Tristan Scott

There are a lot of possibilities here. A theory that has evolved out of Q research is that the Gospel of Luke, as well as Matthew, was an attempt to consolodate the two major writings at the time, Mark and a book of sayings attributed to Jesus (Q), into one book. If this were to be true, it could be that the Gospel of Luke was written at a much later date than Acts, which was probably written soon after the events it encompasses, probably in the early 60s. This could explain the contradictions as the Gospel of Luke could be just a re-write of another testimony, while the events described in Acts could have been based on verbal accounts witnessed by the author during his travels.

[ July 24, 2002: Message edited by: Tristan Scott ]</p>

CX

How could this be given that Acts explicitly refers back to GLk? Are you saying that the introduction in Acts 1:1 and other references are later additions to some proto-Acts? On what basis? Why do we have no manuscript evidence of such?

CX

I've seen this before and it seems highly speculative to me. Firstly it turns on the use of two different prepositions and secondly it presupposes that hanging on a tree could not possibly refer to crucifixion which is totally unjustified given the nature of crucifixion in the period. Thirdly the first description of Jesus' execution we have is that found in GMk. Elswhere it is evident that AMk has little familiarity with Jewish custom it would hardly be surprising that his description of Jesus trial and execution makes some rather large faux pas with respect to Jewish legal practices. This whole issue strikes me as Jewish and/or atheological apologetic more than a good analysis of the text. Do you have a good scholarly reference for this idea?

CX

Why?

FunkyRes

Tradition holds him to be the author- and John Mark was close to Peter and the gospel of Mark has more detail about stuff concerning Peter than the other gospels.

Mind you, no theology of mine is based upon him being the author. It just seems to fit.

CX

Hmmmm...I don't think so. All we have is Eusebius quoting Papias (who is quoting Presbyter John who is quoting "the elders"...) about someone named "Mark" and alleging him to be an interpreter of Peter. Then we have a few vague references in Acts, Philemon, Colossians and 2 Timothy to a John also called Mark but any connection between the two is tenuous at best. Add to that the strong evidence that AMk is a gentile Xian and the attribution becomes even more dubious. In fact were it not for the Papias quote we would have no reason to think the gospel was written by a Mark at all.

Udo Schnelle says this: I see no strong reason to accept John Mark as the other of the Gospel and a strong indication that that attribution is lengendary.

Tristan Scott

Manuscript evidence of what? It's all speculation. There are those that say the 3rd gospel wans't written till the end of the 2nd c. Manuscript evidence? There is no manuscript evidence of any of the Gospels that I am aware of. I simply speculate that Acts may have been written before the tumultuous events that began occuring in Rome shortly after Paul's arrival because they are not mentioned. There, of course is compelling reasons to believe Acts may have been written in the 70s as well; he mentions Bernice without any introduction, as though she were a well known, which was not the case until the late 60s.

The fact that Acts does not discuss the events of the early 60s in Rome is indeed puzzling if a later date is assigned to it, and considering that the whole purpose for Paul's trip to Rome was to plead his case directly to the Emperor, the end of Acts seems very anti-climactic. Indeed, to the point that I have often felt that there was a missing chapter or two.

Tercel

Um, yeah the fundies have found a really "creative" explanation for this one...
Geography lesson:
Bethany is a town situated at the base of the southwestern slope of ...you guessed it... the Mount of Olives.
(There are also suggestions that in ancient times Bethany was actually situated on the Mount itself)

Vorkosigan

Why yes, you are right. It looks like I must eat my words. I confused the two Bethany-s

Vorkosigan

CX

On the contrary we have extensive MSS for all books of the NT. Naturally anything related to history is somewhat speculative, but that needn't imply that we can't determine any facts regarding the NT texts.


Perhaps, but such a conclusion is highly dubious and not widely accepted.

As I've already said this simply isn't so. We have no autographs. We do however have extensive MSS evidence from which we can reconstruct the history of the development of the Gospels and reconstruct the texts, albeit at a somewhat late stage of development.


But it is not the date of Acts which is currently in question. It is your claim that Acts could have conceivably been written prior to GLk. I cannot see how a reasonable defense for this assertion can be made.