Journal: Tyndale Bulletin
Volume: TYNBUL 48:2 (NA 1997)
Article: Leadership And Lifestyle: Luke’s Paul, Luke’s Jesus And The Paul Of 1 Thessalonians
Author: Steve Walton

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TynBul 48:2 (1997) p. 377

Leadership And Lifestyle:
Luke’s Paul, Luke’s Jesus And The Paul Of 1 Thessalonians1

Steve Walton

Paul’s speech to the Ephesian elders at Miletus (Acts 20:18-35) is important for two interlocking debates: first, concerning the relationship between the portrait of Paul found in Acts and that derived from the epistles; and second, concerning Luke’s sources—specifically, whether Luke had knowledge of the Pauline epistles. This thesis contributes to both debates by a careful examination of the speech, and a comparison with speeches by Jesus in Luke’s Gospel (to see how Lukan the Miletus speech is) and 1 Thessalonians (to see how Pauline the speech is).

An initial chapter reviews the history of scholarship on the address to the Ephesians elders—a speech which has been used as a ‘set piece’ for most forms of modern critical study of Acts. The next chapter outlines the approach adopted here. This includes a discussion of how parallels are to be recognised, in the light of the relative lack of discussion of criteria in past scholarship on Luke-Acts. This gap in methodological discussion is surprising given the wide recognition of the phenomenon of parallelism in Luke’s writings. Whilst there is an inevitable subjective element in seeking parallels, I seek a measure of objectivity by using a hierarchical approach, beginning with lexical parallels (including cognate words and compound forms) before moving to consider synonyms, conceptual parallels, and parallel styles

TynBul 48:2 (1997) p. 378

of argumentation. Further, ‘clustering’ of such parallels in particular passages is likely to be significant.

Turning to examine the Miletus speech in the context of Acts (ch. 3), consideration of ancient ‘farewell speeches’ suggests that it has much in common with members of this genre—although care needs to be taken not to assume that our speech shares all the features of the genre, bearing in mind that a genre is a construct from the extant examples.

On turning to consider structure, the speech to the Ephesian elders appears on first sight to be well-organised. A number of features reinforce this view: the repetitions of key words and phrases, the time references, and the change of subject. However, the lack of any scholarly consensus on the sub-divisions of speech suggests that this appearance may be deceptive, and I conclude that it is better to see the speech as like a tapestry, where the major themes are like threads interwoven with each other, often in subtle ways. Further, like a tapestry, it is the overall picture which provides the ‘structure’, by con...

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