We have now to consider what is perhaps the strongest objection to which our theory is exposed. It may be stated as follows:

If the Virgin Birth is a later element in the Third Gospel introduced by St. Luke himself, the Evangelist's revision of cc. i, ii might reasonably have been expected to be much more thorough than it is. Why, for example, does he leave untouched the references to Joseph and Mary as “the parents” of Jesus? Why does he not qualify his ambiguous reference to “their” [pg 079] purification? Why is he still untroubled by their astonishment, and by their failure to understand the words of Jesus at Jerusalem? Why does he not insert some clearer reference to the Davidic descent of Mary, or at least give us reason to believe that he looked upon Jesus as the adopted, and therefore legal, son of Joseph? Why does he leave the Sonship mentioned in the first part of the angel's speech (i. 31-3) apparently of a purely Messianic character? Why does he not provide occasion in the Annunciation for the terms of Mary's question in i. 34? In short, are we not back again face to face with the same difficulties with which our investigation opened? These are some of the difficulties which our theory raises.

In reply to this objection there are two preliminary considerations to be borne in mind. They are not arguments in the sense of things which can be proved; they are rather possibilities which ought seriously to be taken into account.

(1) In the first place it should be recognized that we may not have all the details of St. Luke's actual reconstruction before us. Something may have been altered or excised; we have the result; we may not have all the stages. Usener (EB., col. 3350) has asserted that statements of fact have actually been omitted from the original narrative; he is even able to tell us what they are! He thinks that we can “infer with certainty” that in the original form of the narrative after i. 38 stood the further statement that Mary was then taken to wife by Joseph and that she conceived by him. Usener suggests that this statement was “judged inadmissible” by the redactor who interpolated i. 34 f., and that in consequence it was expunged. There can be little doubt that reasoning such as this requires omniscience as well as intuition! And the same criticism would be just in reply to any one who should elect to tell us exactly what St. Luke himself has altered or omitted. These are things which we do not know, and which we cannot know; we cannot even “infer with certainty” that St. Luke has omitted anything at all. But the broad possibility that he may have effected transformations and modifications in cc. i, ii, which we cannot now trace, is quite another matter, and, indeed, is by no means improbable. And if this is so, must it not affect the judgement we pass upon the skill or lack of skill which, on the theory proposed, St. Luke has shown? We may not know all. [pg 080] Obviously, we cannot prove this, but it is a consideration which we ought to have in mind.

(2) A second thing to be remembered is that, if our theory is true, we do not know anything of the actual circumstances under which the new tradition was introduced into the Gospel; it may have been in haste. Did the story reach the Evangelist at the last moment? Or, if not, was there a process of sifting and testing of the new information, which left little time when at length the fateful decision was taken, and the Evangelist took up his pen? Again we cannot prove these things, but again we cannot deny them. And if we cannot deny them, we must not ignore them. Only if we do ignore these possibilities, are we at liberty to insist that the reconstruction should have been more drastic. If, as we ourselves think, the supposition is reasonable, that i. 34 f. was added when the Evangelist had only just heard of the Virgin Birth tradition, we have clearly a good answer to the objection we are considering.

The foregoing arguments are speculative; there are, however, more positive considerations to urge. In addition to what has been said, we may point out (3) the fact that St. Luke's writings left his hand without a painstaking final revision, and (4) the different effect upon the mind of a new piece of information as compared with a belief, which has been held for some time, and has already become an intellectual presupposition.

(3) That St. Luke's writings left his hands without a final revision is strongly supported by the literary phenomena of the two works. The clearest evidence is found in the Acts, in which we probably have a closer literary parallel to the Birth Stories of Lk. i, ii than in the rest of the Gospel itself. Writing on the Acts (Acts of the Apostles, Eng. Tr., pp. 203 ff.) Harnack gives a list of more than two hundred “instances of inaccuracy and discrepancy”. Harnack does not accept them all, and shows that they are of different types, many of them being comparatively trifling and unimportant. Some are cases of anacoluthon and of transition from indirect to direct speech and vice versa. There are also “cases where St. Luke introduces persons with a certain unconcern, or in other places seems to forget that he has already introduced them” (p. 230). Harnack points out that “the details of a story are here and there inserted [pg 081] later or again earlier than their proper place” (p. 227), and he asserts that “instances of redundancy, of awkward repetition, of silence upon important points, and of extraordinary brevity, can be adduced from different parts of the book” (p. 230). He finds “instances of discrepancy” in the three accounts of the conversion of St. Paul, the letter of Claudius Lysias, the report of Festus, the last speech of St. Paul at Rome, and in other passages (p. 231).

Adequately to enter into this very interesting question would take us too far beyond the limits of our main subject. It is perhaps not unfair to suggest that Harnack's long list, as given in pp. 203-25, is capable of very considerable reduction. There is great force in Ramsay's remark: “He who reads Luke without applying practical sense and mother-wit and experience will always misunderstand him”, and in his caution: “When you think you find an ‘inconsistency’ in Luke, you should look carefully whether you have been sufficiently applying these qualities, before you condemn the supposed fault” (Luke the Physician, p. 55). Ramsay himself admits, however, that there are inconsistencies which cannot be denied, and holds that they show that “the work never received the final form which Luke intended to give it, but was still incomplete when he died” (ib., p. 24). In his earlier work, St. Paul the Traveller and the Roman Citizen, Ramsay has made the same suggestion, illustrations of which he finds in Acts xvi. 19, 20 and xx. 4, 5.75

We may describe the impression which St. Luke, as a writer, makes upon us by saying that, while his work is marked by great literary art, and while it is characterized by many striking instances of historical accuracy, yet, at the same time, the [pg 082] Evangelist shows a certain unconcern in matters of detail (Harnack would call it “a certain literary carelessness”), the results of which would probably have disappeared had he subjected his works to a close final revision. If this view is just there is little weight in the objection that, on the theory we have stated, St. Luke's reconstruction might have been expected to be more drastic than it is. The inconsistencies he has left are like those which we find elsewhere and are a feature of his works as they stand.

(4) Our final argument is of a psychological kind. It rests, as we have said, upon the difference between an intellectual prepossession and the first effect upon the mind of new information.

The previous argument might seem to point in another direction. Will not the character of St. Luke's writings sufficiently explain the literary phenomena of Lk. i, ii, on the view that he taught the Virgin Birth from the first? In the light of the discrepancies which occur in the Gospel and the Acts, can we not believe that after all the Virgin Birth is an original element in the Gospel? This contention would be an example of what Harnack has called attempting to gather apologetic figs from sceptical thistles.76 We do not think that in this case the harvest would realize expectations.

It must be remembered that the two cases are not parallel. In the one case we begin with a writer whose mind is filled with an intellectual presupposition, with a knowledge, that is to say, of the Virgin Birth presupposed. Under these circumstances the miracle must be “a necessary stone in the structure”, and its effect determinative. If the Virgin Birth had been known to St. Luke for some considerable time, we cannot think that Lk. i, ii would have possessed the features to which we have called attention in Chapter II. In the other case—that of our hypothesis—the Virgin Birth is a piece of new information, and, if this is so, we submit that inconsistencies left in the adapted narrative wear a different hue. It is one thing to introduce into a narrative what is inconsistent to one's presuppositions. It is quite another thing not to perceive inconsistencies at once, when our knowledge is enlarged by a totally new fact. A presupposition is much more despotic than a subsequent discovery.