Did Jesus Exist?

looking at the history of humanity there are a lot of people who could be considered significant and to have impacted the world to various degrees but i think very few people can stack up to the figure of jesus of nazareth at least in hindsight and assuming that he existed he must be considered one of the most famous people who have ever lived and want to have had an enormous impact on the world and its culture and history at least symbolically he's a central figure to some of the largest and most influential religions in the world including of course christianity islam and the baha'i faith but jesus can also be quite an elusive figure and different people often tend to have very different ideas and views about who he was if he was and what he stood for it is a greatly debated topic among historians today as well and of course there's disagreements here too but it is of course a very interesting subject and will be the main theme for our discussion in this video who was jesus of nazareth [Applause] [Music] i like jesus according to the way he is described in the gospels of the new testament he seems like a pretty swell dude but that's precisely the problem isn't it how accurate are the gospels and the new testament in describing the actual life or teachings of jesus it of course serves as the basis for mainstream christianity's perception and understanding of who jesus was but this is by no means the only perspective the figure of jesus is one that despite his great importance to so many people there is a huge disagreement about and many different peoples have very different ideas and opinions about who this man actually was and what he meant to mainstream christianity jesus is the incarnation of god's word the son in the holy trinity and thus identical with god himself to muslims baha'is and certain minority groups of christians he is a great albeit human prophet who brought revelation from god similar to other prophets like muhammad or moses to some hindus jesus is sometimes seen as an avatar for the god vishnu to others jesus is a myth he never actually existed but was the creation of the early christian writers entirely in new age circles too he is often seen as a great enlightened being who taught about christ's consciousness there is even theories today that jesus was in fact a psychedelic mushroom or rather that the figure of jesus is a kind of metaphor that represents a mushroom that provided enlightenment but out of this myriad of different perspectives how can we know which one is the most accurate well to put it simply we can't but it's also a lot more complex than that of course historians and scholars have for a long time been trying to figure out who the historical person of jesus actually was but as i've said there is also great disagreement and debate among scholars and academics on this topic too but what i'm going to do with this video is through scholarly academic historical sources explore what we can actually know about one of the most influential figures in history and we'll do so by answering two main questions first we will ask did jesus actually exist and how can we know if he actually existed and then secondly if he existed then who was he what did he teach and how did he view himself okay so before we start any discussion on this subject we should discuss methodology and how scholars and historians view the criterium of historical sources what scholars look for when retelling history is to find sources or material that are as reliable as possible and there are usually different levels of reliability the best kind of evidence for a historical person like this is of course direct material evidence from the person him or herself things like a house objects that the person owned or literally remains like books directly written by the person if none of this exists we have to rely on secondary sources such as stories about the person told by others eyewitness accounts and like the more material the better of course and the closer to the actual event in time the better contemporary sources that come directly from the period of a person's life so from a person's lifetime are of course the most reliable but if this is not possible then we want the sources to be as close in time as possible this means that for example when it comes to the life of jesus purely from an academic perspective the bible is a more reliable source than the quran since the latter appeared 600 years after jesus lived and the new testament only a few decades ideally the sources we employ should also be unbiased and neutral but of course in most cases this is pretty much a lost cause in some respects this means that if we have mentions of a person like jesus from people who are not christians this is often considered more reliable than christian sources themselves for obvious reasons and with all of this in mind what do we have in terms of evidence or sources for the life of jesus well sadly not much at all actually in terms of material evidence we have basically nothing there is no archaeological remains or findings that can prove jesus's existence there have been some claims in the last few years that they may have found jesus's house the house where he grew up in nazareth but this is nowhere close to certainty so we can't really rely on that as a as a source as such in terms of contemporary written material for written sources from jesus's own lifetime there is nothing here either now this isn't that surprising since of course most people in first century palestine couldn't read or write and jesus during his life would probably not have been famous enough for him to be mentioned in any kind of official documents either but this lack of evidence is indeed problematic and there are many who argue today that jesus never actually existed as a historical person that he was a later construct by christian writers and this is a somewhat serious idea or theory that can't be overlooked completely since there is at least some merit to this idea however the fact is that the majority of scholars historians who work on this subject hold the opinion that jesus was indeed a real historical person who lived in 1st century palestine this is because the sources that we do have are convincing enough that scholars think that this is the most likely option now as i said there are no contemporary sources from the time of or the life of jesus but some sources start to appear not too long afterwards and the earliest sources for the life of jesus is actually the some of the books of the new testament itself of course based on the criterium i talked about earlier the new testament accounts would definitely fall under the category of biased but this doesn't mean that they should be discarded completely the new testament does give us some very significant historical information and much of it is deemed trustworthy the earliest written books of the new testament are usually considered to be the letters of paul likely written sometime around the year 50 a. d this is only around 20 years after the commonly believed death of jesus which is pretty close in time paul of course never met jesus personally so he can't be considered an eyewitness as such but his letters show that very shortly after his death jesus's death there was a community of jesus followers that were widespread across the roman empire they also suggest that there was a community of leaders in jerusalem at the time including apostles like james and peter who indeed did meet jesus but while the letters of paul suggest to us that there was some kind of community established at this time they don't really talk much about the life of jesus to any large degree at all this is instead left to the four gospels when it comes to the gospels there is universal agreement among scholars that they were not written by the disciples of jesus directly but by later christian writers a widely accepted theory is that the earliest gospel the gospel of mark was written sometime around the year 70. the gospels of matthew and luke being written slightly later around 80 to 85 and the last gospel of john sometime in the 90s a.

d these gospels can often have seemingly different and contradictory views and perspective on who jesus was and on certain details of his life which we will return to later but they all describe him as a person who lived and walked the lands of palestine and even though they aren't contemporary sources they were written about 40 to 60 years after jesus's life which is indeed relatively close in time many do accept the books of the new testament as evidence enough for the existence and life of jesus but others are not as convinced luckily however we also have sources from outside of the bible who are written also just a few a couple a couple of decades after the life of jesus and they are of course they meet the criterium of being an outside source so not a christian source and thus also not as subject to bias at least not insiders bias of course you could argue that there is there could be a bias in the opposite direction but nonetheless we have sources from outside the bible which is also very significant the earliest and most significant of these is by the jewish historian josephus he is often considered one of the most significant jewish figures of his time and a hugely important source for what we know about first century palestine and in his writings there are sections that are certainly very important for our current discussion in his book antiquities written around the year 93 a. d josephus talks about an event that supposedly took place in the year 62 a. d when a religious leader called ananis misused his power and had a number of people executed the text reads quote so he assembled the sanhedrin of judges and brought before them james the brother of jesus who was called christ and some others and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law he delivered them to be stoned not only does this of course mention jesus and the fact that his followers called him the messiah or christ but also talks about james jesus's brother who was an early leader of the community this is a significant historical document and one of the best evidence that we have for jesus but josephus also provides another perhaps even more striking section which has become known as the testimonium flavianum this is a much longer reference which goes as follows quote at this time there appeared jesus a wise man if indeed one should call him a man for he was a doer of startling deeds a teacher of people who received the truth with pleasure and he gained a following both among many jews and among many of greek origin he was the messiah and when pilate because of an accusation made by the leading men among us condemned him to the cross those who had loved him previously did not cease to do so for he appeared to them on the third day living again just as the divine prophets had spoken of these and countless other wondrous things about him and up until this very day the tribe of christians named after him has not died out now most consider this quote to have been tampered with in some way and for good reason josephus being a devout jew who never converted to christianity would obviously not have referred to jesus unequivocally as the messiah or that he rose on the third day so it is widely accepted that the original quote was probably edited by later christians who added some theological flavor to it but still if we look past those obvious theological statements the original message of josephus seems to give us some significant basic information namely that there was a wise man called jesus who gained a significant following among the jews and who was believed to do remarkable things he was executed by crucifixion by pontius pilate but continued to have devoted followers even after his death these statements by josephus are some of the most significant non-christian sources that we have but there are more of them as well another often quoted source is the roman historian tacitus in his annals of imperial rome written in 115 a.

d he talks about the great fire in rome that broke out in the year 64 and under the emperor nero and while talking about this event he writes quotes nero falsely accused those whom the populace called christians the author of this name christ was put to death by the pro-curator pontius pilate while tiberius was emperor but the dangerous superstition though suppressed for the moment broke out again not only in judea the origin of this evil but even in the city of rome these and a few other sources from around this time as well as the books of the new testament and the non-canonical gospels is basically what we have to go on when it comes to reconstructing the life of jesus and the early community that formed around him and based on this as i mentioned the consensus among scholars is that jesus was indeed a real person and that there are some things with reservations that we can know about him and this brings us of course to that second question that we are to address in this video who then was jesus again there is huge disagreements on this question both from people within different religious traditions that conceive of jesus in different ways but also among modern modern academics and scholars but there are a few things that seems most likely to be true about him and his life and which most scholars agree on jesus of nazareth was a jewish man who was born sometime around the year zero some scholars have suggested 4 bc and grew up and lived in 1st century palestine in adulthood he seemed to have gathered a group of followers among his fellow jews through his preachings it seems that one of the main features of this preaching was that the kingdom of god was soon to arrive sometime around the year 30 he had aroused the suspicion of the authorities and he and his followers seems to have caused some kind of ruckus in jerusalem perhaps because of this or that the authorities generally saw him as a problem the roman governor pontius pilate had him executed through crucifixion it also seems pretty certain that very shortly after his death his followers were convinced that he had risen from the dead this basic outline is a somewhat safe way of thinking about jesus based on the historical sources that we have this is what we can know with at least some level of certainty and anything outside of this framework immediately enters the realm of speculation and theories and boy are there many of those we have already talked about some of the many ideas about who jesus was since so little is known about him as a historical person he is almost infinitely malleable and different people often like to fit him into their own narratives jesus was a socialist he was a feminist jesus was a capitalist he was a radical revolutionary he was a pacifist all kinds of different interpretations exist out there of course from the historical perspective of what we do know some of these portrayals may be said to be more accurate than others but at the end of day it is a subject that is so shrouded in mystery that it's hard to say anything definitively if we again look at the earliest sources which are after all the christian sources themselves in the different gospels they also seem to showcase a variety of perspectives the mainstream churches of christianity which developed gradually over the centuries accept the idea that jesus was the messiah promised in the old testament he was the son of god or the incarnation of god's word that took human flesh and died on the cross to bring salvation to all human beings the question of the nature of jesus divinity was a hot topic even 300 years after he lived so one would expect similar discussions in this early period scholars who hold ideas similar to that of bart ehrman argue that the idea that jesus was divine or a divine being evolved gradually in the years after his death influenced by greek culture and religion not everyone accepts this idea of the gradual development of jesus's divine identity in the canonical gospels of course but it certainly seems that the different gospels sometimes tell different versions of the events and when we start to look outside of the canonical gospels things get even more complicated the literature found at nag hamadi in 1945 includes what is often referred to as gnostic gospels scholars today usually reject this term as the literature seems to represent various different movements only a few of which can rightly be attributed to the so-called gnostics but regardless what it does give us is a deeper look into some of the different forms of christianity or jesus movements that did not become part of the later orthodoxy when looking at early christianity we should not see it as one orthodox strain that continues from jesus and the disciples onwards and that there are various sects that diverge from this orthodox stem instead early christianity is really an explosion of just a multitude of different interpretations and ideas and and perspectives on jesus and the bible and and all kinds of different questions and it is only a few centuries later that a so-called orthodoxy would be established and in the nag hamadi text the writings of some of these what would become non-orthodox forms of christianity survive and they often have very different ideas and perspectives on who jesus was in places like the gospel of thomas themes like the crucifixion are not present at all that is not to say that they denied the crucifixion but they did not share the ideas of the proto-orthodox thinkers that it is the salvific nature of the crucifixion that is central to christian belief or the salvation of human beings instead the gospel of thomas and other early texts emphasize that it is gnosis knowledge of god and the divine realm that is the only way to reach salvation jesus is a divine teacher still the son of god in most places that teaches us how to achieve gnosis namely through knowledge of ourselves and our true spiritual reality the nature of jesus and his function was a topic that continued to be debated for centuries with the exception of the ebionites a jewish christian group who considered jesus to be a human prophet and messiah everyone basically agreed that jesus was divine in some way the question was how the orthodox position eventually came to be that jesus is both fully human and fully divine the so-called gnostics however seem to downplay his human nature and make him a purely spiritual being now we're not going to get into christian theology at this time but the takeaway here should be that even in the very earliest forms of jesus movements and christianity there was huge diversity and disagreements about who jesus was and so that of course doesn't help us very much at all it really makes things even more difficult for us when we try to recreate an accurate picture of who he was of course jesus is a significant figure in the religion of islam as well and by extension also to the baha'i faith but in islam and the baha'i faith jesus is only considered to be a human prophet much like moses or or abraham in this long line of prophets that according to islam ends with the prophet muhammad jesus or isa as he is referred to as in the quran is sometimes called the spirit of god but he is never considered to be divine or the son of god so his divinity or his sonship to god is denied in the quranic narrative but as we've said the quran appears 600 years after the life of jesus and as historians and in historical research we of course don't operate from the perspective that the quran is the actual word of god and so this means that the quran can't be used as a source for the life of jesus any more than the bible can we are thus left with somewhat of a mystery even the earliest sources in the gospels both canonical and non-canonical give us different accounts it is thus left for scholars to engage in educated speculation some probably most place him very firmly within the jewish tradition and his message as being a reflection of that others may see him as more of a kind of philosopher akin to the writers of the wisdom literature of the old testament etc for me i prefer the former option i think if there is anything we can know for certain it is that jesus was a jewish man who operated within a jewish context in first century palestine with all that that entails all of the things jesus talks about in the gospels like the son of man the messiah the kingdom of god it is all present within the jewish religion when we look deeper we see that jesus very much fits into his time and place for example a movement known as jewish apocalypticism was very prominent at the time which thought that an apocalyptic event was soon approaching where the dead would be raised and everyone would be judged by god either being sent to eternal damnation or to a kind of paradise and all of this shows up in jesus and later christianity he is a man of his time in a lot of different ways as such many scholars today see jesus and consider jesus to have viewed himself as an apocalyptic prophet and messiah who warned his fellow jews that this apocalyptic event and thus the kingdom of god was coming soon the fact that jesus was operating within the framework of the jewish religion seems inescapable and this also is corroborated by the bible itself in any case jesus's identity as a jew and the historical context in which he grew up and lived is the starting point from which all sound theories about this should be based but is one that many still fail to take into consideration jesus is a symbol that means a lot of different things to different people and that's the way that figures like him function at the end of the day we are left with very little certainty however scholars will agree that jesus was most likely a real person who lived in 1st century palestine most of them will also agree on the basic points mentioned earlier he was jewish he gathered a group of followers he made the authorities uneasy and he was executed by crucifixion by pontius pilate somewhere around the year 30 a.