1. The obYious facts. — The first point, there- fore, is the establishment of the facts, and in the main these admit of little discussion. Acts falls immediately into two chief parts — the Pauline, and the non-Pauline parts — with a short inter- mediate section in which St. Paul appears at in- tervals. The Pauline section, again, falls into the natural divisions afforded by his two (or three) great journeys ; and a cross-division can also be made by noting that the author sometimes uses the first person plural, sometimes writes exclu- sively in the third person. The earlier sections in the same way can be divided — though the division is here much less clear — into those in which the centre of activity is Jerusalem, and those in which it is Antioch, while a further series of subdivisions can be made according as the chief actor is Peter, Philip, or Stephen. Finally, still smaller subdivisions can be made by dividing the narrative into the series of incidents which com- pose it.
The table on p. 22 serves to give a general conspectus of the facts ; a somewhat more minute system of subdivision has been adopted in the earlier chapters, which are especially afi'ected by the question of sources, than in the — from this point of view — more straightforward later chap- ters. This analysis is sufficient to show that the Avriter must have been drawing on various sources or traditions for his information, and we have to face three problems : What was the purpose with which the writer put togetlier this narrative ? How far is it possible to distinguish the sources, written or oral, which he used ? What is the relative value of the sources which he used ?
2. The purpose with which the whole narrative was composed. — It is, of course, clear that the ^\Titer has not attempted to give a colourless story of as many events as possible, but is using history to commend his own interpretation of the facts. This is corroborated by his own account at the beginning of the Gospel, in which he defines his purpose as that of convincing Theophilus of the certainty of the ' narratives in which he liad been instructed ' (iVa eTnyv<^s irepl Siv KarrjxridTjs X6ywv ttjv dacpaXeiav [Lk !■*]). In other words, he wishes to tell the story of the early days of Christianity in order to prove the Christian teaching.
If we consider the narrative from this point of view, we can see several motives underlying it. (a) The desire to show that the Christian Church was the result of the presence of the Spirit (irvevfj-a, rb TTvev/jLa, rb ayiov irveu/j.a are the usual expressions, but TTvevfia Kvpiov in 5^ 8^^ [the text is doubtful], rb TTVfv/jLa 'Irjaov in 16''), which is the fulfilment of the promise of Jesus to send it to His disciples (Ac ptf- ; cf. Lk 3'6 •24-»8f). The Spirit manifested itself in glossolalia, in the working of miracles of healing, and in the surprising growth of Christi- anity. This is perhaps the main object of Luke's writings, and to it is subordinated, both in the Gospel and in Acts, the eschatological expectation which is most characteristic of Mark and Matthew ; though many traces of this still remain.— (6) The desh-e to show the unreasonableness and wicked- ness of Jewish opposition is also clearly marked, and is contrasted with the attitude of Konian officials. It is, therefore, not impossible that the writer desired to dissociate Christianity from Judaism, and to defend Christians from the im- putation of belonging to a sect forbidden by the State. If we knew the time when Christianity was, as such, first forbidden and persecuted, this might be a valuable indication of date, but at present all that is kno'v\Ti \vith certainty is that (cf. Pliny's correspondence with Trajan) it was
ACTS OF THE APOSTLES
ACTS OF THE APOSTLES
forbidden by the beginning of the 2nd cent., and that in 64 it was probably (but not certainly) not forbidden, as the Neronic persecution was not of the Christians as such, but of Christians as suspected of certain definite crimes. It is, how- ever, in any case clear that this feature of Acts supports the view that one purpose cherished by the writer was the desire to protest against the view that Christians had always been, or could ever be, regarded as a danger to the Empire. — (c) As a means towards the accomplishment of his other purposes, the writer is desirous of showing how Christianity had spread from Jerusalem to the surrounding districts, from there to Antioch, and from Antioch through the provinces to Rome. He also explains in what way the Christians came
Church, and the early history of the Church in Jerusalem. In discussing them it is simplest to begin with the most marked feature — the ' we- clauses ' — and then work back to the earlier chapters.
(1) The ' we-clauses.' — As was shown above, the balance of evidence seems at present to be strongly in favour of the view that the writer of these sections intended to claim that he had been a companion of St. Paul, and that he was himself the editor of the whole book. If this be so, we have for the rest of the ' Paul ' narrative a source ready to our hand — the personal information obtained by Luke from St. Paul himself, or from other companions of St. Paul whom he met in his society. This may cover as much as Ac 9^"*" 1127-30