Jesus Existed

FAQ: OK, nobody really denies that Jesus existed, but don't the scholars now have evidence that the Jesus of history was just a great teacher and prophet?

The search for the "Historical Jesus" is a rather recent undertaking of so-called scholars and realists, who look to dissect the Biblical record and paint a real picture of the man, Jesus. For about the last 100 years, including most recently, the Jesus Seminar, intellectual debate has made its way into the mainstream media based on the supposed goal of "separating historical fact from mythology." The problem is that the entire "Historical Jesus" movement is a product of the 20th Century philosophy of naturalism, in that all debate begins with a shared, yet concealed, presupposition - that anything outside the realm of natural explanation can never be backed by historical evidence. In a nutshell, the movement holds that it's impossible for the Gospel accounts of Jesus to be historically accurate, because they record things that simply can't happen, like people walking on water, food multiplying, and people being raised from the dead. Of course, this is not scholarly evaluation of the historical evidence or Biblical manuscripts - this is strict adherence to the philosophy of naturalism.

When examined, the "Historical Jesus" movement of the last 100 years has unearthed nothing that undermines the Gospel accounts. There is no "new evidence" supporting the idea that Jesus was merely a "good man." There is no "new evidence" debunking the accounts of miracles and the resurrection based on new analysis of "myth theory" over a long period of time. To the contrary, recent discoveries have given more credibility to the nature and content of the New Testament record than ever before. Actually, except for the propagated view of the mainstream media, the trend in the last two decades has been for liberal scholars to become more conservative in their views on the reliability of the New Testament record, not less. Recent finds in archaeology are showing more (not less) consistent detail of the time, culture, religion and politics at the time Jesus walked the earth. At the same time, Biblical manuscript credibility has taken great leaps forward (not backward). Do these things prove the miracles or resurrection of Jesus? No. However, when these things are combined with the record of historical accuracy, Messianic prophecy, early church growth, Christian persecution, and extra-biblical sources, we see powerful substance (not mythology) underlying the claim that the writers of the New Testament record were eye-witnesses to the events themselves.

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Historical Jesus
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