Articles
Historicity of Luke
Historicity of Luke
As Luke unfold the story of Jesus, he abundantly provides the actual historical setting in which these events take place. Just in the opening of this third chapter of Luke:
· Tiberius Ceaser was reigning
· It was the 15 year of his reign
· Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea
· Herod was tetrarch of Galilee
· Philip was his brother
· Philip was tetrarch of Ituraea and Trachonitus
· Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene
· The High priesthood was thought of as being of Annas and Caiaphas
· John the Baptist lived and preached.
Each of these point are given and can be substantiated as accurate usage of such in the time frame. That is, the difference between being a governor and a tetrarch, etc. Also, the fact that Caiaphas was the ‘high priest’, but the people still recognized his father-in-law as the ‘real’ one as seen in their trial of Jesus later – taking him first to Annas.
Darrell Bock in his commentary noted: “Nonetheless an examination of Luke’s use of his sources shows his general trustworthiness (Marshall 1970: 21–76). Investigations into his descriptions of settings, customs, and locales reveal the same sensitivity (Hengel 1980: vii, 3–49; Hemer 1989). Luke is a first-class ancient historian, and most good ancient historians understood their task well (see Fornara 1983: 142–68, on Thucydides and Polybius).” (Bock, Baker Exegetical Commentary, pg. 14). When you consider that his intended audience was a person living at that time, such accuracy would be expected.
These and many more examples have given Luke the recognition of being a 1st class ‘historian’, but actually they show him to be an accurate WITNESS. These events give us confidence in our faith of the things about Jesus that have not been recorded by human historians. Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God…
Hugh DeLong
