Acts (Paideia: Commentaries on the New Testament)

GENERAL EDITORS

Mikeal C. Parsons and Charles H. Talbert

ADVISORY BOARD

Paul J. Achtemeier

Loveday Alexander

C. Clifton Black

Susan R. Garrett

Francis J. Moloney

© 2008 by Mikeal C. Parsons

Published by Baker Academic

a division of Baker Publishing Group

P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287

www.bakeracademic.com

Ebook edition created 2013

Ebook corrections 04.27.2018

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

ISBN 978-1-5855-8821-3

Quotations from the book of Acts are from Martin M. Culy and Mikeal C. Parsons. Acts: A Handbook on the Greek Text, copyright © 1989 by Baylor University Press. Used by permission.

Other scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

In memory of

Cronje B. Earp

and

in honor of

Dean M. Martin

R. Alan Culpepper

Charles H. Talbert

Contents

Cover

Series Page

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

List of Figures

Foreword

Preface

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Introduction

Part 1. Acts 1–7   The Sense of a Beginning

Acts 1   The Beginning of the Church

Acts 2   The Miracle and Meaning of Pentecost

Acts 3:1–4:31   The Healing of a Lame Man

Acts 4:32–5:42   Tensions Within and Without

Acts 6–7   Stephen and the Seven

Part 2. Acts 8–12   Beyond Jerusalem: Philip, Saul, Peter, and Others

Acts 8   Philip: A Man on a Mission

Acts 9:1–31   Saul and Ananias: Conversion and Call

Acts 9:32–11:18   Peter: His Words and Deeds

Acts 11:19–12:25   Barnabas, Peter, and Herod

Part 3. Acts 13–19   Paul’s Mission to the Gentile World

Acts 13–14   Paul’s Initial Missionary Campaign

Acts 15:1–16:5   The Jerusalem Conference

Acts 16:6–17:15   Paul in Macedonia

Acts 17:16–18:17   Paul in Achaia

Acts 18:18–19:41   Paul in Ephesus

Part 4. Acts 20–28   Paul’s Farewell Journey

Acts 20:1–21:16   Paul’s Last Journey to Jerusalem

Acts 21:17–23:35   Paul in Jerusalem

Acts 24–26   Paul before Felix, Festus, and Agrippa

Acts 27–28   The Sea Voyage to Rome

Bibliography

Subject Index

Index of Modern Authors

Index of Scripture and Ancient Writings

Back Cover

List of Figures

1. Map of the Setting of Acts in the Roman World

2. Giotto di Bondone, Pentecost

3. The Healing of the Lame Man: Temporal Segmentation

4. The Healing of the Lame Man: Spatial Segmentation

5. Annibale Carracci, The Martyrdom of St. Stephen

6. Tommasso Masolino, St. Peter Raising Tabitha

7. Raphael, The Liberation of St. Peter from Prison

8. The Parthenon

9. Mars Hill

10. The Gallio Inscription

11. A Magical Text

12. What Would Luke Think?     

13. I’m Going to Say Something Now

Foreword

Paideia: Commentaries on the New Testament is a series that sets out to comment on the final form of the New Testament text in a way that pays due attention both to the cultural, literary, and theological settings in which the text took form and also to the interests of the contemporary readers to whom the commentaries are addressed. This series is aimed squarely at students—including MA students in religious and theological studies programs, seminarians, and upper-divisional undergraduates—who have theological interests in the biblical text. Thus the didactic aim of the series is to enable students to understand each book of the New Testament as a literary whole rooted in a particular ancient setting and related to its context within the New Testament.

The name Paideia reflects (1) the instructional aim of the series—giving contemporary students a basic grounding in academic New Testament studies by guiding their engagement with New Testament texts; (2) the fact that the New Testament texts as literary unities are shaped by the educational categories and ideas (rhetorical, narratological, etc.) of their ancient writers and readers; and (3) the pedagogical aims of the texts themselves—their central aim being not simply to impart information but to form the theological convictions and moral habits of their readers.

Each commentary deals with the text in terms of larger rhetorical units; these are not verse-by-verse commentaries. This series thus stands within the stream of recent commentaries that attend to the final form of the text. Such reader-centered literary approaches are inherently more accessible to liberal arts students without extensive linguistic and historical-critical preparation than older exegetical approaches, but within the reader-centered world the sanest practitioners have paid careful attention to the extratext of the original readers, including not only these readers’ knowledge of the geography, history, and other context elements reflected in the text but also to their ability to respond correctly to the literary and rhetorical conventions used in the text. Paideia commentaries pay deliberate attention to this extratextual repertoire in order to highlight the ways in which the text is designed to persuade and move its readers. Each rhetorical unit is explored from three angles: (1) introductory matters; (2) tracing the train of thought or narrative or rhetorical flow; and (3) theological issues raised by the text that are of interest to the contemporary Christian. Thus the primary focus remains on the text and not its historical context or its interpretation in the secondary literature.

Our authors represent a variety of confessional points of view: Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Greek Orthodox. What they share, beyond being New Testament scholars of national and international repute, is a commitment to reading the biblical text as theological documents within their ancient contexts. Working within the broad parameters described here, each author brings his or her own considerable exegetical talents and deep theological commitments to the task of laying bare the interpretation of Scripture for the faith and practice of God’s people everywhere.

Mikeal C. Parsons

Charles H. Talbert

Preface

Biblical commentaries belong to a genre distinctive to the study of scriptures, texts held to be sacred and authoritative for the faith and practice of religious communities. As such, they demand something from the interpreter that other genres of writing rarely require, namely, attention to each and every paragraph—if not to every word—of the text. Thus commentary writing, which attempts to follow the argument and logic of another and to present that argument as transparently as possible, demands a different kind of discipline than the academic monograph, whose writer attempts to present his or her own logic as lucidly and clearly as possible. Submitting myself to the discipline of this kind of analysis, that is, tracing the narrative logic of the ancient writer who produced the Acts of the Apostles, has been both rewarding and challenging. One is forced to comment on texts the meaning of which may not be readily apparent to the interpreter!

I have worked on Acts for more than twenty-five years, producing various articles and monographs, with a goal, eventually, of producing a full-length commentary. The actual writing of the commentary took place during the 2006–2007 academic year and was especially intense during the spring and summer of 2007, during which time I had a research leave. Taking up my post in a small cubicle in my university’s library, I spent eight or more hours each day engaging with and engaged by the narrative of Acts. My sustained experience with this portion of scripture has profoundly deepened my respect for the literary skills and theological vision of the author who produced it. That respect stands in contrast to the critical reception of Acts among those (perhaps many) who still view the Lukan corpus as the unwanted stepchild among the New Testament writings. That disregard was encapsulated for me in a throw-away comment by a colleague in the field, who, upon learning that I was writing a commentary on Acts, quipped: You have the best story with the worst theology in the New Testament! I must now register my strong disagreement with the latter part of this assessment; Luke’s literary skills in communicating his story are matched if not exceeded by the theological vision that undergirds that story. If this commentary in some small way makes that theological vision a bit more transparent to the modern reader, then it will have achieved my aspirations for it.

One feature of the commentary is the attention paid to the ways in which the Christian scriptures, in this case Acts, shape the theological reflection and moral habits of its Christian readers; hence the title of the commentary series, Paideia. I am glad also to confess that over time this moral vision has captured my own theological imagination, and I humbly count myself in the company of St. Luke, that is, among those who continue to be schooled in matters of Luke’s vision of the Christian Way. The discipline required in commentary writing thus has produced another kind of discipline, this one a kind of spiritual discipline that frankly came upon me in unexpected but welcome ways.

The format of the commentary does not allow me to register in each passage the deep debt I owe to those who have sought to comment on the Acts of the Apostles from beginning to end. I have learned so much about Luke’s Acts from these writers, from Chrysostom and the Venerable Bede to—among others— Joseph Fitzmyer, Beverly Gaventa, Justo González, Ernst Haenchen, Luke Timothy Johnson, John Polhill, Gerhard Schneider, Scott Spencer, Ben Witherington, and my colleague, Charles Talbert, even—perhaps especially—when I found myself disagreeing with them.

I have also profited from the growing body of secondary literature, monographs, articles, and especially doctoral dissertations that have grappled with specific aspects of Acts. In particular, I should like to mention the community of doctoral students at Baylor University who over the years have produced significant contributions in seminar papers and dissertations (some published, some unpublished, and some still in progress) to my understanding of the Lukan corpus: Andrew Arterbury, Kenneth Bass, Martin Culy, Norfleete Day, Derek Dodson, Stan Harstine, Chad Hartsock, Derek Hogan, Dennis Horton, Ira Jolivet Jr., David Matson, Jim McConnell, Kathy Maxwell, Alicia Myers, Mark Proctor, Keith Reich, Jesse Robertson, William Shiell, Julien Smith, Josh Stigall, and Jason Whitlark. In addition to sharing their work with me, several of them also read and interacted with parts of the commentary. It has been an extraordinary blessing to live and work among such a talented and committed community of young scholars, who along with my colleagues in New Testament, Sharyn Dowd, Naymond Keathley, Charles Talbert, and now Lidija Novakovic, have contributed to an environment that is both nurturing and challenging. I especially wish to thank Jim McConnell, who worked with extraordinary patience and diligence in tracking down sources and putting the manuscript in proper format.

I have used the translation produced with Marty Culy for Acts: A Handbook on the Greek Text, published by Baylor University Press (2003). Translations are already acts of interpretation and, in those cases where readers want fuller explanation for the translation (as well as technical discussions of grammar and text-critical issues), they are encouraged to turn to the Handbook for more details. Appreciation is expressed to my coauthor, Marty Culy, and to Dr. Carey Newman, director of Baylor University Press, for permission to use the translation in the commentary.

I am grateful to Baylor University, and especially Provost Randall O’Brien and my departmental chair, Bill Bellinger, for their continued expressions of support, in particular for making possible the aforementioned research leave in spring 2007. James Ernest of Baker Academic first proposed the idea of the series in which this commentary appears and extended the invitation to me to serve not only as an author but also as series coeditor with Charles Talbert. From that initial conversation years ago at a regional SBL meeting has come an impressive collection of authors among whom I am proud to be counted. For James’s gentle spirit and firm editorial hand, I am most thankful, and I look forward to the time when the series is complete!

As always, my family has been my primary source of support and encouragement. For the undeserved joy that Heidi and my children bring to my life, I once again express my deep gratitude. Final revisions to the manuscript were made during the summer of 2007 while we were in Florence, Italy. Thanks especially to Heidi for helping each of us make Italy our home away from home!

Like Luke’s audience, I have been schooled by masters in matters of faith, and it is to four of those mentors that I dedicate this book: Cronje B. Earp—blessed be his memory—taught me, as an undergraduate, how to read classical and Hellenistic Greek. Dean M. Martin, first as my undergraduate adviser and later as a colleague, taught me how to read critically and think theologically. R. Alan Culpepper, first through his seminars and later as a colleague, and Charles H. Talbert, first through his writings and later as a colleague, taught me the art of theological exegesis in interpreting the Greek New Testament, and Luke/Acts in particular. It has been my distinct privilege to be taught more accurately about the Way by these Christian intellectuals, and for those opportunities I will be forever in their debt. I offer this commentary and a humble and grateful heart as a poor return for their investment of time and friendship over the years.

Mikeal C. Parsons

Baylor University

Lent 2008

Acknowledgments

Appreciation is expressed to the following publishers for permission to reproduce portions of these publications:

Fortress Press for permission to reproduce portions of chapter one in Mikeal C. Parsons and Richard I. Pervo, Rethinking the Unity of Luke and Acts (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993).

Baker Academic for permission to reproduce portions of chapters 7 and 8 of Body and Character in Luke and Acts: The Subversion of Physiognomy in Early Christianity (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006).

Baylor University Press for permission to reproduce portions of the introduction and the translation found in A Handbook on the Greek Text of Acts (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2003).

Hendrickson Publishers for permission to reproduce portions of chapter 7 of Luke: Storyteller, Interpreter, Evangelist (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007).

Mercer University for permission to reproduce portions of Acts, pp. 1–64 in Acts and Pauline Writings (Mercer Commentary on the Bible 7; edited by Watson E. Mills, Richard F. Wilson, et al.; Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1997).

The National Association of Baptist Professors of Religion for permission to reproduce portions of Nothing Defiled AND Unclean: The Conjunction’s Function in Acts 10:14, Perspectives in Religious Studies 27 (2000): 263–74.

Abbreviations

General

Bible Texts and Versions

Ancient Corpora

OLD TESTAMENT

DEUTEROCANONICAL BOOKS

NEW TESTAMENT

DEAD SEA SCROLLS AND RELATED WRITINGS

TARGUMIC TEXTS

RABBINIC LITERATURE

OLD TESTAMENT PSEUDEPIGRAPHA

APOSTOLIC FATHERS

NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA AND PSEUDEPIGRAPHA

NAG HAMMADI CODICES

Ancient Authors

ACHILLES TATIUS

ADAMANTIUS

AELIUS ARISTIDES

AESCHINES

AESCHYLUS

ALBINUS

APHTHONIUS

APOLLODORUS

APOLLONIUS RHODIUS

APPIAN

APULEIUS

ARATUS

ARISTIDES, PUBLIUS AELIUS

ARISTOPHANES

ARISTOTLE

ARRIAN

ARTAPANUS

ARTEMIDORUS

ASCONIUS

ATHENAEUS

AUGUSTINE

AULUS GELLIUS

AURELIUS VICTOR

BEDE

CALLISTHENES

CHARITON

CICERO

CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA

CURTIUS RUFUS

DEMETRIUS

DEMOSTHENES

DIDYMUS

DIO CASSIUS

DIO CHRYSOSTOM

DIODORUS SICULUS

DIOGENES LAERTIUS

DIONYSIUS OF HALICARNASSUS

EPICTETUS

EPICURUS

EPIPHANIUS

EURIPIDES

EUSEBIUS

HELIODORUS

HERMOGENES

HERODIAN

HERODOTUS

HESIOD

HIPPOLYTUS

HOMER

HORACE

IAMBLICHUS

IRENAEUS

JEROME

JOHN CHRYSOSTOM

JOHN OF DAMASCUS

JOSEPHUS

JULIAN

JUSTIN

JUSTINIAN

JUVENAL

LACTANTIUS

LIBANIUS

LIVY

LONGUS

LUCIAN

MACROBIUS

MANETHO

MENANDER (COMICUS)

MENANDER (RHETOR)

MINUCIUS FELIX

NICOLAUS

ORIGEN

OVID

PAUSANIAS

PETRONIUS

PHILO

PHILO OF BYZANTIUM

PHILOSTRATUS

PHOEBAMMON

PINDAR

PLATO

PLINY THE ELDER

PLINY THE YOUNGER

PLUTARCH

POLEMO

POLLUX

POLYBIUS

QUINTILIAN

SALLUST

SALLUSTIUS

SENECA (THE ELDER)

SENECA (THE YOUNGER)

SILIUS ITALICUS

SOCRATES

STRABO

SUETONIUS

TACITUS

TERTULLIAN

THEMISTIUS

THEON

THEOPHILUS OF ANTIOCH

THUCYDIDES

TYCONIUS

VEGETIUS

VIRGIL

XENOPHON OF EPHESUS

XENOPHON THE HISTORIAN

Ancient Collections and Anonymous Works

Series, Collections, and Reference Works

Acts

Introduction

A storm center (Unnik 1966). Shifting sands (Talbert 1976). A fruitful field (Gasque 1988). These are but a few of the epithets used to describe the scholarly interpretation of the Acts of the Apostles in the twentieth century. The spate of commentaries and collected essays during the past two decades suggests continued and sustained interest in Acts (commentaries: Schneider 1980; Johnson 1992; Polhill 1992; Barrett 1994–1998; Spencer 1997; Talbert 1997, 2005; Fitzmyer 1998; Witherington 1998; González 2001; Gaventa 2003; Bock 2007; collected essays: Tyson 1988; Keathley 1990; Richard 1990; Neyrey 1991; Parsons and Tyson 1992; Marconi and O’Collins 1993; Witherington 1996; Marshall and Peterson 1998; Thompson and Phillips 1998; Moessner 1999; Verheyden 1999).

This introduction aims at addressing topics necessary to orient the reader in using the commentary as a guide for interpreting Acts. Some of these issues are typically associated with critical introductions (authorship, date, place, etc.); others are not. The focus of the introduction, as with the commentary, is the text and its interpretation, and as such, the history of the interpretation of Acts (available elsewhere; see Gasque 1975) yields to a focus on the work itself (though a volume on the reception history of Acts is in the works: see Parsons and Hornik, forthcoming).

Since issues typically associated with a commentary introduction are scattered throughout this introduction, it may be useful to state succinctly the perspective taken on those issues in this work. The author of Acts, traditionally known as Luke, wrote what became known as the Acts of the Apostles as a sequel to a plurality of gospels then currently in use of which the Third Gospel (which Luke also wrote) stands as the first among equals. The Third Gospel was written in the 80s (or 90s), followed some years later by Acts (within the first two decades of the second century, ca. AD 110). Little can be known for certain regarding the identity of the author of Acts; what is clear is that the text presents the early Christian movement, known as the Way, within the context of first-century Judaism(s), and that first-century Judaism(s), as well as the spread of the Christian movement, must be understood within the larger first-century Greco-Roman context. In his composition of Acts, Luke demonstrated command of a number of rhetorical conventions and techniques, drew on various cultural and social scripts, and blended multiple genres of writing (including, but not limited to, elements of ancient biography, historiography, novel, and perhaps epic). Acts is a charter document of Christian self-identity and legitimation, written, not for a specific Lukan community, but rather for a general audience of early Christians living in the ancient Mediterranean world. Inaccessible—and fortunately for our purposes, irrelevant—is the provenance of Luke at the time of composition (although Ephesus seems to be of special interest to the author). It is difficult to distinguish when Luke’s writing reflects things as they were when they happened, or as they were in Luke’s day at the time of his writing, or as Luke hoped they would be. Luke’s primary purpose in writing is to school his intended audience in the moral and theological implications of the Christian vision by telling the story of the first followers of the movement’s founder. For contemporary Christians to adopt the point of view of the authorial audience (with the nuances necessary for a document set in circumstances nineteen hundred years ago) is to share in this Christian vision; it is to be theologically formed by the perspectives of this part of the Christian canon.

To orient the user of this commentary it is helpful to speak of the now familiar relationship between author, text, and audience. These rubrics were popularized during the emergence of literary studies of the biblical text (see especially Culpepper 1983; Rhoads and Michie 1982) and were based on communication models that assumed that meaning was conveyed through the interaction of these three elements (cf. Chatman 1978).

A communication model appropriate for biblical narrative is at the same time simpler and more complex than most previous models. It is simpler in the sense that ancient writers rarely if ever employed narrators whose voice was in conflict with the ideology of the implied or real author (contra Dawsey 1986) as is sometimes the case in a modern novel. The biblical model is more complex because the process of composing texts often involved a scribe whose participation in the process may have varied from that of being a kind of human word processor, who simply wrote down everything dictated by the author, to the role of coauthor of the document. The roles of the scribe have been rather fully explored in Pauline studies (Murphy-O’Connor 1995). It is assumed for purposes of this commentary that if Luke did use a scribe it would have been for the purposes of writing down his dictation.

The other end of the model likewise represents a complicated situation. It is widely recognized in NT studies that the early Christian literature would have been read to a congregation or gathering of Christians by one appointed to that task, usually referred to as the reader or lector (see Shiell 2004). The role of the reader was later institutionalized in the church in the form of the lector, a minor office in the church (see Tertullian, Praescr. 41; Hippolytus, Trad. ap. 1.12). We find references to readers and public reading in the various types of literature in the NT (Mark 13:14; 1 Tim 4:13; Rev 1:3; cf. Gamble 1995, 218–24). At the beginning of the Christian movement, then, those tapped for the task of public reading, whether of the Jewish scriptures or emerging Christian literature, would have been chosen on the basis of their gifts for public speaking. In addition to being literate, readers would need the gifts of a strong voice and most likely some training in rhetoric. Among the rhetoricians, a strong voice was a natural gift. The reader of early Christian texts presumably had the gift of public speaking. This idea that speaking is a natural gift was easily translated by Christians as evidence of a spiritual gift (Const. ap. 8.22).

In the Roman period, training in rhetoric began in elementary school and continued, for those interested in pursuing a career in politics, through several advanced levels. We may assume that the first lectors or readers of early Christian literature were among those most highly trained in the practice of rhetoric. One bit of evidence for this is found in Irenaeus, who claims that some heretics do not know how to read Paul and gives as an example the need to clarify the use of hyperbaton, the transposition of words, in 2 Thess 2:8 (Haer. 3.7.2). Irenaeus, at least, presumes that the orthodox reader will have enough rhetorical training to avoid some basic mistakes in delivery.

Relatively little attention is paid in this commentary to the actual performance of Acts by the reader or lector (though cf. the comments on the lector’s gestures at 13:16; 24:10; 26:1, and the sidebar at 21:40), but the user of the commentary is well advised always to keep this fact in mind: the author of Acts expected his audience to experience the text aurally and communally (see also Shiell 2004). For this reason, the commentary refers to audience or authorial audience rather than reader not only to respect the role reserved for the reader or lector who performs the text by reading (or reciting) it aloud, but also to underscore the aural and communal context within which Luke expected his work to be experienced, and within which, in practice, it was. One imagines, then, a social context of early Christian worship in which Acts, as one among several early Christian texts, was read aloud as part of a Christian meeting, perhaps after a meal (following the pattern of the Hellenistic symposium), both for edification and for entertainment. The use of Acts as the textual basis for Christian proclamation did not arise until much later (although the second-century writers Irenaeus and Tertullian most certainly knew Acts; Ephraem the Syrian in the fourth century and John Chrysostom in the fifth produced the earliest extant collections of commentaries or homilies on Acts).

In its application to biblical studies, the communication model has often suffered from an overly optimistic view of the autonomy of the text, based on the (often unstated) assumption of what was then known as New Criticism, that a text could be understood best quite apart from its particular social and historical location and was independent of its author’s intentions (the so-called intentional fallacy; cf. Wimsatt and Beardsley 1954). The gains of this approach in NT studies, especially in terms of refocusing the interpreter’s attention on the final form of the text as we have it, rather than historical events, or literary or oral sources, or the evangelist’s mind, are well documented and thoughtfully critiqued (Moore 1989). The communication model, however, presumes a closer cultural and historical relationship between author, text, and audience, and if we rightfully demur from the notion of authorial intention as being too fraught with psychological overtones, we may nonetheless still speak of the intention of the text (intentio operis; cf. Eco 1992) as a way to emphasize the primacy of that first communication between Luke the author and his intended audience, the authorial audience.

The aim of this commentary, in keeping with the overall goals of the series in which it is published, is to read the final form of Acts within the early second-century historical, cultural, rhetorical, and theological contexts in which it was composed (as well as the mid-first-century contexts, which it purports to recount). The focus here is on the earliest reception of the final form of Acts. As such, the rubrics of author, text, and audience serve as helpful reminders of the importance of the first communication between author and audience in the form of a written text within its historical context. Exploring the author, in terms of issues of composition, and the audience, in terms of its reception and formation, allows the focus to remain on the text itself, not as an autonomous entity removed from its historical moorings but rather as a written communication between author and audience deeply embedded and implicated within its historical circumstances. The history of interpretation plays a role, in the sense that knowledge of it can give clues as to the important issues raised by the text as they have been understood over the history of the reception of Acts within the Christian community. Contextualizing the text in this way also allows theological issues of interest to contemporary Christian communities to arise naturally out of the exegetical treatment.

The Author and Issues of Composition

Most discussions of the authorship of Acts center on the author’s identity (see, e.g., Parsons 2001, 12–21, 54–55). Such debates typically assess the reliability of the traditions associating Acts with Luke the Beloved Physician and the problems of identifying the author’s ethnic identity (Gentile, Jew, or a God-fearing Jewish sympathizer). Luke’s ethnic identity is less important for interpretation than acknowledging that he situates the Christian community within the larger Jewish debate about self-identity. Here, clearly, Luke understands the Way to be a movement within first-century Judaism (see below and especially Theological Issues on 9:32–11:18).

Luke as Historian and Theologian

Surveyors of the Lukan landscape typically categorize the scholarship on Acts in terms of interest in Luke the historian, Luke the theologian, and, more recently, Luke the litterateur. The move from form and source criticism (Dibelius 1956 et al.), which focused on Luke as historian, to redaction criticism (Conzelmann 1960 et al.), which focused on Luke as theologian, to the newer literary studies (Tannehill 1986–1990 et al.), which focused on Luke as creative writer, have been well documented in the surveys of Acts research (see esp. Powell 1991). The attention Acts has generated has not always been positive. As a historian, though he had his defenders (see Ramsay 1906, Gasque 1975, Hemer 1989, Marshall 1990), Luke was routinely criticized for his unreliable depictions of various characters (e.g., Vielhauer 1966, 33–50, on Paul) and events (e.g., Knox 1950 on the Jerusalem conference). As a theologian Luke was accused, among other things, of advocating a triumphalistic theology of glory that was inferior to Paul’s theology of the cross and of replacing the pristine eschatology of early Christianity with a three-stage salvation history—an early Catholicism shaped by the delay of the parousia that represented a degenerative step away from the primitive Christian kerygma, which proclaimed the imminent return of Jesus (so Käsemann 1982, 89–92). Even Luke’s abilities as a writer have been called into question from time to time (see Dawsey 1986).

While these issues are pursued in more detail at specific points in the commentary, suffice it to say here that Luke’s theological agenda is rich and nuanced and can hold its own in comparison with Pauline or Johannine theology, against which it is often measured and found lacking. Luke tells the story of the first followers of Jesus in such a way as to highlight that community’s heritage in the scriptures and experience of Israel and at the same time to chronicle the new thing God has done through the death and resurrection of Jesus, Israel’s Messiah, especially in terms of the inclusion of the Gentiles into the newly constituted people of God. Luke’s use of Jewish scriptures and covenantal, especially Abrahamic, language and concepts are addressed throughout the commentary (see especially Theological Issues on 3:1–4:31; 6–7). This community is called to bear faithful witness to the resurrected Lord, even as it suffers for that witness throughout the Roman Empire.

In terms of Luke as historian, Acts suggests an author deeply committed to historical verisimilitude, a commitment that rests in part on Luke’s determination to get the story straight. A modern reader, however, must recognize that getting the story straight in an ancient context does not imply that Luke got it right historically in terms of every detail (though neither is Luke free simply to make stuff up). Rather, Luke’s commitment to verisimilitude is just as much a reflection of Luke’s training in rhetoric as it is a reflection of his knowledge of ancient historiography. Quintilian wrote, It is possible to make sound use of anything that is naturally sound (Inst. 2.10.3, trans. Brett Butler, 1921).

Luke and Rhetoric

To understand Luke either as theologian or historian, we must first understand his skills as a writer. And while modern literary criticism has been successful in raising the question of Luke as litterateur, it has not yet been able to circumscribe it fully. In part this is due to reliance on categories and concepts based on the modern novel and not categories and concepts derived from antiquity. To understand the historical verisimilitude and theological message of Acts, one must first understand the rhetorical strategies and conventions employed by the author. Thus issues of composition are of singular significance in this commentary and mark its distinctive, and perhaps most important, contribution to the interpretation of Acts.

This conclusion is based firmly on the assumption that the historical and theological content of Acts—the what of Luke’s message—is irreducibly shaped by and inextricably interwoven with the how of Luke’s message, that is, the ways in which Luke has shaped Acts into a well-formed narrative, drawing upon all the figures of speech and literary conventions at his disposal through his training in ancient rhetoric.

Species of Ancient Rhetoric

George Kennedy gives a concise and clear summary of the different kinds of rhetorical speech practiced in antiquity:

"There are three species of rhetoric, a theory formulated by Aristotle (Rhet. 3.1.1358a) and universally found in subsequent writers: judicial, deliberative, and epideictic. Although these categories specifically refer to the circumstances of classical civic oratory, they are in fact applicable to all discourse. The species is judicial when the author is seeking to persuade the audience to make a judgment about events occurring in the past; it is deliberative when he seeks to persuade them to take some action in the future; it is epideictic when he seeks to persuade them to hold or reaffirm some point of view in the present, as when he celebrates or denounces some person or some quality."

Kennedy further recognizes that in a single discourse there is sometimes the utilization of more than one species, and the definition of the species as a whole can become very difficult (Kennedy 1984, 19). This is certainly the case with some of the speeches in Acts, although it is a helpful exercise to attempt to understand the rhetorical conventions at work in the individual speeches.

Studies of the speeches in Acts show that Luke was more than competent in the handbook tradition, and it is possible to analyze the speeches in Acts in terms of their rhetorical species (cf. Kennedy 1984, 114–40; Neyrey 1984, 210–23; Black 1988, 1–8; Morgenthaler 1993; Satterthwaite 1993, 337–79; Soards 1994). Scholars, for the most part (though cf. Taylor 1946), have been reluctant to apply these insights to the narrative portions of Acts. One reason for hesitation has been the recognition that the rhetorical handbook tradition represented by Cicero, Quintilian, and others is aimed at training orators for declamation; that is, their focus is on delivering oral speeches, not on writing narratives. This reading of the handbooks, of course, fails to appreciate that Quintilian, Cicero, and the others generously quote examples from various Greek and Latin epics, histories, poetry, and other works. Still, the reluctance is understandable.

Based on the speeches, it is fair to conclude also that Luke would have cut his rhetorical teeth, as it were, on the progymnasmata tradition. The progymnasmata were handbooks that outlined ‘preliminary exercises’ designed to introduce students who had completed basic grammar and literary studies to the fundamentals of rhetoric that they would then put to use in composing speeches and prose (Braun 1995, 146). As such, these graded series of exercises were probably intended to facilitate the transition from grammar school to the more advanced study of rhetoric. Four of these progymnasmata from the first to fifth centuries AD have survived: Theon (first century?), Hermogenes (second century), Aphthonius (fourth), and Nicolaus (fifth) (collected and translated in Kennedy 2003).

What is important about these writings is that some of the exercises in the progymnasmata are clearly intended to embrace both written and oral forms of communication. For example, in his chapter On the Education of Young Students, Aelius Theon remarks:

So then, I have presented these things, not thinking that they are all suitable for all beginners, but in order that we might know that training in the exercises is absolutely necessary, not only for those who are going to be orators, but also if anyone wishes to practice the art of poets or prose-writers, or any other writers. These things are, in effect, the foundation of every form of discourse. (Prog. 70.24–30, trans. Kennedy 2003, 13)

Thus though the rhetorical handbooks and the progymnasmata often address the same topics, the progymnasmata, aimed as they are in equipping young students with the building blocks of communication, both written and oral, serve as a kind of filter for the handbooks to sift out what comments might be more appropriate for written communication.

Furthermore, George Kennedy observes:

The curriculum described in these works, featuring a series of set exercises of increasing difficulty, was the source of facility in written and oral expression for many persons and training for speech in public life. . . . Not only the secular literature of the Greeks and Romans, but the writings of early Christians beginning with the gospels and continuing through the patristic age, and of some Jewish writers as well, were molded by the habits of thinking and writing learned in schools. (emphasis added; Kennedy 2003, ix)

If the last part of Kennedy’s comment is true and if Luke at least, among the gospel writers, was familiar with the rhetorical exercises similar to those discussed by Theon and others, then a thoroughgoing investigation into the rhetorical conventions of Luke is warranted. Throughout the commentary (often in sidebars), the rhetorical strategies, conventions, and figures of speech and thought reflected in Luke’s composition of Acts are explored. The analysis is by no means exhaustive, but rather limited to those instances in which knowledge of the relevant rhetorical device sheds additional exegetical light on the passage’s meaning. This leads to a discussion of the text and issues of intertextual relationships.

Identifying Figures of Speech

Cataloging the rhetorical figures of speech helps contemporary readers understand how the rhetoric functions in Acts. Luke’s audience would not necessarily have been able to identify these figures by their technical names. But they were used to listening to speeches and hearing texts read aloud and would have responded appropriately to these figures.

Consider the I Have a Dream speech delivered August 28, 1963, by Martin Luther King Jr. from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. The speech is replete with rhetorical figures and devices. In addition to allusion, metaphor, alliteration, hendiadys, and so on, the speech makes especially effective use of epanaphora (cf. Rhet. Her. 4.13.19), the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of a sentence. In addition to the repetition of the title phrase, I have a dream, the speech repeats the phrase let freedom ring eight times. Furthermore, the speech ends with an effective use of transplacement, the reintroduction of a word or phrase so as to render the style more elegant (Rhet. Her. 4.14.20): Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, we are free at last. Few modern hearers could name the rhetorical figures at work in King’s speech, but the power of its rhetoric is undeniable, and looking at the rhetorical figures helps explain that power.

The analysis of rhetorical figures and devices in the commentary is aimed at helping the modern reader recover some sense of the rhetorical effect on the ancient audience. We may apply to rhetorical figures in general the words of an ancient rhetorical treatise regarding figures involving repetition: There inheres in the repetition an elegance which the ear can distinguish more easily than words can explain (Rhet. Her. 4.14.21, trans. Caplan 1954, 281).

The Text of Acts and Issues of Intertextuality

Narrowly speaking, discussions of the text of Acts as a matter of critical introduction usually refer to issues related to the manuscript evidence for the writing and issues of textual criticism. While the term is used here more broadly to speak of issues related to the work itself (rather than the author or audience), it is wise to begin with this more narrow understanding.

The Textual Traditions of Acts

To speak of the final form of the text of Acts is to engage in the issue of the distinctive textual traditions of Acts, most commonly referred to as the Alexandrian and Western texts. The so-called Western text is most commonly identified with, but not exclusively limited to, Codex Bezae (D in Acts). It is approximately 8 percent longer than the Alexandrian tradition. We can illustrate the character of many of the Western readings by considering the four verses in Acts that are now omitted in most critical Greek editions and English translations:

And Philip said, If you believe with all your heart, you may. And he replied, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God (8:37; a Western addition found in E, many minuscules, itgig, h vgmss syrh with * copG67 arm; Codex D is not extant for 8:29–10:14).

But it seemed good to Silas that they remain, and Judas journeyed alone (15:34; Codex D; cf. the Majority Text, which reads: But it seemed good to Silas to remain there).

And we would have judged him according to our law. But the chief captain Lysias came and with great violence took him out of our hands, commanding his accusers to come before you (24:6b–8a; a Western addition found in E, 1739, itgig vg, etc.; Codex D is not extant from 22:29 to the end).

And when he had said these words, the Jews departed, holding much dispute among themselves (28:29; a Western addition found in 383 614 itgig, p vgmss syrh with *; Codex D is not extant from 22:29 to the end).

In each case, these additions attempt to expand upon or clarify the immediate context. In all four verses the Western tradition was taken up into the Byzantine or Majority Text, which was the basis for the earliest English translations with versification, including the Authorized or King James Version. This association with the Majority Text (and not necessarily their connection to the Western tradition) accounts for the inclusion of the verses in early Greek editions and English translations of Acts. Once it was determined that the variants in question were not part of the original text, the editors and translators of the various Greek editions and English translations, rather than renumbering the verses from that point forward, opted rather to omit the verses altogether (as they did in other places in the NT). Thus these variants are chosen to illustrate the differences in the Western tradition of Acts, not because they are the most important, exegetically speaking, nor the most controversial, but simply because these are the first places at which a contemporary reader of Acts in translation is most likely to encounter the issue of textual traditions.

Despite arguments that the Western tradition holds priority over, or at least equal footing with, the Alexandrian text (Clark 1933; Boismard and Lamouille 1984; Strange 1992), this commentary, for the most part, accepts the critical consensus regarding the generally secondary and derivative nature of the Western text of Acts, and follows the critical edition of NA²⁷/UBS⁴, which itself is based primarily on the Alexandrian tradition (cf. the history and evaluation of the textual traditions of Acts by Head 1993, 415–45). Occasionally the commentary will treat textual variants as they might shed light on the meaning of a particular passage (for more detailed treatment, see Culy and Parsons 2003).

Acts, Luke, and the Other Gospels

This excursion into textual criticism raises questions regarding the relationship between Acts and Luke (interest in the question of unity has reemerged since Parsons and Pervo 1993; see Rowe 2005, 2007; Johnson 2005; Bockmuehl 2005; Bird 2007; Spencer 2007). Perhaps it is best to begin with what textual criticism can not tell us about that relationship. Contra Kirsopp Lake (1933) and the various versions of this argument by Amos Wilder (1943), Hans Conzelmann (1960), and Philippe Menoud (1962), there is no manuscript evidence to support the contention that the ascension narrative in Luke 24 was added after the two works were separated (Menoud actually argued that both ascension accounts were interpolations after Luke and Acts were divided upon acceptance into the canon).

Each document has its own distinct reception history (see Gregory 2003, 300–301), a point that speaks against a precanonical narrative unity of the two documents. For example, the evidence of early gospel collections fails to support an original unity (Parsons and Pervo 1993). The oldest copy of the fourfold Gospel, P⁴⁵ (ca. AD 200), also contains Acts, but has the gospels in the traditional order: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Codex Bezae preserves the so-called Western order of the two apostles (Matthew and John), followed by the two apostolic companions (Luke and Mark). Here Luke and Acts could easily have been placed together, but Mark stands between Luke and Acts. Thus a great opportunity was missed to place Luke last in the order and alongside Acts, preserving both the Tetraevangelium and the unity of Luke and Acts. The Cheltenham Canon (c. 360) and the stichometry of Codex Claromontanus (seventh century) place Luke last among the gospels, but Acts comes after the Pauline epistles in the former and at the end of the NT books in the latter. P⁷⁴ (seventh century) puts Acts with the General Epistles (see Parsons and Pervo 1993, 22). The inescapable conclusion is that there is simply no manuscript evidence in which Luke and Acts appear side by side, ready for reading as a continuous whole. Some have countered that the reception history does not necessarily reflect authorial intention, and in the case of Luke/Acts most certainly does not (Johnson 2005). But is this necessarily the case?

The fact that the textual history of Acts is distinct from Luke’s other volume, the Third Gospel, is not always fully appreciated in discussions of the relationship between Luke and Acts from the point of view of intentio operis. As Bruce Metzger notes, The text of the book of the Acts of the Apostles circulated in the early church in two quite distinct forms, commonly called the Alexandrian and the Western (Metzger 1994, 222). The same has not, and indeed cannot be said about Luke’s gospel. Furthermore, while the Western tradition of Acts shares with Luke (as well as the other gospels and Pauline corpus) minor variants that seek to clarify and explain the text and make it smooth . . . there are variants of another kind, peculiar to the Western text of Acts (Metzger 1994, 233). These variants

include many additions, long and short, of a substantive nature that reveal the hand of a reviser. . . . The reviser, who was obviously a meticulous and well-informed scholar, eliminated seams and gaps and added historical, biographical, and geographical details. Apparently, the reviser did his work at an early date, before the text of Acts had come to be generally regarded as a sacred text that must be preserved inviolate. (Metzger 1994, 233)

Regardless of how one accounts for the origins of these two textual traditions of Acts (Metzger 1994, 225–32), their existence provides further support for the conclusion that Acts has its own distinctive transmission history and points to a circulation of the text of Acts, independent of the Third Gospel.

The little evidence that we do have, then, does not suggest that these two documents, Luke and Acts, were published together by Luke as one volume or even published at the same time, only later to be separated from one another with the emergence of the fourfold Gospel. Rather, the manuscript traditions suggest two distinct transmission histories, one for the Gospel and one for Acts. This implies at least that the two were published and disseminated separately, and quite probably at different times.

The prologue to the Third Gospel (1:1–4) suggests that Luke writes, in part, because he thinks that previous attempts at gospels have proven unsuccessful in producing a rhetorically persuasive narrative (see Parsons 2007). On the basis of Luke’s reference to many other attempts to write accounts of Jesus’ life, it seems that a plurality of gospels was already a reality by the time the Third Gospel was written (probably in the 80s or early 90s). The number and content of these other gospels is unknown; the many (even if hyperbolic) may have included heretics who used traditional material in the interest of their own perverse propaganda (Danker 1988, 24). In this sense, Luke may have been partially successful in replacing some of these previous attempts, of which he is critical (and thus contributed to the loss of some early accounts that are no longer extant). Nevertheless, Luke probably did not think his version of the Jesus story would replace all other versions. And even if he did, he knew better by the time he published Acts. His account of the things accomplished had taken its place alongside other versions. Thus Luke writes Acts in the full knowledge that it would be read as a sequel, not just to the Third Gospel, but to a plurality of narratives about Jesus, what would later be dubbed simply the gospel (of which there emerged four authoritative versions, but still of one gospel). These gospels (Luke and Mark and an indeterminate number of others) were already being read together in Christian worship by the time Acts was published.

We should not dismiss those other attempts at writing a gospel as possible sources for Acts (cf., e.g., Mark 14:57–58/Acts 6:13–14 et passim), but Luke used