LIEUT.-COL. G. MACKINLAY, ON SOME LUCAN PROBLEMS. 205 



attention to the many striking differences between them, which he 

 thought clearly precluded copying one from the other; and he 

 pleaded for a more simple reading of scripture recognizing the 

 Divine statement of 2 Peter i, 21. 



Mr. F. W. Challis, M.A., said : While heartily endorsing the 

 principle on which Mr. Collett has just been insisting — viz., the 

 supernatural guidance afforded the Evangelists in framing the 

 Scripture — I cannot altogether appreciate his present application 

 of it. 



Broadly speaking, it seems to me that the whole drift of Colonel 

 Mackinlay's able paper has been missed in this discussion. I 

 attribute this largely to the evident fact that most of the present 

 audience have not perused his previously published brochure, which 

 elaborated the original thesis — that there is in St. Luke^s Gospel a 

 threefold narrative of the last journey to Jerusalem. It is this thesis 

 which has been attacked in discussion to-day ; and the main point 

 of the paper (which applied that thesis to the particular problem 

 of "Omission" and "Insertions") has evoked practically no 

 comment. 



Now the matter of the thesis (since this is the point of 

 attack) stands thus : — The words of Luke i, 3 ("in order "), suggest 

 some kind of chronological sequence. Grant this, and the question 

 arises : Is the sequence unbroken, or is it interrupted by 

 retrogressions 1 



Some say that there is only one line of narrative, and they 

 deny retrogression. But is this possible 1 For if chapter ix 

 admittedly deals with the last journey to Jerusalem, in chapter x 

 we reach Bethany, on the outskirts of the city. Yet in chapter xix 

 we are passing through Jericho ! 



Mr. Eouse admits this and agrees that a fresh thread of narrative 

 begins in chapter xi, 1, but he admits only this and claims uninter- 

 rupted sequence from chapter xi, 1, onwards. But can we accept 

 Mr. Rouse's contention that chapter xiii, 32, etc., dates back two 

 years from the end 1 He is asking us to believe that the lament 

 over Jerusalem and the doom pronounced (34, 35) were in the 

 third year before the completion of the Lord's ministry ! 



It seems, therefore, that the closing verses of chapter xiii provide 

 a further clear landmark, and that a threefold narrative raust he 

 admitted. 



