Salam Sojourn
Wa salaam Ali,
The "Gospel of Barnabas" you're referring to is a late 16th century forgery.
The Gospel of Barnabas was accepted as a Canonical Gospel in the Churches of Alexandria till 325 A.D.
Iranaeus (130-200) wrote in support of pure monotheism. He had quoted extensively from the Gospel of Barnabas in support of his views. How can he quote a gospel which did not exist at his time? Ahmed Thomson, a convert to Islam from Christianity, wrote a book "Jesus, Prophet of Islam" with Muhammad Ata Ur-Rahim, which tells us about Iranaeus' references to the gospel of Barnabas.
http://www.answering-christianity.co...s_survived.htm
I don't know of any historian who seriously proposes Jesus of Nazareth did not exist. There are *authors* who claim this, but they are not historical scholars. I'd say its pretty much a consensus that Christ lived and that he was crucified.
First, I'll just clear it up that Muslims believe that Jesus existed and that he was a prophet of God. But there are scholars of history who think that Jesus did not exist. I'm telling you that to show that opinions of historians regarding Jesus' crucifixion vary from Jesus being crucified to Jesus not even existing so there is no point of crucifixion. Here are a few of them
Constantin-François Volney
Charles François Dupuis
George Albert Wells
Since the opinion vary so much, why should we believe some historians if they say that Jesus was crucified. History is not a definite science and has question marks. Furthermore, Quran explains why many historians think that Jesus was crucified.
004.157 وَقَوْلِهِمْ إِنَّا قَتَلْنَا الْمَسِيحَ عِيسَى ابْنَ مَرْيَمَ رَسُولَ اللَّهِ وَمَا قَتَلُوهُ وَمَا صَلَبُوهُ وَلَكِنْ شُبِّهَ لَهُمْ وَإِنَّ الَّذِينَ اخْتَلَفُوا فِيهِ لَفِي شَكٍّ مِنْهُ مَا لَهُمْ بِهِ مِنْ عِلْمٍ إِلا اتِّبَاعَ الظَّنِّ وَمَا قَتَلُوهُ يَقِينًا
004.157 That they said (in boast), "We killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah";- but they killed him not, nor crucified him,
but so it was made to appear to them, and those who differ therein are full of doubts, with no (certain) knowledge, but only conjecture to follow, for of a surety they killed him not:-
Al-Qur'an, 004.157 (An-Nisa [Women])
Text Copied from DivineIslam's Qur'an Viewer software v2.910
Peace