Includes bibliographical references (p. 773-838) and indexes.

Translator's preface -- Author's preface to the German edition -- Approach : theology of the New Testament as meaning-formation -- How history is made and written -- History as meaning-formation -- Understanding through narration -- Structure : history and meaning -- The phenomenon of the beginning -- Theology and the academic study of religion -- Diversity and unity -- New Testament theology as meaning-formation -- Jesus of Nazareth : the near God -- The quest for Jesus -- Beginning : John the Baptist -- Point of departure : the coming of the one God in his kingly power -- Center : the proclamation of the Kingdom of God -- Ethics in the horizon of the Kingdom of God -- Jesus as healer : God's miraculous power -- The imminent judgment : nothing is without its consequences -- Jesus and the law : to will the good -- Jesus's self-understanding : more than a prophet -- Jesus's destiny in Jerusalem : end and beginning -- The first transformation : the emergence of Christology -- Jesus's pre-Easter claim -- The Resurrection appearances -- Experiences of the spirit -- The christological reading of Scripture -- History-of-religions context -- Language and shape of early Christology : myth, titles, formulae, and traditions -- The second transformation : the early Christian mission without the precondition of circumcision -- The Hellenists -- Antioch -- The stance of Paul -- Paul : missionary and thinker -- Theology -- Christology -- Pneumatology -- Soteriology -- Anthropology -- Ethics -- Ecclesiology -- Eschatology -- Setting in the history of early Christian theology -- The third transformation : composition of Gospels as innovative response to crises -- Death of the founders -- Delay of the Parousia -- Destruction of Jerusalem and the earliest Christian congregation -- The rise of the Flavians -- The writing of Gospels as innovative response to crises -- The sayings source, the Synoptic Gospels, and Acts : meaning through narration -- The sayings source as proto-Gospel -- Mark : the way of Jesus -- Matthew : the new and better righteousness -- Luke : salvation and history -- The fourth transformation : the Gospel in the world -- Social, religious, and political developments -- Pseudepigraphy/deuteronymity as a historical, literary, and theological phenomenon -- The Deutero-Pauline Letters : Paul's thought extended -- Colossians : Paul in changing times -- Ephesians : space and time -- Second Thessalonians : date (of the end) as problem -- The Pastoral Epistles : God's philanthropy -- The Catholic Epistles : voices in dangerous times -- Peter : testing by suffering -- James : acting and being -- Hebrews : the God who speaks -- Jude and 2 Peter : identity through tradition and polemic against heresy -- Johannine theology : introduction to the Christian faith -- Theology -- Christology -- Pneumatology -- Soteriology -- Anthropology -- Ethics -- Ecclesiology -- Eschatology -- Setting in the history of early Christian theology -- Revelation : seeing and understanding.