This was Colonel Mackinlay's former thesis (assumed in to-day's paper). It was helped by his recognition of three distinctly prominent spiritual notes dominating these three passages of incident. In Luke (A) the Lord's requirement from all," the obedience of faith"; in Luke (B) the Lord's warning against that indifference and worldliness which register themselves in unbelief and rejection. of the Gospel; in Luke (C) the Lord's encouragement to individuals who-while the shadows deepened through the general public attitude of pride and hostility-might humbly and gratefully accept His proffered grace to meet their need.

This commends itself as possible to the spiritual mind.

The following written communications have been received:

The Rev. Sir JOHN HAWKINS, Bart., M.A., D.D., writes: I quite agree with you that "Insertion " is a better, because a more neutral term, than "Interpolation." I remember hesitating before using the latter, but when I began to write on this particular subject some ten years ago, it seemed to have established itself as the ordinary designation of Luke ix, 51, to xviii, 14. And I consulted the great Oxford dictionary, which shows that the word has been by no means limited to unjustifiable insertions, though it has been "especially" applied to them."

The

The Rev. J. ORR, D.D., writes: I have read with care and much interest your valuable discussion on the Lucan Problems. questions about Luke have naturally occupied my own mind a good deal, and there are points in your view of the matter which are new to me, and from which I hope I may derive help. Whatever our theory of the Synoptic Gospels, the facts of what you call the "great Insertion" and the "great Omission," are there as problems to be solved. I am more impressed by what you say about the parallel narratives in the Gospel, than by your explanations of Luke's "Omission" of a long Marcan passage. I agree fully with Sir John Hawkins that the suggestions offered for the "Omission," as detailed by you, and considered on pp. 189-191, are in no way adequate. But the æsthetic reason or artistic ("the cloud or shadow" of p. 198)-hardly seems to me one which a critical treatment of the Gospel is likely to regard as sufficient either. May I say that my own feeling is perhaps slightly affected by the fact that I am personally unable to accept the theory which regards Matthew and Luke as based-in their common parts-on Mark's Gospel.

Instead of regarding Luke as omitting, a good deal may be said for thinking of Mark's sections as an "Insertion" on his part into the general Synoptic tradition, with help from the so-called Matthaean source-for Matthew does seem to be the ultimate authority for most of the discourses and some incidents.

The Rev. J. VERNON BARTLET, M.A., D.D. (another of the authors in Studies in the Synoptic Problem) writes: You claim for your theory that it illustrates Luke's skill in using his sources, viz., that he uses them in such a way as to "draw decided attention to a definite meaning for the so-called "great Omission," viz. (p. 201, top), "to give emphatic attention" to the coming death of the Lord "as the great theme" of his Gospel. I object that he failed to secure this end, since it has escaped observation from all his readers until your own notice was, by critical study, directed to it. This is an objection, not to there being three such sources used by Luke, and only detected by a scholar in the twentieth century, but to the "skilful" use to which you assume he put them in directing attention to his "definite meaning "-for his use of them, in particular, the socalled "great Omission "--though in vain until recently! Surely these are different things. The "skilful" use was intended to be perceived from the first and all along; and was not, so far as the "definite meaning " for the so-called "Great Omission" goes.

The Rev. F. H. WOODS, M.A., writes that he thinks the most probable explanation of "the great Omission" by St. Luke was his wish to avoid the duplication of incidents which resemble each other. He continues, "I should be inclined to agree so far with Colonel Mackinlay as to admit that one, perhaps the chief, reason why St. Luke did not wish to duplicate was to allow space for all that he wished to write concerning our Lord's Death and Resurrection. I further agree with him also in thinking that we are right in making a break at the end of chapter x, and that the teaching that follows belongs to an earlier period. But his main theory appears to me unproven. It rests mainly on three grounds, no one of which appears sufficiently established."

These grounds are briefly summarized as follows:

(a) It is improbable that there should be such a "strange literary procedure" as the splitting up of the Matthaean Sermon on the Mount into two parts by Luke, part in chapter v ff., and part in chapter xi ff. In support of this objection he refers to the fact

that a large number of fragments of St. Matthew's sermon are found scattered in other parts of St. Luke's Gospel ; e.g., Matthew v, 13, corresponds with Luke xiv, 34; Matthew v, 15, with both Luke viii, 16, and xi, 33.

He considers it more likely that St. Matthew collected in one discourse what he found scattered in different parts of Q.

(b) He thinks that the references in Luke to journeying (which he quotes) refer to a single account of one journey, but he admits that parts of it are obviously in the reverse of chronological order. For instance, he thinks that the passage, "I must go on My way, to-day and to-morrow, and the day following" (Luke xiii, 33), shows that Christ was then only two days' journey of slow progress from Jerusalem.

He states that this chronological difficulty is met by the three narrative theory, but he is himself unable to accept the explanation which it gives because "there is not the least hint or suggestion in Luke xiv, 25, that we are reading about the beginning of a journey, the impression left on the reader's mind is that it is the same of which St. Luke has been speaking throughout."

He thinks a simpler explanation is "to suppose that St. Luke had before him a collection of incidents connected with the journey, but not arranged chronologically, that into these he inserted a portion of Q, probably in the order in which he found it, and finally inserted the whole bodily into his revised Marcan document."

(c) He does not see any analogy between a supposed three-fold narrative in Luke and the two thrice repeated narratives in the Acts of the Conversion of St. Paul and of the visit to Cornelius by St. Peter, "Neither of these cases are parallel, because in both cases the first record is the writer's narrative, the other two are records or references of speakers, and there is not the slightest literary difficulty or obscurity involved."

He concludes, "while I feel that I have no right to argue a priori, the exact degree of accuracy on such a point as chronological order that inspiration involves, I should personally be very sorry to discover that it permitted the use of a method of composition which, if true of St. Luke, has deceived every reader and commentator up to the present time."

The Rev. H. GAUSSEN, M.A., writes: On reading this very interesting paper the following points struck me, (a) On p. 190 mention

is made of a class of miracles, which might seem to detract from the dignity of Christ. It has to be remembered on the other hand that St. John's Gospel contains accounts of gradual miracles in which means are employed (John ii, 7, ff. ix, 6, ff.). It is evident that the writer of the fourth Gospel does not consider such miracles detracting from the dignity of Christ.

(b) On p. 198 the words about St. Luke's purpose shown by his Omissions as well as by his statements are very interesting. His omission of,

(1) The flight into Egypt,

(2) The appearances of Christ after His Resurrection in Galilee, (3) The retirement of St. Paul into Arabia,

are instances of omissions which may be accounted for on the ground of their being in a sense diversions from the main subject, on account of the change of scene involved.

(c) The same feature in lingering over Our Lords' teaching, "before the narrative of the great tragedy" is found in Matthew xxiv, xxv, and in John xii to xviii.

The Rev. Canon R. B. GIRDLESTONE writes: Colonel Mackinlay deserves all our thanks for his effort to give reverent scientific treatment to the Gospels. I doubt, however, if we have attained a complete solution. Certain first principles are to be remembered.

1. We have only a tiny fraction of what our Lord said and did. 2. He probably often repeated his words and deeds under similar circumstances.

3. St. Luke had special qualifications which he sets forth in his Preface, moreover, he was a trained observer.

4. St. Luke and St. Mark were with St. Paul at the end of Paul's career, and perhaps St. Peter (the true author of Mark's Gospel) was there also.

5. Perhaps the tradition is right that St. Luke was a proselyte, a Syrian and one of the seventy.

At any rate he had his own methods of writing. He hardly ever uses notes of time. There are about twenty places in which the Authorized Version puts "then," where St. Luke uses "but" or "and.' He condenses, repeats, groups, and follows the order of thought, regard-' less of time or place. Even such an expression as "after these things" simply means "on a subsequent occasion," and his "next

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day" (vii, 11) simply means "later on." Again, his tenses have to be carefully watched, especially the imperfect journeying tenses. The chapters peculiar to St. Luke do not give new teaching but new illustration of the teaching. He leaves his readers to intercept spaces, as in the case of the forty days (chapter xxiv), the treading down (xxi, 24, 25), the mission of the seventy (x, 16, 17), Saul's stay at Damascus (Acts ix, 19). He was in one sense quite original, and used many words not found elsewhere, and I think his conception of Christ's Ministry was also original. He always looked forward to the "Receiving up" (ix, 51), just as Christ looked forward to His departure to the Father. What a debt we owe to him! You will see from this note that I have no scientific solution as to "sources," for I think that the personal Christ was the true

source.

Sir WILLIAM HERSCHEL, Bt., writes: The idea you put forth is evidently to my mind vrai semblable, as a suggestion of what may have been working in St. Luke s mind. But Sir William adds later on, I think Luke found the difficulty of attaining the chronological "order" (at which of course such a man did aim), to be insuperable.

The Rev. T. J. THORBURN, M.A., writes: I think your view is -speaking broadly-quite borne out by the inner structure of the Gospel, and moreover is the only scheme I know of that takes away the reproach of confusion in the historical order of events in the narrative. Assuming Luke as the author of both Gospel and Acts, each of them seems to be compiled by a writer with ideas of sequence and arrangement, peculiar, in a sense, to himself, and both are difficult to reconcile with modern notions of history. Your theory of a threefold narrative from various sources, put together on the oriental principle of embodying every account that is to be met with, so that nothing may be omitted, and arranging the whole for purely didactic purposes, seems fully to explain the difficulty.

The Rev. T. NICOL, D.D., Professor of Biblical Criticism, University of Aberdeen, writes: It is a very helpful contribution to the discussion of the Synoptic Problem, and the diagram which you have provided enables the reader to take in the situation better than any amount of description. I hope to devote special attention to the questions you have raised and discussed. Meanwhile, my view of your solution is most favourable, and I feel indebted to