Luke’s Resemblances to Features of Paul’s Participatory Christology

Abstract: Ever since Philipp Vielhauer’s classic article on the Paulinism of Acts, it has become common for NT scholars to remark that Luke’s theology conforms very little with Paul’s. Some have recently called this consensus into question by bringing other topics into the comparative investigation. What has received no examination, however, is the degree to which Paul and Luke belong together vis-à-vis a conviction that arguably stands at the center of Pauline theology: participation in Christ. In this essay, I carry recent discussions further by comparing Luke’s narrative theology of participation with Paul’s. Notwithstanding divergences and distinctives, I argue that Luke and Paul bear notable family resemblances to each other with respect to participation that pressure toward reconceiving how Luke’s theological proximity to Paul is framed and articluated.