This book originated as a thesis presented to the University of Edinburgh in 1974 for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Since then it has been substantially revised and rewritten. At all stages in its development, I have been indebted to the advice and encouragement of Professor Hugh Anderson of the University of Edinburgh. I am grateful to the editors of the S.N.T.S. Monograph Series for accepting the work for publication: to Professor Matthew Black, Principal of St Mary's in the University of St Andrews, for initial guidance, and to Professor R. McL. Wilson, of the same University, for much help while the manuscript was being prepared for the publishers; and to Dr David Hill, of the University of Sheffield, for the benefit of his criticism at an earlier stage. My indebtedness to the world of scholarship is, however, much wider than I can readily identify here. I can only hope that the acknowledgements in the notes and bibliography go some way towards indicating the extent to which I have relied on the labours of others. For any omissions and misinterpretations I crave the reader's indulgence.

I acknowledge the help I have received from many modern translations of the Bible, and while I have sometimes translated from the Greek myself and have not used any one version consistently, I am aware of having used the Revised Standard Version (1952) more frequently than any other.