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Rating: 
Summary: Informative!
Review: Purchased as a text book for a College religion class. A text book I actually enjoy reading.
Rating:
Summary: Conservative, Informative, Readable
Review: This is one of the few college textbooks I did not have to use my highlighter to read. Metzger is extremely easy to understand; he structures his book chronologically, covering, albeit briefly given the spacial limitations of an introductory text, most every topic the reader must understand to gain a basic knowledge of the context of the NT's development. The reader first will gain a basic understanding of the cultural context from which the New Testament arose, then will learn about the life of and sources for understanding of Jesus Christ, then finally will see the same for the apostolic age. His prose is lucid and lacks the pedantry of much New Testament scholarship, so that the reader will be prepared to read such scholarship in the future. In assessing Metzger's positions, the reader must keep in mind that, as he plainly states in his preface, Metzger writes as a Christian. As such, he does not dispute traditional authorship for the majority of the New Testament (with the notable exception of 2 Peter), and argues that the evidence for Christ's resurrection is "overwhelming." Liberals will not find this book to their liking. That having been said, Metzger generally does a good job, given how little space he has, of presenting most sides of various debates and leaving it up to the reader to do further research necessary for finding his own opinion. Since this must be the objective of an introductory text, the text succeeds.
Rating:
Summary: Conservative, Informative, Readable
Review: This is one of the few college textbooks I did not have to use my highlighter to read. Metzger is extremely easy to understand; he structures his book chronologically, covering, albeit briefly given the spacial limitations of an introductory text, most every topic the reader must understand to gain a basic knowledge of the context of the NT's development. The reader first will gain a basic understanding of the cultural context from which the New Testament arose, then will learn about the life of and sources for understanding of Jesus Christ, then finally will see the same for the apostolic age. His prose is lucid and lacks the pedantry of much New Testament scholarship, so that the reader will be prepared to read such scholarship in the future. In assessing Metzger's positions, the reader must keep in mind that, as he plainly states in his preface, Metzger writes as a Christian. As such, he does not dispute traditional authorship for the majority of the New Testament (with the notable exception of 2 Peter), and argues that the evidence for Christ's resurrection is "overwhelming." Liberals will not find this book to their liking. That having been said, Metzger generally does a good job, given how little space he has, of presenting most sides of various debates and leaving it up to the reader to do further research necessary for finding his own opinion. Since this must be the objective of an introductory text, the text succeeds.
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