Andy's Note Cards: Acts

 Introduction
The Acts of the Apostles #44
New Jerome Biblical Commentary

NOTE CARDS

Andy Syring

• Identity and Credentials of the Author
• Author of Acts is not found in the text – an anonymous book
• Earliest attributing of Acts to Luke
• The Antiochene and companion of Paul
• 2nd century
• Authorship of Luke-Acts dedicated to Theophilus not contested
• One school (English) insists on full factual basis of “we” passages
• The book’s author appears to take position among Paul’s companions on sporadic missionary journeys
• The other school (German)  
• Emphasizes differences between Acts portrait of Paul and apostle’s firsthand testimonies
• The value of Acts doesn’t hang on these positions
• Many consider the canonical authority to be inadmissibly compromised by denial of credentials as a witness of Paul
• Difficult to process evidence submitted on either side
• Those who deny Luke’s personal connection with Paul cannot agree on “we” passages come from intermittent source or literary technique
• Those who maintain that it was Paul’s companion who wrote the book and expressed himself in the “we”
• Tend to make light of unfamiliar features of Lucan Paul
• Urges Luke’s limited participation in his journey’s
• Writer’s opinion distinguishing traits of Luke’s Paul not assisted by the view that a companion of the apostle wrote Acts.
• This does not mean
• That one cannot minimize the difficulties of explaining “we”
• “We” most likely a stylistic device rather than a signal
• Or that one becomes programmatically committed to accentuating the Luke-Paul discordances while underplaying their harmonies.
• The hypothesis that the “we” is Luke’s own certifying device does not compromise the historical value of accounts in that form
• Immense Importance accorded Paul in Acts history suggests it composition in a community of the Pauline mission ambit
• Exact location of this community is guesswork
• Dating parameters would include Gospel of Luke compostion well after 70 AD
• Probable circulation of the letter corpus circa AD 80
• Thus dating Acts between AD 80 and 90   

• Literary From and Purpose
• Why Luke produced Acts and what did this two volume combination mean to accomplish
• Closely related to the vexed problem of literary genre of the books
• Literary Genre
• Some insist that Acts created a new literary form
• Where genre question has been pursued redounded to the separation of the two volumes
• Showing that purpose of Gospel is self evident
• Purpose of Acts needed to be explained
• Author is interested in the progress of the word of salvation
• Numerous attempts have been made to classify Acts but end up ignoring the fact repeatedly demonstrated by the text.
• Popular Approach involves two firm principles
• That their literary relationship shows Luke and Acts to constitute “a historical and literary unity”
• That the most reliable clues to the character and purpose of his work are offered by Luke’s unique prologues
• Judging by his prologues, Luke intended to write history in an unexceptionable procedure
• “Historical Monograph”
• The distinguishing feature is the exposition of the driving forces through key episodes in a reduced narrative framework
• Both Lucan volumes argue the author’s view of salvation history, embracing the epochs of promise of fulfillment
• Continuity of salvation history through its central crossroads – principle arguments of Luke-Acts
• The life of Jesus
• The birth of the new Church
• Luke not concerned to explain reasons for the failure of the Jews to embrace the gospel, “but to encounter the real theological difficulty that such a failure presented to Christians” 

• Tradition and Composition
• Luke used historiography practiced by others contemporaries
• It involved the compositional stratagems of inserted speeches, letters, generalizing summaries, mimicry of classical discourse patterns, “dramatic-episode” texture of presentation

• A. Dramatic-Episode Style
• Author concentrates on historical reality before the eyes on paradigmatic events
• Ignores the chronological sequence
• Some think this method makes Luke look like a storyteller rather than a historian
• Method not peculiar but stands in a broad tradition of Hellenistic historiography which did not sacrifice the truth to “edification”
• Clearest example of dramatic-episodes
• Pentecost (chapter 2)
• Stephen’s martyrdom (chapters 6-7)
• The Conrnelius Conversion (chapter 10)
• The Jerusalem agreement (chapter 15)
• Paul’s Ahtens mission (17:16-34)
• Successive trials (chapters 21-26)
• Each is shaped like a vehicle for an important theorem of Luke’s theology of history.  

• B. Speeches
• Centerpiece of most of the scenes is a speech whether a:
• A sermon (chapters 2, 17)
• A prophetic indictment (chapter 7)
• A didactic commentary on the event at hand (chapters 10, 15)
• An apologia before public authority (chapters 22, 26)
• Popularity of speeches as historiographcial devices is well documented in Hellenistic literature
• Speeches are to be understood less from the historical situation than from the context of the book as a whole
• Luke is author of all speeches in Acts
• Missionary discourses – thought by Dibelius to limit his Hellenistic analogy
• Six missionary discourses to Jewish audiences
• Two missionary discourses to Gentiles
• Content is held within the traditional contours of early Christianity kerygma
• This accounts for the repetitive feature of these passages
• Does not make tracing their precise traditional background an easy exercise
• Others consider the schema a product of Luke’s design for his own argumentative purposes
• Mission sermons are not really an exception to the Hellenistic analogy
• They do not preach the gospel directly but illustrate how the apostolic preaching and its reception is carried the outcome intended by God 

• C. Mimesis
• Speeches to Jews have been taken as pointers to older tradition
• Speeches also pertain to writing techniques practiced by postclassical culture
• Example of Mimetic Procedure distinctive to Luke
• The section of Acts when dealing with the mission under the twelve the model is the LXX (Septuagint Greek Bible)
• No formal quotation but his adaptation of their style and idiom for his own writing

• D. Summaries
• Used to fill gaps between freestanding episodes
• This is also seen in Mark’s composition
• Generalizes single incidents and circumstances of the narrated episodes
• Major summaries occur in first five chapters
• Where Luke’s information was probably most fragmentary
• Minor summaries, usually a single verse appear throughout text
• Not mere stopgap devices
• Important compositional stratagems for sustaining argument concerning the history he is telling
• Idealize the period of apostle’s ministry in Jerusalem
• Sustain the reader’s impression of a steady growth of the Christian movement plotted by the will of God 

• E. The Sources of Acts
• Stylistic criteria along will not trace continuous source because author rewrites his sources
• Not a continuous source basis for the first half of Acts
• Except “Antiocene” source underlying ch.6-15 has been exhumed
• After chapter 15 there is better footing for source analysis
• M. Dibelius formulated a double hypothesis of “itinerary”
• A travel diary written by a companion of Paul
• Paul- letters give analytical support to pre-Lucan documentation 

• The Greek Text of Acts
• Acts is unique because it was transmitted form early on in two text types - neither of which con be consistently derived from the other
• Western”
• 1/10 longer than the Egyptian text
• “Egyptian” (Alexandrian)
• Purest form in the Codex Vaticanus
• This text is favored in 20th century scholarship
• Because it is closer to Luke’s autograph
• And because lengthened “Western” text has its occasional omissions that betray tendencies of conscious revision
• Such alterations an uninhibited glossing to enrich religious expressions
• To clarify wording or situations
• To smooth out inconsistencies or anomalies
• To “update” the text to suit present practices and perceptions
• These tendencies show an unconstraint in rewriting the text and thus points to a period before the learned recensions, when the scribe “did not yet consider Acts to be ‘holy writ’ which no one was allowed to alter” 

• Outline

• Introduction to the Era of the Church (1:1-26)
• Witness’ Commission and Jesus’ Ascension (1:1-14)
• Proemium (1:1-8)
• The Ascension (1:9-14)
• The Restoration of the Twelve (1:15-26) 

• The Mission in Jerusalem (2:1-5:42)
• The Appeal to Israel (2:1-3:26)
• The Pentecost Event (2:1-13)
• The Pentecost Sermon (2:14-41)
• First Major Summary (2:42-47)
• The Healing in the Temple (3:1-11)
• Peter’s Temple Sermon (3:12-26)
• The Life and Trials of the Apostolic Church (4:1-5:42)
• Peter and John before the Sanhedrin (4:1-22)
• The Apostle’s Prayer (4:23-31)
• Second Major Summary (4:32-35)
• Singular Cases (4:36-5:11)
• Third Major Summary (5:12-16)
• The Second Persecution (5:17-42)
• The Mission’s Outward Path from Jerusalem (6:1-15:35)
• The Hellenists and Their Message (6:1-8:40)
• The Commission of the Seven (6:1-7)
• The Testimony of Stephen (6:8-8:3)
• Mission and trial (6:8-7:1)
• The speech of Stephen (7:2-53)
• The martyrdom of Stephen (7:54-8:3)
• Philip and the Advance of the Word (8:4-40)
• The gospel’s triumph in Samaria (8:4-25)
• Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch (8:26-40)
• The Persecutor Becomes the Persecuted (9:1-31)
• The conversion of Saul (9:1-19a)
• Saul’s Preaching and Peril in Damascus (9:19b-25)
• Saul’s Confrontations in Jerusalem (9:26-31)
• Peter as Missionary (9:32-11:18)
• Miracles in Lydda and Joppa (9:32-43)
• The Conversion of Cornelius and His Household (10:1-11:18)
• The vision of Cornelius (10:1-8)
• The vision of Peter (10:9-16)
• Reception of the messengers (10:17-23a)
• Proceedings in Cornelius’s house (10:23b-48)
• Peter’s accounting at Jerusalem (11:1-18)

• Between Jerusalem and Antioch (11:19-12:25)
• The First Church of the Gentile Mission (11:19-30)
• Herod’s Persecution and Peter’s Escape (12:1-25)
• The First Missionary Journey of Paul (13:1-14:28)
• Prelude to the Journey (13:1-3)
• A Contest Won by Paul in Cyprus (13:4-12)
• Mission and Rejection at Pisidian Antioch (13:13-52)
• Mise-en-scene and sermon (13:13-43)
• Beleaguered missionaries turn to the Gentiles (13:44-52)
• Mixed Receptions in Central Asia Minor (14:1-20)
• Iconium (14:1-7)
• Lystra and Derbe (14:8-20)
• Return to Antioch (14:21-28)
• The Jerusalem Conference and Resolution (15:1-35)
• Prehistory (15:1-5)
• Peter’s Appeal to Precedent (15:6-12)
• James’ Confirmation and Amendments (15:13-21)
• Resolution (15:22-29)
• Aftermath (15:30-35) 

• Paul’s Path to Rome (15:36-28:31)
• The Major Missions of Paul (15:36-20:38)
• Missions Journeys Resumed (15:36-41)
• The Road to Europe (16:1-10)
• Timothy’s circumcision (16:1-5)
• Paul’s vision (16:6-10)
• The Mission in Greece (16:11-18:17)
• The evangelization of Philippi (16:11-40)
• Paul in Thessalonica and Beroea (17:1-15)
• Paul in Athens (17:16-34)
• Paul in Corinth (18:1-17)
• Return to Antioch and Journeys Resumed (18:18-23)
• The Mission in Ephesus (18:24-19:40)
• The ministry of Apollos (18:24-28)
• Paul and the Baptist’s disciples (19:1-7)
• Paul’s mighty word and wonders in Ephesus (19:8-20)
• The silversmiths’ riot and Paul’s departure (19:21-40)
• Final Travels between Asia and Greece (20:1-16)
• To Greece and back to Troas (20:1-6)
• Eutychus resurrected (20:7-12)   
• Troas to Miletus (20:13-16)
• Paul’s Farewell to His Missions (20:17-38)
• Paul as Prisoner and Defendant in Palestine (21:1-26:32)
• The return to Caesarea (21:1-14)
• Paul’s Imprisonment and Testimony in Jerusalem (21:15-23:11)
• Paul’s reception by the church (21:15-26)
• Riot and imprisonment (21:27-36)
• Paul’s defense and appeal to Roman law (21:37-22:29)
• Paul before the Sanhedrin (22:30-23:11)
• Paul before the Governor and King at Caesarea (23:12-26:32)
• Transfer to Caesarea (23:12-35)
• The governor’s hearing (24:1-23)
• Paul’s confinement at Caesarea (24:24-27)
• Appeal to Caesar (25:1-12)
• Festus informs King Agrippa II (25:13-22)
• Paul before King Agrippa (25:23-26:32)
• Paul’s Last Journey and Ministry in Rome (27:1-28:31)
• The Journey to Rome (27:1-28:16)
• Sea voyage, shipwreck, and deliverance (27:1-44)
• Paul on Malta (28:1-10)
• Paul’s arrival in Rome (28:11-16)
• Paul in Rome (28:17-31)