The Acts of the Apostles is the fifth book of the New Testament; it tells of the founding of the Christian Church and the spread of its message to the Roman Empire.
The Gospel of Luke tells of the origins, birth, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus. Together with the Acts of the Apostles, it makes up a two-volume work which scholars call Luke–Acts, accounting for 27.5% of the New Testament. The combined work divides the history of first-century Christianity into three stages, with the gospel making up the first two of these – the life of Jesus the Messiah from his birth to the beginning of his mission in the meeting with John the Baptist, followed by his ministry with events such as the Sermon on the Plain and its Beatitudes, and his Passion, death, and resurrection.
The Gospel of John is the fourth of the New Testament's four canonical gospels. It contains a highly schematic account of the ministry of Jesus, with seven "signs" culminating in the raising of Lazarus and seven "I am" discourses culminating in Thomas's proclamation of the risen Jesus as "my Lord and my God". The gospel's concluding verses set out its purpose, "that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name."
The Jesus Seminar was a group of about 50 biblical criticism scholars and 100 laymen founded in 1985 by Robert Funk that originated under the auspices of the Westar Institute. The seminar was very active through the 1980s and 1990s, and into the early 21st century.
The historicity of Jesus is the question of whether Jesus historically existed. The question of historicity was generally settled in scholarship in the early 20th century. Today scholars agree that a Jewish man named Jesus of Nazareth did exist in the Herodian Kingdom of Judea and the subsequent Herodian tetrarchy in the 1st century AD, upon whose life and teachings Christianity was later constructed, but a distinction is made by scholars between 'the Jesus of history' and 'the Christ of faith'.
The term "historical Jesus" refers to the life and teachings of Jesus as interpreted through critical historical methods, in contrast to what are traditionally religious interpretations. It also considers the historical and cultural contexts in which Jesus lived. Virtually all scholars of antiquity accept that Jesus was a historical figure, and the idea that Jesus was a mythical figure has been consistently rejected by the scholarly consensus as a fringe theory. Scholars differ about the beliefs and teachings of Jesus as well as the accuracy of the biblical accounts, with only two events being supported by nearly universal scholarly consensus: Jesus was baptized and Jesus was crucified.
Jesus, also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many other names and titles, was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the central figure of Christianity, the world's largest religion. Most Christians believe Jesus to be the incarnation of God the Son and the awaited messiah, or Christ, a descendant from the Davidic line that is prophesied in the Old Testament.
John Dominic Crossan is an Irish-American New Testament scholar, historian of early Christianity and former Catholic priest who was a prominent member of the Jesus Seminar, and emeritus professor at DePaul University. His research has focused on the historical Jesus, the theology of noncanonical Gospels, and the application of postmodern hermeneutical approaches to the Bible. His work is controversial, portraying the Second Coming as a late corruption of Jesus' message and saying that Jesus' divinity is metaphorical. In place of the eschatological message of the Gospels, Crossan emphasizes the historical context of Jesus and of his followers immediately after his death. He describes Jesus' ministry as founded on free healing and communal meals, negating the social hierarchies of Jewish culture and the Roman Empire.
The quest for the historical Jesus consists of academic efforts to determine what words and actions, if any, may be attributed to Jesus, and to use the findings to provide portraits of the historical Jesus. Since the 18th century, three scholarly quests for the historical Jesus have taken place, each with distinct characteristics and based on different research criteria, which were often developed during each specific phase. These quests are distinguished from earlier approaches because they rely on the historical method to study biblical narratives. While textual analysis of biblical sources had taken place for centuries, these quests introduced new methods and specific techniques to establish the historical validity of their conclusions.
Géza Vermes, was a British academic, Biblical scholar, and Judaist of Jewish–Hungarian descent—one who also served as a Roman Catholic priest in his youth—and scholar specialized in the field of the history of religion, particularly ancient Judaism and early Christianity. He is best known for his complete translation of the Dead Sea Scrolls into English; his research focused on the Dead Sea Scrolls and other Ancient Hebrew writings in Aramaic such as the Targumim, and on the life and religion of Jesus. Vermes was one of the most important voices in contemporary Jesus research, and he has been described as the greatest Jesus scholar of his time. Vermes' written work on Jesus focuses principally on the Jewishness of the historical Jesus, as seen in the broader context of the narrative scope of Jewish history and theology, while questioning and challenging the basis of the Christian doctrine on Jesus.
Ed Parish Sanders was a liberal and secularized New Testament scholar and a principal proponent of the "New Perspective on Paul". He was a major scholar in the scholarship on the historical Jesus and contributed to the view that Jesus was part of a renewal movement within Judaism. Sanders identified himself as a "liberal, modern, secularized Protestant" in his book Jesus and Judaism; fellow scholar John P. Meier called him a postliberal Protestant. He was Arts and Sciences Professor of Religion at Duke University, North Carolina from 1990 until his retirement in 2005.
Gerd Theißen is a German Protestant theologian and New Testament scholar. He is Professor of New Testament Theology at the University of Heidelberg.
Conservative Christianity, also known as conservative theology, theological conservatism, traditional Christianity, or biblical orthodoxy is a grouping of overlapping and denominationally diverse theological movements within Christianity that seeks to retain the orthodox and long-standing traditions and beliefs of Christianity. It is contrasted with Liberal Christianity and Progressive Christianity, which are seen as heretical heterodoxies by theological conservatives. Conservative Christianity should not be mistaken as being necessarily synonymous with the political philosophy of conservatism, nor the Christian right.
Robert Walter Funk was an American biblical scholar, founder of the Jesus Seminar and the nonprofit Westar Institute in Santa Rosa, California. Funk sought to promote research and education on what he called biblical literacy. His approach to hermeneutics was historical-critical, with a strongly skeptical view of orthodox Christian belief, particularly concerning the historical Jesus. He and his associates described Jesus' parables as containing shocking messages that contradicted established religious attitudes.
Thomas L. Thompson is an American-born Danish biblical scholar and theologian. He was professor of theology at the University of Copenhagen from 1993 to 2009. He currently lives in Denmark.
Bruce D. Chilton is an American scholar of early Christianity and Judaism, and an Episcopalian priest. He is Bernard Iddings Bell Professor of Religion at Bard College, formerly Lillian Claus Professor of New Testament at Yale University, and Rector of the Church of St John the Evangelist He holds a PhD in New Testament from Cambridge University. He has previously held academic positions at the Universities of Cambridge, Sheffield, and Münster.
The historical reliability of the Gospels is evaluated by experts who have not reached complete consensus. While all four canonical gospels contain some sayings and events that may meet at least one of the five criteria for historical reliability used in biblical studies, the assessment and evaluation of these elements is a matter of ongoing debate.
In textual criticism of the New Testament, the L source is a hypothetical oral or textual tradition which the author of Luke–Acts may have used when composing the Gospel of Luke.
Francesca Stavrakopoulou is a British biblical scholar and broadcaster. She is currently Professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Religion at the University of Exeter. The main focus of her research is on the Hebrew Bible, and on Israelite and Judahite history and religion.
The date of the birth of Jesus is not stated in the gospels or in any historical sources and the evidence is too incomplete to allow for consistent dating. However, most biblical scholars and ancient historians believe that his birth date is around 4 to 6 BC. Two main approaches have been used to estimate the year of the birth of Jesus: one based on the accounts in the Gospels of his birth with reference to King Herod's reign, and the other by subtracting his stated age of "about 30 years" when he began preaching.
