Historicity of Jesus

The historicity of Jesus is the question of whether or not Jesus, the central figure of Christianity, historically existed (as opposed to being a purely mythical figure). Virtually all scholars of antiquity argue that Jesus existed. The contrary perspective, that Christ was mythical, is regarded as a fringe theory. Only two key events of Jesus's life are widely accepted as historical, namely his baptism and crucifixion, while other elements (e.g. his alleged miracles) are subject to debate. Standard historical criteria are used in evaluating the historicity of the gospel narratives. Academic efforts to determine facts of Jesus's life are part of the quest for the historical Jesus. Besides the gospels and the letters of Paul, sources for the historicity of Jesus include the works of Jewish historian Josephus and Roman historian Tacitus, who both lived shortly after the time of Jesus and wrote in reference to him and his followers. The quest for the historical Jesus and the scholarly reconstructions of the life of Jesus are based primarily on critical analysis of the gospel texts and applying the standard criteria of historical-critical investigation, and methodologies for analyzing the reliability of primary sources and other historical evidence. Virtually all scholars of antiquity agree that a historical human Jesus existed. Historian Michael Grant asserts that if conventional standards of historical textual criticism are applied to the New Testament, "we can no more reject Jesus' existence than we can reject the existence of a mass of pagan personages whose reality as historical figures is never questioned." Francesco Carotta The Christ myth theory, which developed within the scholarly research on the historical Jesus, is, in Geoffrey W. Bromiley's words, the view that "the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology" possessing no "substantial claims to historical fact".