The Acts of the Apostles

WRITTEN OR ORAL SOURCES
regard xvi. 24-34 ; xviii. 8 ; xviii. 9, 10 ; xviii. 24-28,
and perhaps other passages here and there, as later
interpolations, and xviii. 5—17, 19—23, and perhaps
other passages, as abbreviations of a more extensive
written source. But in xviii. 5-17 the former sup-
position excludes the latter, and then the assumption
of later interpolation is by far the more probable,
although I cannot speak even in favour of this
hypothesis. The section xviii. 24—28, though it
certainly falls somewhat outside the scope of the
whole work, is yet to the point if one assumes that
St. Luke did not wish to pass over so important
a missionary as ApoUos ; and even the best writer
could not have treated the ministry of this man
otherwise than as an episode, nor could he have
inserted it into the context at a more appropriate
place. The passage xix. 19—23 is purposely brief
and sketchy, for St. Luke did not wish to say nothing
about St. Paul's return to Syria, and yet it did not
fit in well with the continuous onward movement of
his plot. As for the passage xvi. 24—34, 1 would here
admit the probability of later interpolation if the
verses were not so entirely liukan in style, and if after
their removal a good and consistent story were left
behind. But it is scarcely credible that St. Luke
only narrated the imprisonment in Philippi in order
to show how proud St. Paul was of his Roman
citizenship.
Chapter xix. (the story of Demetrius) has been sub-
jected by Wellhausen to criticism similar to that with
which he has treated chapter xxvii. (the account of the
voyage). Wellhausen here remarks ; " The original