ChapterTwo
An Historical Account
of Jesus
The more people have tried to discover who Jesus really was, peace
be on him, the more it has been found how little is known about
mm. There are limited records of ms teachings and sorne of his
actions, but very little is known about how he actually lived his
life from moment to moment, and how he conducted his everyday
transactions with other people.
Certainly, the picture many people have been given of Jesus
of who he was, and what he did - is a distorted one. Although
there is sorne truth in them, it has been established that the four
accepted Gospels have not only been altered and censored through
the ages, but also are not eyewitness accounts.
The earliest Gospel is that of Mark, written about 60 AD. He
was the son of St. Barnabas's sister. Matthew was a tax collector, a
minor official who did not travel around with Jesus. Luke's Gos
pel was written much later, and is, in fact, drawn from the same
source as Mark's and Matthew's. Luke was Paul's physician, and,
like Paul, never met Jesus.
John' s Gospel is from a different source, and was written later
still, in Greek, in about 100 AD. The author ofthis Gospel should
not be confused with John, the disciple, who was another man. For
two centuries it was hotly debated whether or not this Gospel
should be accepted as a reliable account of the life of Jesus, and
whether or not it should be included in the Scriptures.
Since none of the Gospels are written by people who person
ally saw and heard the events and words which they describe, it is
hardly surprising that their respective accounts of particular events
often differ - and at times even contradict each other - and that
even highly significant events in the life of Jesus are not described
in all of the Gospels. Thus, as Dr Maurice Bucaille points out in his
book, The Bible, the Qur'an and Science: