º:XD"4H Dæ*@L $"F48XTH, and in 3:1, 23 are contradictory
done after the baptism. IT$< B,B80D@N@D0:X<T< ¦< º:4$< BD" (:VJT< cannot be interpreted in a narrower sense than "Christian facts" (if even that much be admitted), and among "Christian facts" it is very natural to include everything that could possibly be learned about the life of the founder, to whose very person, and not merely to whose work, was attributed such supreme importance by the writer of the Gospel—especially if that writer was a Paulinist as Hilgenfeld so vigorously insists. Further, we cannot admit that –<T2,< is even merely neutral; for –<T2,< and 6"2,>0$H and the whole sense of the prologue indicate an historical purpose, a desire to /pg. 45/ search out all that could be learned; and such a spirit of investigation would never be satisfied with beginning the narrative abruptly at Jesus' thirtieth year, if there were any who could tell from personal experience or through eye-witnesses what had gone before. It seems to me that this is rather confirmed than otherwise by the words @Ê •B, •DP0$H "ÛJ`BJ"4 6"Â ßB0DXJ"4 (,<`:,<@4 J@L$ 8`(@L. It seems to have been the author's fixed purpose to obtain his information not merely from eye-witnesses, but from eye-witnesses whose testimony extended as far back as possible.
2. Hilgenfeld's argument that the chronological data in 1:5, ¦< J"4$H º:XD"4H Dæ*@L $"F48XTH, and in 3:1, 23 are contradictory shatters upon the little word ñF,\ in 3:23. If Jesus was about thirty years old, He may well have been a year or so older than that round number indicates.17
3. Hilgenfeld argues18 that John the Baptist is introduced in Luke 3:2 as if for the first time (cf. Luke 5:10), because he is defined by the name of his father. The reader of Luke 1, says Hilgenfeld, would have no need to be told which John was meant. If anything, the argument may be turned around, for it would be just the reader of Luke 1, who would be interested in the name of the father, and to whom just that detail rather than the baptizing activity of John (Matthew, Mark) could be assumed as known; and it would be just the writer of Luke 1, who would be able to supply the father's name. Furthermore, the fact