The Rationalist Tradition

The Secular Syllabus:

The top 25 Books on atheism and secularism

A curated index of the twenty-five most influential and insightful texts on atheism, skepticism, and rational philosophy.

The Curriculum

1. The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins

3. Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon by Daniel Dennett

2. God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything by Christopher Hitchens

4. The End of Faith by Sam Harris

5. Cross-Examined: Christianity on Trial by John W. Campbell

6. Atheism: The Case Against God by George H. Smith

7. God: The Failed Hypothesis by Victor Stenger

8. Why I am not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion by Bertrand Russell

10. The Christian Delusion by John Loftus

9. The God Argument: The Case Against Religion and for Humanism by A.C. Grayling

11. Godless: How an Evangelical Preacher became One of America’s Leading Atheists by Dan Barker

12. Why I am not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion by Bertrand Russell

13. Atheism: a Reader by S.T. Joshi

14. Misquoting Jesus: The Story About Who Changed the Bible and Why by Bart Ehrman

15. The Skeptics Annotated Bible by Steve Wells

16. Sense and Goodness Without God by Richard Carrier

17. The Demon Haunted World by Carl Sagan

18. Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne

20. Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris

19. The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman

21. How Jesus Became God by Bart Ehrman

22. The Portable Atheist by Christopher Hitchens

23. Brief Answers to the Big Questions by Stephen Hawking

24. Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person’s Answer to Christian Fundamentalism by David Mills

25. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up by John Allen Paulos