THE PUBLIC LIFE OF JESUS CHRIST

Considerations or questions?

From his birth

Here are therefore the facts, inferred from the Gospels through the comparison with other historical and archaeological testimonies.

Jesus had been born in the days around the 25th of December B.C. 3. The angel Gabriel had announced to Mary, a girl that probably was thirteen and eight months old, the intervention of the Holy Spirit in her to generate the child, Son of God.

Also Elizabeth, Mary's relative, by gift of God, had conceived around five months before, with her husband Zechariah, a child that they called John.

When Jesus was in his early one, some Magi had come from the east to look for him as «the king of the Jews that was born».

AD 28 - the Baptist

John, son of Zechariah and Elizabeth, were about thirty years old, when a word of God went down on him and he went to the river Jordan to preach a baptism of conversion.

AD 29 - the beginning

Jesus too, around thirty years old, went at him for to be baptized.

In that moments people could hear or see the Three divine Persons. God Father from the sky talked to Jesus, his Son, and the Holy Spirit went down on him in form of dove. Such the way the Spirit as a homing pigeon, brought the man Jesus the words and works of his Father.

After this baptism Jesus retired for forty days in the desert and he was tried by the devil.

Then he went back to the river Jordan and John presented him to the people telling: «Here is God's lamb, here is who remove the sin of the world!»

From that moment he started to assemble around itself the first disciples: John of Zebedee, Andrew and Simon Peter, Phillip and Nathaniel.

It was March AD 29.

After a week he was invited to a wedding banquet to Cana of Galilee, together with the five disciples and with his mother, Mary. During the party he made the first miracle: he changed the water in wine.

Easter AD 29 was near and Jesus went in pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the festivity. He first sent away the merchants of the Temple.

He stayed for ten months in Judea to baptize, next to John.

AD 30 - preaching «a year of grace»

On February AD 30 he passed through the Samaria and he came back in Galilee. All the people of this region began to know him.

He came to Nazareth and a Saturday, in the synagogue, he presented himself like the Messiah announced by the prophets. 

After these facts he moved to Capharnaum, guest in the house of Simon Peter.

Maintaining the residence to Capharnaum, Jesus went in the outskirts, up to the synagogues of Judea, to preach for around one year: «the year of grace». 

AD 31 - the Twelve and the preaching of the Kingdom

In the first months of the following year, 31, on the shore of the lake of Genesaret he/she called four fishermen to become «men's fishermen». Among these there were three of the first disciples, Giovanni, Andrew and Simon Pietro.

In the first months of the following year, AD 31, on the shore of the lake of Genesaret he called four fishermen to become «fishermen of men». Among these there were three from the first disciples: John, Andrew and Simon Peter, that had kept on developing their job up to that moment.

After the festivity of Pentecost AD 31, on a mountain in the proximities of Capharnaum, Jesus chose among his disciples the Twelve Apostles. That same day he pronounced the Beatitudes and the Discourse of the Mountain.

In that year Jesus made  the pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Tabernacles. Approaching to the holy city stopped to Bethany, where he had some friends: Mary, Martha and their brother Lazar.

To Jerusalem, during the festivity, he recovered a man, ill since 38 years.

Subsequently he went by the cities and the villages of Judea, of Samaria and of Galilee, teaching and making miracles. One day, crossing the Lake of Galilee, he calmed a storm.

They landed to the shore in the region of the Gerasens, where Jesus sent away from a man numerous devils; but these asked to be able to enter a flock of two thousand hogs that was in that place. Jesus allowed it and the hogs threw themselves from the shore into the lake and they drowned all.

Returned to Capharnaum, the Teacher gave to his Twelve Apostles authority on the demons and he sent them to preach village by village the Kingdom of God.

AD 32 - the King Jesus

To the beginning AD 32 Herod Antipas, to satisfy his wife Herodiad, let John the Baptist, that had been holding in the jail for about two years, beheaded.

Just before the Passover AD 32, with five breads and two fishes, Jesus gave to eat to a crowd of 5000 men and numerous women and children. The bread pieces remained filled twelve baskets.

That day some men, having seen the miracle that Jesus had done, understood that he was «the prophet that had to come» and they wanted «to abduct him to do him king».

From this moment many were convinced that Jesus had to go to Jerusalem to make to be proclaimed king.

In the month of May, he climbed a mountain with Peter, John and James and it happened the «transfiguration».

 Jesus himself, on June AD 32, officially assumed the regal role and he set a vexillum, to go to the Capital at the opportune moment (Luke 9,51 in the page Gesù Cristo).

The first voyage of Jesus in Jerusalem, in his new role, was the pilgrimage for the Feast of Pentecost, when he taught the «Our Father» to its disciples, on the Mountain of the Olives.

In that occasion he was invited to table by a Pharisee and, during the lunch, he bitterly scolded the Pharisees and the doctors of the law, that began to hate him, to such a pass that he feared to be killed by the Jews and he retired in Galilee.

For the Feast of the Tabernacles he returned in Jerusalem secretly, but then he recovered in the Temple a man blind since the birth.

By now Jesus went to Jerusalem for every festivity, to practice his role of Lord (King) and Teacher. He also did it to the Feast of the Dedication, in the winter AD 32.

More and more opposed by the Jews, he went to preach in Perea, in the places in which John the Baptist had baptized. Many believed in him.

Then he went a few weeks in Galilee, where he also told the parable of the “prodigal son”, therefore, passing between the Galilee and the Samaria, he returned in Perea.

AD 33 - the Cross and the Resurrection

From the Perea Jesus departed to a brief visit to Bethany, distant around three kilometers from Jerusalem, and he resuscitated his friend Lazar.

The High Priests and the Pharisees of the Capital, seeing that many followed Jesus because the miracle that he had made, decided to kill him, having understood that people wanted to hail him king.

Then he retired to Ephraim, about twenty kilometers toward north, and he prepared himself to the triumphal entry in Jerusalem.

The time of the Passover come, he departed with the disciples and, passing by Jericho, he went up to the holy city in pilgrimage.

When he was entering to Jerusalem, the disciples and the people hailed him saying: «Hosanna to the Son of David, blessed the King that comes in the name of the Lord!». It was the 29th of March AD 33.

Also practicing his role of Teacher, Jesus discussed in Jerusalem with the High Priests, the scribes, the Pharisees and the Sadducees.

The evening of the 2nd of April, celebrating with his Apostles the supper of the Passover, he instituted the Eucharist, sign of the New Alliance. 

After the Supper he dictated to John his last teaching.

Then he made for the garden of the Getsemani to pray, together with the Twelve ones, and he asked for Peter, James and John to watch over a hour with him.

Meanwhile Jiuda, the traitor, came with some armed men.

These arrested Jesus and they conducted him in front of the top priest, therefore in the Sinedrio. He was judged and it was been decided that he had to die.

They brought him in front of the Roman attorney Pontius Pilate.

Pilate didn't find any guilt in him, but the chiefs instigated the crowd because they demand the sentence to the death of cross.

Pilate, to convince the crowd and to try to free Jesus, made him flagellate. But people howled more always and the attorney allowed to convince himself to deliver the sentence.  He was crucified on the 3rd of April AD 33, the day before the great Feast of Passover, that was celebrated that year in Saturday; but on the 5th of April he resuscitated to new life.

The apparitions are a test that Jesus is really risen. He didn't appear to all the people, but to his disciples. With them he ate and he drank. Among them there were also some public officers and together they could give testimony of it to everybody.

The morning of the day of the resurrection he appeared to Mary Magdalene, then to the other women.

The afternoon, while two disciples went from Jerusalem to Emmaus, he formed to their conversation, but they didn't recognize him. They realized that he was Jesus when he broke the bread as in the Last Supper. One of the two was called Cleophas and the other, probably, was the evangelist Luke himself, that tells this episode.

Meanwhile Jesus also appeared to Peter.

To the evening he appeared closed doors in the Cenacle, where his disciples were gathered, and he ate a portion of fish in front of them.

To that same evening Jesus ascended to the Heaven to his Father, but for forty days he returned to make to be seen by the disciples offering a lot of tests of his resurrection. He talked to them about the things of the Kingdom of God, he ate and he drank with them.

In fact, eight days after he was risen, he appeared to the disciples and he gave to Thomas the possibility to see and to touch the signs of the wounds in his hands and in his feet.

A week still passed, he appeared to the Eleven on a mountain, to the parts of the Galilee, as he had promised during the Last Supper. On that mountain they were present «others» (see Mt 28,17 in Gesù Cristo); there was therefore an inhabited center, that can be identified with Gamla. A part of the city inhabitants came together to meet Jesus: they probably were the «more than five hundred brothers» remembered by S. Paul (1 Kor 15,6). He sent them, with the Eleven, to teach and to baptize all the Gentiles.

Finally, past forty days, he definitely ascended to the Heaven from the Mount of Olives. Two men in white dresses reassured the Apostles saying: «Men of Galilee, why is your look at the sky? This Jesus, that has so been from among you assumed up to the Heaven, will return equally in which way you have seen him go to sky» (Acts 1,11).

Giovanni Conforti

Updated on the 15th of September 2008

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