Jesus

"I am the vine, and you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, and I in him, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me."

Jesus, from the Gospel according to John

Almost all we know about Jesus comes from the four accounts of his life (Gospels) which we find in the New Testament.

Born just before the death of Herod the Great, king of Judea in 4 BCE, Jesus lived for a little over thirty years. He was born in Bethlehem in Judea, but was brought up in Galilee, and most of his public activity was in that region. His family was respectable, if not affluent, his father was a carpenter or general builder, an important figure in village life. But Nazareth was an obscure village, and Jesus' background was remote from urban culture.

Along with the very down to earth circumstances of his birth, the Christian Gospels record the fact that it was far from ordinary. Angels proclaimed him the promised saviour and it was maintained that he was not conceived by human intercourse, but by the power of God. This bringing together of earthly poverty and obscurity with a miraculous birth is typical of the Gospels' portrait of Jesus, as truly human but also uniquely the Son of God.

Virtually nothing is known of Jesus' life from his infancy until about the age of thirty. The event which launched Jesus on his public ministry was the mission of his relative, John "the Baptist", down in Judea. John called Israel to return to God, and baptized those who responded in the River Jordan. He attracted a large following and Jesus joined him, was baptized and himself began preaching. When John was put in prison, Jesus moved back to Galilee, and continued to preach in public.

The Gospels summarize Jesus' activity as "preaching, teaching and healing", and that is how he would have appeared to his contemporaries during the three years of so of his public ministry.

He and his closest followers deliberately adopted a wandering and dependent style of life. They had no permanent home, but moved around as a group, accepting gifts and hospitality when offered. Jesus spoke frequently of the danger of becoming preoccupied with possessions.

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Jesus was well known as a healer from the beginning of his public activity. The Gospels record his curing of many different types of illness and deformity, usually by a simple word and touch, sometimes by a word alone. There is no elaborate ritual, nor any search for patients; rather a power which responded to physical need as he met it.

Most of Jesus' recorded miracles are healings, but a number of incidents are recorded where he displayed a supernatural control over nature. Again these were in response to actual needs, not mere arbitrary displays of power, as when he multiplied a little food to feed a hungry crowd, or calmed a dangerous storm on the lake by a command. The Gospels present him as one who did not go out of his way to gain a reputation as a miracle worker, but whose personal authority extended beyond his words to a practical control over nature which inevitably made a deep impression on those around him.

From the outset, Jesus was seen as a threat to the Jewish religious establishment. He refused to recognise the barriers which divided people from one another in society. His habit of mixing with the ostracised classes, and even of eating with them, earned him the name of "friend of tax-collectors and sinners". Women held an unconventionally high place in his following, and not all of them were very respectable in the eyes of the religious fraternity. He delighted in reversing accepted standards with his phrase "The first shall be last, and the last first".

Eventually he was arrested by the Jewish leaders with the help of Judas, his disciple, and was tried according to Jewish law on a charge of blasphemy, because he claimed to be the Messiah and the Son of God. A death sentence was passed, but a Roman conviction was required to make it effective. This was secured by a charge of sedition, pressed upon the Roman governor by the religious leaders with a show of popular support. So, ironically, the Jesus who had forfeited his popular following by his refusal to take up arms against Rome was executed by Rome as a political rebel, the "king of the Jews".

He was executed by crucifixion, the method reserved by Rome for slaves and rebels. Some highly placed followers obtained his body and buried it in a nearby tomb.

The cross has become the symbol of Christianity. In that death, with all its cruelty and injustice, is the focus of salvation, and Jesus had already taught his disciples to see it that way. It was not the cross alone that had significance, it was the sequel that gave it meaning.

Two days later his disciples found the tomb was empty. The meaning was brought home to them by a series of encounters with Jesus himself, alive and real, though no longer bound by the limitations of time and space (he could appear and disappear suddenly, even inside a closed room.)

For a few weeks they met him in a variety of situations, sometimes one or two alone, more often in a larger group. He explained to them again the meaning of his life and death, and the mission he had entrusted to them. Then he left them and they began to preach to the world that Jesus triumphant even over death was Lord and Saviour. It was the resurrection of Jesus that formed the focus of the earliest Christian preaching, it was the risen Lord whom they worshipped.

"I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry".

"I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will have the light of life and will never walk in darkness."

"I am the gate for the sheep...whoever comes in by me will be saved".

"I am the good shepherd, who is willing to die for the sheep".

"I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die".

"I am the way, the truth and the life; no one goes to the Father except by me".

The Gospel according to John.

Extracts taken from "A Lion Handbook, The World’s Religions", various editors, ISBN 0745937209

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