PART I

THE SOURCES OF THE GOSPELS

Sect. 1. IN THE DEDICATION LUKE EXPLAINS HIS METHOD OF RESEARCH[a]

Luke 1:1-4

1 Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to draw up a narrative concerning those matters which have been [1]fulfilled among us, 2 even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were 3 eyewitnesses and ministers of the word, it seemed good to me also, having traced the course of all things accurately from the first, 4 to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus;[b] that thou mightest know the certainty concerning the [2]things [3]wherein thou wast instructed.

[Footnote 1: Or, _fully establish_.]

[Footnote 2: Gr. _words_.]

[Footnote 3: Or, _which thou wast taught by word of mouth_.]

[Footnote a: Luke is the first critic of the life of Christ whose criticism has been preserved to us. Others had drawn up narratives of certain portions of Christ's work. Others still had been eyewitnesses of the ministry of Jesus and gave Luke their oral testimony. Luke sifted it all with care and produced an orderly and reasonably full narrative of the earthly ministry of Jesus. We cannot reproduce all the sources that Luke had at his command, but it is clear that he followed in the main our Gospel of Mark, as any one can see for himself by comparing the two Gospels in this Harmony. Both Matthew and Luke made use of Mark. But they had other sources also. See note 2 on Synoptic Criticism at the close of the Harmony. See also Chapter IV, "Luke's Method of Research" in my _Luke the Historian in the Light of Research_.]

[Footnote b: Luke alone follows the method of ancient historians in dedicating his Gospel, as also the Acts (1:1), to a patron who probably met the expense of publication. So Luke as a Gentile Christian writes an historical introduction in literary (_Koine_) Greek after the fashion of Thucydides and Plutarch. Mark had no formal introduction. Matthew's introduction is genealogical because he is writing for Jewish readers to prove that Jesus is the Messiah of Jewish hope. John, writing last of all, has a theological introduction to meet the Gnostic and philosophical misconceptions concerning the Person of Christ. Thus he pictures Christ as the Eternal Logos, with God in his pre-incarnate state, who became flesh and thus revealed the Father to men.]