I HAVE GIVEN HERE TWO separate bibliographies that may be useful for the nonprofessional: one of mythicist literature, the other of scholarship on the historical Jesus.
Mythicist Literature
This list is not meant to be exhaustive. Instead, it comprises some of the best-known and most influential mythicist literature produced, especially (but not exclusively) in recent years. I have included only books in English.
Acharya, S (a.k.a. D. M. Murdock). The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold. Kempton, IL: Adventures Unlimited, 1999.
Carrier, Richard. Not the Impossible Faith: Why Christianity Didn’t Need a Miracle to Succeed. N.p.: Lulu Press, 2009.
Doherty, Earl. Jesus: Neither God nor Man: The Case for a Mythical Jesus. Ottawa, ON: Age of Reason Publications, 2009.
———. The Jesus Puzzle: Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ? Ottawa, ON: Age of Reason Publications, 1999.
Drews, Arthur. The Witnesses to the Historicity of Jesus Christ. Trans. Joseph McCabe. London: Watts & Co., 1912.
Freke, Timothy, and Peter Gandy. The Jesus Mysteries: Was the “Original Jesus” a Pagan God? New York: Three Rivers Press, 1999.
Graves, Kersey. The World’s Sixteen Crucified Saviors: Christianity Before Christ. New York: Cosimo Classics, 2007. First published in 1875.
Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ: Recovering the Lost Light. New York: Walker & Co., 2004.
Hoffmann, R. Joseph, ed. Sources of the Jesus Tradition: Separating History from Myth. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2010.
Jackson, John G. Pagan Origins of the Christ Myth. Austin: American Atheist Press, 1988. First published in 1941.
Leidner, Harold. The Fabrication of the Christ Myth. Tampa, FL: Survey Books, 2000.
Price, Robert. The Christ-Myth Theory and Its Problems. Cranford, NJ: American Atheist Press, 2011.
———. The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man: How Reliable Is the Gospel Tradition? Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2003.
———. Jesus Is Dead. Cranford, NJ: American Atheist Press, 2007.
Robertson, Archibald. Jesus: Myth or History? London: Watts & Co., 1946.
Robertson, John M. Christianity and Mythology. London: Watts & Co., 1910.
———. Jesus and Judas: A Textual and Historical Investigation. London: Watts & Co., 1927.
———. The Jesus Problem: A Restatement of the Myth Theory. London: Watts & Co., 1917.
Salm, René. The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus. Cranford, NJ: American Atheist Press, 2008.
Thompson, Thomas L. The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David. New York: Basic Books, 2005.
Wells, George A. Cutting Jesus Down to Size: What Higher Criticism Has Achieved and Where It Leaves Christianity. Chicago: Open Court Press, 2009.
———. Did Jesus Exist? 2nd ed. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1986. First published in 1975.
———. The Historical Evidence for Jesus. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1988.
———. “Is There Independent Confirmation of What the Gospels Say of Jesus?” Free Inquiry 31 (2011): 19–25.
———. The Jesus Legend. Peru, IL: Carus, 1996.
———. The Jesus Myth. Chicago: Open Court, 1999.
Zindler, Frank R. Through Atheist Eyes: Scenes from a World That Won’t Reason. Cranford, NJ: American Atheist Press, 2011.
Studies of the Historical Jesus (and Related Topics)
The following list is highly selective. I’ve included only a few of the books that in my opinion are among the most important and interesting studies of the past thirty or forty years that are accessible to nonspecialists. For a full annotated bibliography, which is now fifteen years old, see Craig A. Evans, Life of Jesus Research: An Annotated Bibliography, rev. ed., New Testament Tools and Studies 24 (Leiden: Brill, 1996). Evans’s bibliography includes 2045 entries of significant books and articles—and even this is nowhere near exhaustive.
Allison, Dale. Jesus of Nazareth: Millenarian Prophet. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998.
Borg, Marcus J. Conflict, Holiness, and Politics in the Teachings of Jesus. New York: E. Mellen Press, 1984.
———. Jesus, the New Vision: The Spirit, Culture, and the Life of Discipleship. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987.
Brandon, S. G. F. Jesus and the Zealots: A Study of the Political Factor in Primitive Christianity. New York: Scribner, 1967.
Charlesworth, James. Jesus Within Judaism: New Light from Exciting Archaeological Discoveries. New York: Doubleday, 1988.
Crossan, John Dominic. The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1991.
———. Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1994.
———. Who Killed Jesus? Exposing the Roots of Anti-Semitism in the Gospel Story of the Death of Jesus. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1995.
Downing, F. Gerald. Christ and the Cynics: Jesus and Other Radical Preachers in First-Century Tradition. Sheffield, Eng.: JSOT Press, 1988.
Ehrman, Bart D. Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1999.
———. The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. 5th edition. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2011.
Fredriksen, Paula. From Jesus to Christ: The Origins of the New Testament Images of Jesus. New Haven, CT: Yale Univ. Press, 1988.
———. Jesus of Nazareth: King of the Jews. New York: Vintage, 1999.
Funk, Robert W. Honest to Jesus: Jesus for a New Millennium. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996.
Funk, Robert W., and the Jesus Seminar. The Acts of Jesus: The Search for the Authentic Deeds of Jesus. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1998.
Funk, Robert W., Roy W. Hoover, and the Jesus Seminar. The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus. New York: Macmillan, 1993.
Goldstein, Morris. Jesus in the Jewish Tradition. New York: Macmillan, 1950.
Goodacre, Mark. The Case Against Q: Studies in Markan Priority and the Synoptic Problem. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 2002.
Harvey, Anthony E. Jesus and the Constraints of History. London: Duckworth, 1982.
Herberg, R. Travers. Christianity in Talmud and Midrash. New York: Ktav, 1903.
Horsley, Richard A. Jesus and the Spiral of Violence: Popular Jewish Resistance in Roman Palestine. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1987.
Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Real Jesus: The Misguided Quest for the Historical Jesus and the Truth of the Traditional Gospels. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996.
Kloppenborg, John. The Formation of Q: Trajectories in Ancient Wisdom Collections. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987.
Marshall, I. Howard. I Believe in the Historical Jesus. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1977.
Meier, John. A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus. 4 vols. New York: Doubleday, 1991, 1994, 2001, 2009.
Merz, Annette, and Gerd Theissen. The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998.
Sanders, E. P. The Historical Figure of Jesus. London: Allen Lane/Penguin Press, 1993.
———. Jesus and Judaism. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.
———. Judaism: Practice and Belief, 63 BCE–66 CE. London: SCM Press and Philadelphia: Trinity Press International, 1992.
Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. In Memory of Her: A Feminist Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins. New York: Crossroad, 1983.
Schweitzer, Albert. The Quest of the Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of Its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001. First published in German in 1906.
Segal, Alan F. Two Powers in Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports About Christianity and Gnosticism. Leiden: Brill, 1977.
Smith, Jonathan Z. Drudgery Divine: On the Comparison of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1990.
Smith, Morton. Jesus the Magician. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1978.
Stanton, Graham. The Gospels and Jesus. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1989.
Strauss, David Friedrich. The Life of Jesus Critically Examined. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1972. First published in German in 1835–36.
Vermès, Géza. Jesus in His Jewish Context. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003.
———. Jesus in the Jewish World. London: SCM Press, 2011.
———. Jesus the Jew: A Historian’s Reading of the Gospels. London: Collins, 1973.
Wright, N. T. Jesus and the Victory of God. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996.