Jesus Christ (Greek
Ἰησοῦς Χριστός Iēsoûs
Khristós,
Aramaic ישׁוע
משׁיח Yēšûᵃ‘ Māšîᵃḥ; c.
4 BC – c.
30), also called Jesus of
Nazareth, is the central figure in
Christianity.
Jesus' life and teaching according to the New Testament
Jesus was born in
Bethlehem. Galilee was his childhood home.
Jesus' mother was
Mary. Two of the Gospels
(Matthew and
Luke, but not
Mark or
John), are interpreted to allege that
Joseph was Jesus' foster father, and that Jesus' biological father was the
Holy Spirit, who miraculously caused Mary to conceive, giving rise to a
virgin birth. The other two Gospels, Mark and John, make no mention of Joseph at
all, but in their first chapters refer to Jesus as the son of God. Nothing is certain about Jesus' childhood or young adulthood.
Certain events are mentioned in the various Gospels, but there is no common agreement.
The
Gospel of Mark reports that Jesus had brothers, that he was
"Mary's son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon," and also suggests that Jesus had sisters. The Jewish
historian Josephus and the Christian historian
Eusebius (who wrote in the 4th century but quoted much earlier sources now unavailable to us)
refer to
James the Just as Jesus' brother. Some churches reject this
interpretation, saying that they were Jesus' cousins, which the Greek word for "brother" used in the Gospels would
allow. The Gnostic
Acts of
Thomas identifies the Apostle
Thomas as Jesus' twin brother. Other churches suggest
that these were step brothers, children of Joseph and a previous wife who died before Mary was betrothed to him. This tradition
probably originates with the
Protevangelion of
James, traditionally ascribed to James the Just and certainly dated sometime in the late 1st to middle of the 2nd
century.
Some have interpreted Gnostic texts like the
Gospel of Philip to suggest that
Mary Magdalene
was the wife of Jesus. The Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions do not record any wife of Jesus; the Roman Catholic
hagiography of Mary Magdalene says that she traveled to France and lived the life of an ascetic. The Eastern Orthodox synaxarion
says that she continued preaching the Gospel in various places, eventually settling in Ephesus to work with
John the Evangelist.
The Evangelists do not describe much of Jesus' life between birth and the beginning of his ministry, except that as a young
teen he instructed the scholars in the temple. The apocryphal
Infancy
Gospels describe the child Jesus performing miraculous works. The 19th-century Russian scholar
Nicolai Notovich suggested, based
on a document he claimed to see in a Ladakh monastery in the
Kashmir region, that
Jesus traveled the world, including
India, as an adolescent and youth, and was exposed to
religious traditions such as
Hinduism and
Buddhism. While the monastery Jesus is alleged to have studied at by Notovich in India was not built until the
16th century, and there is no independent evidence confirming that particular story, there are still persisting minorities in
some circles who say that references to a man named something like Issa place Jesus even in the holy
Hindu city of
Kashi. However, the evidence proffered
here, too, has been deemed by most unreliable. These theories are not considered orthodox by any major Christian church.
Jesus began his public ministry some time after he was
baptized by
John the Baptist, who perhaps unwittingly inspired
Mandaeanism. Jesus began preaching, teaching, and healing. There is no firm evidence
for when his ministry started or how long it lasted. The detailed nature of Jesus' spiritual teaching cannot be fully agreed
because accounts are fragmentary and because he made extensive use of
paradox,
metaphor and
parable; making it is
unclear how literally he wished to be taken and precisely what he meant.
Jesus did preach the imminent end of the current era of history, in some sense a literal end of the world as people of his
time knew it; in this sense he was an
apocalyptic preacher bringing a message
about the imminent end of the world the Jews knew.
Jesus opposed stringent interpretations of
Jewish law, and preached a more
flexible understanding of the law. His teachings show an inclination to following a teleological approach, in which the spirit of
the law is more important than the letter of the law, and the Gospels record him as having many disagreements with the
Pharisees.
Although the interpretations of the law by the
Sadducees were in most cases
much stricter than Pharisee interpretations of the law, and the Sadducees were the dominant authority at that time, yet the
Gospels record no sign of Jesus having much disagreement with their views (although it was, according to the Gospels, the priests
– aligned with the Sadducees – who ultimately arrested Jesus). A few modern scholars thus believe that Jesus may have
been a liberal Pharisee in some respects, or an
Essene (a sect with whom he shared
many views); and that later Christian transcribers cast him as an enemy of the Pharisees, because when Christians and Jews came
into conflict in later years the Pharisees had become the dominant sect of Judaism. This view receives some support in
Acts of the Apostles, because Jesus'
apostles were generally attacked by Sadducees but were sometimes protected by Pharisee liberal interpretations of
Jewish law.
Jesus increasingly gained followers as his fame grew, though within his lifetime Jesus' core following remained no more than a
small religious sect. Jesus had by the time of his death taught a number of his disciples or apostles to preach his teachings and
perform faith healing to both Jews and
Gentiles alike.
In his role as a social reformer Jesus threatened the status quo. He was unpopular with many Jewish religious authorities.
According to the Gospels, this was because he criticised them, and, moreover, because some of Jesus' followers held the
controversial and inflammatory view that he was "The Messiah". It is not clear from strict analysis of the original
Gospel texts that Jesus made this claim about himself, but he did not deny it. Neither is it wholly clear to scholars that when
Jesus spoke of being "Son of God" he meant this to be taken literally as Christians believe, rather than metaphorically
in the sense that we are all children of God. Scholars currently suggest that whether Jesus claimed to be a political rebel or
not, Jewish authorities would very likely have feared that his activities would provoke a riot in Jerusalem – something
Roman authorities absolutely forbade.
Jesus came with his followers to Jerusalem during the
Passover festival. He was
involved in a public disturbance at the
Temple in Jerusalem
when he overturned the tables of the moneychangers there. At some point later, he was betrayed to the Jewish religious
authorities of the city – either the full council (Sanhedrin) or perhaps
just the High Priest – by one of his apostles,
Judas Iscariot.
The High Priest of the city was appointed by the government in
Rome and the current holder
of the post was
Joseph Caiphas. The Romans ruled the city through the
High Priest and Sanhedrin, so often the Jewish authorities of the city had to arrest people in order to obey Roman orders to
maintain the peace. Jesus' disciples went into hiding after he was arrested.
Jesus was crucified by the Romans on the orders of
Pontius Pilate,
the Roman Governor of Judea in Jerusalem. The Gospels state that he did this at the behest of the Jewish religious leaders, but
it may have been simply that Pilate considered Jesus' ability to incite public disturbance as a potential Messiah to be a threat
to Roman order. Pilate was known as a harsh ruler who ordered many executions for lesser reasons during his reign (then again,
he'd been in trouble twice with his Roman superiours for being too harsh in his rule). Furthermore, the plaque placed on the
cross was used by the Romans to detail the crime of the crucified individual. In the case of Jesus the plaque reads "Iesvs
Nazarenvs Rex Ivdaeorvm" (INRI)—"Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews", indicating that Jesus was crucified for the crime of
rebelling against the authority of Rome by being declared the "King of the
Jews".
All the Gospel accounts agree that
Joseph of Arimathea,
variously a secret disciple or sympathiser to Jesus, and possible member of the Sanhedrin, arranged with Pilate for the body to
be taken down and entombed. According to most accounts Jesus' mother, Mary, and other women, notably a female follower of Jesus,
Mary Magdalene, were present during this process.
The resurrection
Main article:
Resurrection of Jesus
According to the Christian Gospels, Jesus' disciples encountered him again on the third day after his death, raised to life.
He met them in various places over a period of forty days before "ascending into heaven".
