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According to the Bible, in a little-known town on the edge of the Roman Empire, a man named Jesus was born and killed 33 years later. Despite some skeptics’ claims about the veracity of this data, experts say that there is extremely convincing evidence to support the story described in the Gospel.

Archaeologists working in Palestine and Israel have found a number of artifacts that confirm the basic facts of Christ’s life. DailyMail presents 7 convincing proofs that Jesus was a real person.

Written evidence

The first reason we should believe in the existence of the historical Jesus is that there are written records of his life. Many of the accounts were written by non-Christian authors, which makes their written accounts even more powerful, researchers say.

Perhaps the best example of this is the Roman historian Tacitus, who despised Christians. In a section of the Annals that describes the fire of Rome in 64 AD, Tacitus describes how Emperor Nero tried to shift the blame to the early Christians.

“Nero framed the guilty and punished in the most unusual ways those who were hated for their shameful deeds, whom the crowd called ‘Christians. The founder of this movement, Christ, was executed under Tiberius by the procurator Pontius Pilate,” the Roman historian wrote.

Graffiti by Alexamen

Surprisingly, one of the best authentic proofs of Jesus’ existence is a rough and rather offensive ancient graffiti, researchers say.

Known as the Graffito of Alexamen, it is a drawing scratched on the wall of a room near the Palatine Hill in Rome sometime between the first and third centuries AD. The drawing is known to depict a man worshipping a man with a donkey’s head hanging on a cross, with a message that translates as follows: “Alexamen worships God.”

“The earliest evidence we have in the archaeological record of Christians is that someone was mocking Jesus being crucified,” said Dr. Jonathan Reed, a leading expert on early Christian archaeology at the University of La Verne.

The crucified heel

While there is much evidence that the crucifixion did occur, some critics argue that Jesus would have likely been thrown into a mass grave for criminals rather than allowed a separate burial.

However, in 1986, a construction crew accidentally found several tombs in North Jerusalem. One skeletal remains chest was labeled with the name Yochanan and contained the bones of a man who appeared to have been crucified, researchers say.

Among the bones was a heel with a nail still in it. Not only does this further confirm the accuracy of the description of Jesus’ nailing to the cross, but it also shows that families could receive the remains of crucified criminals.

Although it is not direct evidence of Jesus’ life, the discovery confirmed the Gospel writer’s account of his death, scholars say.

The Shroud of Turin

According to experts, the most famous of all the objects associated with Jesus is the Shroud of Turin. This is a piece of cloth with a human print, which many believe is the cloth in which Jesus was wrapped after his crucifixion.

Church of the Apostles

In 2017, archaeologists conducting excavations in the area of El Araja (Israel) made an amazing discovery. On the banks of the Jordan River, they found the remains of a Byzantine basilica. The researchers believe that this may be the site of Bethsaida, the village where the apostles Peter, Andrew, and Philip lived.

“There are no other churches in the vicinity mentioned by Byzantine visitors to the Holy Land, and there is no reason to doubt that this is the Church of the Apostles,” Professor Stephen Notley told the Society for Biblical Archaeology after further investigations in 2021.

The inscription “Jesus is God”

An 1800-year-old mosaic containing the first written statement about Jesus as God was found under the floor of an Israeli prison. The mosaic decorated the world’s first prayer hall in 230 AD and contains the ancient Greek phrase: “God-loving Akeptus offered the table to God Jesus Christ as a memorial.”

Carlos Campo, director general of the Museum of the Bible, which put the mosaic on display, called it “the greatest discovery since the Dead Sea Scrolls.”

Jacob’s ossuary

Another proof of Jesus’ life was the “Osuarium of Jacob,” a box of bones with an inscription on it: “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus.” However, there is a lot of controversy surrounding this artifact.

If scientists prove that the Jacob’s ossuary is genuine, it will indeed be impressive proof that Jesus was a real figure, researchers say.