(2) Even as they delivered them unto us.--There is something noticeable in the candour with which the writer disclaims the character of an eyewitness. The word "delivered" is the same as that used by St. Paul when he speaks of the history of the Lord's Supper (1Corinthians 11:23-25) and of the Resurrection (1Corinthians 15:3-7), and, with its cognate noun "tradition" (2Thessalonians 2:15), would seem to have been almost a technical term for the oral teaching which at least included an outline of our Lord's life and teaching.

Ministers of the word.--The word used is that which describes the work of an attendant, something between a "slave" and a "minister," in the later ecclesiastical use of the term as equivalent to "deacon" or "preacher." It is used of St. Mark in Acts 13:5. On the opportunities St. Luke enjoyed for converse with such as these, see Introduction. The "word" is used in its more general Pauline sense (as e.g., 1Corinthians 1:18; 1Corinthians 2:4), as equivalent to the "gospel," not in the higher personal meaning which it acquired afterwards in St. John (1John 2:14).

Verse 2. - Even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eye-witnesses, and ministers of the Word. The general accuracy of the recitals contained in those early Gospels is here conceded, as the source of these primitive writings was the tradition delivered by the eye-witnesses of the acts of Jesus; among these eye-witnesses the apostles would, of course, hold the foremost place. The whole statement may be roughly paraphrased thus: "The narrative of the memorable events which have been accomplished in our midst many have undertaken to compose. These different narratives are in strict conformity with the apostles' tradition, which men who were themselves eye-witnesses of the great events, and subsequently ministers of the Word, handed down to us. Now, I have traced up all these traditions anew to their very sources, and propose rewriting them in consecutive order, that you, my lord Theophilus, may be fully convinced of the positive certainty of those great truths in which you have been instructed." Eye-witnesses, anal ministers of the Word; witnesses of the events of the public ministry of Jesus, from the baptism to the Ascension. These men, in great numbers, after Pentecost, became ministers and preachers of the Word.

1:1-4. Luke will not write of things about which Christians may safely differ from one another, and hesitate within themselves; but the things which are, and ought to be surely believed. The doctrine of Christ is what the wisest and best of men have ventured their souls upon with confidence and satisfaction. And the great events whereon our hopes depend, have been recorded by those who were from the beginning eye-witnesses and ministers of the word, and who were perfected in their understanding of them through Divine inspiration.Even as they delivered them unto us,.... By whom the evangelist means, as appears from the after description of them, the twelve apostles, and seventy disciples; who handed down to others the accounts of the birth, life, and death of Christ; and according to which the above Christians proposed to write:

which from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word; either of the Gospel, or rather of Christ himself, the eternal Word of God; for from the beginning of Christ's preaching the Gospel, or as soon as he entered upon his public ministry, he called his apostles, as Simon, Andrew, James, John, &c. and afterwards seventy disciples; who were eyewitnesses of him, of the truth of his incarnation, and of his ministry and miracles; saw, and conversed with him after his resurrection from the dead and beheld his ascension to heaven; and were ministers that were called, qualified, and sent out by him and waited on him, and served him. This shows, as is by some rightly observed, that Luke was not one of the seventy disciples, as some (i) have thought, and as the title of this Gospel, to the Arabic version of it, expresses; for then he would have been an eyewitness himself: nor did he take his account from the Apostle Paul; for he was not a minister of the word from the beginning, but was as one born out of due time,

(i) Epiphan. contra Haeres. l. 2. Haeres. 51. Theophylact. in Argument in Luc.