Just glossing over "many"

[Bob Crowley]

I went to church twice today - my wife's Baptist church this morning, and my own Catholic Church this afternoon for the 3pm "Passion of the Lord" mass.

But something my wife's pastor said got me thinking a bit. He remarked that in Luke's gospel, he begins the narrative by saying that "many" had undertaken to write an account of what happened in the life of Christ.

Luke 1:1-2 NIV

"Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word."

In my case I normally would have glossed over that statement without giving it a second thought. Many? So what? But back in those days writing was hard work. I don't know how long it would have taken an ancient scribe to write a book like Luke, but according to Wikipedia it typically took a medieval scribe about fifteen months to copy a Bible (which is why they were expensive).

Scribe - Wikipedia.

.. It typically took a scribe fifteen months to copy a Bible. Such books were written on parchment or vellum made from treated hides of sheep, goats, or calves....

My Douay-Rheims (which I'm plodding through in a hit and miss fashion) has about 1383 pages. Luke takes up about 40 of those pages, so if I assume a 15 month period of 6 day weeks viz. about 390 days, then to write "Luke" would have taken a scribe an estimated 11 or so days.

(P.S. To calculate the total working days, I assumed a 6 day working week and 50 weeks in the year - I think they would have had some time off - sick, feast days etc. In other words I rounded it off to make it easier, so the "11 or so days" would have been working days).

With today's technology we could probably transcribe it in a day or so, and then hit the button and print off 100 copies if we wanted. But not back then. By the time an author wrote another copy if it was an important issue, the better part of a month would have gone. In my case with all the coffee breaks - two months?

He went on to say that the execution of criminals was usually not even recorded - why bother when it was so time consuming? If they got a mention at all, it was merely in passing. The Roman historian Tacitus had the following line about Christ's crucifixion.

Tacitus on Jesus - Wikipedia

Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus,

And that was it - one sentence - although he does at least mention Tiberius and Pontius Pilate. That was all the importance a literate Roman historian attached to the execution of a "criminal" or "enemy of the state".

But in the case of Christ, "many" tried to write an account of a man who ended up being crucified as a criminal, despite all the hard work involved putting pen to paper on papyrus or parchment.

Something happened, and it must have been quite extraordinary.

 

[Valletta]

I went to church twice today - my wife's Baptist church this morning, and my own Catholic Church this afternoon for the 3pm "Passion of the Lord" mass.

But something my wife's pastor said got me thinking a bit. He remarked that in Luke's gospel, he begins the narrative by saying that "many" had undertaken to write an account of what happened in the life of Christ.

Luke 1:1-2 NIV

In my case I normally would have glossed over that statement without giving it a second thought. Many? So what? But back in those days writing was hard work. I don't know how long it would have taken an ancient scribe to write a book like Luke, but according to Wikipedia it typically took a medieval scribe about fifteen months to copy a Bible (which is why they were expensive).

Scribe - Wikipedia.

My Douay-Rheims (which I'm plodding through in a hit and miss fashion) has about 1383 pages. Luke takes up about 40 of those pages, so if I assume a 15 month period of 6 day weeks viz. about 390 days, then to write "Luke" would have taken a scribe an estimated 11 or so days.

(P.S. To calculate the total working days, I assumed a 6 day working week and 50 weeks in the year - I think they would have had some time off - sick, feast days etc. In other words I rounded it off to make it easier, so the "11 or so days" would have been working days).

With today's technology we could probably transcribe it in a day or so, and then hit the button and print off 100 copies if we wanted. But not back then. By the time an author wrote another copy if it was an important issue, the better part of a month would have gone. In my case with all the coffee breaks - two months?

He went on to say that the execution of criminals was usually not even recorded - why bother when it was so time consuming? If they got a mention at all, it was merely in passing. The Roman historian Tacitus had the following line about Christ's crucifixion.

Tacitus on Jesus - Wikipedia

And that was it - one sentence - although he does at least mention Tiberius and Pontius Pilate. That was all the importance a literate Roman historian attached to the execution of a "criminal" or "enemy of the state".

But in the case of Christ, "many" tried to write an account of a man who ended up being crucified as a criminal, despite all the hard work involved putting pen to paper on papyrus or parchment.

Something happened, and it must have been quite extraordinary.

Much of it was passed on orally at first, and that indeed was extraordinary, whether orally or written down, it was by the power of the Holy Spirit. But Jesus did not send out his Apostles saying "write this," there is nothing written from most of the twelve Apostles. But there did come a time when the Catholic Church, certainly under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, decided to preserve the writings and decide which ones were God-breathed and which were not. That process spanned centuries. And you are right, it was hard work and the early animal skin material did not last long. A lot of Catholic monks spent years and years copying and translating the Word of God.

 

[Christian Gedge]

I’m picking that it took Luke quite a few years to write his gospel. He was a very conscientious author and historian. And for every sentence there would have been a lot of prayer too.

 

[Valletta]

I’m picking that it took Luke quite a few years to write his gospel. He was a very conscientious author and historian. And for every sentence there would have been a lot of prayer too.

I agree, he traveled with Paul although it is not clear how much, I believe Paul spent a lot of time praying.

 

[Bob Crowley]

I estimated a bit over 11 days in my first post, but that was for a medieval scribe "transcribing" the book. To write it for the first time would have taken quite a bit longer.

Back then it wasn't easy to correct errors or change your mind about how you would write an article. For us it's a cinch with our word processors - I often edit my own posts. They would have had a fair idea of what they were going to write and how they would write it before they even started.

Like everyone else, I don't know how long it took Luke to write the gospel, but the "many" others who set out to write their own versions of events would have faced the same hurdles - they wouldn't have undertaken it lightly.