Almost everything that is known about Jesus is provided by the canonical gospels. These writings are not based on eyewitnesses information, but, at best, based on hearsay. Very likely most of the stories are fictional. Historians have searched for millennia for independent evidence for the existence of Jesus and corroboration of any parts of the gospels. Thus far that search has yielded nothing.
The earliest written account of Jesus is found in the seven legitimate letters of the Apostle Paul. However, he provides no report on the life or ministry of Jesus and no corroboration for the gospels. Very little record exists for the three hundred years of the Christian movement. It is known that there were many religious sects/cults competing for dominance and many "gospels".
Richard Carrier has researched the historicity of Jesus and offers insight into this period of time. He is a religious historian with a Ph.D. from Columbia University, and is a published philosopher and historian, specializing in contemporary philosophy of naturalism, and in Greco-Roman philosophy, science, and religion, and the origins of Christianity. He blogs regularly, lectures for community groups worldwide, and teaches courses online. He is the author of many books including Sense and Goodness without God, On the Historicity of Jesus, and Proving History, as well as chapters in several anthologies and articles in academic journals.
If you are a "believer" the following video with sail right over your head. Your beliefs are based on faith and not on evidence. Don't waste your time attempting to understand what Dr Carrier has found in his search of historical records. However, if some of the claims about Jesus don't seem sound, you ought to watch this following video, take some notes, and do your own followup research. He offers some common sense arguments as counter-point to the prevailing stories about the Jesus persona.
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