with the spread of his movement expanding across the empire, ending with Paul boldly proclaiming the Gospel at the heart of the Roman Empire. I think the immediate appeal of the story would have been with the urban elite who read Greco-Roman literature and were always hungry for more, then obviously trickled down into the various Jesus communities where it was even more popular and began drawing the Hellenes into these communities, with its fantastical tales of royal lineage, the constant interactions of mortals with the Divine, miraculous deeds, voyages of adventure, shipwrecks, healings, raisings from the dead, miraculous escapes from mortal danger, etc. Luke-Acts would have been welcomed in the Jesus groups as an ‘historical’ perspective on Jesus and Paul, even though so much of what Luke wrote was the stuff of legend, meant to heighten the drama and make the story popular amongst Greco-Roman literature of the time, rather than a strict narration of the history of the early Jesus Movement. This is probably why he does not sync with Paul on similar events- he is using artistic licence to enhance his tale, so it doesn’t matter to him when, nor how many times Paul went to Jerusalem, for example.
I would also expect that this author wrote all manner of this type of literature in his time and that Luke-Acts was no isolated tale in his literary corpus.
So while we are greatly enriched in our faith by Luke-Acts and it forms a critical part of our Scriptures, the reading of history, theology, Christology or ‘salvation history’ into this work might just be surmise based on ‘spurious familiarity.’

[CharlesPayet]

Will we ever get to see a picture of the bookshelves/library when it’s all done? I would LOVE to have a proper library!!!

[lallian]

Bart you taught me so much, and Megan you helped me so much, thanks both of you

[AbbaKovner-ggzp]

audio level on the advertisement is WAY TOO LOUD compared to the rest of the podcast

[palamane]

Bart and Megan, if you haven’t already ordered those rolling Library ladders, I can recommend one of the older manufacturers of them in New York City, the Putnam Rolling Ladder Co., which has been in business since the early 1900s. (Happy customer from years ago. I don’t make anything from this recommendation. And sorry if this seems like a commercial endorsement.)

[jacobsutton]

Would love to see some episodes with Bart and Islamic scholars discussing the relationship between Islam and Christianity in regards to being exclusivist, and consequently so evangelistic. What biblical sources did the authors of the Quran have access to? Are similarities in the texts responsible for such strong textual fundamentalism in both religions, or is that more of a case of “convergent evolution?” Admittedly, this starting to sound more like a book than a podcast episode…

[JosephNobles]

Thank you for answering my question (Judas discrepancy)! Both options give me a lot to think about, and I do lean toward the first one you mentioned. I've really gotten back into researching Biblical topics in the past year, and Judas is a particular fascination of mine. Isn't it odd that the account of Judas' death are so contradictory, and yet his part in the Last Supper is much less so (although there are some)? His motives are different in each gospel as well. I am no mythicist when it comes to Jesus, but I'm starting to wonder if it was necessary to invent Judas!

[sebolddaniel]

This is purty darned good. I really love Bart's learned high falutin English, a lot better than Mark's Huck Finn Greek