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I and to his disciples ; and from the first three Gospels we have rather copious records of our Lord ' s transactions during it : but nothing that at all accords with the occurrence during it of the mission of the Seventy , and their return after having executed their commission .
If the mission of the Seventy could not have occurred on our Lord ' s last journey , we are at liberty to place it where it best suits the history ; and no situation appears more probable than during the absence of the Twelve , and soon after our Lord had sent them forth . Purposing , without a doubt , to spend some time in the eastern part of Herod ' s dominions , ( which he did
after he had visited Jerusalem at the Feast of Dedication , ) it was natural that—in order to prepare for his preaching in a district where he had not yet been in his public character , and at a season of the year when it would not be practicable to collect great numbers of the people together , as in the preceding months in Galilee—he should adopt the preparatory measure of sending persons , many of whom might be natives of the Persea , to the various towns and villages which he intended to visit . It is not improbable that we are to refer to his preaching in the Persea at that period , several of the
discourses and occurrences which are recorded in our fourth division of St . Luke ' s Gospel , i . e . the Gnomology . If the Evangelist became acquainted with the materials of that portion , principally by his researches in the Pertea , it might have contributed to their heing arranged in their present situation and together ; and if they were chiefly derived from some of the Seventy , it would naturally lead to their being introduced by a brief record of the mission and ministry of those disciples . Independently of any other consideration , it might , indeed , be reasonably supposed , from the expression , " after these things" ( ch . x . 1 ?) that St . Luke considered the mission of the Seventy as occurnng on the last journey ; and though the fact is perceived to be otherwise , from the accounts of the
preceding Evangelists , yet it might be admitted that such really was the view of St . Luke , except for his preceding representation ( ch . ix . 51 ) of the despatch and directness with which our Lord performed that journey . Thi 3 almost obliges us to refer such an occurrence as the mission of the Seventy to a different period . —How then are we to interpret the words pera . tolvtcc , ** after these things" ? Since the record obviously forms an independent in
section of the Gospel , it might be supposed that ^ ra tuvto . occurred the original document , and was left by St . Luke as he found it . This , however , does not seem very consistent with that correctness of style which is manifestly a characteristic of this Evangelist ; and it is more probable , that since his preceding section ( ch . ix . ) had begun with the account of the mission of the twelve—with which he connected a brief view of the events following their return till our Lord ' s last journey—he adverted to their mission in the
expression [/ . era , tolvto , ( without notice of the intervening records ) ; just as he clearly does when he says that ** the Lord appointed Seventy others also , " teat irepaq i €$ ofjwjytavTa . —If the reader do not deem this solution fully satisfactory , he may consider it as one of the many cases in which we have only to choose between difficulties ; and we prefer that supposition which is attended with a verbal difficulty to that which opposes fact .
The remarks already made in reference to the characteristics of the fourth part of St . Luke ' s Gospel , consisting of the Gnomology , will probably have prepared the way for what we have to offer on the historical portion forming the third part—respecting our Lord ' s ministry in Galilee . There is little room to doubt that St . Luke would arrange his materials in the order of time , in proportion as he could ascertain it j and as he gives
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t * - 384 On the Chronology and Arrangement of the Gospel Narratives , r-
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1831, page 384, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2598/page/24/
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