Luke was deficient in the sense for time ; and hence his chronology is bad. It would be quite impossible from Acts alone to get a true idea of the lapse of time. That is the fault of his age ; Tacitus, writing the biography of Agricola (about 98 A.D.), makes no chronological statement, until in the last paragraph he gives a series of statistics. Luke had studied the sequence of events carefully, and observes it in his arrangement minutely, but he often has to carry forward one thread of his narrative, and then goes back in time to take up another thread ; and these transitions are some- times rather harsh. Yet, in respect of chronology, he was, perhaps, less careless than would appear : see p. 23.
His plan leads him to concentrate attention on the critical steps. Hence he often passes lightly over a long period of gradual development marked by no striking incident ; and from his bad chronological sense he gives no measure of the lapse of time implied in a sentence, a clause, or even a word. He dismisses ten years in a breath, and devotes a chaptel to a single incident. His character as an historian, there- fore, depends on his selection of topics. Does he show the true historian's power of seizing the great facts, and mark- ing clearly the stages in the development of his subject ? Now, what impresses me is the sense of proportion in Acts, and the skill with which a complex and difficult subject is grouped to bring out the historical development from the primitive Church (Ch. I-V) through the successive steps associated with four great names, Stephen, Philip,
Sec. 3. Working Hypothesis of the Investigation. 1 9
Peter, Paul. Where the author passes rapidly over a period or a journey, we shall find reason to believe that it was marked by no striking feature and no new foundation. The axiom from which we start must be that which is assumed in all literary investigations — pre- ference is to be given to the interpretation which restores order, lucidity, and sanity to the work. All that we ask in this place is the admission of that axiom, and a patient hearing, and especially that the reader, before condemning our first steps as not in harmony with other incidents, will wait to see how we can interpret those incidents.
The dominant interpretation rests avowedly on the principle that Acts is full of gaps, and that "nothing is more striking than the want of proportion ". Those un- fortunate words of Bishop Lightfoot are worked out by some of his successors with that " illogical consistency " which often leads the weaker disciples of a great teacher to choose his errors for loving imitation and emphasis. With such a theory no historical absurdity is too gross to be imputed to Luke. But our hypothesis is that Luke's silence about an incident or person should always be investigated as a piece of evidence, on the principle that he had some reason for his silence; and in the course of this study we shall in several cases find that omission is a distinct element in the effect of his narrative.
There is a contrast between the early chapters of Acts and the later. In the later chapters there are few sen- tences that do not afford some test of their accuracy by mentioning external facts of life, history, and antiquities. But the earlier chapters contain comparatively few such details ; the subject in them is handled in a vaguer way, with a less vigorous and nervous grasp ; the facts are
20 The Acts of the Apostles, Chap. I.
rarely given in their local and historical surroundings, and sometimes seem to float in air rather than to stand on solid ground.
This fundamental difference in handling must be acknow- ledged ; but it can be fairly attributed to difference of information and of local knowledge. The writer shows himself in his later narrative to be a stranger to the Levant and familiar with the y£gean ; he could not stand with the same confidence on the soil of Syria and Palestine, as on that of Asia Minor or Greece. Moreover, he was dealing with an earlier period ; and he had not the advantage of formal historical narratives, such as he mentions for the period described in his First Book (the Gospel). Luke was dependent on various informants in the earlier chap- ters of Acts (among them Paul and Philip) ; and he put together their information, in many cases reproducing it almost verbatim. Sometimes the form of his record gives a clue to the circumstances in which he learned it. That line of investigation is liable to become subjective and fanciful ; but modern historical investigation always tries to get behind the actual record and to investigate the ultimate sources of statements.