what is true about Jesus of Nazareth?

Answer 1

Jesus is the son of God. He came to Earth long, long ago and made it so we can be washed of our sins through God himself, not through any ritual. (or said to be in most religions like Catholicism and Christianity. The belief in God depends on your religion.)

Answer 2

A:

If the gospels are true, there should be a wealth of information in them about Jesus, or at least the period of his ministry. As for the nativity accounts and the genealogies in Matthew and Luke, most New Testament scholars dismiss these as literary creations. Raymond E. Brown (An Introduction to the New Testament) says the two accounts are "massively different" and virtually irreconcilable. And in the view of John Shelby Spong (Born of a Woman: A Bishop Rethinks the Birth of Jesus), neither of the nativity stories contains any historical truth.

We then have to decide whether the synoptic accounts of the mission of Jesus are true, or whether John's account is true: we can not say they are complementary, because they contradict each other too much. Of the four different accounts of the empty tomb, Archbishop Peter Carnley wrote:

"The presence of discrepancies might be a sign of historicity if we had four clearly independent but slightly different versions of the story, if only for the reason that four witnesses are better than one. But, of course, it is now impossible to argue that what we have in the four gospel accounts of the empty tomb are four contemporaneous but independent accounts of the one event. Modern redactional studies of the traditions account for the discrepancies as literary developments at the hand of later redactors of what was originally one report of the empty tomb...

There is no suggestion that the tomb was discovered by different witnesses on four different occasions, so it is in fact impossible to argue that the discrepancies were introduced by different witnesses of the one event; rather, they can be explained as four different redactions for apologetic and kerygmatic reasons of a single story originating from one source."

We can not even rely on the two gospels attributed to disciples Matthew and John to establish that there must be some truth in the accounts, because they were originally anonymous and scholars say that none of the gospels could have been written by eyewitnesses to the events portrayed.

Paul says that Jesus was seen by Cephas (Peter), then the twelve, then by more than 500, most of whom were still alive, then by James and all the apostles, and finally by himself. Is this true, or were there only eleven disciples at the time of the resurrection and if so, which gospel account of the risen Jesus is closest to the truth?

Looking at issues like these, we begin to realise we really know nothing about Jesus of Nazareth. What has been written simply tells us there was probably a Jesus of Nazareth who somehow sparked a new religion that has been adopted around the world.

Answer 3

Because he was the son of god

ANOTHER ANSWER:

Jesus' LIFE was important to His followers, because they "believed Him, by John the Baptist's testimony, to be the long-awaited Messiah":

"The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother, Simon, and tell him, 'We have found the MESSIAH' (which means the Christ)." (John 1:41 NLT New Living Translation)

And for about three-and-a-half years they were expecting Him to fulfill the ancient prophecies and come across with the Kingdom of God; a Kingdom in which Jesus promised each of them a throne to rule over the nations!

"...'I assure you that when I , the Son of Man, sit upon My Glorious throne in the Kingdom, you who have been My followers will also sit on twelve thrones, Judging the twelves tribes of Israel.'" (Matt.19:28 NLT)

The DEATH of Jesus was more important to Jesus' followers, because on the day He was arrested and taken away from them without a fight, their worlds came crashing down around their ears, and they all fled in utter terror... thinking that all their Hopes had been for nothing... and that they were next on the Jews' "hit list."

"That evening, on the first day of the week, the disciples were meeting behind locked doors because they were AFRAID OF THE JEWISH LEADERS. Suddenly, Jesus was standing there among them! 'Peace be with you,' He said." (John 20:19 NLT)

But the most important reason Jesus was important to His followers was when He came back to LIFE! IMMORTAL! He suddenly materialized among them in a locked room after three horrendously terrifying days. He stood there ALIVE. He had no blood coursing through His veins [it had all been shed for the sins of His creation, mankind]. He now had no need for respiration, to inflate His lungs, to massage His heart, to maintain a constant flow of blood to live. He stood there, forever Alive and Immortal before them.

If it hadn't been for the "coming back to Life" part [Jesus' defeat of death]... Jesus' mere "life and death" wouldn't have been important at all -- to His deceived followers... or to anyone at all in the future. Without that third part of Jesus' Life, He would have just been another forgotten historical statistic of past generations of mankind.

First, Jesus' faithfulness unto death resolved an important aspect of the "sacred secret." He proved to the ultimate degree that a perfect man can maintain "godly devotion" and uphold God's sovereignty despite the severest of tests imposed by Satan. (1 Tim. 3:16) Second, as Jesus said, "the Son of man came . . . to give his soul a ransom in exchange for many." (Matt. 20:28) This "corresponding ransom" paid the penalty for sin inherited by Adam's offspring and made it possible to give everlasting life to all who accept Jesus as God's means of salvation.-1 Tim. 2:5, 6.

Answer 4

As the Son of God, the life of Jesus of Nazareth would have been important to the people of his time. To modern Christians, the death of Jesus was a sacrifice for forgiveness of sins, but Rhoads, Dewey and Michie (Mark as Story) say that Mark's Gospel does not portray Jesus' death as a sacrifice for sin. Markportrays Jesus already pardoning sin during his life and authorising others to do the same. His death is not needed to make forgiveness possible.