The nature of Lukan Literature is evident upon reading. Both treatises of Lukan Literature are clearly mythical narratives. The virgin birth and miraculous healings of Luke; the divine manifestations and miraculous healing handkerchiefs of Acts; and the sky flying, heavenward ascending Jesus of both Luke and Acts, are representative of legend and folklore.
The Gospel of Luke was an anonymously written version of the story of the earthly Jesus; a tale which evidently was in circulation as early as the mid 2nd CE. As noted in the introduction to Luke, several writers had written their particular version of this common narrative. By the late 2nd CE, the Orthodox Church had adopted four such versions as authentic and authoritative, one of those being the Gospel of Luke.
Although each of the four Church sanctioned Gospels have a similar cast of characters, and although three (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) seem to have used a common original source (either Matthew or Mark possibly being the original source), yet Luke is distinguished from the others in that he wrote Acts as an addendum; a supplementary treatise as it were, which provided a link between the story of the four Gospels and the late 2nd CE Orthodox Church. The Lukan author also cited certain transitional phases which distinguish specific eras within the Christian narrative, thus establishing a direct relationship between Judaism and the early Roman Church.
"The Law and the Prophets were until John, since that time the kingdom of God is preached" (Luke 16:16)
"all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the Law of Moses, and the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me" (Luke 24:44)
The major eras of the Christian myth were those of "The Law and the Prophets", and that of "the kingdom of God"; the former representing the national identity of the Hebrew people, and the latter referencing the era of the Church. "The Law and the Prophets" are representative of the religion of Judaism, the Hebrew people, and their epoch struggle and collective obsession with independence and national identity. Throughout the first Century and a third of the common era, certain elements of the Hebrew people were engaged in an ongoing revolt against what they perceived to be the Roman occupation of their homeland. As a result of their quest for religious freedom and national independence, several "Messianic movements" arose in support of a variety of attempted military coups against the reigning Roman government. The final such effort; the Simon Bar Kochba uprising of 132-135CE, was seemingly successful for about 3 years, until a confederation of several national armies was dispatched by the Roman Emperor Hadrian to subjugate the insurgents and restore order to the region. The action was swift, brutal, and effective. Jerusalem was surrounded; the insurgents were starved out, Bar Kochba and his forces were killed, and the aftermath was that all Jews were driven out of Jerusalem, which was then leveled and hand plowed by the Roman victors. The military tactics employed, the brutal nature of the subjugation of the Bar Kochba uprising, and the complete diaspora of all Jews from Jerusalem were historic events evidently known to the anonymous author of Lukan Literature (Luke 21:20-21; Acts 8:1,4). After the unsuccessful Bar Kochba uprising and the complete diaspora of the Hebrew people from Jerusalem in 135CE, the Jews who were not slaughtered, starved to death, or sold into Egyptian slavery, became refugees who over the course of the following decades slowly assimilated into a variety of Roman-Greco cultures throughout the Empire.
"Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto the same day that he was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection" (Acts 1:21-22)
The baptism of Jesus by John is recognized in Lukan Literature as a transitional event which signified the end of one era of the Christian myth, and the dawning of another. For whereas John symbolizes the end of the era of the Law and the Prophets, the baptism of Jesus by John marks the commencement of the proclamation of the kingdom of God. The nature of the kingdom God is then revealed at the baptism of Jesus, an event which could be interpreted as an anointing of the kingdom's symbol of peace. Hence, rather than being crowned as an icon of militarism, Lukan Literature envisions Jesus the baptized as one anointed as a symbol of peace (Luke 3:21-22; cf Luke 2:11,14). And so the kingdom of God envisioned by Lukan Literature is a contrast to the sought after and fought for, yet ever elusive earthly kingdom based upon militarism; one which the Hebrew Zionists of the first Century and a third of the common era had coveted. For whereas the Hebrew Zionists had sought a national identity based upon militarism and might; the kingdom of God of Lukan Literature was rather a spiritual relationship based upon peace, healing, and non-violence (Luke 8:1; 9:1-2;10-11; 11:1-2; 22:15-16; Acts 1:3,6-8).
"The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the Apostles whom he had chosen" (Acts 1:1-2)
"ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth" (Acts 1:8)
The ascension of Jesus, by its very nature, represented the end of the era of the earthly Jesus, and likewise introduced an advanced role of the Apostles within the Christian myth. For once Jesus cleared the clouds so to speak, the Apostles suddenly evolved from wandering comrades of Jesus, into confident witnesses of the resurrection of the same from the dead. The era of Apostolic authority in this embryonic stage soon developed into the Orthodox Church doctrine of Apostolic succession, which would prove to be their major competitive edge over Gnostic Christians in the 2nd CE, as well as the foundation for Church hierarchy ever since.
