Was Jesus a Real Person?

Some people say that Jesus never existed. Do we have any proof that he was a real person?

Absolutely.

Jesus is the most famous and influential person who has ever lived. We have more information about his life than almost any other person in ancient history.

People who suggest that Jesus never lived are not normal, rational people who are seeking the truth. They are simply trying to get rid of Jesus, because they don’t like what he taught.

How Do We Know What Jesus Did and Taught?

Jesus was born about 4 BC and probably died in 31 AD. We have four biographies of Jesus, all written a short time after Jesus lived.

All early Christian writers affirmed that Matthew was the first to write a biography of Jesus. Matthew was one of Jesus’s 12 disciples. Jesus asked 12 of his followers to follow Him everywhere as he taught the crowds, and Jesus also trained these 12 men to spread his message. Matthew recorded events that he saw as he followed Jesus. Matthew also recorded information about Jesus that he had learned from other people who knew Jesus.

Mark wrote a shorter biography of Jesus that focuses mostly on what Jesus did. Mark wrote about many of the same events mentioned by Matthew, but Mark often mentioned different details than Matthew did, so Mark’s biography helps learn more details about what Jesus did and taught.

Luke was an early Christian who interviewed many people who knew Jesus. Luke wrote a biography of Jesus about 30 years after Jesus died—sometime before the year 63 AD. Luke mentioned many events that Matthew and Mark did not mention, and Luke also included a lot more details about the women who followed Jesus, and more details about events that were happening in the Roman Empire during the lifetime of Jesus.

John wrote the fourth biography of Jesus. John was Jesus’s best friend and one of his 12 disciples. He mentioned that there was a pool called Bethesda in Jerusalem at the time he wrote (John 5:2). This area was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, so John probably wrote his biography before 70 AD, less than 40 years after Jesus died. John wrote mostly about what happened near the end of Jesus’s life.

In addition to these four biographies, many people who knew Jesus mentioned him in their letters.

Peter was one of Jesus’s 12 disciples. He wrote two letters that mention Jesus and his teachings.

Two of Jesus’s brothers—James and Jude—each wrote a letter mentioning Jesus.

Paul, an enemy of Christianity who later became a follower of Jesus, wrote 14 letters that mention Jesus and his teachings.

John, who wrote the last biography of Jesus, also wrote three other letters and a book of prophecy that mention Jesus.

Before John died, these biographies and letters that taught about Jesus were recognized as scripture by the Christian Church. Peter said that Paul’s letters were scripture (2 Peter 3:15-16) and he said his own letters and the writings of the other apostles were equal to the other scriptures (2 Peter 3:1-2).

John, who wrote the last five books of the Bible, organized the writings about Jesus into four sections as follows:

First, the four biographies of Jesus—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

Second, the Acts of the Apostles (written by Luke), and seven letters written by the apostles and Jesus’s brothers, including three letters written by John.

Third, the 14 letters of Paul, which were already being distributed as complete unit from the time that Paul wrote his last letter to the Hebrews.

Fourth, the book of Revelation, written by John.

At the end of the book of Revelation, John added a warning to anyone who would try to add to what had already been written:

I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to them, may God add to him the plagues which are written in this book. If anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, may God take away his part from the tree of life, and out of the holy city, which are written in this book. (Revelation 22:18-19).

When John finished writing and setting the order of the books, the Bible was complete, less than 65 years after Jesus died. From that time, these four sections of the Christian Bible were copied by hand and distributed widely in Christian communities around the world.

Clement, a leader in the early church, wrote a letter about 96 AD which quotes from the writings of Matthew, Luke, Paul, James, and Peter. Papias, writing about 95-110 AD, mentioned the biographies written by Matthew and Mark and the writings of Peter and John (Eusebius, Church History, book 3, chapter 39, verses 15-16). Other ancient writers like Polycarp, Ignatius of Antioch, and Justin Martyr also quoted and referred to many of the apostles’ writings as scripture.

From the earliest days, there was no question about who had written the biographies of Jesus or the other books that became part of the Christian Bible. Because these writings were recognized as scripture so early—less than 65 years after the death of Jesus—no one has been able to add to them or take away from them. There have been some men, such as Eusebius and Martin Luther, who have tried to introduce doubts about certain books that they did not agree with. But today these same writings are still recognized as the final part of the Christian Bible.

Other Accounts of Jesus

Besides the accounts of Jesus that became part of the Bible, there are also many mentions of Jesus by people who did not know him directly.

For example, he was mentioned by the Jewish historian Josephus, by the Roman historian Tacitus, and the Jewish Talmud. He was also mentioned by many Christian writers who lived after the time of the apostles.

Jesus is also mentioned in the Quran, which was written about 700 years after Jesus lived.

Why Aren’t the Gnostic Gospels in the Bible?

There are several gnostic accounts of Jesus that were found in Egypt, like the “Gospel of Thomas.” These stories about Jesus were written many years after the Bible was written by people who did not know Jesus. They were written in order to promote the teachings of the Gnostics, which were a heretical Christian sect who believed that people needed secret knowledge for salvation. Here is an example of the strange teachings of the so-called Gospel of Thomas:

Simon Peter said to him, “Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life.” Jesus said, “I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Gospel of Thomas, 114)

These were the late teachings of a strange religious group in Egypt. The authors of these fictional accounts were not able to convince the Christian community that their stories were real. Some modern writers claim that these fictional accounts tell the real story of Jesus, but historical evidence doesn’t support their claims.

Can We Trust the Stories in the Bible about Jesus?

How can we be sure that the people who wrote about Jesus were telling the truth?

Consider this: Jesus emphasized in his teaching the importance of truth.

Jesus said, “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:24)

He said that truth would be a mark that distinguished his followers (John 17:17).

The apostle John wrote, “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth” (3 John 4).

The apostle Paul wrote that those who don’t “receive the love of the truth” will perish (2 Thessalonians 2:10).

Do you think these people—who were zealots for truth, who believed that the penalty for lying was eternal death—made up stories about Jesus? Absolutely not! We know from the character of their life and their willingness to die for their beliefs that they sincerely believed what they wrote.

This is what Peter said about the things he taught:

“we didn’t follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and arrival of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” (2 Peter 1:16)

The people who wrote about Jesus did their best to accurately record the facts of his life. Some, like Peter, were eyewitnesses. Others, like Luke, got their information from eyewitnesses.

This is what Luke wrote at the beginning of his biography of Jesus:

Since many have undertaken to set in order a narrative concerning those matters which have been fulfilled among us, even as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having traced the course of all things accurately from the first, to write to you in order, most excellent Theophilus; that you might know the certainty concerning the things in which you were instructed. (Luke 1:1-4)

As you can see, Luke made every effort to write an accurate account of Jesus’s life.

Luke also wrote a second book about the activities of the apostles and the history of the early Church. His second book ends about two-and-a-half years after Porcius Festus was appointed as procurator of Judea. Porcius Festus became procurator in 59 or 60 AD. That means Luke wrote his history no later than 63 AD, and he wrote his biography of Jesus before that.

How accurate are Luke’s writings? Extremely accurate.

Scholars have tried to find errors in Luke’s histories, but again and again, careful examination has shown that Luke was correct, and his critics are wrong. For example, people said that “Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene” mentioned in Luke 3:1 never existed—until an inscription was found with his name. Many Bible scholars said Luke was wrong in Acts 14:1-7 when he said that the city of Iconium was not in the district of Lycaonia. But in 1910, the archeologist Sir William Ramsay discovered an inscription showing that Iconium was part of Phrygia from 37-72 AD—the same time period when Paul visited the city.

Sir William Ramsay had been taught that the Bible was written long after the events recorded, by people who weren’t there. After he carefully studied the geography and archaeology of Greece and Turkey, Ramsay realized that the popular theories about the Bible could not be true. These historical accounts could only have been written by someone who had been there, who knew the facts. This is what he says about Luke’s history of the Church: “Further study … showed that the book could bear the most minute scrutiny as an authority for the facts of the Aegean world, and that it was written with such judgment, skill, art and perception of truth as to be a model of historical statement” (Sir William Ramsay, The Bearing of Recent Discoveries on the Trustworthiness of the New Testament. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1915, p. 85).

Those who claim that the accounts we have of Jesus are not accurate—or that they were written much later by anonymous authors—are either ignorant of the facts, or they choose to ignore the facts.

You also can choose to believe unproven theories on the internet about Jesus and the Bible. Or you can get the facts and accept the genuine writings about Jesus—just like you accept all the other genuine historical accounts about other people who lived long ago.

We have, in the Christian Bible, accurate accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus, written by people who knew Jesus directly and those who interviewed people who knew Jesus directly. These accounts were written by men who were committed to accuracy and truth, and the historical accuracy of these accounts has been confirmed again and again.

Jesus was a real person. Instead of listening to what others say about him, why not read the four original biographies of Jesus for yourself, and make up your own mind about him?

Further reading: Which Gospel Was Written First?