In a previous article I have dealt with the striking parallels between the Dead Sea Manual of Discipline (iQS) and the Book of Acts and the special material of Matthew. The organization of early Christianity in Jerusalem, particularly its conservative or Judaizing wing, strongly suggests the Dead Sea sect at several points. The more liberal Christianity of Stephen and the Epistle to the Hebrews may, however, also have contacts with the Qumran sect's idea of spiritual sacrifices and its protest against the Jerusalem Temple. In addition there are parallels between the Dead Sea literature and the Pauline epistles but they are very different from the ones just named.

New Testament scholars have almost universally assumed that Luke was written before Acts. The evidence to support this assumption is not great, and the possibility that these two books might have been written in the reverse order should also be considered. The clearest and perhaps the only evidence for the priority of Luke to Acts is to be found in Acts 1:1, where the author speaks of a “first book” which he has written, and then describes it in terms which show that he is referring to the Gospel of Luke. To this might perhaps be added the evidence of Luke 1:1–4, where the author is almost certainly giving us a preface not only to the Gospel but to Acts as well. But as Cadbury has indicated, Luke 1:1–4 may have been written after Acts had already been completed, so that this General Preface does not really give us substantial evidence for the priority of Luke. And although the secondary preface in Acts 1:1 is explicit enough about the priority of Luke, there is the possibility that it too may have been written only after the main body of both Luke and Acts had been completed. The editors of The Beginnings of Christianity, vol. V, p. 350, say, “Prefaces then, as now, were probably written after the work was completed….” This comment was made with special reference to the preface to Luke, but it might apply equally to the preface to Acts.

The Work of the Northumbrian Alcuin in the service of Charlemagne by far excels in importance the contributions of other scholars allied with the Frankish king. One of Alcuin's many interests was to develop in the leaders among the laity of a barbarian age a sense of moral responsibility and a personal culture fit for the commanding positions which these men held. Many of the letters sent by Alcuin to Charlemagne and other members of the Royal household, to the kings of Mercia and Northumbria, to Frankish and British nobles and government officials, overflow with advice and requests to mend their ways. With this aim he wrote special works for some of these persons — for one example, the Rhetoric as a Via Regia for Charlemagne, a work which must be classed as the oldest Carolingian speculum principis, preceding that of Smaragdus of St. Mihiel (written for Louis the Pious), that of Jonas of Orláns (for Pippin of Aquitania), that of Sedulius Scotus (for Lothar II), and that of Hincmar of Reims (for Charles the Bald).

The seventh centenary of the death of Robert Grosseteste, the brilliant theologian and scientist who became bishop of Lincoln, was celebrated in 1953 and stimulated some interest in him and his work. The same year saw the publication of an outstanding study of his contribution to the origins of experimental science. The author of this study regards Grosseteste as “the first medieval writer to recognize and deal with the two fundamental methodological problems of induction and experimental verification and falsification which arose when the Greek conception of geometrical demonstration was applied to the world of experience.” Grosseteste's eminent position in science and theology thus makes the problem of his early life and education more significant both as to sources of influence and dates and places of education.

The relatively frequent occurrence in the New Testament of the preposition ὅτι before passages of direct speech calls for an explanation. The following note does not aim at giving an explanation that would hold good in all cases where the usage is found, but it is confined to a few instances where ὅτι precedes passages of quoted speech in Luke; the suggestion proposed ought, perhaps, to be more closely explored.