The above sums up all we really know about St. Luke; but, as is often the case, in proportion to the scantiness of authentic information is the copiousness of tradition—increasing in definiteness, be it remarked—as it advances. His Gentile descent being taken for granted (cf. Col. iv. r, 14), his birth. place was appropriately enough fixed at Antioch, the centre of the Gentile church, and the birthplace of the Christian name ' (Euseb., H. iii. 4, Td /let, 14vos TiZn, /i7"ApT/oxElas, Jerome, De Vir.
Illust. 7; Antiochensis,' 111 Matt., Prxf., na Done Syrus Antiochensis ') ; though it is to be observed that Chrysostom, when dwelling on the historical associations of the city, appears to know nothing of such a tradition. He was believed to have been a Jewish proselyte, ignorant of Hebrew (`licet plcrique tradant Lucant Evangelistam, ut prose lyturn, Hebrmas literas ignorasse,' Jerome, Qmast. in Gen., c. xlvi.), and probably—because he alone mentions their mission, but in contradiction to his own words (Luke i. 23)—one of the seventy dis ciples who, having left our Lord in offence (John vi. 6o-66), was brought back to the faith by the ministry of St. Paul (Epiphan., li. II); one of the Greeks who desired to 'see Jesus,' John xii. 20, 21 (Lange), and the companion of Cleopas on the journey to Emmaus (Theophyl. Proem in Luc).
ATI idle legend of Greek origin, which first appears in the late and credulous historian Nicephorus Cal lisus (died 145o), Hist. Reel. ii. 43, and was uni versally accepted in the middle ages, represents St. I,uke as well acquainted with the art of painting, 6xpcos. g-urypcicpou rexpnr, bEfrio-rcinevos, and as signs to his hand the first portmits of our Lord, His mother, and His chief apostles.
Nothing is known of the place or manner of his death, and the traditions are inconsistent with one another. Gregmy Naz. reckons him among the martyrs, and the untrustworthy Nicephorus gives us full details of the time, place, and mode of his martyrdom; viz., that he was crucified to a live olive-tree in Greece, in his eightieth year. Accord ing to others, he died a natural death after preach ing (according to Epiphanius) in Dalmatia, Gallia, Italy, and Macedonia ; WaS buried in Bithynia, whence his bones were translated by Constantius to Constantinople (Isid. Hispal., c. 82 ; Philostorg, vol. iii. c. xxix.) Here, as everywhere, as soon as we leave the solid ground of Holy Scripture, we are lost in a quagmire of shifting and baseless tradi tions, which scarcely deserve even to be enumerated. —E. V.