Strictly speaking, we don’t know who wrote Luke-Acts. It was written anonymously, as were the other Gospels. However, from quite early on the tradition attributes both the Gospel and Acts to Luke, a physician and fellow-worker of Paul mentioned in two (or three, if 2 Timothy is authentically Pauline) of the apostle’s letters.
- A 2nd century anti-Gnostic prologue to the Gospel names Luke as author of both the Gospel and Acts.
- The oldest known list of New Testament books, the late 2nd century Muratorian Canon, ascribes authorship of Luke and Acts to “the well known physician.”
- Irenaeus in his Against Heresies attributes the third Gospel to Luke and describes him as ”inseparable from Paul and his fellow-labourer in the Gospel.” Irenaeus insists Luke did not misrepresent Paul, or the other apostles, in his recording of their exploits.
- Tertullian and Clement of Alexandria, and later Origen of Alexandria, voice their agreement with the tradition on the matter.[1]
Jervell argues that the tradition would not have attributed authorship to Luke without strong supporting evidence, because he was at best only a second-rank companion of Paul. “If the idea was to give authority to the writing through the name of the author, no one would have chosen Luke when they had far more significant and prominent companions of Paul at their disposal.”[2]
The Beloved (Gentile) Physician
If the Luke of Paul’s letters is the author of Luke-Acts – and there is good evidence for it – then we know something of Luke’s race, vocation, and place of origin, too. In Colossians 4.7-14, Paul names “Luke, the beloved physician” among others of his Gentile co-workers whom he clearly sets apart from “the only ones of the circumcision” who have worked with him (4.11). Also, in Acts 27.1-28.10, which describes Paul’s shipwreck and rescue on the island of Malta, Luke refers to the islanders as βάρβαροι (v.2; the NIV, NASB, NRSV miss this nuance), which usually is reserved for those who lack Greek culture and cannot speak the Greek language.[3] This is apparently a kind of cultural prejudice, and serves as one of our best clues to Luke’s ethnic and cultural heritage.
Beloved?
Why was Luke “beloved” – and by whom? The phrasing seems to indicate Luke has won the affection by the good effects of his medical practice. In other words, he is loved because he is a good physician. The question is, on whom was he practicing? A couple of possibilities emerge.
Perhaps he was Paul’s personal physician. Witherington suspects that Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” was a chronic illness or malady, such as an eye disease, that required constant professional care.[4]
Perhaps he as a medical missionary who traveled with Paul, caring for the sick in the cities where Paul preached and taught. For instance, when Paul and Luke (if we take the use of first person plural seriously) were stranded together on the island of Malta (28.1-10), we are told that Paul healed (ἰάσατο) an old man and because of that the rest of the people came and were cured (ἐθεραπεύοντο). Some discern a difference between the (supernatural) healing and the (natural) curing; the former would have been Paul’s work; the latter, Luke’s. Personally, I find this unconvincing. But I think it unnecessary and unwise to draw too sharp a distinction between the “natural” and the “supernatural.” I see no reason that Luke’s medical skill could not serve as an instrument of the Spirit in bringing healing to the sick there.
Probably, Luke fulfilled both of these roles if he fulfilled either of them. It is plausible to suppose that Luke joined Paul’s team of ministers as Paul’s personal physician and shared his expertise with others as the opportunities presented themselves.
Luke and Demas?
Besides Colossians 4.14, which pairs Demas and Luke, Paul names Luke and Demas together in two other places. In the concluding remarks of his letter to Philemon (1.19-24) Paul lists Luke and Demas last among others of his fellow-workers (συνεργοί). Also, in 2 Timothy 4.9-11, Luke is mentioned as one of Paul’s last remaining faithful companions, deliberately contrasting him with Demas.
Do your best to come to me quickly, for Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is helpful to me in my ministry.
Perhaps Luke and Demas were particularly dear to Paul; Luke because he was Paul’s physician, and Demas for some unknown reason. Perhaps they were both from Antioch. Perhaps they were close friends, or even family. Of course, it is impossible to know what to make of this connection, but the pairing does seem to be more than coincidental and deserves some careful thought.
From Antioch in Syria?
According to the tradition, Luke was from Antioch in Syria. The so-called anti-Marcionite prologue to the third Gospel, written anonymously in the 2nd century, identifies Antioch as his city of origin.[5] Also, the longer Western text (more on this later) of Acts 11.28 puts him personally among the church gathered there:
Now in these days there came down prophets from Jerusalem unto Antioch. And there was much rejoicing; and when we were gathered together one of them named Agabus stood up and spake, signifying by the Spirit that there should be a great famine over all the world
Gentile?
Not all scholars agree Luke was a Gentile and/or that he did write Luke-Acts. Shillington thinks the author was a Jew of the diaspora, like Stephen, because his “knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures and Jewish background is second to none.”[6] He supposes it unlikely that a Gentile could display such “gifted Jewishness.”[7]
To be sure, Luke writes decent Greek, better at times by far than the other Gospel writers. But there is no need to follow Shillington’s inferences or arrive at his conclusions. We only have to suppose that Luke was what he calls in Acts a god-fearer (φοβούμενοι τὸν θεόν), a proselyte to Judaism, who learned the faith of the fathers in a synagogue – as we saw, probably in Syrian Antioch – and there became intimate with the stories and teachings, the concepts and style of the LXX version of the Hebrew Scriptures.
A Companion of Paul
At several points in Acts (16.10-17; 20.5-16; 21.1-18; 27.1-28.16), Luke rather abruptly switches from his standard use of the third person (“they”) to the first person plural (“we”), apparently indicating he himself is present for these events. As we have already seen, Irenaeus took these sections as proof that Luke was Paul’s “inseparable” companion and that this privileged Luke with detailed information for use in his writing; this conclusion most scholars now find dubious. That being said, we can safely assume that Luke was the sometime companion of Paul, probably with him occasionally during the (somewhat misleadingly called) second missionary journey, and significantly more often during the third journey.
Perhaps more important than the time Luke did (or did not) spend with Paul, was the timing of his work with him. The fact that Luke was there only at the end of Paul’s life makes all the difference in his understanding of the apostle, as Fitzmyer concludes,
Luke was not with Paul during the major part of his missionary activity, or during the period when Paul’s most important letters were being written… Luke was not on the scene when Paul was facing the major crises in his evangelization of the Eastern Mediterranean world, e.g., the Judaizing problem, the struggle with the factions in Corinth or the questions that arose in Thessalonica. Luke would not have been with Paul when he was formulating the essence of his theology or wrestling with the meaning of the gospel. This would explain why there is such a difference between the Paul of Acts and the Paul of the letters [8].
We will return to this point often, as it helps to explain so much.
Conclusion
The information about Luke provided for us by the tradition and Paul’s letters fits the profile the writer of Luke-Acts must have met.
- As a physician, Luke would have been well educated and literate, privileges which would help explain both Luke’s desire and facility to write “an orderly account.”
- As a companion of Paul, he would have been in the position to learn some of the details of the apostle’s thought and work. But because he was there only at the end, he would not have been eyewitness to much of what we find in Paul’s letters.
- As a native of Antioch, he would have been in the path of the emerging Jesus sect and the tumult surrounding it and its leading figures as it moved out from Jerusalem to the “ends of the earth.”
- As a Gentile proselyte to Judaism, he would have possessed a unique perspective and concern for what the Good News of the Kingdom meant for both Jews and Gentile alike.
We have good reason, then, to suppose Luke did author the Gospel and Acts.
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[1]F. F. Bruce, “Acts of the Apostles” in The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol 1. Geoffrey W. Bromiley ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995), 36.
[2]Jacob Jervell, The Theology of the Acts of the Apostles, New Testament Theology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 2.
[3] Ben Witherington, Acts of the Apostles: A Socio-rhetorical Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 776-777.
[4] Witherington, 58.
[5] Bruce, “Acts of the Apostles,” 36.
[6] V. George Shillington, An Introduction to the Study of Luke-Acts (New York: T & T Clark International, 2007), 10.
[7] Shillington, 11.
[8] Quoted in Witherington, 484.
