The Gospel was written to help believers to understand the nature of the love of God for all people” Discuss and access this view of the purpose for Luke’s Gospel.

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Katy Taylor

“The Gospel was written to help believers to understand the nature of the love of God for all people” Discuss and access this view of the purpose for Luke’s Gospel.

To investigate whether this statement, attempting to describe Luke’s reason for writing, is correct, the first place to look would seem to be his prologue. Because this has been written by Luke himself this would seem to be the most reliable source.

Information from his prologue referring that he is writing to ‘believers’ is quite limited however. The only possible believer that Luke could be writing for is “…you, most excellent Theoph’ilus”. As this is the only person mentioned throughout the prologue.                                                                                                              

Since Luke has called this man a person that is ‘most excellent’ it can only be presumed that this man is of a high status. Whether he is a religious believer can only be determined on the fact that this man should “know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed”. These ‘things’ could be thought of as the accounts that have already been written about Jesus or things he has heard about him.

Two theologians, Bruce and Neil, believe differently. They state that Theoph’ilus could have been a non-Christian being converted to a Christian by Luke. They also state that Theoph’ilus are many Christians (as explained below) whose faith is wavering, however this does not explain why Luke address a fellow Christian most excellent. This would be strange as the teaching of Jesus was that all of us were equal, to address a Christian as higher than your status would therefore be wrong. They also theory that Theoph’ilus could be a magistrate.

Possible identifications of ‘Theoph’ilus’ are that he is a Roman official persecuting Christians and Luke is writing the ‘truth’ about the Christian community. If this were for a Roman magistrate then addressing him so highly would make sense. The fact that Luke’s ‘Act’s’ is written to this man also makes this a possible reason for writing, as during Act’s the imprisonment of Paul took place. This gives a reason to write to this man to maybe convince him to release Paul.

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The meaning of the name Theoph’ilus could hold a different twist on the audience Luke is writing to however. Theo gives the meaning God and philio the meaning love. So the whole meaning of this word could be interpreted as ‘lover of God’ . This could conclude that this Theoph’ilus is not a real person at all, and that it is simply a short term for believers. This would then give some sort of back up to he statement that his Gospel was for believers.

Any evidence, in the prologue that Luke has written for all people is ...

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