Is it normal to refer to Christ as our Lord in an encyclopedic text? I am not a native speaker of English, so I do not know if such subtleties exist.--branko :Nope. It's our favorite vandal (and I'll use the term even if others don't want to). 62.98.136.xxx needs to be banned in my opinion. Rgamble ------------- This article is taken from Easton Bible Dicionary of 1897, and probably the contributor forgot to edit out that reference to "our Lord". Since much new research has been conducted in the field since 1897 one wonders if it makes any sense to copy an article from such an antiquated source (it does refer to JC as our Lord!) ------- '''Suggested headings''' To bring readability and order to the entries for the Gospels, I would like to structure each of the entries under some headings. The following headings occur to me. '''Please add additional headings that are needed''': :Contents and character of ''Luke'' :''Luke'' 's audience and purpose :Sources and comparisons :Surviving manuscripts --Wetman 13:44, 22 Jan 2004 (UTC) :That's an excellent idea! I edited Matthew and had a go at Luke. But I haven't looked at the others. There's also a lot of redundant stuff with Two-source_hypothesis, Synoptic_problem, Gospel, Q_document and others that needs to be put into the proper article. - David Gerard 14:24, Jan 22, 2004 (UTC) ==Non-mainstream POV from anonymous IP== I've noticed that this IP is adding some non-mainstream points of view concerning the authorship of Luke and the identity of Theophilus. I haven't removed his points of view, but have relegated them to minority points of view; the mainstream POV is that Luke was a Greek (Acts 16:10 has a self reference to Luke being in Greece; Luke removes a lot of details only of interest to Jews, such as references to Daniel in Matthew 24:15, compare Luke 21:20; etc.). I wonder what other people think of this person's points of view. Samboy 22:24, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC) ::To back this up, from the introduction to Luke for the New American Bible "[Luke's] incomplete knowledge of Palestinian geography, customs, and practices are among the characteristics of this gospel that suggest that Luke was a non-Palestinian writing to a non-Palestinian audience that was largely made up of Gentile Christians." and from the notes for Luke 1 "Theophilus ("friend of God," literally)". Samboy 22:33, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC) OK, I've removed the following the IP in question added: ::A small minority feel that Luke-Acts was written by a Jew to persuade other Jews that Jesus of Nazareth was the messiah of Scripture and that the words of the prophets concerning ‘restoration’ have been ‘fulfilled’. Next: Remove his other possible vandalism. Samboy 01:14, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC) OK, the following has also been removed: ::A few argue that Theophilus is a High Priest who served from 37–41. This high priest had a granddaughter named Johanna (see ossuary, IEJ, 1986). As it turns out, only the Gospel of Luke tells his readers that Johanna was one of the women who served Jesus (See Luke 8:3). Again, does anyone think this is worth keeping? Samboy 01:14, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC) :: Removed sentence by 68.80.152.97: "It could have been addressed to Theophilus_the_High_Priest."Alecmconroy 11:23, 12 November 2005 (UTC) One link that speculates on Theophilus: http://gbronline.com/thewholetruth/theo.htm The "Ossuary" link the IP referred to is as follows: Dan Barag and David Flusser, "The Ossuary of Yehohanah Granddaughter of the High Priest Theophilus," Israel Exploration Journal 36 (1986), 39—44. Samboy 01:23, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC) ==Papyrus Bodmer XIV== I disambiguated the oblique reference to "Papyrus Bodmer XIV" to a more reader-friendly form, thus: "Traditionalists point to the fact that the oldest manuscript that has retained its opening page, a papyrus in the Martin Bodmer Library, Cologny, assigned a date c. AD 200 (Papyrus Bodmer XIV), proclaims that it is the ''euangelion kata Loukan'', the "Gospel according to Luke," and the subsequent tradition is unbroken." However, before saving, when I subsequently read that Papyrus Bodmer XIV "starts with much of Luke 3--18; then Luke 22:4--24:53 continues immediately with John 1:1--11:45" http://myweb.lmu.edu/fjust/John/Papyri.html, I am put in doubt of the whole claim and have moved it here. The Bibliothèque Bodmer published the Papyrus in 1961. What about Papyrus Bodmer XIV actually does connect the text to "Luke" besides its being a version of the familiar text ascribed to "Luke"? There's no "opening page:" it starts with Luke 3. Is there anything to this "traditionalists" text at all, or is this mumbo-jumbo? --Wetman 22:35, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC) ::I'm not familiar with this document. What I ''am'' familiar with is the fact there there is a theory that "Luke" started with a "proto-Luke" that didn't include the first two chapters of Luke; that the first two chapters of Luke were added later (by Luke himself, most people think). Samboy 06:24, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC) :The Proto-Luke you've heard tell of was part of the discussion of "Luke"'s sources, in B.H. Streeter, ''The Four Gospels : A study of origins'' 1924. Like everything else it's on-line now: just click the highlighted link. No connection with the claims for the Bodmer Library papyrus. --Wetman 09:58, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC) == Title: suggest "according to" == The Greek – in the case of all four Gospel accounts – has ''kata'', Latin ''secondo'', both meaning ''according to''. In other words ''[The] Good News according to ...''. There is a lively discussion as to the ''genre'' of the Gospels, hence their precise title, while not original but very early all the same, may be considered significant. (It is easy to see, why one often encounters ''of'', even in scholarly writings ... it is 9 characters and 1 space shorter, and rolls better off the tongue.) Portress 03:09, 17 May 2005 (UTC) :As you suggest, the applied titles are simply a convention. The link "What links here" at the left will show you the links that would need to be fixed, before you moved on the the other gospels, in order to maintain consistency. Then you'd be renaming the ''Gospel according to Thomas'' too? And ''Gospel_of_Peter''? The "according to" is a rather specific assertion, which doesn't always hold up to critical analysis. --Wetman 04:33, 17 May 2005 (UTC) ==Excise Testimonials and appreciations?== Is there any reason to keep the Testimonials and appreciations section and its contents? It mostly contains various platitudes about the gospel, lists of "also call The Gospel of ____", and proclaims "This Gospel is indeed 'rich and precious.'". My initial reaction was to cut the whole section as POV and non-encyclopedic. But deleting that much is scary without saying asking first, especially since the text has been in the article since at least 2001-- being originally copied from Easton Bible Dictionary of 1897. So-- anyone have any thoughts? What's the rational behind why so many people have kept this text in? Alecmconroy 11:03, 12 November 2005 (UTC) :I've done that; Let's see what people think. We can always revert it. Tom Harrison ^(talk) 13:10, 12 November 2005 (UTC)