Do you remember Irving Wallace's The Word from 1972. Okay, I don't even remember it, but I remember coming across it used sometime in the 1980s. An interesting premise: a new gospel, ostensibly written by Jesus's brother James the Just, is discovered. Wallace's usual jet set and political hi jinks ensue.

Couldn't help but remember The Word when i read about the discovery of a burial box that might well have contained the bones of James, brother of Jesus.

Since there have been many interpretations of what has been written about the life of Jesus, I've sometimes wondered if he ever really existed. One opinion among a minority of Biblical scholars is that he didn't. While the Gospels themselves are often contradictory, evidence of Jesus' life outside of the Gospels is nearly non-existent.

There is only one reference to Jesus that we can suggest with any certainty was written by someone who lived during his lifetime: the histories of a Romanized Jew named Flavius Josephus, writing during the second half of the first century CE. He produced two major works: The History of the Jewish War and Antiquities of the Jews. There is no mention of Jesus in the former and the following paragraph from the latter:

About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who wrought surprising feats and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Messiah. When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of the highest standing amongst us, had condemned him to be crucified, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him. On the third day he appeared to them restored to life, for the prophets of God had prophesied these and countless other marvellous things about him. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared.

This passage was written probably 90 CE, but our only copy in Greek dates from the 11th century, and there is every indication that Christian scribes modified the text. One does not need to read too much Josephus to recognize that the passage simply doesn't fit with his other work. Josephus was a Pharisaic Jew and it is unlikely that he would write such a laudatory passage about a man supposedly killed for blasphemy. Indeed, the passage seems to make Josephus himself out to be a Christian, which was certainly not the case. To support this, early Christian writer Origen claims that Josephus did not recognize Jesus as the Messiah. It should be noted that Josephus spends much more time in his writings discussing John the Baptist and various other supposed Messiahs than he does discussing Jesus.

Interestingly there is a late Arabic copy of this passage in Josephus from Agapius's Book of the Title, a history of the world from its beginning to 941/942 CE. Agapius was a tenth century Christian Arab and Melkite bishop of Hierapolis:

Similarly Josephus (Yusifus), the Hebrew. For he says in the treatises that he has written on the governance (?) of the Jews: 'At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. His conduct was good, and (he) was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. But those who become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion, and that he was alive; accordingly he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophets have recounted wonders.'

On the whole, it seems at least plausible that Josephus made some references to Jesus in the original version of Antiquities of the Jews. However, the extent of these references is very uncertain, and clear evidence of textual corruption does exist. While Josephus may be the best non-Christian source on Jesus, that is not saying much.

This dubious passage is the only contemporary account of Jesus. There are >a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/scott_oser/hojfaq.html">other mentions of Jesus from the time immediately after his death, but the knowledge appears very general and from probable Christian sources.

Understand that James (Ya'akov), Joseph (Yosef) and Jesus (Yeshua or Yeshua) were all common names during the first century AD. Yeshu, Yeshua, and Yeshoshua -- typically translated as Joshua and latinized as Jesus -- are all forms of the same name and were extremely common during the first century AD.