But to give just an example: Luke actually rewrote Matthew’s Nativity to push Luke’s agenda of representing Christians, and hence Jesus and his family, as law abiding citizens—in contrast to the fugitive outlaws that Matthew’s Nativity depicts them as. See OHJ, 472–73; with Robert Smith, “Caesar’s Decree (Luke 2.1-2): Puzzle or Key?,” Currents in Theology and Mission 7 (December 1980), pp. 343-51.

Yes. Most definitely. The same techniques Luke used to compose Acts, he used to compose his Gospel. I show this (with citations to the scholarship confirming it) in On the Historicity of Jesus (Ch. 10, section on Luke; a lot more scholarship confirming it has since published; I will cite that bibliography in a forthcoming volume).

Note that I don’t cite that article for any of these points. It is merely a reference link. The article you are reading here is the argument being made. You should never trust Wikipedia on any point of Christian propaganda. You should always check it against the facts. That is what I am doing here. So you can either trust dubious assertions, or demonstrated facts. That’s up to you. But the facts and scholarship proving Wikipedia wrong are provided here for you.

That Christian apologists don’t want Acts to be based on Josephus makes their opinions unreliable. Whereas the fact is, all the latest peer-reviewed experts on Acts agree Acts used Josephus. That’s in standard references now. If you are interested in exploring that debate, you can compare the assertions of Christian apologists with the conclusions of the arguments and evidence presented by the latest peer-reviewed experts, and see who is arguing speciously, and who is arguing soundly.

Meanwhile, regarding the titles, you seem to have mistaken what I said for something else. I never argue that Acts gets the titles wrong. Rather, I show here that the letter of Lysias presented by Acts does not contain Felix’s actual title (he does not call him a proconsul there, or even call himself a tribune; there are no official titles in the letter at all), not that Acts did not identify Lysias as a tribune or Felix as a proconsul. In other words, the author of Acts knows their titles, but then screwed up by not having them appear in a quoted piece of official correspondence—among many other mistakes, indicating the letter cannot be a copy of a real one. Maybe it is a paraphrase, but then that means the author is choosing what the letter said and not simply showing us the letter. And in any event, this is all addressed in the article here that you are supposed to be commenting on.

It states that the proconsuls were titled correctly and that Lysias was correctly called a tribune.
It states that most scholars agree that Luke and Josephus DIDN’T borrow from each other.

P.S. Do also note Acts invents a story whereby Timothy has a Jewish mother (warranting the compromise in his case). No such fact exists in Paul (of Titus or Timothy) or is even likely there (they are both clearly Gentiles with no imagined concerns about parentage). And Acts has Paul circumcise Timothy for the appeasement of local Jews (mission diplomacy), not Christian Judaizers (internal politics). Thus Acts is creating a diplomatic narrative that does not exist in Paul’s eyewitness accounts.

You are confusing Acts’ invention of a unity narrative with Paul’s more truthful account of the conflict. Throughout, Acts erases nearly every sign of conflict attested in Paul and replaces it with a “the church always got along and cooperated” POV (such as by having Peter come up with the Gentile movement on his own, before Paul; and as here, having Paul make compromises to the other side; thus proving unity rather than conflict).

When it comes to the actual detente achieved, Acts agrees with Paul: Gentiles were allowed in without being converted. Acts even has Peter support this outcome by having already thought of it before Paul did! That is not in Paul. But it furthers the unity perspective. But in terms of political outcome, they are talking about the same thing: a detente was achieved between the Judaizers and the Paulines.

What Acts covers up is the existence of any conflict underlying this detente. But from Paul we know there was a lot. And we know Paul definitely didn’t cooperate with the Judaizers. Nor did Peter come up with the idea of a Gentile mission.

This is why Acts changes everything (he says this of a different person than was present at the second council; and he locates it to the Diaspora, and thus in no connection with either council). The move makes Paul look like the nice guy against all those mean nasty Diaspora Jews, who therefore have no valid complaint against him, he’s totally innocent and they are just being unreasonable. Whereas what Paul relates actually happened gives those Jews a legitimate gripe, which would complicate Acts’ narrative agenda (this tension is readily evident across several of Paul’s letters; Acts erases it, to create a simple “unified church against the unbelieving Jews” narrative).

It’s about this text of yours blindly taking Paul writings as truth regarding Timothy being circumcised.
“
Indeed, a real companion of Paul would be so aware of this that he’d have to comment on it, so as to explain why Paul completely reversed course after already winning the point he says he actually fought for at Jerusalem. Instead, Paul’s real position and story is erased by the author of Acts, and history is then revised to depict Paul doing and enacting exactly the opposite (and conveniently by picking an alternative companion to be targeted and thus circumcised, elsewhere). There is no evidence in Paul that Timothy was ever circumcised; in fact, there is evidence against it. Because had he been, he’d have thus become a Jew; yet Paul only knows Timothy as a Gentile in his last letter, written before his final sail to Rome, refuting any possibility of his having been circumcised when Acts imagines.
“

I don’t follow you.

The result you describe as “actual” is precisely the result Paul admits to in Galatians 1–2. And Acts is pro-Pauline (that’s why it invents Peter pre-confirming Paul’s innovation by receiving a vision of it first).

So, what do you think Paul claimed as “victory”? And why do you think Acts is a Petrine faction text?

It makes sense for Paul to claim a complete victory, but it’s quite possible that the result was actually the one hinted in Acts: following “The Law” is desirable, but not mandatory.

So Acts may preserved this Petrine tradition vs. Pauline one.