Is the Gospel of Luke historically reliable?
The Bible contains four accounts of the life of Jesus - the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. This page focuses particularly on the historical reliability of Luke's Gospel. But the Gospels were written nearly two thousand years ago. Why would anyone today have any reason to believe they are reliable? Here are five good reasons:
(1) The author of Luke's Gospel claims to be writing real history, carefully investigated - see Luke chapter 1 verses 1-4. He understands the difference between truth and fiction, and claims that what he writes is truth. He understands the need for careful research and accurate reporting, and claims to have done both.
(2) The same person wrote Luke's Gospel and the book of Acts.
(3) There are numerous ways we can check the background accuracy of the book of Acts - its accurate references to the titles of officials, to political regions as they existed in the middle of the first century, to legal processes, to the realities of travel by sea. These are detailed in Jefferson White's book 'Evidence & Paul's Journeys.'
(4) The author of Luke-Acts claims to have first-hand experience of some of what he writes about in Acts:
- In Acts chapter 16 verses 10-17, the writer indicates by his use of the word 'we' that he joined Paul in Troas, and went with him to Philippi. Paul apparently left him in Philippi.
- In Acts chapter 20 verses 5-15, Paul returns to Philippi, and the writer again starts using the word 'we' to indicate that he travelled with Paul via Troas and on to Miletus.
- In Acts chapter 21 verses 1-18, the author indicates that he was with Paul on the journey from Miletus to Jerusalem.
- In Acts chapter 27 verse 1 to chapter 28 verse 16, the author again indicates that he was with Paul on Paul's journey as a prisoner from Caesarea to Rome (which included the experience of being shipwrecked on Malta).
So the author clearly distinguishes between the things he experienced first hand, and the things he researched from sources. It is very difficult to write something convincing that is meant to be based on first hand experience but in fact is not - all kinds of mistakes creep in.
(5) Because we can show that Luke is accurate in Acts, this gives us confidence that he is also accurate in Luke's Gospel.
William Ramsay was one of the greatest archaeologists ever. Josh McDowell records in 'The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict' (page 62) how Ramsay studied in the German liberal school of theology. As a result, he came to his archaeological research assuming that Luke-Acts was written in the middle of the second century AD, and was completely unreliable historically. Yet as he went on with his researches, he was forced by the evidence to admit that Luke was historically accurate. Ramsay said:
I may fairly claim to have entered on this investigation without prejudice in favour of the conclusion [the historical reliability of Luke] which I shall now seek to justify to the reader. On the contrary, I began with a mind unfavourable to it.
Ramsay's conclusion was that
Luke is a historian of the first rank; not merely are his statements of fact trustworthy... this author should be placed along with the very greatest of historians... Luke's history is unsurpassed in respect of its trustworthiness.
For all these reasons, it makes sense to take Luke's Gospel seriously as a historical account.