Once upon a time theologians would thank their parents for a wonderful Christian upbringing and quote a bible verse to preface their publications. Gabi Bauer nails her colours to the mast by appending a poem by Kurt Marti, by profession a Swiss Reformed pastor and by inclination a ‘Christian Marxist’. It was from Karl Barth that Marti imbibed doubts about God, physical resurrection, Judgement Day and eternal life. Such concepts remained incomprehensible puzzles for Marti, as they are for many theologians. The poem takes us to the heart of this book, the published version of Bauer's Habilitationsschrift, which deals with the debate within the provincial Churches of western Germany over what actually constitutes the Gospel. Drawing principally upon primary source material Bauer outlines the struggle between conservative Evangelicals and adherents of modernist theology. At the heart of the debate are the attacks on the truth claims of the Bible. The book is divided into sections of greatly varying length. The focus of this study is on the 1960s; the section dealing with the 1970s covers about forty-five pages, that dealing with the 1980s a little over twenty pages. The author is clearly writing as an outsider and has problems in correctly defining ‘Evangelical’. Bauer suggests that what she calls ‘the Evangelical movement’ only came into being in the 1960s when Lutheran and Reformed Evangelicals either set up new or took over old organisations. Free Church Evangelicals, Pentecostals, charismatics and Evangelical Catholics are excluded from her examination. Bauer's failure seriously to interact with the theology and history of German Pietism lead her into errors of judgement. The organisations that she discusses are not set within the tradition of ecclesiolae in ecclesia and their protest against empty formalism. If she had read Kurt Heimbucher's memoirs she would have realised that many German Evangelicals prefer the designation ‘Pietist’, the label ‘Evangelical’ having for them broader, vaguer and more international connotations. Evangelical critiques of theological speculations did not begin, as she seems to suggest, in the late twentieth century; they informed the debate that led to the Evangelical Alliance being set up in the first place. Bauer goes on to discuss those groups that form the core Evangelical movement: holiness associations, evangelistic groups as well as the German Evangelical Alliance. The outline of responses to Rudolf Bultmann's impact on post-war theology covers one-third of the book. It was recognised that not a few state-funded university theologians were applying a spiritualising exegesis to the historical data on the death and resurrection of Jesus, teaching a generation of budding pastors biblical concepts devoid of their literal meaning. Emptying Christianity of its distinguishing tenets and considering the Gospel incidents as ciphers and metaphors rather than as history was believed essential if Christianity were to be made attractive and relevant again for modern man. The times were a-changing in that decade; theology, as part of the ideological superstructure of modern capitalist society, was deeply affected. Traditionalists, however, could not accept that the old Gospel was rapidly aging; for them, Bultmann's disciples were creatures of their times, criticising what they could not understand. A grass-roots opposition movement was galvanised to protest against the pseudomorphosis and secularisation of theology, the redefinition of biblical concepts in a political sense and the general drift away from traditional moorings. Critics could no longer tolerate what they believed to be doctrinal indifferentism (Bauer prefers the term ‘pluralism’ of beliefs). She tends to see these critics of the ruling theological ideas as fundamentalist yokels. The activism of Evangelicals clearly provoked the forces upholding the status quo as has the establishment of institutions of theological training not controlled by the oligarchs of historical criticism. Again, Bauer would temper her critique were she able to contextualise the felt need for such establishments. The ordained father of the great Evangelical bible commentator Matthew Henry refused to allow his son to study theology at university, packing him off instead to a dissenting academy where a truly Christian influence could be expected. That was in 1680. The situation facing German Evangelicals today is not much different although there are few well-established theological colleges outside the monopolistic control of the State and its Churches. Academics working in these establishments who reject the presuppositions of historical-critical methodologies are subjected to vitriolic attacks from Lutheran and Free Churchman (Erich Geldbach) alike. Inspired by the Church struggles during the Third Reich a second Confessing Movement calling itself No Other Gospel and Church Assemblies for the Bible and Creed came into being to express their grave concerns about existential interpretations of scriptural texts which, in their view, were tantamount to heresy. One figure associated with the battle against the pro-Hitler German Christian Movement, the Erlangen theologian Walter Künneth, was drawn into the very public campaign against the latest reinterpretation of New Testament Christianity which began around the year 1966. Needless to say, Bauer paints him in rather dark colours and denies any real linkage between the two struggles even though the Protestants at Barmen, too, were concerned with the alien presuppositions which were thwarting and undermining the theological basis of the Church, making its witness ineffective. Bauer's study could have profited from giving more attention to the interdenominational, ecumenical and international character of Evangelicalism. The crucial importance of the German movement's links with British Evangelicals is not discussed. Bultmann's attempt to modernise Christianity has certainly not led to a revival of piety or parish life. In spite of serious misgivings about false teaching and its effects, the Evangelical remnant has to date remained loyal to their Churches, willing to help to pay the salaries of those whose teaching they consider heretical and whose lifestyles are in their eyes an abomination. This is the tolerant legacy of mainstream Pietism. Were Evangelicals to leave en masse, the loss in tax revenue to the Churches would be immense and the gaps left behind would certainly cripple much of what takes place under the umbrella of German Protestantism.