Some people study the Gospels to focus on the author’s shaping of the message — so they talk about how Matthew or Mark or Luke or John “tell the story of Jesus.” For over a century scholars have contended that behind each of the storied presentations in the Gospels was a real Jewish messiah. About two years ago, my PhD mentor, James D.G. Dunn, and I co-edited a book that can guide you to some of the best scholarship on the historical Jesus questions.

The book is called The Historical Jesus in Recent Research and it is published by Eisenbraun’s. You may have to enter the title or my name.
This volume collects together pieces hard to find and representative of the most influential and best of scholarship. Here are some of the names:
Albert Schweitzer, Rudolf Bultmann, HJ Cadbury and Martin Kaehler
Joachim Jeremias, Bruce Chilton, JP Meier, JDG Dunn, WG Kuemmel, D. Allison … and others.
The book can function well as an advanced level textbook, but if you want to know how the field has been established, this is a good place to begin.