Christology of the New Testament: Jesus and His Earliest Followers

Who did other people think Jesus was? What did Jesus think of himself? This text offers a critical survey of the whole question of the Christology of the New Testament writers. It covers discoveries, for example, in the area of Judaism, and takes note of critiques of older approaches to the subject. It provides coverage of the christological ideas explicit or implicit in each of the main New Testament writers, as well as saying something about Jesus’ own self-understanding. It also seeks to raise briefly some of the more hermeneutical questions concerning the place which any New Testament Christology might have in a more contemporary theological debate. Chapters cover the individual Epistles and Gospels, offering the reader a primarily historical-critical approach, in the sense of seeking to understand each writer as an individual in his own original historical context. The book assumes no prior knowledge of the area.