216 LIEUT.-COL. G. MACKINLAYj ON SOME LUCAX PEOELEMS. 



consecutive, times. Thus our Lord fed the five thousand, and on 

 the next day at a different place spoke of Himself as the Bread of 

 Life (John vi, 5-14, 22, 48) ; the teaching of the first being last 

 and the last first was put forward on the last journey (Matt, xix, 



30, XX, 16), and again shortly afterwards in Jerusalem (Matt, xxi, 



31, 32). The teaching of the lament and also of the parable of the 

 great Supper in Luke refers in both cases to the coming severe 

 judgment on the Jews — a subject which elsewhere in the Gospels 

 we find confined to the teaching of the Saviour at the very end of 

 His Ministry ; hence it is fair to conclude that these Lucan utter- 

 ances were also spoken towards the end — not at the time of the 

 Sermon on the Mount as Mr. Eouse suggests. 



It is interesting to note that the verse " I must go my way to- 

 day, and to-morrow, and the day following," Luke xiii, 33, is 

 interpreted by Mr. Woods (who denies any repetition of narrative) 

 to refer to days^ and he thinks it was spoken within about two days' 

 journey of Jerusalem, while Mr. Rouse thinks the days mean years, 

 and he concludes that the words were spoken at a more distant 

 spot. The nearest part of Herod's trans-Jordanic dominions, where 

 our Lord most probably was when these words were uttered, is only 

 some twenty miles distant in a direct line, though 3,700 feet below 

 that city, hence a couple of days would probably suffice for the 

 journey. Alford favours the interpretation of literal days, but the 

 passage is a difficult one, and as commentators are not agreed as to 

 its exact meaning, it seems hardly wise at present to base any 

 theory of chronology upon it. 



Mr. Eouse adduces the fact that in a later chapter, Luke xvii, 11, 

 it is recorded that our Lord passed between Samaria and Galilee, as 

 a proof that the Lucan lament and parable were not spoken near 

 the end of the Ministry, but is not this rather a begging of the 

 question 1 If it is allowed that the Lucan lament and parable 

 were spoken towards the end of the Ministry, and that a third 

 narrative begins at Luke xiv, 25, the passing between Samaria and 

 Galilee comes correctly in due chronological order in the third 

 narrative. 



If Canon Girdlestone's statements can be substantiated, that 

 St. Luke " hardly ever uses notes of time," that he " groups, 

 follows the order of thought regardless of time and space," then 

 the arguments for a threefold narrative rest upon such slender 



