Making an abstraction of the narratives found in the Gospel, including the Acts of the Apostles, we will give voice in this text to witnesses who did not know the Master, did not live with Jesus, but referred to Him, and in the sequence we will bring the voice of Spiritist authors, incarnated and disincarnated. Unfortunately some of the eyewitnesses of Jesus, or close to the Master, were silenced by the destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman Empire in AD 70, with the consequent pillaging and burning of the Temple of Jerusalem, guarding the main documents of the Jewish people, for the order given from Rome by the Emperor was that not one stone be left on a stone, and that the Jews should be scattered throughout the world. It is invaluable what has been lost in terms of rolls of papyrus of the utmost importance.

Other witnesses were silenced by the relentless Roman persecutions of Christians until the mid of the year 300, when many manuscripts kept by Jesus' followers were destroyed because they were considered subversive to the established order, which had in paganism its official religion (worship of many gods and ritual cults).

Worthy of note is the divergence of views in the interpretation of the evangelical teachings among the Christian nuclei, which were not understood, giving rise to the burning of many written documents, because they were considered contrary to the interpretation of this or that group. Unfortunately this internal struggle lasted until the Council of Nicaea, on the year 325 AD, when the Catholic Church was created and a new history of Christianity began.

Despite this context contrary to the preservation of witnesses and documents, several evidences survived the time, and we can highlight the testimonies of non-Christians about the existence and teachings of Jesus.

The earliest texts about Jesus date back to the first century, mostly written by followers of Christianity. One of the exceptions is Flavius ​​Josephus (AD 37 - 100 AD), a Jewish historian who attempted to write the entire History of the Jewish people from Genesis to his time. He quotes Jesus, John the Baptist, and James (brother of Jesus) as examples of men who led messianic movements in the region of Galilee. In his book Jewish Antiquities, more precisely in the third chapter of Volume XVIII, he writes:

"...at that time there was a certain Jesus, a wise man... He was a miracle maker ... He taught in such a way that men listened to him with pleasure ... It was the Christ, and when Pilate condemned Him to be crucified, those who loved Him did not abandon Him and He appeared to them on the third day ... ".

Another testimony is of Tacitus, a convicted Roman pagan (AD 56 - 120 AD) and considered one of the greatest historians of Antiquity. In his Annals (Part XV) he wrote:

"... Nero inflicted the most refined tortures on those men who, under the common name of Christians, were already marked by the deserved infamy. Their name originated from Christ, who under the reign of Tiberius had suffered the death penalty by a decree of the procurator Pontius Pilate..."

We also have the testimony of Pliny (AD 62 - 114 AD), who was a proconsul in Jerusalem and wrote a letter to Emperor Trajan reporting that:

"... to curse Christ, a true Christian will never do it... they sing (the Christians) hymns to Christ, as to a God...”

Also the Roman historian Suetonius (AD 70 - 130 AD) wrote in an excerpt from the fifth book of The Twelve Caesars, more precisely in chapter XXV, in which he evokes the Emperor Tiberius:

"...he expelled from Rome the Jews, who instigated by a certain Chrestus (Christ), provoked frequent tumults...”

We found another historical witness in Lucian of Samosata (125 AD - 180 AD), a non-Christian Greek writer, who throughout his life wrote that Jesus Christ was worshiped by Christian people, for He had introduced several new teachings and He was crucified by them. Lucian of Samosata also says in his writings that among the main teachings of Jesus Christ was fraternity, the importance of conversion and that all should deny other gods but their Father (God). He still says that Christians lived under the laws of Jesus, believed to be immortal and disdained of death.

Finally, we have the testimony of Mara Bar-Serapion (no one knows his date of birth or death), a Syrian writer who was known to have provided one of the greatest non-Jewish and non-Christian references to the existence of Jesus Christ when he wrote a letter in AD 73, that is, 40 years after the crucifixion, where he encourages his son to acquire knowledge. In this letter he uses various examples such as the philosophers Socrates and Pythagoras, as well as a "wise king" who had been executed by the Jews.

They are the reputable witnesses, not directly involved with the episodes narrated in the Gospels, which testify that the figure of Jesus Christ is real, that He did in fact exist.

The Spiritist Vision on Jesus

On April 18, 1857, with the launching of The Book of Spirits, by Allan Kardec, in the nineteenth-century, in France, began the History of Spiritism, or the Spiritist Doctrine. Among the various references to Jesus, let us highlight question 625 of this book, when the Encoder inquires of the Higher Spirits:

"What is the most perfect type that God has offered to man, to serve him as a guide and model?

- See Jesus.

In addition, Kardec writes an admirable note:

"Jesus is for man the kind of moral perfection that mankind can aspire to on Earth. God offers Him as the most perfect model and the Doctrine he taught is the purest expression of His law because He was animated by the Divine Spirit and was the purest being that ever appeared on Earth. If some of those who sought to instruct men in God's law sometimes misled them into false principles, it was because they were overpowered by too earthly feelings, and because they mistook the laws governing the conditions of the soul's life with those governing the body’s life. Many of them presented as Divine Laws what were only human laws instituted to serve man’s passions and to dominate him".

For Spiritism there is no doubt about the existence of Jesus and His importance for Humanity, being a perfect Spirit, a Spiritual Governor of our planet, and guide and model for any and every human being, whether Christian or not, because His teachings are for all times, for all peoples, for all nations, because they are universal teachings followed by His own example, for this is the most perfect teaching methodology: theory allied to practice.

In the year 1864, Allan Kardec launched The Gospel according to Spiritism, with the Spiritist interpretation of the moral teachings of Christ. Of this monumental work, we emphasize section of item 4 of the first chapter, where we can read:

"He came to fulfill the prophecies which had announced His advent. His authority stemmed from the exceptional nature of His Spirit and the divine nature of His mission. He came to teach men that true life is not on Earth, but in the Kingdom of Heaven; to teach them the way that leads them there, the means of reconciling with God, and to warn them about the progress of future things, for the fulfillment of human destinies".

In this deep and transcendent vision that is brought to us by the Spiritist Doctrine, we can now pass the word to the philosopher, journalist and educator Jose Herculano Pires for it is his excellent study gathered in the book Review of Christianity, where we glimpse the Master not only yesterday but alive in the present day and for ever and ever:

"Jesus of Nazareth did not only exist in the past, He exists right now, and it is an existing one that stands in the streets and squares, in the workplace and in the places of suffering. He is no longer nailed to the Roman cross by Jewish impiety. The philosophical concept of existence in our day is not the common life of men, who only care to support the body. Existence, say philosophers, is pure subjectivity in the course of transcendence. Jesus of Nazareth became subjectivity in the consciousness of the world. His teachings mark the elevation of the Earth toward the higher worlds. But for us to be worthy of this, we must restore the truth about Jesus and the legitimacy of Christianity. No other path exists for the world at this decisive crossroads of History. Only two paths intersect at this moment, in the anguished flesh of the Earth: that of the lie, in which we are; and that of Truth, drawn by Christ".

Through the psychographics of the medium Jose Raul Teixeira, we bring the work “Who is Christ?” - authored by the Spirit Francisco de Paula Vitor, when in its first chapter it clarifies us:

"Jesus Christ is not the One who came to destroy the Divine Laws. He came, indeed, to execute them, disarticulating the human laws which, in opposition to the precepts of the Creator, still sow shadows, still impose brutality and support the indignity with which are treated so many helpless communities”.

Jesus' revelation of the divine paternity of all of us human beings inaugurated a new era in Humanity, no more hatred and wars, but love and solidarity. He did not come to fulfill the determinations of human laws, often unjust, but to bear witness to the divine law, wise, perfect, incorruptible, opening new horizons for man's understanding of life.

Still bringing the word of the Spirits about Jesus, we have a beautiful and profound vision brought by Joanna de Angelis in the book Jesus and the Gospel in the Light of Deep Psychology, through the psychographics of the medium Divaldo Pereira Franco. These are at the same time both poetic and philosophical words:

"In all respects His Testament - the Gospel - is the most beautiful poem of hopes and consolations known to us. (...) Jesus broke the dark side of society and creatures, enlightening consciences with the proposal of liberation for the knowledge of truth and integration into the sovereign postulates of love. (...) Mankind would never go back to living days like those in which He was with the creatures, suffering with them and loving them, helping them and understanding them, while taking examples of nature and, in his unrivaled agenda, sang the extraordinary tune of the Good News. And even today His voice reaches the ears of all those who suffer, or who aspire to the ideals of beauty and happiness, or who yearn for better days, emulating them in pursuit of the task and self-improvement, aiming for fullness”.

As we can see, the Spiritist understanding of Jesus is much broader and deeper than the understanding of any human historian, for they lack the spiritual vision of life, the understanding of the immortality of the soul, as well as of the law of evolution which is intended to lead us to perfection and happiness. For the Spiritists, there is no doubt about the existential reality of Jesus and the deep meaning of His mission.

This understanding is very well understood by Leon Denis, a brilliant apostle of the Spiritist Doctrine, contemporary of Allan Kardec, and who in his studies enshrined in the excellent work Christianity and Spiritism, brings us a beautiful text at the same time philosophical, poetic and of high inspiration, enclosing our considerations on the subject:

"Jesus is one of these divine missionaries and He is the greatest of all. Deprived of the false halo of divinity, He seems more imposing. His sufferings, His failings, His resignation, make Him almost insensible, if He comes from a God, but they touch us, they touch us deeply in a brother. Jesus is, of all the sons of men, the most admirable. It is extraordinary in the Sermon of the Mountain, amid the mob of the humble. He is even greater on Calvary, when the shadow of the cross extends over the world in the afternoon of the ordeal. (...) The passage of Jesus through the Earth, its teachings and examples, left traces indelible; His influence will extend for the centuries to come".

Bibliography:

ANGELIS, Joanna de / FRANCO, Divaldo Pereira. Jesus and the Gospel in the Light of Profound Psychology. Salvador: Leal, 2014.

DENIS, Leon. Christianity and Spiritism. Rio de Janeiro: Feb, 1971.

KARDEC, Allan. The Gospel According to Spiritism, O. Sao Paulo: Lake, 2003.

KARDEC, Allan. The Book of Spirits, O. Sao Paulo: Lake, 1995.

MACHADO, Dirceu. Historical Splashes of the Holy Scriptures. Rio de Janeiro: JS, 2014.

MIRANDA, Herminio Correa de. Christianity, the Forgotten Message. Matao: O Clarim, 1988.

PIRES, Jose Herculano. Review of Christianity. Sao Paulo, Paideia, 2014.

Vitor, Francisco de Paula / TEIXEIRA, Jose Raul. Who is the Christ? Niteroi: Frater, 2008.

Marcus De Mario is from Rio de Janeiro, where he collaborates in the Spiritist Group Seara de Luz. And Rio de Janeiro Radio, the brotherhood broadcaster, being the creator and director of the Brazilian Institute of Moral Education. He is a writer, educator, speaker and consultant.