Proof of Jesus?

Question

I read a question which got me thinking? I have always told people that there is actually evidence for the existence of Jesus but have never really bothered finding out if this is true or not?

And when I say actual evidence I don't mean the bible. I mean Roman records and whatnot.

What I wanted to mean was that did a guy called Jesus exist? Just proof of existence doesn't actually mean he was the son of God and did the miracles and such.

I didn't tell a lie I was - what's the phrase? - being economical with the truth. lol

Answer 1

No, there isn't. The closest you can get is the infamous "Jesus passage" in Jospehus, which is probably forged, and not contemporary even if it's authentic.

It's hilarious that the guy above me mentions that Jesus "predicted" the destruction of Jerusalem, which (coincidentally!) happened just before the time the gospels were composed.

I mean, believe in Jesus if you want to. But it IS a matter of "faith." History is silent; and, in fact, there's a lot of circumstantial evidence to argue against the story presented in the gospels. To mention only one minor point - take Matthew's account of Herod's "Massacre of the Innocents." You would think that the systematic slaughter of all male infants in Bethlehem might have left some trace on the historical record outside of this gospel - but no.

P.S. - As for whether a guy named "Jesus" existed - there ARE historical records of several "Jesuses" who lived at roughly the time of the legendary Jesus, some of whom were upstart Jewish prophet types who were executed by the Romans for sedition - such executions were absolutely commonplace, in fact. Any one of these may have served as the model for certain aspects of the composite character of "Jesus" as he appears in the gospels. Most of the miraculous and mysterious elements of the gospel story, though, are demonstrably plagiarized from earlier pagan legends.

Answer 2

This is a common problem with most christians, they have taken this whole book of fairy tales as fact without ever doing any critial examination of it. There are no records of this Jesus character actually living, outside of the bible stories. The wiriting of Josephus were concluded to be a forgery, the writing of Pliny and Tacitus mention christians well after the supposed death of Jesus, and don't mention him at all. Everytning that has been claimed as evidence has been shown to be a forgery or simply inaccurate. For someone who was supposed to be such an important figure, there is nothing there to base it on.

Answer 3

There aren't any. Josephus was a bumbling fool, and anti-Roman propagandist.

The Romans didn't keep records of people that didn't pay taxes directly to them and could not vote in a Roman election.

Jesus would have been amongst the records of Herod, and who knows if that drunken cow even kept tax records. My guess would be that he didn't.

Pliny the Younger and Tacitus are the only Roman historians to have mentioned Jesus, and they were both big time buddies, so one obviously heard it from the other, who heard it from who knows. Still, this was 60 years or so after Christ's death. Still no cigar.

That leaves us with nothing. Sorry.

Answer 4

There is no record of a Jesus in the entire Roman record. The one mention that Christians claim did not appear until long after his supposed death and is misspelled and since Jesus was a common name it cannot seriously be linked!!

Correspond that to the fact that at the same time as Jesus was supposedly around there were a number of Jews claiming to be the messiah and they are all well recorded!!!

Christianity is a faith - Christians that keep seeking proof lack faith!!!!

Answer 5

If you found such evidence, it would actually be detrimental to your purpose here on earth. How, you may ask? We are living here to learn to develop faith and trust in God. If there is concrete evidence beyond and empirical shadow of a doubt, where would the need for faith be in that? There would not, as it would be sure knowledge. Accordingly, God wants us to live by faith and develop that quality.

We live that way anyway, to a smaller degree. You work for a paycheck, not getting paid after every minute you work, but (typically) after the end of two weeks. Likewise, we will be paid for our faith in God at the end of our earthly mortal lives.

Answer 6

Any evidence of Jesus trial and conviction would have been destroyed when the Romans sacked and burnt the Jewish Temple well after his death.

Although it is now said that they have put together the location of Jesus family tomb and found the stone boxes that the bones were kept in as well as other family members.

Answer 7

The earliest mention of Jesus in any official documents (in an empire known for keeping meticulous records) didn't occur until some 30 years after his supposed death.

That having been said, scholars suspect that there probably was a historical person that parts of the scripture describe, just because Jesus says some stuff that's just downright BIZARRE if the writers of the bible were making the whole thing up from scratch.

Answer 8

There is no contemporaneous mention of Jesus in any Roman histories, and only brief and disputed references from histories written decades after he would have lived exist. The most famous of these is from the historian Josephus, which was written about 90 CE, and was derived from Christian sources. It had been considered a forgery, but now it is unknown if it was or not.

Answer 9

The bible is the most purchased and most read book in the history of the world. If you don't believe that why would you believe some rare Roman record which is so dead that it can't come out of the grave.

Answer 10

Ummm....you told a lie! Naughty naughty!
There is no contemporary evidence of the existence of Jesus. All writings on him were written well after his death.