I have been (intermittently) discussing the debate that I had with myself in front of my New Testament class on the resolution, Resolved: The Book of Acts is Historically Reliable.  So far I have indicated what the Affirmative side argued in favor of the resolution; what the Negative side argued against the resolution; and what the Negative side said in its rebuttal to the first Affirmative speech.  NOW, at last, I can indicate what the Affirmative side said in its rebuttal to the two Negative speeches.   Recall: in this post I’m not indicating what I really thing; I’m indicating what I would argue if this were the side I was required to argue (and what I did argue in class that day).  Here it is:

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Despite what the negative side has maintained, we remain convinced that the New Testament book of Acts is historically reliable.

The first point to stress is that it is of utmost importance that we not impose modern standards of historical accuracy on an ancient text.  Of course the author of Acts did not follow the historiographic methods that developed in European circles of the 19th and 20th centuries.  He was a first-century author, and as such he followed first-century historiographic techniques.  He can scarcely be faulted for that!

And by the standards of his own day, Luke was a superb historian.  As we have seen…

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