Luke for Everyone

N. T. Wright

• Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press
• Year: 2004
• ISBN:
  9781611640366
• Topic: Teologia e religione
• Subtopic: Commento della Bibbia

Enlarged print edition now available! Tom Wright's guide to Luke, which includes a wealth of information and background detail, provides real insights for our understanding of the story of Jesus and its implications for the reader. His clear style is accessible for new readers of the Bible, as well as to those who are further on. His exciting new translation of the biblical text brings to life, passage by passage, the immediacy and drama of Luke's Gospel.

Tom Wright has undertaken a tremendous task: to provide guides to all the books of the New Testament, and to include in them his own translation of the entire text. Each short passage is followed by a highly readable discussion with background information, useful explanations and suggestions, and thoughts as to how the text can be relevant to our lives today. A glossary is included at the back of the book. The series is suitable for group study, personal study, or daily devotions.

LUKE 1.1–4

Prologue

¹Many people have undertaken to draw up an orderly account of the events that have occurred in our midst. ²It has been handed down to us by the original eyewitnesses and stewards of the word. ³So, most excellent Theophilus, since I had traced the course of all of it scrupulously from the start, I thought it a good idea to write an orderly account for you, ⁴so that you may have secure knowledge about the matters in which you have been instructed.

‘SPACE ALIENS TOOK MY BABY’, screams the headline. Or perhaps ‘GRANDMOTHER SWIMS ATLANTIC’. And what do people say? ‘It must be true; it was in the newspapers.’ ‘I saw it on television. ‘ ‘The person who told me was told by someone who was there at the time.’

We have learnt to laugh at all of these. News is ‘packaged’ to tell us what we want to hear. Television cameras often deceive. And stories which come from ‘a friend of a friend’ might as well be fiction. How do we know what to believe?

Luke opens his gospel with a long, formal sentence, like a huge stone entrance welcoming you impressively to a large building. Here, he is saying, is something solid, something you can trust. Writers in the first-century Mediterranean world quite often wrote opening sentences like this; readers would know they were beginning a serious, well-researched piece of work. This wasn’t a fly-by-night or casual account. It would hold its head up in the world at large.

‘Of course,’ we think, with our suspicious modern minds, ‘he would say that, wouldn’t he?’ But look at the claims he makes. Luke isn’t asking us simply to take it on trust; he is appealing to a wide base of evidence. Several others have written about these events; he has these writings, some of which we may be able to trace, as sources. He has been in touch with eyewitnesses who have told him what they saw and heard. And, perhaps most important, he has listened to accredited teachers within local communities. We need to say a further word about these people.

Imagine a village in ancient Palestine. They didn’t have printed books or newspapers, television or radio. They had official storytellers. Some great event would happen: an earthquake, a battle, or the visit of an emperor. Within a day or two the story would be told all round the village, and would settle into a regular form. Everyone would know the story, but some of the better storytellers in the village would be recognized by the others as the right people to tell it.

And that’s what they’d do. They wouldn’t change the story or modify it; if they did, people would notice and set them straight. Perhaps the closest we get to this in the modern Western world is when a family tells a story or anecdote, often with everybody knowing what’s coming. In the same way, you don’t change the words of your national anthem, or of the songs that you sang as a child. So when Luke went round the villages of Palestine and Syria in the second half of the first century, listening to the stories told by the accredited storytellers – ‘the stewards of the word’, as he calls them – he would know he was in touch with solid, reliable evidence that went right back to the early events. Plato had said, five hundred years earlier, that there was a danger in writing things down; human memories, he thought, were the best way to get things right and pass them on. In the century after Luke, one of the great Christian teachers declared that he preferred living testimony to writings. You can’t tell where a book has come from, but you can look witnesses in the eye, and use your judgment about whether to trust them.

So why is Luke writing it all down now? Isn’t he shooting himself in the foot? Who was he, anyway, and when was he writing?

I wish we knew for sure who the author of this book was, but actually we don’t. We call him ‘Luke’ because that’s who the church, from very early on, said had written this gospel and the Acts of the Apostles (as you’ll see from Acts 1.1, Acts appears to be written by the same person, and there are signs throughout both books that this is in fact the case). He may well have been the Luke whom Paul mentions as his companion (Colossians 4.14; Philemon 24; 2 Timothy 4.11). He could have been writing any time between AD 50 and 90; there must have been time for the ‘many others’ he refers to to have written and circulated their works, but equally there is no particular reason to insist that he must have been writing as late as 90, or even 80. A fair guess is probably that he was indeed Luke, one of Paul’s companions, and that he was writing in the 60s and 70s.

The main reason he’s writing is that the message about Jesus has spread far and wide, way beyond the original communities in the regions Jesus himself visited. Peter, Paul and other missionaries had carried the message in all directions, and doubtless there were garbled, muddled and misleading reports circulating about who exactly Jesus was, what he did and said, and what had happened to him. Luke knows of other writings that have begun the task of putting it down on paper, but he has a wider audience in mind, an educated, intelligent, enquiring public. ‘Most excellent Theophilus’ may be a real person, perhaps a Roman governor or local official, whom Luke has come to know; or this may be a literary device, a way of addressing anyone who has heard about Christianity, and who is perhaps ‘a lover of God’ (that’s what ‘Theophilus’ means in Greek). He does imply that ‘Theophilus’ has already been officially taught something about Jesus and what it means to follow him, so perhaps he also intends it for recent converts who are eager to learn more.

In any case, if he is writing in the late 60s or early 70s, a further reason would be the horrendous war that was raging in Palestine at the time. The Jews rebelled against the occupying Roman forces in 66, until finally, after a long siege, Jerusalem was destroyed in 70. The result was that many towns and villages where Jesus had been seen and known were decimated. Not only was the older generation dying out, but communities that had witnessed Jesus’ activities were being dispersed or destroyed. The stories, which depended for transmission on a peaceful, stable society, were in danger of dying out. Unless steps were taken to write them down, the message would not be passed on to the next generation. And since Luke, like all the early Christians, believed that the things that had actually happened – what we would call the historical facts – had changed the course of the world, it was vital that they be presented as clearly and unambiguously as possible.

Luke thus constructs a grand doorway into his gospel. He invites us to come in and make ourselves at home. Here we will find security, a solid basis for lasting faith.

LUKE 1.5–25

Gabriel Visits Zechariah

⁵In the time when Herod was King of Judaea, there was a priest called Zechariah, of the priestly division of Abijah. His wife, who came from the Aaron family, was called Elisabeth. ⁶Both of them were righteous in God’s sight; they followed all the Lord’s commandments and ordinances without fault. ⁷They had no children. Elisabeth was barren, and both of them were of an advanced age.

⁸It so happened, when Zechariah was performing his priestly service before God, according to the order of his division, ⁹that the lot fell to him, according to the priestly custom, to go in to the Lord’s sanctuary to offer incense. ¹⁰The people were praying outside in a large crowd, at the time of the incense-offering.

¹¹An angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right hand side of the incense-altar. ¹²Zechariah was troubled and terror-struck when he saw the angel.

¹³But the angel said to him:

‘Don’t be afraid, Zechariah: your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elisabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John. ¹⁴This will bring you joy and celebration, and many will rejoice at his birth. ¹⁵He will be a great man in God’s sight; he will drink no wine or strong drink. He will be filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother’s womb, ¹⁶and will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. ¹⁷He will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, and he will turn the hearts of fathers to children, and of unbelievers to the wisdom of the righteous. He will get ready for the Lord a prepared people.’

¹⁸‘How can I be sure of this?’ said Zechariah to the angel. ‘I’m an old man! My wife’s not as young as she used to be, either!’

¹⁹‘Look here,’ replied the angel, ‘I’m Gabriel. I stand in God’s presence. I was sent to speak to you and give you this splendid news. ²⁰Now, listen: you will be silent – you won’t be able to speak – until the day when it all happens, because you didn’t believe my words. But they will come true at the proper time.’

²¹Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah, and were surprised that he was taking such a long time in the sanctuary. ²²But when he came out he couldn’t speak to them, and they understood that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He made gestures to them, but remained speechless.

²³So, when the days of his priestly service were complete, he went back home. ²⁴After that time, Elisabeth his wife conceived. She stayed in hiding for five months.

²⁵‘This is the Lord’s doing,’ she said; ‘at last he has looked on me, and taken away my public shame.’

The capital of Ireland is the wonderful old city of Dublin. It is famous for many reasons. People go there from all over the world to stroll around its streets, to drink in its pubs, to visit its historic buildings, and to see the places made world-famous by writers such as James Joyce.

Perhaps surprisingly, the attraction that draws most visitors in Dublin is the zoo. And, perhaps equally surprisingly, the second most popular site for visitors is the Book of Kells, displayed at the centre of a special exhibition in Trinity College. This wonderfully ornamented manuscript of the gospels dates to around AD 800 – considerably closer in time to the New Testament itself than to us today.

The people who arranged the exhibition don’t let the public see the gospels themselves straight away. Wisely, they lead you first past several other very old books, which prepare you step by step for the great treasure itself. By the time you reach the heart of the exhibition you have already thought your way back to the world of early Celtic Christianity, to the monks who spent years of their life painstakingly copying out parts of the Bible and lavishly decorating it. You are now ready to appreciate it properly.

Luke has done something very similar in the opening of his gospel. His story is, of course, principally about Jesus, but the name ‘Jesus’ doesn’t occur for the first 30 verses, and Jesus himself is not born until well into the story. Luke is going to tell us about Mary’s extraordinary pregnancy and Jesus’ extraordinary birth, but he knows we will need to prepare our minds and hearts for this story. So he begins with the story of Zechariah and Elisabeth, a devout couple going about their everyday life.

First he grips us with their human drama. This couple, well past childbearing age, are going to have a son at last, in a culture where childless women were mocked. This drama is heightened by the comic encounter between Zechariah and the angel (don’t be frightened of finding the Bible funny when it really is!). Luke indicates that through this all-too-human story of puzzlement, half-faith, and dogged devotion to duty, God’s saving purposes are going to be dramatically advanced. The son to be born will fulfil the biblical promises that had spoken of God sending someone to prepare Israel for the coming divine visitation. The scriptures had foretold that the prophet Elijah would return one day to get the people ready for God’s arrival. Gabriel tells Zechariah that this will be John’s task.

The story would remind any Bible reader of much older stories: Abraham and Sarah having a child in their old age (Genesis 21), Rachel bearing Jacob two sons after years of childlessness (Genesis 30; 35), and particularly the births of Samson (Judges 13) and Samuel (1 Samuel 1). This story, Luke hints, is not a strange new thing, but takes its place within a long-standing sequence of God’s purposes. The child to be born, who will be called John, will play a key role in God’s fulfilment of his promises. The story thus prepares us, like tourists getting into the mood for the central exhibit, for the still more remarkable events that will follow swiftly.

Zechariah and Elisabeth weren’t expecting any of this. They were simply devout people going about their regular business. They were ‘righteous in God’s sight’, observant Jews, keeping the law as a sign of grateful devotion to God. They lived outside Jerusalem, in the Judaean hill-country. Like all priests except the chief priests, who lived in Jerusalem itself, Zechariah would come in to the city when it was the turn of his division to perform the regular Temple-liturgy; he would stay in lodgings within the Temple precincts, and then return home to continue his normal work as a teacher and leader in the local community. On this occasion Zechariah was appointed by lot to go into the inner court, out of sight of the lay people, to offer incense. Sometimes regular duty provides the context for extraordinary visions.

Luke is careful not to dress up the story by making Zechariah a great hero of faith. Like some of the Old Testament leaders, his first reaction to the news is to clutch at straws: he needs a sign, something that will help him to believe. He is given one, but it comes as a punishment; we can almost see the angel putting his hands on his hips and telling Zechariah off for presuming to doubt his word. Zechariah is struck speechless, and the dark comedy continues with the old priest coming out to the people and making signs and gestures to indicate what had happened (how would you describe seeing an angel, just using your hands and arms?). The account concludes, of course, with Elisabeth’s joy at her unexpected pregnancy.

This story, preparing us for the even more remarkable conception and birth of Jesus himself, reminds us of something important. God regularly works through ordinary people, doing what they normally do, who with a mixture of half-faith and devotion are holding themselves ready for whatever God has in mind. The story is about much more than Zechariah’s joy at having a son at last, or Elisabeth’s exultation in being freed from the scorn of the mothers in the village. It is about the great fulfilment of God’s promises and purposes. But the needs, hopes and fears of ordinary people are not forgotten in this larger story, precisely because of who Israel’s God is – the God of lavish, self-giving love, as Luke will tell us in so many ways throughout his gospel. When this God acts on the large scale, he takes care of smaller human concerns as well. The drama which now takes centre stage is truly the story of God, the world, and every ordinary human being who has ever lived in it. That’s how Luke intends it to be.

LUKE 1.26–38

The Annunciation of the Birth of Jesus

²⁶In the sixth month, Gabriel the angel was sent from God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, ²⁸to a virgin engaged to a man called Joseph, from the family of David. The virgin was called Mary.

²⁸‘Greetings, favoured one!’ said the angel when he arrived. ‘May the Lord be with you!’

²⁹She was disturbed at this, and wondered what such a greeting might mean.

³⁰‘Don’t be afraid, Mary,’ said the angel. ‘You’re in favour with God. ³¹Listen: you will conceive in your womb and will have a son; and you shall call his name Jesus. ³²He will be a great man, and he’ll be called the son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of David his fath...