Historical Jesus references

Books I found most useful

• Richard Bauckham: Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony. A thorough and fascinating study of the eyewitness basis of the gospels and how memories and important information are handed down in oral cultures. Jesus: a very short introduction – the best short summary I have read of the historical information about Jesus.
• Marcus Bockmuehl, Cambridge University: The Cambridge Companion to Jesus. A useful reference because it contains essays by a number of scholars on a variety of important topics.
• Maurice Casey, Emeritus Professor of New Testament, University of Nottingham: Jesus of Nazareth. A goldmine of information by an expert in the Aramaic language, which Jesus spoke.
• John Dickson: Is Jesus history?, The Christ Files, A Spectator’s Guide to Jesus and Jesus: a short life. Good, simple and even-handed references by a historian and fair-minded christian on the evidence historians use to understand the life of Jesus.
• Bart Ehrman, University of North Carolina: Misquoting Jesus, Jesus Interrupted, Did Jesus Exist?, How Jesus Became God and Forged. Popular books written for the layperson by a respected and sceptical scholar, whose conclusions sometimes slightly overstate his case.
• Craig Evans: Fabricating Jesus. A useful summary of the reasons why scholars generally don’t accept many novel approaches to Jesus and history.
• Michael Grant: Jesus: an historian’s review of the Gospels. A balanced account by a respected historian of the Roman Empire, who used the same historical methods in studying Jesus as he used in his other works.
• Elijah Hixson & Peter Gurry (eds). Myths and Mistakes in New Testament Textual Criticism. Up-to-date and accurate information on manuscripts, copies and errors in the NT text.
• A M Hunter: The Work and Words of Jesus. An easy to read, scholarly and inspiring summary by a Scottish theologian. Also useful are his The Parables Then and Now and Bible and Gospel.
• Larry Hurtado, Edinburgh University: How on earth did Jesus become God? Authoritative analysis of the growth of the christian understanding of the divinity of Jesus.
• M A Powell: The Jesus Debate. Powell is recognised as a fair-minded reviewer of current trends, and this book summarises the views of some of the most influential scholars in the field (the Jesus Seminar, J D Crossan, M Borg, E P Sanders, J Meier, N T Wright).
• Professor E P Sanders, Duke University Jesus and Judaism and The Historical Figure of Jesus. One of the most respected and influential New Testament scholars.
• NT Wright, Oxford & St Andrews Universities: Simply Jesus. A simple summary by a prodigious historian.

Other reference books

• Dale Allison: The Resurrection of Jesus: Apologetics, Polemics, History.
• Jonathan Bernier: Re-thinking the dates of the New Testament.
• Craig Blomberg: The historical reliability of the gospels.
• M Borg & J D Crossan: Last Week.
• M Borg & T Wright: The meaning of Jesus: Two visions.
• Dr J Charlesworth, Princeton Theological Seminary (ed): Jesus and Archaeology and Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls.
• Dr J Charlesworth, Princeton Theological Seminary & Petr Pokorny, Univerzita Karlova (eds): Jesus Research: an international perspective.
• GW Clarke, The origins and spread of Christianity, in The Cambridge Ancient History Volume 10.
• WD Davies & EP Sanders, Jesus: from the Jewish Point of View, in The Cambridge History of Judaism Vol 3.
• Paul Rhodes Eddy & Gregory Boyd: The Jesus Legend.
• Craig Evans and Tom Wright: Jesus: the final days.
• Prof P Fredriksen, Boston University: Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews
• Robert Funk and the Jesus Seminar: The Acts of Jesus
• Emeritus Professor E A Judge, Macquarie University, foreword to The truth about Jesus by P Barnett.
• Craig Keener, Asbury Theological Seminary: The Historical Jesus of the Gospels.
• Anthony Le Donne. Historical Jesus: What can we know and how can we know it?
• Prof G Stanton, Cambridge University: Message and Miracles. In M Bockmuehl.
• Lee Strobel: The Case for Christ and The Case for the Real Jesus.
• Prof P J Tomson, Protestant Theological Faculty, Brussels: Jesus and his Judaism. In M Bockmuehl.
• Robert Van Voorst: Jesus outside the New Testament.
• Prof Geza Vermes, formerly of Oxford University: The Changing Face of Jesus and The Nativity.
• Prof F Watson, University of Aberdeen: The Quest for the Real Jesus. In M Bockmuehl.
• John Wenham, Oxford University: Easter Enigma.
• L Michael White: From Jesus to Christianity

Source of quotes

• Prof M Borg, Oregon State University, is quoted in M A Powell.
• (Emeritus) Prof J Dunn, Durham University, is quoted in J Polkinghorne: Science and Christian Belief.
• H Koester is quoted in G Habermas.
• Prof J Meier, Notre Dame University, is quoted in M A Powell.
• J A T Robinson is quoted in G Habermas.
• A. N. Sherwin-White is quoted in Wikipedia.
• J Wenham is quoted in G Habermas.
• N T Wright is quoted in M A Powell.

Websites:

• Bede’s Library – A comprehensive and useful site with information assembled by a historian who is also a fair-minded christian and includes a variety of viewpoints. His summary of literature on the Jesus myth and the historical Jesus are especially relevant here.
• Bart Ehrman Blog: Christianity in Antiquity
• G Habermas: Why I Believe The New Testament Is Historically Reliable and Recent Perspectives on the Reliability of the Gospels. Excellent summaries of the views of christian scholars.
• Larry Hurtado’s blog
• Secular web:
  Richard Carrier: Did Jesus Exist? Earl Doherty and the Argument to Ahistoricity
  J J Lowder: Independent Confirmation and the Historicity of Jesus
• Stephen Davis: Why the historical Jesus matters
• So Just What Do Classical Historians Make of the New Testament Documents?
• Butler University: Scholarly Approaches to and Perspectives on the Historical Study of Jesus. A useful reference list.
• Wikipedia: Historicity of Jesus and Historical Jesus.