Evidence for the historical existence of Jesus Christ - RationalWiki

Evidence for the historical existence of Jesus Christ is not terribly strong, being found only in the Bible and being surprisingly absent from other contemporaneous sources.

It is most commonly accepted by historians that there was likely a fellow named Jesus who lived in Palestine about two millennia ago, whose life became pivotal to some of the world's largest religions — though questioning his existence is an increasingly respectable position.

Contents

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• 1 Ancient history and evidence
• 2 Biblical evidence
  • 2.1 Paul
  • 2.2 Authorship of the gospels
  • 2.3 Gospels as history
  • 2.4 Cutting across the grain
• 3 Non-Biblical evidence
  • 3.1 Josephus Flavius
  • 3.2 Pliny the Younger
  • 3.3 Tacitus
    • 3.3.1 Tampering of the Tacitus source
  • 3.4 Mara Bar-Serapion
  • 3.5 Lucian
  • 3.6 Suetonius
  • 3.7 Talmud
  • 3.8 Julius Africanus and Thallus
  • 3.9 Other sources used by apologists
• 4 Archaeological evidence
  • 4.1 Nazareth
  • 4.2 Where is the Tomb?
• 5 Hoaxes, fakes, and frauds
  • 5.1 Shroud of Turin
  • 5.2 Ossuary of James
  • 5.3 Letters of Pontius Pilate
• 6 Common objections to doubters of the historical Jesus
  • 6.1 Why do most scholars think Jesus existed?
  • 6.2 What about these other historical figures? Are they real?
    • 6.2.1 How can you doubt the existence of Jesus when you accept (insert famous person or event)?
    • 6.2.2 No one would have noticed, because "Jesus" was a minor figure (Jesus of where?!?)
  • 6.3 Would the Disciples die for a lie?
  • 6.4 Skeptics just don't want to be accountable for their sins
  • 6.5 Skeptics have blind faith in the words of man
• 7 See also
• 8 Footnotes