The Nativity Story

The Christmas season is fast approaching now. But it seems to have arrived earlier this year than normal (as it does every year). This year its early arrival is partially due to the fact that I have been studying the infancy narrative in Luke’s Gospel (Luke 1-2) as part of my thesis. On several occasions I found myself humming Christmas carols as I read through commentaries and articles on the birth of Jesus and the angelic announcement to the shepherds. “O Little Town of Bethlehem” featured quite regularly. 

Elizabeth (Luke 1)

It seemed only fitting that considering that, as my phd does focus on the Gospel of Luke, I should start featuring it a bit more on my blog. The main reason that this hasn’t been the case so far is that I have spent quite a bit of time dealing with background issues in the Old Testament and other Jewish and Greek literature rather than Luke itself. I have done some research on Luke but most of that is too dense to be put up here where I like to try and keep things as simple and straightforward as possible while still being interesting.

Leviticus and Deuteronomy

One of the bonuses of doing biblical research is that you get to learn all manner of interesting things that you might not have learnt otherwise, especially about parts of the bible that you don’t normally find yourself in. For example, Leviticus is usually the book where the bold plans many Christians have of reading the whole bible come grinding (or crashing) to a halt. Chapter upon chapter of laws about cleanliness and animal sacrifice is on a par with the genealogies at the beginning of Numbers and 1 Chronicles – they tend to put modern readers to sleep as they lack the features of stories that we are used to. Deuteronomy has the problem of being more or less a repetition of what has already been said in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers (much like 1-2 Chronicles is a repetition of 1-2 Samuel and 1-2 Kings). So all in all, Leviticus and Deuteronomy are unlikely to be anyone’s favourite biblical book (but if they are, let me know).

The Beatitudes in Matthew and Luke

As any reader of the Gospels will have noticed, there are two beatitude lists spoken by Jesus; one in Matthew and one in Luke. They are similar, but also different. For instance, both begin a major section of teaching by Jesus, in front of a crowd of his disciples and people from the surrounding countries. But in Matthew there are nine beatitudes and in Luke only four. What is more, Luke contrasts his beatitudes with four woes, whereas Matthew has none.

The Synoptic Problem

One of the problems with choosing to work with the Gospel of Luke as the central topic of my phd is that I have to come to terms with the Synoptic Problem. For those who have not done any theological training or have just simply never heard of this before, this the area of scholarly debate which seeks to address the large quantities of material shared by Matthew, Mark and Luke. And it can be a minefield, especially when first encountered. As a result, I have been avoiding it as much as possible. However, now this is no longer possible.