Can we ever know the historical Jesus, instead of the idealized one found in the New Testament?

Answer 1

No we cannot, no one alive today was with the human Jesus on earth to provide us with that. We do not know, for a fact, that any idealization was made of Jesus in the New Testament...that is no more than an argument from anti-theist propoganda and anti-catholic Christians...neither who have a great deal of influence in the wider world.
ME AND HIM

Answer 2

That's like asking if we can ever know the historical Siddhartha, or Moses. Any facts have been obliterated by the myths. Billions of people have died and been completely forgotten. The tiny fraction that are remembered have all been summarized and polished, their roughest edges knocked off to create a comprehensible figure with a life story that will fit the requirements of legend.

Lao Tzu wrote the Tao Te Ching. Do we know him? Jesus wrote nothing. How can we really know Jesus the man who woke up, washed his face and looked for breakfast every morning?

We like to be reassured that our heroes are real, human, like us. It gives us hope for ourselves. But does it really matter? Some people think there was no Jesus, that he was an invention of the "apostles" to sell a new kind of religion. If that were so, it would certainly shake up the believers who focus too much on Jesus' personality, but would it make the ideas invalid? Love of neighbor, even enemies, humility, service and self-sacrifice, challenging the powerful and comforting the poor and outcaste, these are all risky propositions but life-transforming when allowed to take root.

Jesus, as recorded, demonstrated the way that it worked, challenging authority despite the risk, preaching social justice and personal compassion, never losing sight of his ideals yet always responding to the people he found himself among. A real human being can't live that perfectly, even a divine one. (Some days it just takes longer to get out of the bathroom.) But we leave ordinary details out of all of our stories, precisely because we all experience them, they are all thoroughly understood.

What we need is the extraordinary, the moments we don't anticipate or quite understand, the things that take us beyond workaday life. In the preamble to his gospel, Luke promises to write an "orderly" account, not necessarily chronological. Indeed, there are a few geographical inconsistencies in the synoptic accounts of Jesus' ministry, suggesting the writers weren't too familiar with Palestine. Does that damage their credibility? Their purpose was not history but preaching the "good news".

There's an old Zen saying, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." Honoring Buddha is not the objective of Buddhism. Perhaps praising Jesus Christ, the Son of God is not the primary purpose of a Christian. Praise costs the worshipper nothing but time and provides a great excuse for ignoring the ongoing problems in the world, great and small. The prophet Amos warned worshippers that God preferred justice over burnt offerings. Jesus told his disciples to wash each others' feet. Do we really need to know whether he was in Capernaum on Tuesday or Wednesday, or whether he handled this basket when he multiplied the loaves and fishes?

There's a natural curiosity about the missing parts of Jesus' life. What was he doing during his 20s? Who were his influences? That notion simultaneously erodes his credibility as God's "Word" while reassuring us that there is attainable wisdom in this world that even Jesus needed to hear. But we'll never really know. Our historical search may be a way of "understanding" Jesus, of polishing those edges, packaging him up and filing him away. There's too much of that already. Better to leave him a little mysterious, just to keep the thought going.

Answer 3

You just have to alter your sources of history of that era. You can do this with jesus, and the rest of ancient western civilization.

For example, in the bible it states that David was chosen to be king "by the hand of god". Secular history of that time periods shows he was actually elected by the people. Now, many theologians dispute this fact by saying it was "god's will" that made the people vote as they did.

There are many "alternative" versions of history that one can read. It is very interesting stuff to read about. Once you start piecing things together, identifying the inconsistencies of the "mainstream" versions of history, you will be amazed.

This can be said for any historical writing. Read any American History textbook. Then, read Howard Zinn's book on the same subject. Very different.

I am from Texas, and studied Texas History a great deal. The version that they are teaching our high school students is very inaccurate. But, it is the popular, inspiring, and accepted version.

Answer 4

Yes, you can. Go back into the Old Testament and study the Word of God, you will find all kinds of examples of Christ and places where He was present. For example the Priest Melchizedek. He was the Priest that mysteriously appears in the OT and disappears again. Then we are told that Jesus is a Priest in the order of Melchizedek, in the NT. Christ is found in the OT and symbolized in the OT many times. Not in the same way as in the NT but rather in these mysterious ways. It's fascinating. If you are getting your understanding about Jesus from the Bible then you are on the right path. It is the Hollywood version of Jesus to avoid. I did not see Mel Gibson's movie, "The Passion of Christ", so I cannot speak about that one.

Answer 5

not sure.

on one hand, he wasn't really recorded as a historical figure/from that point of view. probably because he believed he was the son of God. No one knew him as anything else.

On the other hand, that probably was the historical Jesus. If the bible is, in fact, true, then the historical Jesus is the "idealized Jesus because that is how he actually acted.


we can only go off of what we have.

It seems to me that either(because no one looked at him/saw him from that point of view) the "idealized" version is how he really was or seen by other people, or that nobody recorded anything from the historical point of view.

wow... i hope that made sense...because I'm kind of confused now.

Answer 6

Until we can harness the space-time continuum and either create a time machine to go back in time or figure out how to use wormholes to travel to parallel universes, the only jesus we will be exposed to is the fictional, idealized one found in the bible. I personally, am not religious. I don't believe jesus was the son of god, if there is a god. I don't doubt that he was a man who existed, and was believed to be a threat to the Romans, which is why they crucified him. I also believe that if he wasn't crucified, he would have been one of many false idols to pass on unnoticed. I think that his crucifixion is what created christianity and is what causes christians to follow an outdated book rather than practicing what it is likely that jesus actually preached: love, honesty, and acceptance. My opinion.

Answer 7

Yes. Once we embrace God we heal the divide between the natural and spiritual allowing the Trinity (God, Jesus and Holy Spirit) to become a living part of us - here and now. Our lives seem to change because we are learning but the spiritual world remains constant because it is complete. Jesus knew this statement to be true then, now and always and based on that I believe there is nothing historical about Jesus because He was is and always will be constant. Does this make sense?

Answer 8

The Jesus Christ of the New Testament IS the historical Jesus. There is no other.

Answer 9

What makes you think the NT Jesus is 'idealized'? Can we know the historical Julius Caesar without his own biased writings?

Answer 10

The 4 Gospels were written by witnesses to the events in their lifetimes. They knew each other, and the fact that none of them disagree is proof that they are true.
You could believe in a Muslim Jesus written 700 years later by the successors of an illiterate prophet (who wrote rules which did not apply to him) after the prophets death and even then did not get the story right?