Best Commentaries on Luke

The ZECNT is quickly proving itself to be a premier commentary series. Garland is a trusted commentator, so I believe this volume will attract the plaudits of many scholars and pastors.

Many readers will know Davis from his much-loved Old Testament expositions; these two volumes are his first foray into the New Testament, and they carry his trademark warmth and wit. Tom Schreiner found the exposition “so winsome, wise, and illuminating that I found it hard to put down,” calling the pastoral application “nothing short of brilliant.”

A brand-new mid-length commentary from a confessional Reformed scholar at RTS Orlando. Jonathan Pennington says, “I will be adding it to my stack of go-to volumes on the Third Gospel,” and Benjamin Gladd calls it “an exceptional commentary that makes [Luke’s Gospel] come alive.”

The Pillar series is one of the absolute best and every volume is worth collecting. This one was released after most of the commentaries on the commentaries were already published.

The clear and unanimous leader in the field is this 2,100-page two-volume set by Darrell Bock. It receives accolades for being thorough but not dense, for being conservative, and for having plenty of theological discussion that makes it especially useful for sermon preparation. D.A. Carson praises the volumes for being “recent, comprehensive, well written, and intelligent.” Do note that Bock has written two other volumes on Luke but that if you own these, you will not need the others.

Stein’s 642-page commentary is positively small next to Bock’s. It is considered an intermediate-level commentary that may be a little too advanced for the casual reader; the pastor or scholar well-versed in Greek may want to pass it up in favor of Bock and Marshall (see below). One benefit of this commentary is that it is reasonably-priced and thus good value for the money.

The inherent and deliberate limits of the Tyndale New Testament Commentaries means that this volume is relatively short (370 pages) and written at a popular level. This is the entry-level commentary for those who would like just one volume on Luke. Morris has written commentaries on many books of the Bible and they are uniformly sound even if they are rarely considered the top of the class.

Most commentators on the commentaries commend this volume, D.A. Carson among them, though he offers caveats. He says it is “full of thoughtful interaction with contemporary scholarship, but I do not think it is either as rigorous or as accurate as the work of Luke.” He suggests that its unique strength is narrative historiography and discourse analysis. If you, like me, don’t know what that means, then perhaps choose one of the other volumes!