I. Narratives and Passages Said to be Inconsistent With the View
Our first task must be to examine those narratives and passages in the Third Gospel which are said to be irreconcilable with the view that St. Luke wrote in the belief that Jesus was miraculously conceived of the Virgin Mary by the Holy Ghost. What we have to ask is whether or not they are consistent with that supposition. We begin with Lk. iii. 22.
(a) Lk. iii. 22, according to the “Western Text”
In the great majority of existing MSS. this passage reads as in the RV., “Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well [pg 025] pleased”. But in Codex Bezae, supported by Old Latin MSS. and by quotations in Justin and Clement, the passage reads, “Thou art my Son: to-day have I begotten Thee”. Blass (Philology of the Gospels, p. 168 f.) believes this to be the genuine Lukan reading, and explains the common text as “a product of assimilation to the other Gospels”. Usener (EB., col. 3348) also accepts the “Western” reading, and says, “Thus the passage in Lk. was read, in the Greek Church down to about 300 a.d. and in the Latin West down to and beyond 360 a.d.” Dr. Moffatt (INT., 3rd ed., p. 269) goes so far as to say that the Lukan reading “undoubtedly was υἱός μου εἷ σύ· ἐγὼ σήμερον γεγέννηκά σε”. He follows this reading in his Translation of the New Testament, and says (p. 74), “In the other MSS. it has been altered, for harmonistic reasons”. These opinions, and the arguments upon which they rest, have great weight. If the “Western” reading is accepted, a strong presumption is set up against the view that the Third Gospel originally contained the Virgin Birth; for it is very difficult to believe that the hand which wrote, “To-day have I begotten Thee”, had already described the miraculous birth. (Cf. also Harnack, Sayings, pp. 310 ff.)
At first sight Blass's argument would seem to show a way of escape from this conclusion. He defends the “Western” reading by showing the close connexion which it has with the following verse. “The ‘to-day have I begotten Thee’ stands in opposition to the ‘thirty years’, and the ‘Thou art my Son’ likewise to ‘being as was supposed the son of Joseph’ ” (op. cit., p. 169). The phrase “as was supposed” (verse 23) will fall to be discussed next. Meanwhile we may observe that the connexion which Blass notes is actually strengthened if what St. Luke originally wrote was “being the son of Joseph”. This is the real point in the parallelism, as Blass himself indicates by printing the name Joseph in italics.
If the “Western” reading is to be accepted, a very interesting question arises as regards St. Luke's conception of the Baptism of Jesus. There is no need to suppose that he looked upon it as the occasion of the imparting of the Divine Sonship. If the connexion which Blass notes be allowed, it is probably purely literary, and the form in which St. Luke reports the logion is [pg 026] determined by his recollection of Ps. ii. 7.[29] There is no intention, that is to say, on his part, of describing an act of deification or even adoption. But if the connexion is literary, we return again to the question, Can we think that St. Luke would have written the passage in this form, if he had already described the miraculous birth? Can we explain his deliberate preference for the language of Ps. ii. 7? The answer is, we feel bound to say, It is difficult, if it is not impossible. The force of this argument rests, nevertheless, upon the confidence with which we can accept the “Western” reading; and while the present writer would favour that reading himself, he recognizes that its attestation is not such as to compel acceptance. Moffatt's claim that it “undoubtedly was” the Lukan reading is too strong. The most we can say is that it has great, if not very great, probability in its favour.
(b) The Lukan Genealogy and Lk. iii. 23
It will be best at this point to consider the question of the Lukan Genealogy, and also the passage to which attention has just been called: “being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph” (RV.).