In the New Testament, Jesus is referred to as the King of the Jews, both at the beginning of his life and at the end. In the Koine Greek of the New Testament, e.g., in John 19:3, this is written as Basileus ton Ioudaion ( βασιλεὺς τῶν Ἰουδαίων). [1] According to the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, Jesus was a descendant of King David. [46] [47] One argument against this claim [ clarification needed] is the contradiction which is contained in Jesus's genealogies: Matthew says that he was descended from King Solomon, while Luke says that he was descended from Solomon's brother, Nathan. John of Damascus taught the belief that there is no contradiction, for Nathan wed Solomon's wife after Solomon died in accordance with yibbum (the mitzvah that a man must marry his brother's childless widow). [48] The question troubles Herod who considers the title his own, and in Matthew 2:7–8 he questions the Magi about the exact time of the Star of Bethlehem's appearance. Herod sends the Magi to Bethlehem, telling them to notify him when they find the child. After the Magi find Jesus and present their gifts, having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they returned to their country by a different way. Thought to have been born a few years after the crucifixion of Jesus around 37 A.D., Josephus was a well-connected aristocrat and military leader in Palestine who served as a commander in Galilee during the first Jewish Revolt against Rome between 66 and 70 A.D. Although Josephus was not a follower of Jesus, “he was around when the early church was getting started, so he knew people who had seen and heard Jesus,” Mykytiuk says.

It was in his attitude towards the Torah that Jesus seems to have departed from the Judaism of his time. In their teaching, the rabbis would state, "thus says the Torah." Jesus showed independence by standing above the Torah and speaking as one "having authority". (Mark 1:22) He dared to base his teachings on "I say to you" and it was this daring which brought him into conflict with contemporary Judaism. The leaders of the Jewish establishment realise that he threatens their power, and so do the Romans, who fear that Jesus has the charisma to lead a guerrilla uprising against Imperial Rome. Pilate was recalled to Rome to be tried for his brutal treatment of Jews, but the Emperor Tiberius died, and Pilate was never brought to trial. He is thought to have committed suicide in 37 AD - not long after the crucifixion.Glasgow, James (2010) [1872]. The Apocalypse Translated and Expounded. Edinburgh: T&T Clark. ISBN 978-1-153-28844-6. OCLC 557904029 . Retrieved 18 June 2011. Brown, R.E. (1994). Introduction to the New Testament Christology. Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 978-0-8264-7190-1.

Christian theology includes the beliefs that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, was born of a virgin named Mary, performed miracles, founded the Christian Church, died by crucifixion as a sacrifice to achieve atonement for sin, rose from the dead, and ascended into Heaven, from where he will return. [27] Commonly, Christians believe Jesus enables people to be reconciled to God. The Nicene Creed asserts that Jesus will judge the living and the dead, [28] either before or after their bodily resurrection, [29] [30] [31] an event tied to the Second Coming of Jesus in Christian eschatology. [32] The great majority of Christians worship Jesus as the incarnation of God the Son, the second of three prosopons of the Trinity. [h] The birth of Jesus is celebrated annually on 25 December as Christmas. [i] His crucifixion is honored on Good Friday and his resurrection on Easter Sunday. The world's most widely used calendar era—in which the current year is AD 2023 (or 2023 CE)—is based on the approximate birthdate of Jesus. [33] Brown, R.E. (1988). The Gospel and Epistles of John: A Concise Commentary. Concise Commentary. Liturgical Press. ISBN 978-0-8146-1283-5.

France, R. T. (2007). The Gospel of Matthew. Grand Rapids, Mich: William B. Eerdmans Pub. ISBN 978-0-8028-2501-8. OCLC 122701585. a b c d Taylor, Joan E. (8 February 2018). What did Jesus look like?. ISBN 978-0-567-67151-6. OCLC 1012838369. Binz, Stephen (2004). The names of Jesus. Mystic, CT: Twenty-Third Publications. ISBN 1-58595-315-6. OCLC 56392998. Although some images of Jews exist in the synagogue in Dura-Europos, and such images may have been common, in theory, Judaism forbade images, and its influence on the depictions of Jesus remains unknown. [82] Christian depictions of Jesus which were produced during the 3rd and 4th centuries typically focused on New Testament scenes of healings and other miracles. [84] Following the conversion of Constantine in the fourth century, Christian art found many wealthy donors and flourished. [84] During this period, Jesus began to have more mature features, and he was also shown with a beard. [18] A new development which occurred at this time was the depiction of Jesus without a narrative context; he was just depicted as a figure all by himself. [18]

The story of the night in Gethsemane contains powerful medical evidence to support the theory that Jesus knew what he was doing. During that Last Supper Jesus seemed to be predicting his own death. As he and the disciples sat together, Jesus called the bread they were eating his broken body and referred to the red wine they drank as his spilled blood.To release Jesus would have been likely to cause a riot; Pilate could have lost control of the city, and possibly the province. Pilate was effectively a dictator; so long as he kept Rome happy, he had absolute power, including power of life and death.

a b Blum, Edward J.; Harvey, Paul (2012). The Color of Christ: The Son of God & the Saga of Race in America. Univ of North Carolina Press. p.85. ISBN 978-0-8078-3572-2. At that moment, St. Luke - himself a doctor - records that Jesus sweated drops of blood onto the path before him. Jesus and his family would have been observant of Torah, paid tithes, kept the Sabbath, circumcised their males, attended synagogue, observed purity laws in relation to childbirth and menstruation, kept the dietary code - one could go on. While the Gospels record disputes about Jesus' interpretation of a few of these, the notion of a Christian Jesus, who did not live by Torah or only by its ethical values, does not fit historical reality.

A wide range of depictions have appeared over the two millennia since Jesus's death, often influenced by cultural settings, political circumstances and theological contexts. Many depictions are interpretations of spurious sources, and are generally historically inaccurate. [7] :44–45 Shortly before Tacitus penned his account of Jesus, Roman governor Pliny the Younger wrote to Emperor Trajan that early Christians would “sing hymns to Christ as to a god.” Some scholars also believe Roman historian Suetonius references Jesus in noting that Emperor Claudius had expelled Jews from Rome who “were making constant disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus.” It was there that Jesus was touched by dreadful doubt - was death really what God wanted for him? He begged God to release him from his fate. The continued reliance on the use of the term king by the Judeans to press charges against Jesus is a key element of the final decision to crucify him. [3] In John 19:12 Pilate seeks to release Jesus, but the Jews object, saying: "If thou release this man, thou art not Caesar's friend: every one that maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar", bringing the power of Caesar to the forefront of the discussion. [3] In John 19:12, the Jews then cry out: "Crucify him! ... We have no king but Caesar." Quigley, Megan (2015). Modernist Fiction and Vagueness: Philosophy, Form, and Language. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-316-19566-6.