1. Introducing Luke Flashcards
- Introducing Luke
• Luke is the longest Gospel
• Luke begins with a Prologue addressed to someone called Theophilus…
- Some scholars believe him to be Luke’s patron (a wealthy Christian convert who wanted to know more about the origins of Christianity)
- Others believe him to be a Roman official (Like constantly presents Christianity as a respectable religion that is no threat to the Roman Empire)
- ‘Theophilus’ means ‘loving God’ so could refer to everyone in Luke’s Church
- In Luke, JC performs 21 miracles (compared to 7 signs in John)
- Six of the parables in Luke are in Mark and Matthew but Luke adds another 18
• Redactor: Luke alters material from Mark
- Corrects Mark’s Greek, alters representations of Jesus to be more respectful (removes scenes of anger or emotion) and produces a more logical story
• ‘Gospel of Compassion’: Luke’s main concern is for the poor and outcast
- Shows Jesus blessing the poor and condemning the rich.
- Women and Gentiles feature prominently
- Eschatology
• Greek ‘eschatos’ – last
- Refers to the end of the world and the afterlife.
• Hellenic Idea: the world passed through ‘ages’
- Eschatology is the end of one age and the beginning of another
• Jewish Idea: idea of just two ages…
- This age and the Messianic age.
- The end of the age was going to be an apocalypse in which the Messiah will arrive and an earthly kingdom would be ruled over by him.
- In this new order, other empires will be conquered and the Jews liberated
- Little Apocalypse
- Luke: Jesus describes the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.
- Christian: broadly four interpretations
- Preterist: Apocalypse refers to the events of JC’s lifetime and the lifetime of his immediate followers who experienced his Resurrection / founded Church
- Destruction of Temple = crucifixion - Futurist: the end of time (this is still to come)
- Destruction of Temple = End of the world - Literal: describing factual events
- Destruction of Temple: Temple was literally destroyed in 70 CE - Symbolic: describing spiritual events in the soul / after death
- Destruction of Temple symbolises death
- Scholar’s Approaches to Eschatology
• Weiss: Jesus preached a preterist eschatology:
- ‘This generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened’
- C.S. Lewis: this is the ‘most embarrassing verse in the Bible’
- Despite what JC says, his Disciples did die without the world ending.
- Therefore, many Christians interpret the apocalyptic language symbolically
- Schweitzer: Jesus believed the world would literally end with his own Crucifixion and that the first Christians believed the world would end when Christ returned to Earth (supposed to happen very soon after the Resurrection.)
- Marshall: sums up the problem for believers of Jesus’ having a mistaken belief in an imminent Apocalypse that never happened.
- Dodd: Jesus preached that the Apocalypse was taking place during his ministry (realised eschatology).
- However, Dodd argued the Apocalypse is symbolic for Jesus and not literal.
- It is a change in how people live, not the end of the world.
- Kingdom of God
- 39 references in Luke to the ‘Kingdom of God’ or ‘The Kingdom’
- The debate is about WHEN this Kingdom is supposed to happen
- Kingdom in the Past: an eternal Kingdom: always has existed.
- God extended his Kingdom to Earth, but Adam and Eve rebelled against him
- The OT is the story of God’s Kingdom breaking through into the world.
- He chose the Israelites to be his people and appointed Kings like David to represent him on Earth (‘Golden Age’ when Kingdom of God was also a political kingdom)
- Luke sees John the Baptist as the end of the od’s Kingdom in the past and the beginning of a new phase introduced by Jesus.
- This Kingdom is available to everyone (Gentiles and Jews) - Kingdom in the Present: happens during Jesus’ ministry
- Luke seems to treat many references to the Kingdom in the spiritual sense: it is ‘within you’ as in being spiritually close to God.
- Similar to symbolic eschatology - Kingdom in the Future: Kingdom is a future reality that will take place at the end of this age.
- Futurist view of eschatology – Second Coming of Christ (Parousia)
- Two types: Kingdom could be imminent (near future) or remote (far future)
- Salvation History in Luke
• Conzelmann: proposes theory that Luke was faced with a Christian community confused and disappointed by the failure of Christ to return (Parousia Delay)
- To answer their complaints, Luke reinterprets the Kingdom of God in a historical sense (Salvation-history view of Kingdom of God)
- This view interprets Kingdom as an ongoing historical project…
1. It was begun in the ancient past by Propehets
2. It was demonstrated by Jesus
3. It has to be carried on into the future and spread by Christians.
• Conzelmann: Luke is different from other Synoptics as he breaks away from apocalyptic thinking and views Christianity as a religion that guides how you live.
• Support: Luke has a strong social message on feeding the hungry, caring for the poor and settling disputes peacefully.
• Criticism: Marshall points out there are still moments of urgent apocalyptic discourse such as the ‘Little Apocalypse’.
- If Luke is a redactor, why would he leave apocalyptic messages in?
- Introduction to Parables
- Stories with a spiritual meaning.
- Jesus used Parables as a teaching tool as they had a meaning for his audience and 1st century Christians who preserved them as part of the Oral Tradition
• Form Criticisms: views these Parables as textual units that owe more to the beliefs of 1st century Christians than to JC’s original teachings.
- Marshall: Luke faithfully reproduces JC’s idea of an imminent Kingdom.
• Redaction Criticisms: views these Parables as being edited by Luke to serve his own viewpoint.
- Conzelmann: this was done to promote the idea of salvation-history
Summary
- Introducing Luke
- Eschatology
- Little Apocalypse
- Scholar’s Approaches to Eschatology
- Kingdom of God
- Salvation-History in Luke
- Introduction in Parables
