Kryptonite for the Evangelicals

This book demonstrates that the Bible evolved over time and that many of its key sources were copied and re-copied, with errors introduced at each stage of the process. I heard an excellent interview with the author, a former evangelical, and his arguments were clear and well-presented. He got a 'question' via e-mail from some fundamentalist accusing him of making a fetish of textual analysis. His response was basically: you're the folks who worship a book, sorry this is inconvenient for you.

This is the second fatwa-worthy book he's written. His previous one, Lost Christianities, details the many versions of the religion that went by the wayside and the political struggles that went into the formulation of the original Christian consensus.

If you'd like a different and highly readable take, I'd highly recommend the translation of the gospels done by the eminent scholar Richmond Lattimore back in 1979.