Jesus, aged 12,
teaching the doctors of the Faith

The earliest known sources are Christian writings - the New Testament - which, according to modern historians, were written only 20-30 years after Jesus died.

However, while Christianity considers Jesus to be the Christ (Messiah) and Son of God, and Islam views him only as a prophet, secular historians and followers of most other world religions (including Judaism) tend to regard him as an ordinary human. Messianic Judaism, however, also considers Jesus (Yeshua HaMashiach) to be the Jewish Messiah.

⁴ John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, ⁵ and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth.

To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood ⁶ and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. ⁷ Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him.  Even so.  Amen.

⁸ "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."

(Revelation of Jesus Christ 1:4-8 ESV)

Earliest known sources

Christian writings

The most detailed sources of historical information about Jesus in the Bible are contained within the Gospels but recent critics have asserted that these weren't written until between 68 and 110[2]. However, some also claim that evidence for a historical Jesus is provided by the Epistles, especially those by Paul in the latter half of the 1st century (see also Pauline Epistles).

The four canonical Gospels (most commonly estimated to have been written between the years 65 and 110[2]) and the writings of Paul of Tarsus are among the earliest known documents relating to Jesus' life. Flavius Josephus is also studied by historical scholars[3] as is the Epistle to the Hebrews.[4] Some scholars also hypothesize the existence of earlier texts such as the Logia, Signs Gospel and the Q document. There are arguments that parts of the Gospel of Thomas are likewise early texts.

Jesus is also a large factor in New Testament apocrypha, works that some early Christians, notably in the Council of Laodicea, chose to exclude from the canon, based on judgments regarding whether or not they were inspired by God. Again, the most detailed extra-biblical information is contained within apocryphal Gospels, but the contents of other books has also been presented as evidence.

Scholarly opinions on the historicity of the New Testament accounts are diverse. At the extremes, they range from the view that they are inerrant descriptions of the life of Jesus,[5] to the view that they provide no historical information about his life.[6] The sources extant contain little evidence of Jesus' life before the account of Jesus' Baptism, and it has been suggested by many [7] that the events recorded in the gospels cover a period of less than three years. Historians subject the gospels to critical analysis, attempting to differentiate authentic, reliable information from what they judge to be inventions, exaggerations, and alterations.[8]

The Gospels

• Gospel of Matthew
• the Gospel of Mar
• the Gospel of Luke
• the Gospel of John

Many historians believe that the texts on which the Gospels were based were written within living memory of Jesus' lifetime. They therefore accept that the accounts of the life of Jesus[5] in the Gospels provide valid evidence for the historical existence of Jesus, and a reliable, historically verifiable account of his life and death (see also Historicity of the Bible).

The four canonical Gospels are anonymous. The introduction to the Gospel of Luke mentions accounts of what was handed down by eyewitnesses, and claims to have "diligently investigated all things from the beginning". The epilogue to John states that "these things" are testified to by the beloved disciple, whose "testimony we know ... is true".[10] The authors in antiquity who discussed the authorship of the Gospels generally asserted the following:[11]

The Gospel of Matthew was supposedly written by Matthew, one of the Twelve apostles of Jesus; the Gospel of Mark was also supposedly written by Mark, a disciple of Simon Peter, who was one of the Twelve; the Gospel of Luke was supposedly written by Luke, who was a disciple of Paul of Tarsus, who was the Apostle to the Gentiles; the Gospel of John was supposedly written by John, who was one of the Twelve. In addition, the book of the Acts of the Apostles has traditionally been attributed to Luke. There is no independent evidence within the Gospels, however, as to their authorship other than those claimed within the Christian tradition[12].

"Thus our prime sources about the life of Jesus were written within about fifty years of his death by people who perhaps knew him, but certainly by people who knew people who knew him. If this is beginning to sound slightly second hand, we may wish to consider two points. First... most ancient and medieval history was written from a much greater distance. Second, all the Gospel writers could have talked to people who were actually on the spot, and while perhaps not eyewitnesses themselves, their position is certainly the next best thing."[18]

Other issues with the historicity of the Gospels include possible conflicts with each other, or with other historical sources. The most frequent suggestions of conflict relate to the Census of Quirinius as recounted in Luke, the two genealogies contained in Luke and Matthew, and the chronology of the Easter events.[19]

Believers in Biblical inerrancy, such as Christian fundamentalists, reject all claims that the Gospels are anything less than the literal truth regarding Jesus' life. The Catholic Church likewise upheld at the Second Vatican Council the historicity of the Gospels in the document Dei Verbum (Latin for "Word of God"). Nevertheless, subjecting the Bible to the same level of source criticism that secular historical texts receive raises questions of historiography.

A significant factor in considering the historicity of the Gospels is the Synoptic problem: in some areas, the first three Gospels seem to contradict each other, while in other areas they are so close in wording that one could almost be a direct copy of the other. The most common theories explaining these discrepancies are that either some of the Gospels drew partly from a common source, or that the Gospels were based, directly or indirectly, on one another. However, all claims of contradictions have clear defensive facts and proofs that dispel these contradictions (see apologetics).

Although the traditional stance of early christianity was that the Gospel of Matthew was the first to be written, the Gospel of Mark is now considered by almost all Biblical historians to be the earliest of the four. These scholars date it before AD 70, fairly close to the early oral preaching about Jesus' life. Similar preaching may also have survived in part through the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, as it is believed that those two Gospels both based much of their accounts on Mark and on another, unknown and possibly even earlier, document—a hypothetical "sayings Gospel" dubbed the Q document by New Testament scholars.

However, these late dates are hardly late at all compared to other ancient records that historians regard as credible. For instance, "the two earliest biographies of Alexander the Great were written by Arrian and Plutarch more than four hundred years after Alexander's death in 323 B.C, yet historians consider them to be generally trustworhty. Yes, legendary material about Alexander did develop over time, but it was only in the centuries after these two writers. In other words, the first five hundred years kept Alexander's story pretty much intact; legendary material began to emerge over the next five hundred years. So whether the gospels were written sixty years or thirty years after the life of Jesus, the amount of time is negligible by comparison. It's almost a nonissue." (The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel, p41; The Historical Reliability of the Gospels by Craig L. Blomberg)

Beyond this, it is likely that the gospels were written sooner than the estimate cited above (which dates Mark around 70, Matthew and Luke around 80 and John around A.D. 90). "The book of Acts" was written by Luke. Acts ends apparently unfinished--Paul is a central figure of the book, and he's under house arrest in Rome ^[]. With that the book abruptly halts. What happens to Paul? We don't find out from Acts.. because the book was written before Paul was put to death.. That means Acts cannot be dated any later than A.D. 62. Having established that, we can then move backward from there. Since Acts is the second of a two-part work, we know the first part-- the gospel of Luke-- must have been written earlier than that. And since Luke incorporates parts of the gospel of Mark, that means Mark is even earlier. If you allow maybe a year for each of thosem, you end up with Mark written no later than about A.D 60, maybe even the late 50s. If Jesus was put to death in A.D. 30 or 33, we're talking about a maximum gap of thirty years or so." (ibid, 41-2)

Further, from a historical perspective, (as opposed to a presentist one based on our contemporary standards) "the definition of memorization was more flexible back then. In studies of cultures with Oral Traditions, there was freedom to vary how much of the story was told on any given occasion-- what was included, what was left out, what was paraphrased, what was explained, and so forth.. in the ancient Middle East, anywhere from ten to forty percent of any given retelling of sacred tradition could vary from one occasion to the next. However, there were always fixed points that were unalterable, and the community had the right to intervene and correct the storyteller if he erred on those important aspects of the story." And "ten to forty percent is pretty consistently the amount of variation among the synoptics on any given passage." Thus, allowing for "the elements..of paraphrase, of abridgment, of explanatory additions, of selection, of omission-- the gospels are extremely consistent with each other by ancient standards which are the only standards by which it's fair to judge them." (The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel, p54-7; The Historical Reliability of the Gospels by Craig Blomberg)

Reliability of the gospels

1. The amount of time between the events mentioned in the gospels and the time when they were written was simply not long enough for them to have been historically modified. Why? Because surely there would have been massive objection if any falsification had taken place. People knew of the people and events because they were there.
2. At the time of the life of Jesus, Jewish culture was accustomed to an Oral Tradition that was extremely reliable. They had developed the ability to memorize large portions of scripture with 100% accuracy. It is from this tradition that the written gospels had their source, and the writers would have been careful to maintain the same level of accuracy with the texts.
3. The writings about Jesus were not exaggerated, since some eyewitnesses to the actual events, under the care of the apostles, were still alive at the time of its writing.
4. The gospel accounts referred to real people and real events, not mythological people such as the Greek king of the gods, Zeus (Ζεύς). Why? Almost never is a myth created that refers to actual people.
5. The Gospel writers credentials have survived the test of time, over and over. Thus far, the accuracy of the gospels has never been disproven.

The Epistles

In his Epistle to the Galatians, Paul claims he went to Jerusalem three years after his vision of Jesus on the road to Damascus ^[]. He had traveled in Arabia and back to Damascus before going to see Peter, who Paul calls an apostle of Jesus, and James, "the Lord's brother", believed by many to be James the Just. (1:18-20) Paul then says that fourteen years later he traveled back to Jerusalem ^[], at which time he held a meeting with the Jerusalem Christians. Believed by most scholars to be the Council of Jerusalem, this was a debate with Paul arguing against the need for circumcision to be a member of the group. Paul says he won the argument and that Peter, James, and John agreed that he should be the preacher to the Gentiles. Peter later visited Paul at Antioch ^[] and associated with the Gentiles, but when certain friends of James showed up they seem to have discouraged Peter from associating with the Gentiles, and Paul rebuked Peter for this. (2) Galatians is one of the undisputed letters of Paul, so if one believes him and accepts these events as historical, then this is the earliest textual evidence for the existence of Jesus. Having a "brother" and "apostles" who are arguing with Paul over what Jesus' real intentions were during his life is impossible if he never existed. Acts of the Apostles, written at least twenty but probably thirty or forty years after Galatians, gives a more detailed account of the Council.

The significance of non-Pauline authorship varies depending on which epistle is considered, but it is notable that the 7 uncontested epistles appear to some scholars to present a more docetic and gnostic view than the far more orthodox epistles which constitute those in dispute, particularly more so than the pastorals. Princeton University's Professor of Religion, Elaine Pagels, a specialist in the study of gnosticism has in consequence proposed that Paul was in fact a gnostic, in her book The Gnostic Paul; an unconvincing view which implies that the Pastorals, and the other disputed Pauline epistles, were created by the church to bring Paul's followers into the fold and to simultaneously subtly counter his arguments. Needless to say, Pagels' arguments have little to no acceptance in academia.

The epistles that the Bible itself attributes to other individuals (Peter, James, John, and Jude) are generally considered to be written at a much later date, and hence are rarely considered in this context.

However, the aforementioned point regarding the gospels elucidates that Acts actually cannot be dated later than A.D 62.

Non-canonical texts

Gospel of Thomas

In addition, some scholars see the lack of mention of a resurrection of Jesus within the Gospel as significant. On the other hand, many textual scholars have argued that the Gospel of Mark may originally have ended without mentioning a resurrection as well, particularly given that the most ancient manuscripts of Mark 16 do not present the ending used in modern translations.

Gnostic texts

Non-Christian writings

Most writers of the time whose works have survived had little interest in the Middle East in general, and Judea in particular, and so would have had little reason to write about a local religious leader who preached there for a handful of years. The absence of any mention of Jesus by writers such as Philo of Alexandria, Seneca the Elder, and Plutarch seems to indicate that if Jesus had existed, he must have been a relatively minor figure since these writers mention many people who are of much lesser historical significance.

Nonetheless, the work of four major non-Christian historians contain passages possibly relating to Jesus: Pliny the Younger, Flavius Josephus, Suetonius, and Tacitus. But these are generally references to early Christians rather than a historical Jesus. Pliny the Younger condemned Christians as easily led fools, as did the rhetorician Lucian some years later. There is an obscure reference to a Jewish leader called "Chrestus" in Suetonius. Surviving manuscripts of Tacitus (in a passage in the Annals written c. 115) summarize popular opinion about Jesus, but do not demonstrate access to any independent source of information. Of the four, Josephus' writings are the most interesting to scholars dealing with the historicity of Jesus.

Josephus (c. 37 AD/CE – c. 100), who became known, in his capacity as a Roman citizen, as Flavius Josephus, was a 1st century Jewish historian and apologist of priestly and royal ancestry who survived and recorded the Destruction of Jerusalem in 70. In 93, Josephus published his work Antiquities of the Jews.

Testimonium Flavianum

Greek version

3. Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day. As usual with ancient texts, the surviving sources for this passage are Greek manuscripts, all minuscules, the oldest of which dates from the 9th century. It is likely that these all derive from a single exemplar written in uncial, as is the case with most other ancient Greek texts transmitted to the present in medieval copies, and have come down through the hands of the church. The text of Antiquities appears to have been transmitted in two halves — books 1–10 and books 11–20. But other ad hoc copies of this passage also exist. However, other manuscripts existed which did not contain this passage, and one such was known to Isaac Vossius (see also Josephus on Jesus).

However, there was no mention of these passages by early Christian writers, and in the case of Tacitus nothing was noted about Christianity until the translation by Sulpicius Severus. The most substantial non-Christian source is Josephus. Both John the Baptist and James the Just are also documented in Josephus, although the reference to James is widely regarded as a later interpolation by a by a Christian scribe. The only record that unambiguously mentions Jesus himself is that of Josephus in a passage known as the Testimonium Flavianum. However, its authenticity is still greatly debated as well, since it seems odd that Josephus (who was life-long Jew) would have called Jesus the Messiah.

Flavius Josephus

A 10th century manuscript has been discovered which reports the existence of an alternate version of the passage. No explanation has been provided as to how this text came to be and why it differs from the other texts. Some scholars consider this text to also be in error, since the author, Agapius of Hierapolis, seems to have quoted it from memory.

The growing consensus among scholars is that the passage is not entirely forged, but it is difficult to be sure what the original passage said.

Pliny the Younger

"Christians.. asserted, however, that the sum and substance of their fault or error had been that they were accustomed to meet on a fixed day before dawn and sing responsively a hymn to Christ as to a god, and to bind themselves by oath, not to some crime, but not to commit fraud, theft, or adultery, not falsify their trust, nor to refuse to return a trust when called upon to do so. " (Pliny to Trajan, Letters 10.96–97)

Suetonius

Some have interpreted Chrestus as a misspelling of Christus, and thus as a possible reference to Jesus. However, Suetonius implies that the person in question was in Rome in 54, making the likelihood that he is writing about Jesus very slim.

The term Chrestus also appears in some later texts applied to Jesus, indicating that such a spelling error is not unthinkable. However, Chrestus is itself a common name in Rome, meaning good or useful. It was a particularly common name for slaves, and, indeed, the passage deals with a slave revolt. As such, this passage is not held by the vast majority of scholars to be a reference to Jesus.

Tacitus

Tacitus simply refers to 'Christ' - the Greek translation of the Hebrew word “mashiyach”(Messiah meaning anointed, or the anointed one), rather than the name "Jesus", and he refers to Pontius Pilate as a "procurator", a specific post that differs from the one that the Gospels imply that he held - prefect or governor. In this instance the Gospel account is supported by biblical archaeology, since a surviving inscription states that Pilate was prefect.

Some scholars suggest that the second paragraph is merely describing Christian beliefs that were uncontroversial (i.e. that a cult leader was put to death), and that Tacitus thus had no reason not to assume as fact, even without any evidence beyond that spiritual belief. Others, including Karl Adam, claim that, as an enemy of the Christians and as a historian, Tacitus would have investigated the claim about Jesus' execution before writing it.

Jewish records

Jewish records of the period, both oral and written, were compiled into the Talmud, a collection of legal debates and stories so large that it fills over 30 volumes. There is no mention of anyone called "Jesus" (in Hebrew Yehoshuah) within it, the closest match being a person (or persons) called Yeshu from the Babylonian Talmud. However, the description of Yeshu does not match the biblical accounts of Jesus, and the name itself is usually considered to be a derogatory acronym for anyone (possibly, but not necessarily, Christians) attempting to convert Jews from Judaism, standing for yemach shemo vezichro ("erased be his name and memory"). Additionally, the term does not occur in the Jerusalem ^[] version of the text, which would be expected to mention Jesus more often than the Babylonian version, rather than less.

However, the lack of references to Jesus in Talmudic writings may simply be due to Christianity being a minor, negligible organization when most of the Talmud was created, in addition to the Talmud being more concerned with teachings and law than with recording history.

Jesus as historical figure

In The Historical Figure of Jesus, E.P. Sanders presents Alexander the Great as paradigmatic—the available sources tell us much about his deeds, but nothing about his thoughts. Sanders considers the quest for the "historical Jesus" to be much closer to a search for historical details on Alexander than to those historical figures with adequate documentation. For this reason, he concludes, "the sources for Jesus are better, however, than those that deal with Alexander" and "the superiority of evidence for Jesus is seen when we ask what he thought" (1993:3).

Paul Barnett has also pointed out that "scholars of ancient history have always recognized the "subjectivity" factor in their available sources" and that "they have so few sources available compared to their modern counterparts that they will gladly seize whatever scraps of information that are at hand". He notes that modern history and ancient history are two separate disciplines, with differing methods of analysis and interpretation.

Consequently, scholars like Sanders, Geza Vermes, Paula Fredriksen, John Dominic Crossan and John Meier argue that although many readers are accustomed to thinking of Jesus solely as a theological figure, whose existence is a matter only of religious debate, the source documents on which several modern source hypotheses argue the four canonical Gospel accounts are based were written within living memory of Jesus' lifetime, and therefore provide a basis for the study of the "historical" Jesus. These historians draw on the canonical Gospel accounts, but also on other historical sources and archaeological evidence, to reconstruct as best they can the life of Jesus in his historical and cultural context.

The "Pilate Stone

"as evidence of the Roman official who ordered Jesus' execution"

The Pilate Stone
(larger image)

In 1961, startling new evidence for Pilate's existence, and Jesus' by extension, was unearthed by an archeological dig in Israel. A block of limestone was found in the Roman theatre at Caesarea Palaestina, the capital of the province of Judea, bearing a damaged dedication by Pilate of a Tiberieum. This dedication states that he was prefectus (usually seen as praefectus), that is, governor, of Judea. The word Tiberieum is otherwise unknown: some scholars speculate that it was some kind of structure, perhaps a temple, built to honor the emperor Tiberius. The inspription is currently housed in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, where its Inventory number is AE 1963 no. 104. It has come to be known as the Pilate Inscription.

Many supporters for the existence of a historical Jesus point to the discovery of the so-called "Pilate Inscription" as one more bit of ancillary evidence that supports the New Testament account of the historical Jesus. They say that the same critics that argued against the existence of Jesus, argued against the existence of the characters that supported him, and that the "Pilate Inscription" supports the existence of one more historically signficant New Testamant character in the life of an actual historical Jesus.

The idea that Jesus never existed

Jesus and syncretism

Ceiling Mosaic - Christus helios,
the mosaic of Sol
(larger image)

Another integral part of this view is the idea the early Christians were docetic - that Christ was a spiritual being rather than flesh and blood. Professor of German G.A. Wells says regarding the New Testament:"It is not just that the early documents are silent about so much of Jesus that came to be recorded in the gospels, but that they view him in a substantially different way—as a basically supernatural personage only obscurely on Earth as a man at some unspecified period in the past, 'emptied' then of all his supernatural attributes (Phillipians 2:7), and certainly not a worker of prodigious miracles which made him famous throughout 'all Syria' (Matthew 4:24). I have argued that there is good reason to believe that the Jesus of Paul was constructed largely from musing and reflecting on a supernatural 'Wisdom' figure, amply documented in the earlier Jewish literature, who sought an abode on Earth, but was there rejected, rather than from information concerning a recently deceased historical individual. The influence of the Wisdom literature is undeniable; only assessment of what it amounted to still divides opinion." During the first and second centuries BC, Hellenic philosophy merged with various minor deities to produce mystery religions, in which a Life-death-rebirth deity was used as an allegory for the search for wisdom. Such religions quickly replaced or absorbed local religions and became the dominant beliefs in many places throughout the Mediterranean, with the resulting variations of the central god-man figure becoming known as Osiris-Dionysus.

Some scholars, notably Martin A. Larson, believe that Jesus existed, but that Christianity is based on the soteriology of Osiris and the ethics and eschatology of other beliefs, while the Messianic concept is a uniquely Jewish addition to the development of Christianity. More recently, writer Timothy Freke and scholar of mystery religions Peter Gandy, who wrote The Jesus Mysteries, think that Jesus did not exist as a historical figure but was in fact one of the forms of Osiris-Dionysus. CNN's David Dodson, in a review of their book, however, noted that "while the authors discuss many examples of elements of Osiris/Dionysus in the Jesus story, they virtually ignore the more direct ties to Jewish tradition and prophecy. This oversight undermines the credibility of many of their arguments, and could have the tendency to mislead the novice reader in this subject". On the other hand, the Canberra Times said

"The theory is not new. For two centuries at least, scholars have been aware of the intriguing parallels between the accounts of Jesus' life and that of preceding and contemporaneous figures such as Osiris, Dionysus, and Mithras. What is new is the powerful scholarship brought to the issue by authors Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy in The Jesus Mysteries, just published in Australia. The result, which draws strongly on the Gnostic gospels discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945 (see also Nag Hammadi library), is so persuasive that it is doubtful whether theological scholarship will ever be the same." A recent book, The Pagan Christ: Recovering the Lost Light (2004), by journalist-priest Tom Harpur, discusses another possible origin, based partly on the writings of Alvin Boyd Kuhn and Egyptologist Gerald Massey. Massey's The Historical Jesus and Mythical Christ: A Lecture, published in 1880, explores the similarity between what has been written about Jesus and what has been written about Jehoshua Ben-Pandira, who "may have been born about the year 120 B.C." From page 2 of the lecture: ".. according to the Babylonian Gemara to the Mishna of Tract 'Shabbath', this Jehoshua, the son of Pandira and Stada, was stoned to death as a wizard, in the city of Lud, or Lydda, and afterwards crucified by being hanged on a tree, on the eve of the Passover. .."

Notes

1. «  Raymond E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah: From Gethsemane to the Grave (New York: Doubleday, Anchor Bible Reference Library 1994), p. 964; D. A. Carson, et al., p. 50-56; Shaye J.D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, Westminster Press, 1987, p. 78, 93, 105, 108; John Dominic Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant, HarperCollins, 1991, p. xi-xiii; Michael Grant, p. 34-35, 78, 166, 200; Paula Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, Alfred A. Knopf, 1999, p. 6-7, 105-110, 232-234, 266; John P. Meier, vol. 1:68, 146, 199, 278, 386, 2:726; E.P. Sanders, pp. 12-13; Geza Vermes, Jesus the Jew (Philadelphia: Fortress Press 1973), p. 37.; Paul L. Maier, In the Fullness of Time, Kregel, 1991, pp. 1, 99, 121, 171; N. T. Wright, The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions, HarperCollins, 1998, pp. 32, 83, 100-102, 222; Ben Witherington III, pp. 12-20.
2. «  Mack, Burton L. (1996), "Who Wrote the New Testament?: The Making of the Christian Myth (Harper)
3. «  Louis H. Feldman, "Josephus" Anchor Bible Dictionary, Vol. 3, pp. 990–91
4. «  Craig A. Evans, The Historical Jesus, Taylor & Francis 2004 (PP 175 - 179)
5. «  Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 1994), pages 90-91
6. «  Howard M. Teeple (March 1970). "The Oral Tradition That Never Existed". Journal of Biblical Literature 89 (1): 56–68. doi:10.2307/3263638.
7. «  B. Chilton and C. Evans, eds., "Studying the Historical Jesus: Evaluations of the State of Current Research" (NTTS 19; Leiden: Brill, 1994)
8. «  Sanders, E. P. The historical figure of Jesus. Penguin, 1993.
9. «   Eliade, Mircea "Images and Symbols: Studies in Religious Symbolism" (trans. Philip Mairet), Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1991, p.170
10. «   "The nonhistoricity thesis has always been controversial, and it has consistently failed to convince scholars of many disciplines and religious creeds. .. Biblical scholars and classical historians now regard it as effectively refuted." - Robert E. Van Voorst, Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000), p. 16.
11. «   "There are those who argue that Jesus is a figment of the Church’s imagination, that there never was a Jesus at all. I have to say that I do not know any respectable critical scholar who says that any more.” Burridge, R & Gould, G, Jesus Now and Then, Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2004, p.34
12. «   Michael Martin; John Mackinnon Robertson
13. «   Mack, Burton L. (1996), "Who Wrote the New Testament?: The Making of the Christian Myth (Harper)
14. «   Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 1994), pages 90-91
15. «   Howard M. Teeple (March 1970). "The Oral Tradition That Never Existed". Journal of Biblical Literature 89 (1): 56–68. doi:10.2307/3263638.
16. «   On John, see S. Byrskog, "Story as History - History as Story", in Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 123 (Tübingen: Mohr, 2000; reprinted Leiden: Brill, 2002), p. 149; Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses (Cambridge: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2006) p. 385.
17. «   John 21:24.
18. «   See the commentary by St. Augustine on hypotyposeis.org; also see the fragments in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 3.39.1, 3.39.15, 6.14.1, 6.25.
19. «   For an overview of the synoptic problem that discusses the traditional view in detail, see Drane, Introducing the New Testament (San Francisco: Harper Row, 1986) chapter 11. Also, see Donald Guthrie, New Testament Introduction (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1990)
20. «   Raymond E. Brown. An Introduction to the New Testament. New York: Anchor Bible.
21. «   J.A.T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament. Philadelphia: Westminster Press. 1985. pp.86-92.
22. «   Brown 7
23. «   For an early date, see: J. A. T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament, and William F. Albright, Towards a More Conservative View, in Christianity Today (18 January 1963); for a late date, see R. Bultmann, Kerygma and Myth: A Theological Debate; for a brief overview, see also this article at bethinking.org
24. «   Jo Ann H. Moran Cruz and Richard Gerberding, Medieval Worlds: An Introduction to European History Houghton Mifflin Company 2004, pp. 44-45
25. «   Genealogies Brown p. 236, Ehrman, p. 121; census Brown p. 321, Ehrman, p. 118; Easter events Ehrman, p. 277 and see An Easter Challenge For Christians by Dan Barker
26. «   Joseph Barber Lightfoot in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians writes: "At this point [[Gal 6:11]] the apostle takes the pen from his amanuensis, and the concluding paragraph is written with his own hand. From the time when letters began to be forged in his name (2 Thess 2:2; 3:17) it seems to have been his practice to close with a few words in his own handwriting, as a precaution against such forgeries… In the present case he writes a whole paragraph, summing up the main lessons of the epistle in terse, eager, disjointed sentences. He writes it, too, in large, bold characters (Gr. pelikois grammasin), that his handwriting may reflect the energy and determination of his soul."
27. «   1 Thessalonians 2:13-16: A Deutero-Pauline Interpolation, Birger A. Pearson, The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 64, No. 1 (Jan., 1971), pp. 79-94
28. «   1 Thess 2:13-16: Linguistic Evidence for an Interpolation, Daryl Schmidt, Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 102, No. 2 (Jun., 1983), pp. 269-279
29. «   A basic text is that of Oscar Cullmann, available in English in a translation by J. K. S. Reid titled, The Earliest Christian Confessions (London: Lutterworth, 1949)
30. «   Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) p. 47; Reginald H. Fuller, The Formation of the Resurrection Narratives (New York: Macmillan, 1971) p. 10; Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968) p. 90; Oscar Cullmann, The Earlychurch: Studies in Early Christian History and Theology, ed. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966) p. 64; Hans Conzelmann, 1 Corinthians, translated James W. Leitch (Philadelphia: Fortress 1969) p. 251; Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament vol. 1 pp. 45, 80-82, 293; R. E. Brown, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus (New York: Paulist Press, 1973) pp. 81, 92
31. «   see Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968)p. 90; Oscar Cullmann, The Early church: Studies in Early Christian History and Theology, ed. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1966) p. 66-66; R. E. Brown, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus (New York: Paulist Press, 1973) pp. 81; Thomas Sheehan, First Coming: How the Kingdom of God Became Christianity (New York: Random House, 1986 pp. 110, 118; Ulrich Wilckens, Resurrection translated A. M. Stewart (Edinburgh: Saint Andrew, 1977) p. 2; Hans Grass, Ostergeschen und Osterberichte, Second Edition (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1962) p96; Grass favors the origin in Damascus.
32. «   Hans von Campenhausen, "The Events of Easter and the Empty Tomb," in Tradition and Life in the Church (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968) p. 44
33. «   Archibald Hunter, Works and Words of Jesus (1973) p. 100
34. «   Cullmann, Confessions p. 32
35. «   Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament vol 1, pp. 49, 81; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus translated Norman Perrin (London: SCM Press, 1966) p. 102
36. «   Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man translated Lewis Wilkins and Duane Pribe (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968) pp. 118, 283, 367; Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) pp. 7, 50; C. H. Dodd, The Apostolic Preaching and its Developments (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980) p. 14
37. «   Reginald Fuller, The Foundations of New Testament Christology (New York: Scriner's, 1965) pp. 214, 216, 227, 239; Joachim Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus translated Norman Perrin (London: SCM Press, 1966) p. 102; Neufeld, The Earliest Christian Confessions (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964) pp. 7, 9, 128
38. «   James M. Robinson, ed., The Nag Hammadi Library in English (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1977) and especially his essay in Hedrick and Hodgson, Nag Hammadi, Gnosticism, and Early Christianity (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1986); Elaine Pagels, The Gnostic Gospels (New York: Random House, 1979); R. E. Brown, "The Christians Who Lost Out" in The New York Times Book Review, 20 January 1980 p. 3; Koester in Robinson, Nag Hammadi in English, vol. 2 pp. 4, 47, 68, 150-154, 180. It is important to stress that all these scholars, with perhaps the exception of Pagels (whom the rest were critical of on this point) distanced themselves from using the texts as historical sources for the most part, and only proceeded to consider information therein with great caution.
39. «   Apocryphon of John 1:5-17
40. «   Koester, Helmut & Lambdin (translator), Thomas O. (1996), “The Gospel of Thomas”, in Robinson, James MacConkey, The Nag Hammadi Library in English (Revised ed.), Leiden, New York, Cologne: E. J. Brill, pp. 125, ISBN 9004088563
41. «   Miller 6; it also is not quoted in any contemporary writings, and suffers from a paucity of manuscripts, see these articles at answers.org and ntcanon.org
42. «   Clement, Corinthians 42
43. «   Ignatius, Letter to the Trallians 9, Letter to the Smyrneans 1, 3
44. «   Justin First Apology 30, 32, 34-35, 47-48, 50; Dialogue with Trypho 12, 77, 97, 107-108, &c.
45. «   translation by Richard Bauckham in his Jesus and the Eyewitnesses (Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2006), pp. 15-16.
46. «   Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses (Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2006), pp. 15-21.
47. «   Quoted in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 4.3.2, translation by Richard Bauckham in his Jesus and the Eyewitnesses (Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2006), p. 53.
48. «   Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses (Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2006), pp. 53l.
49. «   Feldman (1989), p. 430
50. «   Josephus Antiquities 20:9.1
51. «   Louis H. Feldman, "Josephus" Anchor Bible Dictionary, Vol. 3, pp. 990–91
52. «   "Testimonium Flavianum". EarlyChristanWritings.com. Retrieved on 2006-10-07.
53. «   Josephus Antiquities 18.3.3
54. «   Origin Commentary on Matthew 10.17; Against Celsus 1.47
55. «   Michael L. White, From Jesus to Christianity. HarperCollinsPublishers, 2004. P. 97–98
56. «   i.e. Daniel-Rops, Silence of Jesus' Contemporaries p. 21 and G. R. Habermas, The Historical Jesus p. 193
57. «   John Drane Introducing the New Testament (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1986) p. 138; John P. Meier. A Marginal Jew (Anchor Bible Reference Library, 1991) v.1; also, James H. Charlesworth, Jesus Within Judaism (Garden City: Doubleday, 1988) p. 96
58. «   Henri Daniel-Rops, Silence of Jesus' Contemporaries p. 21; J.N.D. Anderson, Christianity: The Witness of History (London: Tyndale, 1969)p. 20; F.F. Bruce, New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable? (Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1967) p. 108
59. «   Agapius Kitab al-'Unwan, 239-240
60. «   F.E Peters, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam Vol.1 p. 149
61. «   Pliny to Trajan, Letters 10.96–97
62. «   Tacitus, Annals 15.44 (Latin, English and also here)
63. «   Robert E. Van Voorst (2000). Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence. Wm. B. Eerdmans, p. 43. See also the criterion of embarrassment.
64. «   F.F. Bruce, Jesus and Christian Origins Outside the New Testament, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974) p. 23
65. «   Ehrman, p. "[212 INSERT TITLE]".
66. «   Did Jesus exist? Earl Doherty and the argument to ahistoricity, by Richard Carrier. http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/jesuspuzzle.html
67. «   Iudaeos, impulsore Chresto, assidue tumultuantes Roma expulit; [1]
68. «   see his translation of Suetonius, Claudius 25, in The Twelve Caesars (Baltimore: Penguin, 1957), and his introduction p. 7, cf. p. 197
69. «   Francois Amiot, Jesus A Historical Person p. 8; F. F. Bruce, Christian Origins p. 21
70. «   R. T. France. The Evidence for Jesus. (2006). Regent College Publishing ISBN 1573833703. p. 42; ]:
71. «   "Jewish Encyclopedia: Rome: Expelled Under Tiberius".
72. «   Suetonius, Nero 16
73. «   Julius Africanus, Extant Writings XVIII in Ante-Nicene Fathers, ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1973) vol. VI, p. 130
74. «   Lucian, The Death of Peregrine, 11-13 in The Works of Lucian of Samosata, translated by H. W. Fowler (Oxford: Clarendon, 1949) vol. 4
75. «   Morton Smith, Jesus the Magician: Charlatan or Son of God? (1978) pp. 78–79.
76. «  "www.anthropoetics.ucla.edu/Ap0301/CELSUS.htm".
77. «   Justin Martyr, First Apology 48
78. «   see Tertullian, Apology V
79. «   for a discussion, see Daniel-Rops, Silence of Jesus' Contemporaries, p. 14
80. «   The Babylonian Talmud, translated I. Epstein (London: Soncio, 1935), vol. 3, Sanhedrin 43a, p. 281
81. «   The Babylonian Talmud edited by Rabbi Dr. Isidore Epstein of Jews’ College, London folio 43a
82. «   Paul Barnett, "Is the New Testament History?", p.1.
83. «   Sanders 1993:3
84. «   Van Voorst, p. 8
85. «   Constantin-François Volney, Les ruines, ou Méditations sur les révolutions des empires (Paris: Desenne, 1791); English translation, The Ruins, or a Survey of the Revolutions of Empires (New York: Davis, 1796).
86. «   C. F. Dupuis, Origine de tous les cultes (Paris: Chasseriau, 1794); English translation, The Origin of All Religious Worship (New York: Garland, 1984).
87. «   Durant, Will. Caesar and Christ. New York: Simon and Schuster. 1972
88. «   Durant 1944:553-7
89. «   Bruce, F.F. (1982). New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable? InterVarsity Press, ISBN 087784691X
90. «   Herzog II, WR (2005). Prophet and Teacher. WJK, ISBN 0664225284
91. «   Komoszewski, JE; Sawyer, MJ & Wallace, DB (2006). Reinventing Jesus. Kregel Publications, 195f. ISBN 978-0825429828.
92. «   Walter P. Weaver, The Historical Jesus in the Twentieth Century, 1900-1950, (Continuum International, 1999), page 71.

References

• Adam, Karl (1933). Jesus Christus. Augsburg: Haas.
• Adam, Karl (1934). The Son of God (English ed.). London: Sheed and Ward.
• Brown, Raymond E. (1997) An Introduction to the New Testament. Doubleday ISBN 0-385-24767-2
• Daniel Boyarin (2004). Border Lines. The Partition of Judaeo-Christianity. University of Pennsylvania Press.
• Doherty, Earl (1999). The Jesus Puzzle. Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ? : Challenging the Existence of an Historical Jesus. ISBN 0-9686014-0-5
• Drews, Arthur & Burns, C. Deslisle (1998). The Christ Myth (Westminster College-Oxford Classics in the Study of Religion). ISBN 1-57392-190-4
• Durant, Will (1944). Caesar and Christ, Simon & Schuster, ISBN 0-671-11500-6
• Ehrman, Bart D. (2004). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford. ISBN 0-19-515462-2.
• Ellegård, Alvar Jesus – One Hundred Years Before Christ: A Study In Creative Mythology, (London 1999).
• France, R.T. (2001). The Evidence for Jesus. Hodder & Stoughton.
• Freke, Timothy & Gandy, Peter. The Jesus Mysteries - was the original Jesus a pagan god? ISBN 0-7225-3677-1
• Fuller, Reginald H. (1965). The Foundations of New Testament Christology. Scribners. ISBN 0-684-15532-X.
• George, Augustin & Grelot, Pierre (Eds.) (1992). Introducción Crítica al Nuevo Testamento. Herder. ISBN 84-254-1277-3
• Grant, Michael, Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels, Scribner, 1995. ISBN 0-684-81867-1
• Habermas, Gary R. (1996). The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ ISBN 0-89900-732-5
• Leidner, Harold (2000). The Fabrication of the Christ Myth. ISBN 0-9677901-0-7
• Meier, John P., A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus, Anchor Bible Reference Library, Doubleday
  (1991), v. 1, The Roots of the Problem and the Person, ISBN 0-385-26425-9 (1994), v. 2, Mentor, Message, and Miracles, ISBN 0-385-46992-6 (2001), v. 3, Companions and Competitors, ISBN 0-385-46993-4
• Mendenhall, George E. (2001). Ancient Israel's Faith and History: An Introduction to the Bible in Context. ISBN 0-664-22313-3
• Messori, Vittorio (1977). Jesus hypotheses. St Paul Publications. ISBN 0-85439-154-1
• Miller, Robert J. Editor (1994) The Complete Gospels. Polebridge Press. ISBN 0-06-065587-9
• New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha, New Revised Standard Version. (1991) New York, Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-528356-2
• Price, Robert M. (2000). Deconstructing Jesus. Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books. ISBN 1-57392-758-9.
• Price, Robert M. (2003). The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man: How Reliable is the Gospel Tradition?. Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books. ISBN 1-59102-121-9.
• Voorst, Robert Van (2000). Jesus Outside of the New Testament. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.
• Wells, George A. (1988). The Historical Evidence for Jesus. Prometheus Books. ISBN 0-87975-429-X
• Wells, George A. (1998). The Jesus Myth. ISBN 0-8126-9392-2
• Wells, George A. (2004). Can We Trust the New Testament?: Thoughts on the Reliability of Early Christian Testimony. ISBN 0-8126-9567-4
• Wilson, Ian (2000). Jesus: The Evidence (1st ed.). Regnery Publishing.

See also Jesus,
James In Josephus by Paul Smith
The Historicity of Jesus
The Miracles of Jesus: A Historical Inquiry
Jesus: Historical Evidence