An investigation into the motives behind writing the canonical versions of Luke and Acts Building on recent scholarship that argues for a second-century date for the book of Acts, Marcion and Luke-Acts explores the probable context for the authorship not only of Acts but also of the canonical Gospel of Luke. Noted New Testament scholar Joseph B. Tyson proposes that both Acts and the final version of the Gospel of Luke were published at the time when Marcion of Pontus was beginning to proclaim his version of the Christian gospel, in the years 120-125 c.e. He suggests that although the author was subject to various influences, a prominent motivation was the need to provide the church with writings that would serve in its fight against Marcionite Christianity. Tyson positions the controversy with Marcion as a defining struggle over the very meaning of the Christian message and the author of Luke-Acts as a major participant in that contest. Suggesting that the primary emphases in Acts are best understood as responses to the Marcionite challenge, Tyson looks particularly at the portrait of Paul as a devoted Pharisaic Jew. He contends that this portrayal appears to have been formed by the author to counter the Marcionite understanding of Paul as rejecting both the Torah and the God of Israel. Tyson also points to stories that involve Peter and the Jerusalem apostles in Acts as arguments against the Marcionite claim that Paul was the only true apostle. Tyson concludes that the author of Acts made use of an earlier version of the Gospel of Luke and produced canonical Luke by adding, among other things, birth accounts and postresurrection narratives of Jesus.

"When and how may Christians first be shown to have used the Gospel of Luke and its companion volume, The Acts of the Apostles? Andrew Gregory offers the first book-length discussion of the reception of Luke and of Acts in the period before Irenaeus. The research project which was the basis of this monograph was originally conceived as a comparison of the pneumatology of Luke-Acts with the pneumatologies presented in Christian literature of the second century. Recent scholarship on Lukan pneumatology is agreed that Luke has a particular interest in the Spirit, but it is divided as to whether his pneumatology is part of a homogenous early Christian understanding or a distinctive presentation that is to be sharply differentiated from that of Matthew and Mark, of John, and of Paul. Noting a lacuna identified by Turner, the author set out to originally ask two questions. First, whether it might be possible to identify in second century pneumatologies any characteristics that New Testament scholars might label as distinctively Lukan. Second, whether such characteristics might be sufficient to indicate not only the influence of Lukan pneumatology but also a conscious appropriation of distinctively Lukan theology by other early Christians. Contents include: Introduction and methodology, Previous research, The evidence of the earliest manuscripts and notices, Do narrative outlines of episodes in the life of Jesus presuppose Luke?, Collections of the sayings of Jesus, Marcion, Justin Martyr, The reception of Luke in the Second Century, The reception of Acts in the Second Century, Early and Ambiguous Evidence, Justin Martyr, Narrative accounts explicitly concerning the Post-resurrection teaching of Jesus and the activity of Apostles and other prominent figures, The reception of Acts in the Period before Irenaeus, The reception of Luke and Acts in the Period before Irenaeus."

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This study explores Marcion's ideas through his writings and the writings of early Christian polemicists who shaped the idea of heresy.

Acts is the sequel to Luke's gospel and tells the story of Jesus's followers during the 30 years after his death. It describes how the 12 apostles, formerly Jesus's disciples, spread the message of Christianity throughout the Mediterranean against a background of persecution. With an introduction by P.D. James