John the Baptist is the son of Zachariah, a priest of the Temple, according the Gospels, and of Elizabeth, a kinswoman of Mary, the mother of Jesus.

John had begun his public ministry In the region of the lower Jordan Valley by proclaiming a baptism of repentance in preparation for the messiah.

Throngs come to John the Baptist for the ritual purification ceremonies he conducts, among them his cousin Jesus the Nazarene, whom John (according to the Gospels of Luke and Mark) recognizes as the Messiah.

At the moment of Jesus’ baptism (according to all four Gospels) a divine voice is heard assuring him of his unique relationship with God.

According to the Gospel of Luke, written near the end of the century, the public life of Jesus begins in twenty-nine, the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius.

Jesus reportedly proclaims himself the messenger of God spoken of by the prophet Isaiah who would reach out by word and deed to the poor, the outcast, and the suffering.

Jesus sees himself as empowered and commissioned to announce the coming of the Kingdom of God foretold by the prophets.

As God's messenger, Jesus calls into the service of the kingdom those willing to leave home, family, and livelihood and devote themselves to calling people to prepare for the new age that is to be established on Earth.

The only sources for the life of Jesus are the Gospels, written decades after the time Jesus was supposed to have flourished.

The Galilee region was presumably the home of Jesus during at least thirty years of his life.

The first three Gospels of the New Testament are mainly an account of Jesus' public ministry in this province, particularly in the towns of Nazareth and Capernaum.

Galilee is also cited as the place where Jesus cured a blind man.

According to the Gospel narratives, Jesus gathers around him a group of male disciples (referred to in the Gospels as the apostles or the Twelve).

Among those mentioned most frequently include four Galilean fishermen: the brothers James and John, the sons of Zebedee—called Boanerges, or Sons of Thunder, by Jesus, in apparent acknowledgment of their intense loyalty and aggressive zeal—and the brothers Andrew and Peter.

Jesus (or the early church) gives Peter, originally named Simon son of Jonah, the Aramaic name "Cephas" ("rock," translated into Greek as Peter.

Peter is attracted by Jesus’ interpretation of Jewish law and his alleged miracles, especially his healing of the sick and his exorcisms of demons from the possessed.

Jesus claims (according to Luke) that he performs these feats by divine power ("by the finger of God") and that these examples of God's triumph over the powers of evil are signs that his reign is already breaking into the present.

At one of Jesus most famous miracles (described in the Gospel of John), attended by the disciple Philip, he fed five thousand people from only a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish.

Jesus promises (according to Luke) the availability to the "poor"—those who know and acknowledge their need—of a share in God's kingdom, and that those who pride themselves in their possessions and attainments will be punished on the Day of Judgment. (Philip, according to the Gospel of John, brought another disciple, Nathanael, to Jesus and acted as an intermediary for Gentiles wishing to meet Jesus.)