Jesus

Jesus (also known as Jesus Christ, or Jesus of Nazareth) is the central figure whose life and teachings inspired the foundation of the major world religion of Christianity. Jesus is also one of the principal prophets of Islam.

By virtue of the impact of Christianity as a religion, Jesus is one the most influential people who ever lived. The history of European literature, art and music would be unimaginable without its Christian heritage. Translations of the Christian Bible number among the foundational literature of many languages. Events in Jesus's life are commemorated through public holidays such as Christmas and Easter. Most of the world now follows the Gregorian calendar, based on the number of years since Jesus's birth.

For Christians throughout the world, the story of Jesus's life is the embodiment of the ethical principles to which they aspire, and his teachings, as recounted in the New Testament, are a source of comfort and inspiration. These ethical values have had a major impact upon the political, legal and social structures of many countries. As an ethical teacher associated with the Greatest Commandment and the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is admired even by many humanists from outside the Christian and Muslim traditions (Gandhi being a notable example).

Christians and Muslims believe that he is the Messiah (Greek Christos, whence the title "Christ"), whose coming fulfilled Old Testament prophecy; and whose life was accompanied by numerous miracles beginning with the Virgin Birth. Beyond that, most Christians worship Jesus as the Son of God, and as God incarnate, the Second Person of the Trinity. The Qur'an condemns such beliefs as violations of monotheism, insisting that Jesus was a human prophet similar to Abraham or Muhammad.

For historians, little is known for certain about the life of Jesus. Jesus was a Jew who lived in Palestine during the first century AD. Most would accept the description of Jesus as a travelling, charismatic teacher, and a healer and exorcist who was active around Galilee and Judea. He was baptised by John the Baptist, but left the Baptist movement, attracting his own disciples as well as very large numbers of followers. Though often questioned about Jewish law, he was not regarded as strictly observant. He taught in parables, often of something called the Kingdom of God (or the Kingdom of Heaven). His followers were drawn from the peasantry or artisan / retainer classes, and rarely from the social elite. He enjoyed no institutional recognition or sponsorship; rather the nature of his authority was charismatic.

Jesus was executed by crucifixion near Jerusalem, around AD 30 or 33, on the orders of Roman procurator Pontius Pilate. For Christians, this event was the defining moment in the history of the world, a kind of axis mundi. It is remembered not as a tragedy, but as a triumph--and not only because of Jesus's subsequent resurrection from the dead and ascension into heaven. Various Christian theologies attempt to explain how Christ's sacrifice has brought salvation into the world.

Jesus of the Canonical Gospels

The Christian Church's recognition of four gospels- the four "canonical gospels", (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) occurred gradually during the fourth and fifth centuries. The popular Christian-inspired image of Jesus is derived mainly from these four, but other apocryphal works have also influenced traditional Christian beliefs, including the Apocalypse of Peter, Protevangelium of James, Infancy Gospel of Thomas, and Acts of Peter. Several Christian traditions (such as Veronica's veil and the Assumption of Mary) are found not in the canonical gospels, but in these and in other apocryphal works.

Geneaology

Matthew 1:1 ff and Luke 3: 23 ff give accounts of Jesus's genealogy which appear contradictory (e.g. Joseph's father is called "Jacob" in Matthew, and "Heli" in Luke), though several theories attempting to harmonize them (regular levirate marriages?) have been proposed. Matthew pointedly traces Jesus's ancestry to Abraham and King David; Luke, to God by way of Adam. Skeptics note that cross-culturally, such geneaologies are often fictitious; and that many of the characters listed here appear to be mythical (while Matthew skips several historical persons, either by mistake or for the sake of numeric symetry). Although, these gospels clearly affirm that Jesus's true father was God rather than Joseph, they also take great pains to recount the exact ancestry of Joseph. This might be explained by the importance of a legal relationship (as with adoption), that existed during Jesus' lifetime.

Nativity

The Gospels of Matthew and of Luke contain nativity stories, which are often conflated for popular commemoration. Matthew 2 (perhaps recalling Isaiah 45) has the infant Jesus reverenced by magi (rather than kings), who expected the imminent birth of the Messiah based on the appearance of a "star". Its nature is unclear (astrological?) as no known celestial phenomenon would precisely match Matthew's description. The number of magi is traditionally assumed to be three, based on the three gifts which they present. Luke 2 has angelic choirs announce the Messiah's birth to shepherds in the fields. From this detail, some critics have concluded that Jesus was born in the spring; others balk at accepting testimony which includes angels.

Both Matthew and Luke explain that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, although the gospels usually refer to him as a Galilean. Matthew explains that Jesus's parents previously lived in Bethlehem, but fled to Egypt in order to escape the Massacre of the Innocents, returning to Nazareth after after the death of Herod the Great. (Matthew's account may recall the stories of Moses and Joseph from the Book of Genesis.) Luke makes the couple residents of Nazareth, who were required to travel to Bethlehem for tax purposes (the Census of Quirinius). The two accounts seem inconsistent with one another, and each fails to refer to events in the other. External historical sources such as Josephus fail to record Herod's supposed massacre, while the only known census of Quirinius took place after Herod's death, and would have applied only to Judea (not Nazareth). Many historians suspect that the evangelists are attempting to link Jesus to Bethlehem, the birthplace of King David, in order to bolster his messianic claim.

Perhaps the most striking claim of the Nativity stories is that Mary conceived Jesus while still a virgin. Matthew explicitly cites this as a fulfillment of Isaiah 7:4, an interpretation which relies on the (Greek) Septuagint translation. The original Hebrew text could either mean "a virgin shall conceive" or "a young woman shall conceive"; the Septuagint affirmed the former meaning with its choice of parthenos as the Greek term. Among scholars who reject the possibility of the supernatural, some assume Joseph to have been Jesus's true father (making Jesus legitimate according to then-prevailing standards), while others (e.g. Jane Schaberg) propose that Mary was impregnated through rape. The gospels have Jesus's enemies, the Pharisees, pointedly introduce the topic of illegitimacy, as if alluding to a familiar scandal.

The Historical Jesus

Since the Enlightenment, various scholars have tried to distinguish Jesus as a historical figure from the figure worshipped by Christianity, althogh Albert Schweizer commented that scholars who set out on a "Quest for the Historical Jesus" tend to discover in him a reflection of their own views. Some scholars, motivated by rationalism, focused doubt on the biblical accounts of miracles. Others saw Jesus as a great moral teacher whose views are best represented by the Sermon on the Mount. In recent decades, the name "Jesus Studies" has come to describe historical (as opposed to theological) approaches to the study of Jesus.

Sources

The most important sources of information, the four canonical gospels, have several shortcomings as historical sources:

• Their authors are not known (despite the titles assigned to them by church tradition); thus we have no way of knowing how they acquired their information.
• Their composition appears to involve multiple authors and an active editorial process. For example, the synoptic gospels share much material, albeit rearranged.
• They appear to have been written at least a generation after Jesus's death. (Mark, the oldest, is usually dated within a few years of AD 70.)
• No first-century manuscripts survive.
• They report many supernatural events, which many historians consider to be prima facia evidence of their unreliability.
• Their authors were committed believers, not disinterested observers.
• Some details (such as the Census of Quirinius mentioned in Luke 2:1) conflict with what we know of the history of the time.
• They show signs of adapting their stories to make theological points. For example, Matthew (21:1 ff) describes Jesus as entering Jerusalem while seated on not one but two animals, a donkey and a colt--this might be a misunderstanding of Zachariah 9:9, (which Matthew quotes).
• Some stories appear to have been inspired by Old Testament prototypes. For example, Christ's miracles in Matthew 8 and 9 parallel the miracles of Elisha in 2 Kings 4 - 6.

Several ancient authors who were not Christians mention Jesus. They are: Flavius Josephus, Pliny the Younger, Tacitus, and Suetonius. With the possible exception of Josephus (and here the textual integity is a concern), their information about Jesus probably relies on Christian sources.

Saint Paul apparently met some of Jesus's relatives and companions (although not Jesus himself, except through visions). Unfortunately, his epistles offer almost no biographical details. Donald Harmon Akenson suggests that the teachings of Paul--especially those which are also attested in the earlier strata of the gospels--are likely to incorporate genuine Jesus traditions.

Noncanonical Christian literature is voluminous but relatively late, with the following possible exceptions: the Gospel of Thomas, the Unknown Berlin Gospel, the Oxyrhynchus Gospels, the Egerton Gospel, the Fayyum Fragment, the Dialogue of the Saviour, the Gospel of the Ebionites, the Gospel of the Hebrews, and the Gospel of the Nazarenes. The earliest surviving fragments of these texts are dated later than the earliest surviving fragments of the canonical Gospels, but they are probably copies of manuscripts whose dates are unknown.

Many scholars point to a hypothetical, reconstructed text called "Q" (from the German Quelle, meaning "source") as a possible older text that might bridge the gap between the time of Jesus and the composition of the gospels. This hypothesis is based on the fact that the three synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) share much material in common. In particular, Matthew and Luke each include almost the whole of Mark's material (and are each about twice as long as Mark), suggesting that Mark came first, and was incorporated into Matthew and Luke. However, Matthew and Luke also share other material not found in Mark, suggesting that they were also copying from another, no longer extant text. Thus "Q" is anything which is in Matthew and Luke, but not in Mark. This material consists largely of sayings of Jesus--exactly the sort of document one would expect to have been composed at an early date. (The Gospel of Thomas follows this pattern, being a collection of logoi.) The assumption is that Jesus lore would have circulated as oral tradition and collections of written logoi before its incorporation into the gospels.

Some scholars believe that different elements within Q were written at different times. If so, this would place the older elements closer to the time of Jesus. However, many either reject the two-source hypothesis (for example, the Augustinian hypothesis holds that Luke copied Matthew and Mark); consider Q to be later (John Spong explains its contents as midrash); or view Q as a non-Christian import (i.e. pre-existing logoi which were only later attributed to Jesus--this being the view of Earl Doherty).

Other theoretical documents include the Signs Gospel, which Rudolf Bultmann believed to have been a source for the Gospel of John; and the "Cross Gospel" which John Dominic Crossan identifies as the source of the noncanonical Gospel of Peter.

Degrees of Skepticism

Problems with sources have led a few scholars to suggest that the story of Jesus is a myth, like various other Near Eastern deities or demigods (e.g. Mithras, Apollo, Attis, Horus, Osiris-Dionysus) who experienced virgin birth and / or resurrection from the dead. This view, however, has little support.

A major counter-argument is the criterion of embarrassment. This holds that a gospel detail which early Christians would have found embarrassing is more likely to be true. An example would be Jesus's execution as a criminal, a rather disturbing element not included in any known Jewish traditions of the messiah. Were Jesus entirely fictional, his story would surely have ended differently.

Jesus's baptism by John is another example. This would have been embarrassing to early Christians because of (a) the suggestion that Jesus had sins to be forgiven, and (b) the inferior role of Jesus viz. John. Matthew (3:13-15) even has John object to the arrangement, only to hear Jesus insist. All four gospels stress John's expectation of another greater than himself, as if this required emphasis. In this connection, the Mandaeans of southern Iraq are a gnostic sect which venerates John but not Jesus, whom they regard as a schismatic who abandoned the Baptist movement. Other details that arguably fit the criteria include Jesus's statement (Mark 10: 18, cf. Luke 18:19) "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone."

Another principle is that a claim is more likely to be true if it appears in several independent sources. The gospels may not qualify, as their textual history is bound together, and they were apparently selected for preservation by the same sect. Hence the importance of confirmation from other ancient sources; or failing that, of recovering ur-texts and otherwise distinguishing between strata of texts otherwise thought to be unitary.

Jesus in Context

In AD 70, the Temple of Jerusalem was destroyed. Before then, Judaism was a temple-centered religion--not so different, perhaps, from other Near Eastern temple cults. While many religious movements disagreed about the true teachings of Judaism, all did so in the context of this temple-centered religion (even those such as the Essenes who regarded its authorities as illegitimate).

After AD 70, this temple cult no longer existed, except as an aspiration of some to rebuild it. As Donald Harmon Akenson describes it, instead of a "religion of the temple", one sect (which came to represent Judaism as a whole) reoriented itself to become a "People of the Book," i.e., the Torah. Another sect recognized a person, Jesus Christ, as the new center of their religion, in the process abandoning a purely ethnic Jewish identity. The notorious "blood curses" from the gospels, and the Eighteen Benedictions (really curses) from the synagogue service, probably reflect mutual ill-will between the two emerging religions as they disagreed over which was the true heir to biblical tradition.

While the life of Jesus belongs to the period before AD 70, almost all the sources about him--with the exceptions of Saint Paul, the Gospel of Mark, and possibly Q--were composed after this date, and reflect different contexts and understandings. Aspects of Second Temple Judaism with which Jesus is commonly associated include:

Apocalypse: A major category of Jewish thought and literature during the Second Temple period consisted of revelations delivered by angels or other spiritual beings, often through visions, and emphasized such themes as the resurrection of the dead; the Last Judgment, the geography of heaven and hell, and prophecy (either messianic / millennial, or catastrophist, and often symbolic). Pre-Christian examples would include Ethiopic Enoch, 4 Ezra, and the Book of Jubilees. The gospels sometimes resemble this genre (e.g. the Little Apocalypse, the phrase "Son of Man"). which became Early Christianity after the Great Commission spread his teachings to the Gentiles. Jesus is also connected to the apocalyptic tradition through John the Baptist, and his Pauline successors were apocalyptic. Bart Ehrman, noting that predictions of the end of the world have been made throughout Christian history, raises the question of whether Jesus himself preached this. Paula Fredriksen observes that such notions were already "in the air," but speculates that Jesus's popularity, arrest and execution (in contrast to the leniency shown his followers) might be explained if he predicted that the end would come, not soon, but now. The theology of Matthew, Luke, and John may consist of a "realized eschatology" which would be a natural response to failed prophesy. A particularly controversial point is whether Jesus claimed to be the messiah. Mark suggests that this was kept secret (the "Messianic Secret"); some propose that the identification of Jesus with the messiah came after his death.

Pharisaic Judaism: The Pharisaic movement--the ancestors of rabbinic Judaism as it exists today--was a major faction within Second Temple Judaism. Interestingly, the only two ancient authors who claimed to be Pharisees (or former Pharisees) themselves were Josephus and Paul, both rather unique figures. Although the gospels portray Jesus as opposed to this movement (he calls them "hypocrites", "fools", "vipers", and "sons of your father the devil"), some scholars assert that Jesus was himself a Pharisee. Cross-culturally, the greatest vitriol often occurs between the groups or viewpoints which are most closely related. On the other hand, Jesus's anti-Pharisaic rants may be entirely fictitious. The crux of his criticism seems to be that the Pharisees demanded stricter observance of halakhah than ordinary people, or the Pharisees themselves, could follow. This is ironic in that Jesus's interpretations of Jewish law range from the strict (e.g., his prohibition of divorce, except on grounds of adultery) to the impractical (e.g., his equation of momentary lust with adultery). Christians who perhaps take Jesus too much at his word viz. the Pharisees might reflect that Jesus's "Greatest Commandment" quotes Leviticus and Deuteronomy by way of Hillel the Great (Matthew 22:34 ff; Luke 10:25 ff). Jacob Neusner contends that Jesus' teachings were closer to the House of Shammai than the House of Hillel.

Social protest: Crucifixion was the prescribed form of execution for sedition against the Roman authorities. The gospels--written when Christians were seeking good relations with Rome--deny Jesus's guilt (though he is depicted as physically attacking money-changers). Apparently his claim was willfully misunderstood--he was "King of the Jews" only in a spiritual sense. A number of Jesus's near-contemporaries (e.g. Judas of Galilee) sought to oust Rome and reestablish Israel as an independent monarchy. The gospels and other sources mention a class of revolutionaries called Zealots (Jesus's disciples included one called "Simon the Zealot"--but also a Roman collaborator in the person of Matthew the tax-collector); these may fit better the social category of banditry than that of nationalist resistance. Many scholars see political meaning in Jesus's naming of twelve disciples (corresponding to the Twelve Tribes of Israel). A number of sayings attributed to Jesus (e.g. "blessed are the poor"; "the first shall be last") appear vaguely subversive of the established order. His concept of "The Kingdom of God" (or Heaven) is thought by some to have a political dimension involving debt forgiveness and the abandonment of burdensome purity requirements. In this sense, the "revolutionary" nature of Jesus's message would be his championing of the interests of the Palestinian peasant class.

Palestinian folk religion: Reading the gospels, it is easy to imagine Jesus as delivering the equivalent of sermons--but less easy to imagine him as a kind of medium who allows himself to be possessed by an angel, or the Spirit of God (this is Stevan Davis's view), which then accomplishes teachings, healings and exorcisms through him. Second Temple Palestine saw several folk religious figures whose roles are as much magical as religious. Among them were Honi the Circle Drawer and Hanina ben Dosa, two saintly characters from the Mishnah whose prayers were capable of persuading God to allow healings, rainfall, or whatever else was requested. Marcus Borg proposes to call Jesus a "spirit person," among other roles, in order to underscore the degree to which he must have experienced the spirit as a living reality rather than mere theory.

The Essene sect: The Essenes are mentioned by Josephus, Philo, and Pliny the Elder. Whether the Qumran community consisted of Essenes is a point of ongoing debate. The idea that Jesus was an Essene dates back to 1717 (to deist Humphry Prideux; the idea was later taken up by esoteric writers), and seems to have been inspired by the observation that of the three religious factions mentioned in Josephus, Jesus vilifies two (the Pharisees and Saducees), whereas the Essenes are not mentioned in the New Testament. Intriguing parallels between early Christianity and Josephus's Essenes include the practice of communism (especially communal meals) and their shared objection to taking oaths.

Cynic philosophy: Newcomers to Jesus Studies are likely to greet with some bewilderment, the suggestion that Jesus belonged to a Hellenistic gentile philosophical movement--especially one famed primarily for such eccentric figures as Diogenes of Sinope. Yet several members of the Jesus Seminar, including Robert Funk and Burton Mack, have argued this. They point out that the Palestinian Jewish culture of Jesus's day was heavily Hellenized; and that the oft-caricatured Cynics were in fact a serious social movement which produced a wisdom literature analogous, they say, to Q1. Nevertheless, the identification of Jesus with Cynicism remains very much a minority viewpoint.

Biographical details

The gospels do not say when Jesus was born, when he died, or his age at death. (Church tradition reports that he began his ministry at age 30, on the grounds that this was the ideal human age, and was killed three years later.) Those details which can be dated, often appear to conflict with one another. The gospels also sometimes disagree about the sequence of events. One theory is that the synoptic gospels were constructed around several ancient church calendars, with an eye to providing teaching material to complement the Torah readings for each week.

Name

Jesus was named after the Old Testament hero Joshua, whose Hebrew name Yehoshua (יהושוע) becomes Yeshua (ישוע) in Aramaic (Jesus's native language). Greek being the lingua franca of the Roman Empire as well as early Christianity, Yeshua came to be rendered as Iesous (Ιησους). It entered English by way of Latin (Iēsus).

Christ is a title and not a part of his name. Christos is the Greek translation for the Hebrew Moshiach ("Messiah"), and literally means "anointed one." The original reference was to the family of ceremonies for crowning a king, or ordaining a prophet, which involved pouring oil upon the head. Whether these and other titles were used during his lifetime, or by him, and what they might have meant, are all matters of controversy.

Birth

In Western Christianity, it has been traditionally celebrated as Christmas on 25 December, a date that can be traced as early as 330 among Roman Christians. Before then, and still today in Eastern Christianity, Jesus' birth was generally celebrated on January 6 as part of the feast of Theophany, also known as Epiphany, which commemorated not only Jesus' birth but also his baptism. Scholars speculate that the date of the celebration was moved in an attempt to replace the Roman festival of Saturnalia (specifically, the birthday of the God Sol Invictus).

In the 248th year during the Diocletian Era (based on Diocletian's ascension to the Roman throne), Dionysius Exiguus attempted to pinpoint the number of years since Jesus' birth, arriving at a figure of 753 years after the founding of Rome. Dionysius then set Jesus' birth as being December 25 1 BC|1 ACN (for "Ante Christum Natum", or "before the birth of Christ"), and assigned AD 1 to the following year — thereby establishing the system of numbering years from the birth of Jesus: Anno Domini (which translates as "in the year of our Lord"). This made the then current year 532, and almost two centuries later it became the established calendar in Western civilization due to its championing by the Venerable Bede.

Languages

That Jesus's native language was Aramaic is shown not only by external history, but also by Amamaic quotes embedded within the otherwise Greek texts of the gospels. Scholars are unsure as to how much Greek or Hebrew (if any) Jesus might have known. Latin is considered a more distant possibility.

Family

The gospels agree on the names of Jesus's mother, Mary, and all but Mark name Joseph as his father. Joseph appears only in descriptions of Jesus' childhood, whereas Mary is present at the crucifixion, and this has led some Christians to speculate that Joseph died before then.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus entrusts the care of his mother to the "beloved disciple" (who traditionally is thought to mean John). If historical, suggesting that he had no surviving male relatives. However, Matthew 13:55-56 and Mark 6:3 (cf. Galatians 1: 19) name several "brothers" (adelphoi) and allude to sisters as well. Orthodox and Catholic Christians insist that a different family or affectionate relationship is meant, as they believe that Mary remained a lifelong virgin, with Jesus as her only child.

Josephus names Jesus's "brother," James (or Jacob) the Righteous (or Just, probably ha-Zaddik)as having headed the Jerusalem church after Jesus's death, and mentionsother blood relatives of Jesus. After AD 70,

The gospels do not say whether Jesus was married. Jewish tradition discourages celibacy, but there are exceptions for special situations such as war, and some Jewish groups (such as the Essenes) practiced it on this basis. Some modern scholars have speculated that Mary Magdalene was his wife. The Secret Gospel of Mark--rejected by many as a 20th century fraud--hints that Jesus practiced ritual homosexuality. Mormon tradition holds that Jesus was (and remains) plurally married, to Mary and Martha. The Book of Revelation unites Jesus in nuptual embrace with a member of the species Ovis aries; church tradition regards this as symbolic.

Appearance

While the earliest artistic depictions of Jesus come far too late to be of any value in reconstructing his actual appearance, scholars assume that he resembled the native populations of the eastern Mediterranean--which would still offer a range of skin-tones and facial physiognamies. He is unlikely to have appeared Caucasoid; a Negroid appearance is only slightly more probable. Short hair was the custom for men of the time based on archeological evidence as well as Paul (who would otherwise not likely have condemned long haired on men), but Jesus might have followed Nazarene vows against hair-cutting.

Teachings

One key issue which defies consensus is that of Jesus's teachings. Scholars researching the historical Jesus have arrived at a variety of conclusions:

Death

The exact date of Jesus' death is unclear. Many scholars hold that the Gospel of John depicts the crucifixion just before the Passover festival on Friday 14 Nisan, called the Quartodeciman, whereas the synoptic gospels (except for Mark 14:2) describe the Last Supper, immediately before Jesus' arrest, as the Passover meal on Friday 15 Nisan; however, some scholars hold that the synoptic account is harmonious with the account in John. Further, the Jews followed a lunisolar calendar with phases of the moon as dates, complicating calculations of any exact date in a solar calendar. According to John P. Meier's A Marginal Jew, allowing for the time of the procuratorship of Pontius Pilate and the dates of the Passover in those years, his death was probably on April 7, 30 AD/CE or April 3, 33 AD/CE.

Jesus in Christianity

The nature of Jesus is the central issue of Christology. Christian beliefs about Jesus have always been diverse, although many theologians have condemned as heresy beliefs opposed to theirs.

The Ebionites, an early Jewish Christian community, believed that Jesus was the last of the prophets and the Messiah. They believed that Jesus was the natural-born son of Mary and Joseph, and thus rejected the Virgin Birth. The Ebionites were adoptionists, believing that Jesus was not divine, but became the son of God at his baptism. They rejected the Epistles of Paul, believing that Jesus kept the Mosaic Law perfectly and wanted his followers to do the same. However, they felt that Jesus' crucifixion was the ultimate sacrifice, and thus animal sacrifices were no longer necessary. Therefore, some Ebionites were vegetarian and considered both Jesus and John the Baptist to have been vegetarians. Shemayah Phillips founded a small community of modern Ebionites in 1985. These Ebionites identify as Jews rather than as Christians, and do not accept Jesus as the Jewish Messiah.

The name "Gnosticism" has been applied to a vast collection of often unrelated figures and movements. While some Gnostics were docetics, mostbelieved that Jesus was a human who became possessed by the spirit of Christ during his baptism. Many Gnostics believed that Christ was an Aeon sent by a higher deity than the evil demiurge who created the material world. Some Gnostics believed that Christ had a syzygy named Sophia. The Gnostics tended to interpret the New Testament as allegory, and some interpreted Jesus himself as an allegory. Modern Gnosticism has been a growing religious movement since fifty-two Gnostic texts were rediscovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945. The movement was also given a boost by the publication in 2006 of the Gospel of Judas.

Marcionites were 2nd-century Gentile followers of the Christian theologian Marcion of Sinope. They believed that Jesus rejected the Jewish Scriptures, or at least the parts that were incompatible with his teachings. Seeing a stark contrast between the vengeful God of the Old Testament and the loving God of Jesus, Marcion came to the conclusion that the Jewish God and Jesus were two separate deities. Like some Gnostics, Marcionites saw the Jewish God as the evil creator of the world, and Jesus as the savior from the material world. They also believed that Jesus was not human, but a divine spiritual being whose material body, and thus his crucifixion and death, were divine illusions. Marcion was the first known early Christian to have created a canon, which consisted of ten Pauline epistles, and a version of the Gospel of Luke (possibly without the first two chapters that are in modern versions, and without Jewish references), and his treatise on the Antithesis between the Old and New Testaments. Marcionism was declared a heresy by proto-orthodox Christianity.

The theological concept of Jesus as Christ was refined by a series of ecumenical councils beginning in the 4th century AD, the first and second of which produced the Nicene (or Niceno-Constantinopolitan) Creed. Referring to the Second Person of the Trinity, it affirms belief

...in one Lord Jesus Christ,

the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds;

God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God;

begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father,

by Whom all things were made:

Who for us men and for our salvation came down from Heaven,

and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man:

And was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; he suffered and was buried:

And the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures:

And ascended into Heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father:

And he shall come again, with glory, to judge both the quick and the dead:

Whose Kingdom will have no end [Anglican version]

These councils were convened in an atmosphere of politically-charged theological debate, and their conclusions do not represent a consensus of Christian views at the time. Indeed, each successive council resulted in the expulsion of yet another branch of Christianity: Arianism after the second; Nestorianism after the third, and so on. Today the Assyrian Church of the East (the so-called "Nestorian" church) recognizes only two such councils; the Oriental Orthodox (non-Chalcedonian) churches, the three; Eastern Orthodoxy, seven; and Roman Catholicism, twenty-one (the most recent being Vatican II).While Protestants do not usually accord the same authority to these councils as would Catholics or Orthodox (with some churches opposing the use of creeds as a violation of sola scriptura), they would not likely object to the content of at least the first seven councils. In church, mainline Protestants generally recite the Nicene and Apostles' Creeds, and may have their own denominational statements of belief (such as the Westminster or Augsburg Confessions).

Most Christians believe that Jesus is God incarnate, one of the three divine persons who make up the single substance of God, a concept known as the Holy Trinity. In this respect, Jesus is both distinct and yet of the same being as God the Father and the God the Holy Spirit. They believe Jesus is the Son of God, and the Messiah. Following John 1:1, Christians have identified Jesus as "the Word" (or Logos) of God. Most further believe that Jesus has two natures in one person: that he is fully God and fully human, a concept known as the hypostatic union. However, Oriental Orthodoxy professes a Miaphysite interpretation, while the Assyrian Church of the East professes a form of Nestorianism.

Some Christians however profess various nontrinitarian views. Arianism, denounced as a heresy by the second council, taught that Jesus is subordinate to God the Father. Binitarians believe that Jesus is God, although a separate being from God the Father, and that the Holy Spirit is an impersonal force. Unitarian Christians believe that Jesus was a prophet of God, and merely human. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) theology maintains that God the Father (Heavenly Father), Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are three separate and distinct beings who together constitute the Godhead. Finally, most Jehovah's Witnesses believe Jesus to be Michael the Archangel, who became a human to come down to earth.

Another crucial aspect of Christology is soteriology, the issue of how Jesus provides salvation. Paul of Tarsus wrote that, just as sin entered the world through Adam (known as The Fall of Man), so salvation from sin comes through Jesus, the second Adam (Rom 5:12–21; 1 Cor 15:21–22). Most Christians believe that Jesus' death and resurrection provide salvation not only from personal sin, but from the condition of sin itself. This ancestral or original sin separated humanity from God, making all liable to condemnation to eternal punishment in Hell (Rom 3:23). However, Jesus' death and resurrection reconciled humanity with God, granting eternal life in Heaven to the faithful (John 14:2–3).

Jesus in Islam

In Islam, Jesus (known as Isa in Arabic: عيسى), is considered one of God's most-beloved and important prophets, and the Messiah. Like Christian writings, the seventh-century Qur'an holds that Jesus was born without a biological father to the virgin Mary, by the will of God (in Arabic, Allah) and for this reason is referred to as Isa ibn Maryam (English: Jesus son of Mary), a matronymic (as he had no biological father). (Qur'an Template:Quran-usc, Template:Quran-usc, Template:Quran-usc, Template:Quran-usc) In Muslim traditions, Jesus lived a perfect life of nonviolence, showing kindness to humans and animals (like the other Islamic prophets), without material possessions, and abstaining from sin. Most Muslims believe that Jesus abstained from alcohol, and many believe that he also abstained from eating animal flesh. Similarly, Islamic belief holds that Jesus could perform miracles, but only by the will of God. However, Muslims do not believe Jesus to have divine nature as God nor as the Son of God. Islam greatly separates the status of creatures from the status of the creator and warns against believing that Jesus was divine. (Qu'ran Template:Quran-usc, Template:Quran-usc, Template:Quran-usc-range). Muslims believe that Jesus received a gospel from God called the Injil in Arabic that corresponds to the Christian New Testament, but that some parts of it have been misinterpreted, misrepresented, passed over, or textually distorted over time so that they no longer accurately represent God's original message to mankind (See Tahrif).

Muslims also do not believe in Jesus' sacrificial role, or that he died on the cross. The Qur'an states that Jesus' death was merely an illusion of God to deceive his enemies, and that Jesus ascended to heaven. (Qur'an Template:Quran-usc-range.) Based on the quotes attributed to Muhammad, some Muslims believe that Jesus will return to the world in the flesh following Imam Mahdi to defeat the Dajjal (an Antichrist-like figure, translated as "Deceiver"). Muslims believe he will descend at Damascus, presently in Syria, once the world has become filled with sin, deception, and injustice; he will then live out the rest of his natural life. Sunni Muslims believe that after his death, Jesus will be buried alongside Muhammad in Medina, presently in Saudi Arabia. However, the sects of Sunni and Shi'ite Islam are divided over this issue. Some Islamic scholars like Javed Ahmed Ghamidi and Amin Ahsan Islahi question quotes attributed to Muhammad regarding a second coming of Jesus, as they believe it is against different verses of the Qur'an.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Movement (accounting for a very small percentage of the total Muslim population) believes that Jesus survived the crucifixion and later travelled to Kashmir, where he lived and died as a prophet under the name of Yuz Asaf (whose grave they identify in Srinagar). Mainstream Muslims, however, consider these views heretical. Also, historical research found these accounts to be without foundation.

Jewish views of Jesus

Judaism considers the idea of Jesus being God, or part of a Trinity, or a mediator to God, as heresy.(Emunoth ve-Deoth, II:5) Judaism also does not consider Jesus to be the Messiah primarily because he did not fulfill the Messianic prophecies of the Tanakh, nor embodied the personal qualifications of the Messiah.

The Mishneh Torah (an authoritative work of Jewish law) states:

Even Jesus the Nazarene who imagined that he would be Messiah and was killed by the court, was already prophesied by Daniel. So that it was said, “And the members of the outlaws of your nation would be carried to make a (prophetic) vision stand. And they stumbled” (Daniel 11.14). Because, is there a greater stumbling-block than this one? So that all of the prophets spoke that the Messiah redeems Israel, and saves them, and gathers their banished ones, and strengthens their commandments. And this one caused (nations) to destroy Israel by sword, and to scatter their remnant, and to humiliate them, and to exchange the Torah, and to make the majority of the world err to serve a divinity besides God. However, the thoughts of the Creator of the world — there is no force in a human to attain them because our ways are not God's ways, and our thoughts not God's thoughts. And all these things of Jesus the Nazarene, and of (Muhammad) the Ishmaelite who stood after him — there is no (purpose) but to straighten out the way for the King Messiah, and to restore all the world to serve God together. So that it is said, “Because then I will turn toward the nations (giving them) a clear lip, to call all of them in the name of God and to serve God (shoulder to shoulder as) one shoulder.” (Zephaniah 3.9). Look how all the world already becomes full of the things of the Messiah, and the things of the Torah, and the things of the commandments! And these things spread among the far islands and among the many nations uncircumcised of heart. (Hilkhot Melakhim 11:10–12)

Reform Judaism, the modern progressive movement, states For us in the Jewish community anyone who claims that Jesus is their savior is no longer a Jew and is an apostate. (Contemporary American Reform Responsa, #68).

According to Jewish tradition, there were no more prophets after 420 BC/BCE, Malachi being the last prophet, who lived centuries before Jesus. Judaism states that Jesus did not fulfill the requirements set by the Torah to prove that he was a prophet. Even if Jesus had produced such a sign, Judaism states that no prophet or dreamer can contradict the laws already stated in the Torah (Deut 13:1–5)

Other Views of Jesus

Mandaeanism regards Jesus as a deceiving prophet (mšiha kdaba) of the false Jewish god Adunay, and an opponent of the good prophet John the Baptist, although they do believe that John baptized Jesus.

The New Age movement entertains a wide variety of views on Jesus, with some representatives (such as A Course In Miracles) going so far as to trance-channel him. Many recognize him as a "great teacher" (or "Ascended Master") similar to Buddha, and teach that Christhood is something that all may attain. At the same time, many New Age teachings, such as reincarnation, appear to reflect a discomfort with traditional Christianity. Many New Age subgroups claim Jesus as a supporter, often incorporating contrasts with or protests against the Christian mainstream. Thus, for example, Theosophy and its offshoots have Jesus studying esotericism in the Himalayas or Egypt during his "lost years."

There are others who emphasize Jesus' moral teachings. Many humanists, atheists and agnostics empathize with these moral principles. Thomas Jefferson, one of the Founding Fathers that many consider to have been a deist, created a "Jefferson Bible" for the Indians entitled "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth" that included only Jesus' ethical teachings.

Legacy

Cultural effect of Jesus

Pietà, Michelangelo, 16th c.: Jesus' mother Mary holds the body of her dead son

According to most Christian interpretations of the Bible, the theme of Jesus' preachings was that of repentance, forgiveness of sin, grace, and the coming of the Kingdom of God. Jesus trained disciples who, after his death, interpreted and spread his teachings. Within a few decades his followers comprised a religion clearly distinct from Judaism. Christianity spread throughout the Roman Empire under a version known as Nicene Christianity and became the state religion under Constantine the Great. Over the centuries, it spread to most of Europe, and around the world.

Jesus has been drawn, painted, sculpted, and portrayed on stage and in films in many different ways, both serious and humorous. In fact most medieval art and literature, and many since, were centered around the figure of Jesus. A number of popular novels, such as The Da Vinci Code, have also portrayed various ideas about Jesus. Many of the sayings attributed to Jesus have become part of the culture of Western civilization. There are many items purported to be relics of Jesus, of which the most famous are the Shroud of Turin and the Sudarium of Oviedo.

Other legacies include a view of God as more fatherly, merciful, and more forgiving, and the growth of a belief in an afterlife and in the resurrection of the dead. His teaching promoted the value of those who had commonly been regarded as inferior: women, the poor, ethnic outsiders, children, prostitutes, the sick, prisoners, etc. Jesus and his message have been interpreted, explained and understood by many people. Jesus has been explained notably by Paul of Tarsus, Augustine of Hippo, Martin Luther, and more recently by C.S. Lewis.

For some, the legacy of Jesus has been a long history of Christian anti-Semitism, although in the wake of the Holocaust many Christian groups have gone to considerable lengths to reconcile with Jews and to promote inter-faith dialogue and mutual respect. For others, Christianity has often been linked to European colonialism (see British Empire, Portuguese Empire, Spanish Empire, French colonial empire, Dutch colonial empire); conversely, Christians have often found themselves as oppressed minorities in Asia, the Middle East, and in the Maghreb.

References

• Allison, Dale. Jesus of Nazareth: Millenarian Prophet. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1999. ISBN 0-8006-3144-7
• Brown, Raymond E. An Introduction to the New Testament. New York: Doubleday, 1997. ISBN 0-385-24767-2
• Cohen, Shaye J.D. From the Maccabees to the Mishnah. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1988. ISBN 0-664-25017-3
• Cohen, Shaye J.D. The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001. ISBN 0-520-22693-3
• Crossan, John Dominic. The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant. New York: HarperSanFrancisco, 1993. ISBN 0-06-061629-6
• Guy Davenport and Benjamin Urrutia. The Logia of Yeshua ; The Sayings of Jesus. Washington, DC: 1996. ISBN 1-887178-70-8
• De La Potterie, Ignace. "The Hour of Jesus." New York: Alba House, 1989.
• Durant, Will. Caesar and Christ. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1944. ISBN 0-671-11500-6
• Ehrman, Bart. The Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-19-514183-0
• Ehrman, Bart. The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-19-515462-2
• Fredriksen, Paula. Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews: A Jewish Life and the Emergence of Christianity. New York: Vintage, 2000. ISBN 0-679-76746-0
• Fredriksen, Paula. From Jesus to Christ. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-300-04864-5
• Finegan, Jack. Handbook of Biblical Chronology, revised ed. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1998. ISBN 1-56563-143-9.
• Meier, John P., A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus, New York: Anchor Doubleday,

v. 1, The Roots of the Problem and the Person, 1991. ISBN 0-385-26425-9

v. 2, Mentor, Message, and Miracles, 1994. ISBN 0-385-46992-6

v. 3, Companions and Competitors, 2001. ISBN 0-385-46993-4

• O'Collins, Gerald. Interpreting Jesus. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1983.
• Pelikan, Jaroslav. Jesus Through the Centuries: His Place in the History of Culture. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-300-07987-7
• Robinson, John A. T. Redating the New Testament. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2001 (original 1977). ISBN 1-57910-527-0.
• Sanders, E.P. The Historical Figure of Jesus. New York: Penguin, 1996. ISBN 0-14-014499-4
• Sanders, E.P. Jesus and Judaism. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1987. ISBN 0-8006-2061-5
• Vermes, Geza. Jesus the Jew: A Historian's Reading of the Gospels. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1981. ISBN 0-8006-1443-7
• Vermes, Geza. The Religion of Jesus the Jew. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1993. ISBN 0-8006-2797-0
• Vermes, Geza. Jesus in his Jewish Context. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2003. ISBN 0-8006-3623-6
• Wilson, A.N. Jesus. London: Pimlico, 2003. ISBN 0-7126-0697-1
• Wright, N.T. Jesus and the Victory of God. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1997. ISBN 0-8006-2682-6
• Wright, N.T. The Resurrection of the Son of God: Christian Origins and the Question of God. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2003. ISBN 0-8006-2679-6

External links

• About-Jesus.org (Christian)
• Jesus Christ at WikiChristian
• Complete Sayings of Jesus Christ In Parallel Latin & English -- The Complete Christ Sayings
• Jesus Christ Catholic Encyclopedia article
• Latter-day Saint statement on the divinity of Jesus Christ
• An Hindu perspective on Jesus
• An Islamic perspective on Jesus
• The Historic & Reformation View of Jesus Christ: Solus Christus, Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, Sola Scriptura, Soli Deo Gloria
• Jesus Christ - Smith's Bible Dictionary article

Historical and skeptical views

• earlychristianwritings.com A list of some prominent scholars, together with summaries of their work
• Overview of the Life of Jesus A summary of New Testament accounts.
• From Jesus to Christ — A Frontline documentary on Jesus and early Christianity.
• The Jewish Roman World of Jesus
• The Jesus Puzzle - Earl Doherty's website.
• Skeptic's Guide to Jesus