Authorship of Luke–Acts

The Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles make up a two-volume work which scholars call Luke–Acts. The author is not named in either volume. According to a Church tradition, he was the Luke named as a companion of Paul in the Pauline letters, but critical views at the end of the 20th century were evenly divided about whether Luke the physician wrote it, with a consensus noting the differences with the Pauline epistles. Most scholars date the composition of the combined work to around 80–90 AD.

Many scholars believe Luke the Evangelist to be a Gentile Christian, though some scholars think Luke was a Hellenic Jew. Nearly all ancient sources supported this theory of authorship. The identification of Luke as a physician comes from Colossians 4:14 and 2 Timothy, but both are viewed by most New Testament scholars to be pseudonymous. Much discussion concerns the “we” passages, though there currently exists no scholarly consensus.


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