Biographies of Christ

Jesus Christ.
Much has been said and done in the name of Christ, and better scholars than I have written countless works about him, but who was he? Depending on who you ask you will receive a different answer, to some he was a great teacher of moral platitudes; while to others he was merely radical Jewish zealot who inspired many followers to rise up against the existing religious systems of his day. To our Muslim brothers and sisters he was a prophet of Allah, or to other he was not one man at all but a conglomeration of several stories that needs an anthropomorphic repository in order for a religious institution to gain power. Again I would say that there has been a lot written about any of theses views and many other, but they are all missing something.
The argumentation of who Christ is may seem like a modern debate, however, I would remind the reader that this same debate is recorded in the New Testament itself. Christ asked his disciples, after their first mission to area surrounding Jerusalem who the public thought he was, some thought of him as Elijah, and others as John the Baptist returned from the grave, but it was Peter's testimony that I would like to focus on here. He states in very simple language, because he is a simple man, but by no means unintelligent, the the truth that he has felt in his heart for a long while before this interrogatory with Jesus: "Thou art the Christ."
This written account of Peter's testimony is the crux of my post today. The New Testament was written based on the eye witness accounts of those who saw and experienced first hand the miracles, teachings and power of Christ. The Gospels really are the records of eye witness accounts of the Savior.
There are a scholarly reasons for this assumption and I will list a few that I have picked up in my New Testament class. Since we are currently reading the Gospel of Mark I will list some of the facts in relation to that book, but keeping the idea in mind that the points made can be applied across the synoptic Gospels.
First, the Gospel of Mark is probably more accurately described as Peter memoirs, Mark would have been in Rome at or just after the execution of Paul and would definitely have been there at Peter's execution, thus he would have had access to Peter, and would have been writing for the branches of the early Church in Rome.
Second, Mark includes names of seemingly insignificant people, it is a point easily argued that this is because these are the eye witness from whom he got the story. The reason one would mention the name is that it would ensure that truthfulness of the story could be verified, these were people that were still alive, and could be asked to retell it.
Third, while the style is different then modern day biographies, Mark wrote in the style of ancient biographical texts, so he was creating a biography of Christ, not just merely spinning tales about a non existent person.
Fourth, the gospel includes elements that scholars would call "embarrassment factors", now what is meant here is that these are elements that would at first glance seem to be contradictions, to later elements of the text. It help in proving validity, for if the story was fictionalized why would one include it in the text in the first place. One of these factors is Christ' baptism by John. John baptized for the remission of sins, it is later stated in the text that Christ was always without sin. So why include that in a fictional account if one it trying to make a story up?
The simple truth of it is the Gospels are telling about real events that happened to real people in the life of Jesus Christ. That is all I will go for now, it may not be earth shattering proof to the unbeliever, but in my opinion that hard tangible proof that those individual seek after will not be had until the day when every knee will bow and all tongues confess that Jesus is the Christ. Until then we may now as Peter knew, as the Holy Ghost speaks to our hearts that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.