Bart Ehrman recently wrote a book entitled:
Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth
Due to an increase in a popular conception that seeks to argue that the historical Jesus never existed, Dr. Ehrman felt compelled to write a book to:
“…convince genuine seekers who really want to know how we know that Jesus did exist, as virtually every scholar of antiquity, of biblical studies, of classics, and of Christian origins in this country and, in fact, in the Western world agrees.”
This is Ehrman’s thesis:
“As a historian I can show why at least one set of skeptical claims about the past history of our civilization is almost certainly wrong, even though these claims are seeping into the popular consciousness at an alarming rate.
Jesus existed, and those vocal persona who deny it do so not because they have considered the evidence with the dispassionate eye of the historian, but because they have some other agenda that this denial serves.
From a dispassionate point of view, there was a Jesus of Nazareth.”
I’m currently about halfway through the book and I have to say, though Ehrman does not think the same way I do about who Jesus the man is, he does passionate believe, with historical reliability, that the historical Jesus did, in fact, exist, which is a claim that I appreciate amidst our current world of skepticism of whether there was a real Jesus or not. Ehrman is not a Christian, which, while sad for him (although he is not sad), helps the conversation because he has no engendered or inherent bias to prove it either way. Ehrman relies solely on the discipline of historical studies to arrive at his, and many others, conclusion: that Jesus did exist.
