Jesus Christ

(c. 4 bc–c. ad 30)

   Founder of Christianity.

   Jesus’s life is known only from the accounts given in the Four Gospels. According to St luke and St matthew, he was born in Bethlehem of mary, who was at the time betrothed but not married to joseph. The Gospels indicate that Joseph was not his father, but that he was of divine origin. He grew up in the town of Nazareth on the Sea of Galilee with brothers and sisters, one of whom, james, became a leader in the early Church. He did not begin his ministry until he was approximately thirty, when he was baptised by John in the River Jordan. At his baptism he experienced a divine call; he was anointed with the Holy Spirit and hailed as God’s Messiah and suffering servant. After spending a short time in the wilderness of Judaea, he returned to the region of Galilee. There he recruited twelve disciples, including peter, James and john, and dedicated himself to preaching the arrival of God’s Kingdom on earth. His ministry was accompanied by healings and exorcisms and he attracted large crowds in the Galilean countryside. He spoke of God as father and he stressed the virtues of generosity, unselfishness, mercy and love – ‘Be ye perfect even as your Father in Heaven is perfect’. Even though his activities ful- filled the Old Testament prophecies about the role of the Messiah, he was at pains to emphasise that he was not the nationalistic Messiah the Jews were expecting. Instead he would have to ‘suffer many things’. Even though his miracles demonstrated that the Kingdom of God was already present, he still instructed his followers to pray ‘Thy Kingdom come’. At the end of his ministry, he turned his face to Jerusalem, knowing the fate that awaited him there. He deliberately fulfilled the prophecy of the Messiah coming to the city ‘meek and riding upon an ass’ and he was recognised by the crowds with much rejoicing. He preached in the Temple and aroused the hostility of the authorities by ‘cleansing’ its outer courts of traders and moneychangers with the memorable words ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a den of thieves’. He was arrested one night and, according to the Gospels, was first tried before the High Priest. His accusers found it difficult to prove their charges, but finally, when Jesus seemed to accept the title of Messiah, he was handed over to the Roman governor as a political rebel. The Roman authorities condemned him to death by crucifixion and the accusation ‘The King of the Jews’ was nailed above the cross. Christians believe that through Jesus’s suffering and death, atonement was effected for the sins of humanity. He himself had spoken of ‘giving his life as a ransom for many’. He died just before the start of the Jewish Sabbath and he was buried by joseph of arimathaea in a nearby tomb. Two days later, on the Sunday morning, the tomb was found to be empty and, after seeing him again, his disciples believed that he had risen from the dead and was now exalted in Heaven. They preached this message, beginning in Jerusalem and it has spread to all corners of the earth. Jesus’s earthly life is commemorated in the Christian year. Christmas celebrates his birth, Good Friday his death, Easter Sunday his resurrection and Whitsunday the birthday of the Church. The title ‘Christ’ attached to his name signifies that he is the longawaited Messiah and the Church teaches that, as second person of the Trinity, he is a co-equal, co-eternal person within the Godhead, ‘God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God’.

   The Four Gospels;

   The Acts of the Apostles;

   H. Carpenter, Jesus (1980);

   G. Vermes, Jesus the Jew (1973);

   B. Chilton and C.A. Evans, Studying the Historical Jesus;

   Evaluations of the Current Research (1994).