There are two kinds of truth about Jesus of Nazareth: the certain Gospel truth of faith and the approximate historical truth of academic research. Gospel truth was dominant in the Christian world for more than seventeen centuries. It resulted from the uncritical acceptance of everything stated about Jesus in the New Testament, and seen through the prism of faith. Inquiry for the human figure of Jesus began by Samuel Reimarus in the eighteenth century and characterized academic Gospel criticism from the age of the enlightenment to the present day. It aimed at the rediscovery of the first century Galilean religious master, the "historical Jesus" as distinct from the "Christ of faith". The problem is back in the melting pot following the claim of Pope Benedict XVI's book, Jesus of Nazareth (2007), that the Christ of faith is the historical Jesus.

Geza Vermes is a Professor Emeritus of Jewish Studies and Emeritus Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford. He has edited the Journal of Jewish Studies since 1971, and since 1991 he has been director of the Oxford Forum for Qumran Research at the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies. He is the author of 'The Changing Faces of Jesus' - a book presenting Christ not as a divine being, but as a real historical figure.