In Search of Jesus of Nazareth

What can historical research tell us about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth? For several centuries, the solid majority of New Testament scholars (in the Protestant world, at least), would have answered: “not much, with any confidence. Much of the material in the gospels is myth, legend, or theological and pious fiction.” In recent decades, however, that scholarly consensus has broken down, and the general historical reliability of the gospel accounts of the life of Jesus is appreciated more than ever before.

This series looks at the methods historians use to uncover the authentic words and deeds, preaching and miracles of Jesus, and shows how the historical evidence, fairly treated, generally supports the picture of the real Jesus common to Catholic and Evangelical Christians alike. In short, the common belief in Jesus Christ of mainstream, orthodox Christianity need not be embraced with mere “blind faith.” Rather, the historical facts about Jesus do not strictly “prove,” but at least generally point toward the truth of what Christians have proclaimed from the start: that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.

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