f it? They relate
so many wonders, why not this one, the greatest of all? But it is not
enough that they do not claim any miraculous communication for themselves
or their works. Luke states in plain words the character of his gospel,
"For as much as many have taken in hand to draw up a narrative concerning
those matters which have been fulfilled among us, even as they delivered
them unto us, which from the beginning were eye-witnesses, and ministers
of the word (Logos); it seemed good to me also, having traced the course
of all things accurately from the first, to write unto thee in order, most
excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty concerning the
things wherein thou wast instructed."

What can be clearer? Theophilus had evidently received a not very
systematic Christian training, such as was possible under the conditions
of that time. As Luke says, there were even then several works on the
matters of common belief among Christians. In order, however, that
Theophilus may have a trustworthy knowledge of them, his friend (whether
Luke or any one else) determines to communicate them to him in regular
order, as they had been imparted to him, without asserting that he had
himself been from the beginning an eye-witness of them, or a minister of
the Word. It is apparent, therefore, that the writer rests upon a
tradition derived from eye-witnesses, and that he had even investigated
everything with care. Is it credible that he would not have made mention
of a revelation or a theophany, had either fallen to his lot? He also lays
stress upon his orderly arrangement, which probably implies that even at
that time there were the same discrepancies in the sequence of events that
we observe in the four Gospels, to say nothing about the numerous
apocryphal Gospels. This is just what we as historians expected, in fact
it could scarcely be otherwise. Christ's message had first to pass through
the colloquial process, the leavening process of oral transmission; then
followed the reduction to written form, and it is this that we have, apart
from the corruptions of copyists. It is difficult to conceive how it could
have been otherwise, and still we are not content with these facts, and
imagine that we could have done it much better ourselves.

When we take the Synoptic Gospels one by one, we find in Luke the most
complete and probably the latest sequence of all the important events; in
Mark, the shortest and probably most