This is an excellent introduction to the New Testament. Fr. Raymond F. Collins was a Roman Catholic priest who also taught New Testament at the Catholic University in Louvain, Belgium.
Fr. Collins' approach to the New Testament differs from most introductory works. Rather than discuss the New Testament book by book, or by groupings of books (e.g., the Synoptic Gospels, the Johannine corpus, or the Pauline epistles), Fr. Collins instead takes up the various exegetical methods that New Testament critics employ. Thus, there are separate sections of the book on textual criticism, source criticism, form criticism, redactional criticism, and structural analysis. Fr. Collins also discusses the thorny issues involved in the history of canon formation the of New Testament writings, and offers his take on the role and necessity of critical New Testament scholarship within the Roman Catholic Church. Of necessity, Fr. Collins writes from the Catholic perspective, but this does not lessen the importance of his book; he wears his Catholicism lightly and his insights are important for those coming from a Protestant or Mormon persepctive.
Fr. Collins' New Testament Introduction supplements rather than supplants other introductory volumes. The New Testament scholar's bookshelf will still contain the more conventional Introductions from Fr. Raymond Brown, Werner Georg Kummel, and others of the same type. But for anyone, scholar or layperson, who struggles to lay bare the meaning of the New Testament and who wishes to avail him/herself of the latest insights from critical scholarship, Fr. Collins' work is an invaluable tool. ( )