"How wide was the range of ideas used by early Christians to proclaim redemption through Jesus Christ? What did early Christians do with the concepts of shame, death, suffering, forgiveness, and friendship? And how did these ideas relate to the lives and thoughts of actual people in the Greco Roman world - including women?" "These and other questions are dramatically posed by J. Massyngbaerde Ford as she describes the religious and social aspects of the world into which Christianity sprang, and as she reexamines the provocative themes of the Gospel of John - the pathos of friendship, of wise men and women, of God, and of the passion of Christ."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved