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1) St. Luke, also called Saint Luke the Evangelist, (flourished 1st century CE; feast day October 18), in Christian tradition, the author of the Gospel According to Luke and the Acts of the Apostles, a companion of St. Paul the Apostle, and the most literary of the New Testament writers. Information about his life is scanty. Tradition based on references in the Pauline Letters has regarded him as a physician and a Gentile. He probably accompanied Paul on several missionary journeys.
Luke is first mentioned in the letters of Paul as the latter’s “coworker” and as the “beloved physician.” The former designation is the more significant one, for it identifies him as one of a professional cadre of itinerant Christian “workers,” many of whom were teachers and preachers. His medical skills, like Paul’s tentmaking, may have contributed to his livelihood; but his principal occupation was the advancement of the Christian mission
If Luke was the author of the third Gospeland the Acts of the Apostles, the course and nature of his ministry may be sketched in more detail from both texts. He excludes himself from those who were eyewitnesses of Christ’s ministry. He indicates participation in the Pauline mission by the use of the first person in the “we” sections of Acts. They suggest that Luke shared in instructing persons in the Christian message and possibly in performing miraculous healings.
The “we” sections are analogous in style to travel reports found elsewhere in writings of the Greco-Roman period. They place the author with Paul during his initial mission into Greece—i.e., as far as Philippi, in Macedonia (c. 51 CE). It is there that Luke later rejoins Paul and accompanies him on his final journey to Jerusalem (c. 58 CE). After Paul’s arrest in that city and during his extended detention in nearby Caesarea, Luke may have spent considerable time in Palestine working with the apostle as the occasion allowed and gathering materials for his future two-volume literary work, the Gospel and the Acts. In any case, two years later he appears with Paul on his prison voyage from Caesarea to Rome and again, according to the Second Letter of Paul to Timothy 4:11, at the time of the apostle’s martyrdom.
St. Paul's missionary travels in the eastern Mediterranean.
Further direct information about Luke is scanty in the New Testament, but certain inferences may be drawn. The literary style of his writings and the range of his vocabulary mark him as an educated man. The distinction drawn between Luke and other colleagues “of the circumcision” (Colossians 4:11) has caused many scholars to conclude that he was a Gentile. If so, he would be the only New Testament writer clearly identifiable as a non-Jew. This conclusion, however, rests upon a doubtful equation of those “of the circumcision” with Jewish Christians. Actually, the phrase probably refers to a particular type of Jewish Christian, those who strictly observed the rituals of Judaism. It offers no support, therefore, to the view that Luke was a Gentile. His intimate knowledge of the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible) and the focus of interest in his writings favour, on balance, the view that he was a Jewish Christian who followed a Greek lifestyle and was comparatively lax in ritual observances.
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THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW
Universalism
One of the characteristics of Matthew’s gospel is that it appeals to the entire world. In other words, Christianity is for humanity and not only for the Jews. When Jesus was born, for example, there were three wise men that came from the East to visit the child. Also when the child’s life was threatened, God told Joseph to escape with the child to Egypt, a Gentile country.
Jewish Particularism
Apart from being universal, the gospel is still exclusive to the Jews in some sense. In other words, it is a gospel dedicated to the Jews. Matthew, for example, traced the genealogy of Christ to Abraham who is regarded as the father of the Jewish nation. Matthew also recorded Jesus as saying he was sent to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel” meaning he came specifically for the Hebrew race and not for any other race.
Ecclesiastic interest
Another characteristic of Matthew’s gospel is that, he is seen to be much interested in the church or the “ecclesia”. Matthew recorded Jesus as telling Peter that he is the rock on which he would build his church. Also, according to Matthew, the church must be the final place for the adjudication of disputes, emphasizing the importance of the church in the lives of Christians.
Elements of miracles
Matthew alone tried to make Jesus’ stories more miraculous that they may actually seem. He seemed to employ the literary device called exaggeration to make Jesus look like a powerful miracle worker. In the story of the healing of the Gerasene demoniac, Matthew alone recorded that there were two mad men that Jesus healed. Also, when Jesus cursed the fig tree, Matthew recorded that the tree died immediately but Mark wrote that it was discovered the next day that the tree had withered.
Interest in the Messiah
Matthew also tried to prove that Jesus was the Messiah that was being expected by the Jews. For this reason; he quoted copiously from the Old Testament to buttress his point. His catch phrase is “that it might be fulfilled” preceded his reference to an Old Testament linkage of something he was writing about. So for example, when he wrote about the flight of Joseph with his nuclear family to Egypt, Matthew wrote “that it might be fulfilled that ‘out of Egypt have I called my son’”. He was quoting from the book of Hosea 11:1.
Apocalyptic interests
Matthew was also interested in the happenings of the last days, referred to as eschatology. He spoke about issues concerning the end of the world. The parable of the Talents and that of the Ten Virgins were exclusive to the book of Matthew. All these showed apocalyptic influences.
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