Outka provides an ethical analysis from an analytic perspective of Christian theological writing pertaining to agape from writers 1930 to 1970. Among the central figures that he discusses are M. C. D'Arcy, Gerard Gilleman, Soren Kierkegaard, Reinhold Niebuhr, Anders Nygren, and Paul Ramsey. This work is still one of the very best because of its rigorous analysis of love issues.

Outka is not so much interested in offering his own proposals about how best to understand agape, nor is he interested in proposing a particular theological scheme. Rather, Outka analyzes prominent texts with an eye toward how their authors understand agape as ethics. "I am convinced that many of the historic ethical concerns of the Judeo-Christian tradition have been encapsulated in the 'love language,' and one ought to try to understand more clearly just what has been meant within that language" (5).

Early on, Outka addresses what love as a normative, ethical principal or standard means. His concentration is upon how one's understanding of agape affects how one understands neighbor-love. Outka contends that crucial aspects of agape include the fact that agape is independent and unalterable. "Regard is for every person qua human existent, to be distinguished from those special traits, actions, etc., which distinguish particular personalities from each other" (9). Furthermore, Outka contends that agape entails a basic equality whereby one's neighbors' well-being is as valuable as another's neighbor's well-being.

In chapters two and three, Outka addresses how various authors understand agape as related to loving oneself and to acting for justice. Chapter four engages how agape is related to various dominant ethical schemes and what Outka calls "subsidiary rules." The author notes that almost all of the authors do not equate agape with a particular given moral code. Chapter five includes the author's assessment of how agape might be understood as a virtue or aspect of one's character. Chapter six entails an examination of how various authors justify or support their contention that persons ought to love with agape. In other words, these are justifying reasons for why someone might regard others with equal-regard. In the seventh chapter, Outka pays particular attention to the claims of Karl Barth with regard to agape. He notes that Barth understands agape as both equal-regard and-self sacrifice. Outka then addresses how Barth understands the major themes examined in the book's previous chapters.

In the book's final chapter, Outka explores various issues that have arisen in his examination of dominant texts on agape. He proposes what he believes to be the fundamental content of human agape and some unresolved issues related to that content. "The meaning ascribed in the literature to love, in general, and to agape, in particular, is often characterized by both variance and ambiguity" (257-258). This has to do, says Outka, with the particular wider beliefs and theological schemes espoused by the writers of the love literature. It also has to do with the many ways in which the word love is used in the English language.

Upon reflecting on the matters that have arisen in his examination of love texts, Outka comes to a tentative suggestion for the meaning of agape as "an active concern for the neighbor's well-being, which is somehow independent of particular actions of the other" (260). This means in part that the human must not let disparities and inequalities determine his or her basic attitudes towards others amongst others with whom he or she interacts.

Outka also notes that various problems arise when one understands self-sacrifice as the quintessence of agape. "Generally, therefore, I am inclined to think that instead of appraising self-sacrifice as the purest and most perfect manifestation of agape, the difficulties I have considered are voided if one allows it only instrumental warrant" (278). Regard of one's self ought to be based upon the fact that he or she is a creature of God who is more than a means to some other end. Outka also notes that agape involves certain social and personal relations thus entailing an overlap between regard of others and social cooperation.