Dowd examines the Gospel of Mark from literary and theological perspectives, suggesting what the text may have meant to its first-century audience of Gentile and Jewish Christians. Mark is a Greco-Roman biography of Jesus written in an apocalyptic mode. Its theology is based on the message of the prophet Isaiah— the proclamation of release from bondage and a march toward freedom along the "way of the Lord."

Sharyn Dowd is an associate professor of religion at Baylor University, Waco, Texas.