> Do we have a record apart from the Bible (and other obviously religious works such as non-canonical Gospels) that back up the facts of Jesus' life as written in the Gospels?

First, I think it's a mistake, although I certainly understand your reasoning, to discount the biblical record. If one can argue for the *historical* reliability of the New Testament (one need not establish its divine inspiration for this purpose) or even one or more of its authors, you've pretty much established some rational evidence for the historical existence of Jesus right there.

However, yeah, there are non-biblical historical references to Jesus. I'm not immediately sure if any eyewitness accounts to Christ exist apart from the books of the New Testament, but writings of historians sometimes just one degree of separation from Christ survive.

- Cornelius Tacitus, born A.D. 52-54, was a Roman historian, Governor of Asia. On the reign of Nero, Tacitus alludes to the death of Christ and the existence of Christians in Rome: "But not all the relief that could come from man, not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the gods, availed to relieve Nero from the infamy of being believed to have ordered the conflagration, the fire of Rome. Hence to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the guilt, and punished with the most exquisite tortures, the persons commonly called Christians, who were hated for their enormities. Christus, the founder of the name, was put to death by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius: but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time broke out again...[etc]." (Annals XV)

- Lucian of Samosata was a satirist who lived during the second century. He spoke scornfully of Christ and Christians, but he acknowledged his existence. In "The Passing Peregrinus," he writes: "...the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced this new cult into the world... Furthermore, their first lawgiver persuaded them that they were all brothers one of another after they have transgressed once for all by denying the Greek gods and by worshipping that crucified sophist himself and living under his laws."

- Suetonius, born A.D. 120, a Roman historian, writes: "As the Jews were making constant disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he expelled them from Rome."

- Josephus, again, born A.D. 37: "At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. And his conduct was good, and was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned Him to be crucified and to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that He had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that He was alive; accordingly, He was perhaps the Messiah concerning whom the prophets have recounted wonders."

- There are more: the writings of Plinius Secondus, Tertullian, Thallus (whose writings are lost but pieces survive as quoted material in other sources), Phlegon, and Justin Martyr, all of the first and second centuries A.D., also have writings that make reference to Christ.

- The Encyclopaedia Britannica has (or had; I don't know what the latest edition is, but the latest edition as of the early 1990s, anyway) an entry on Jesus lasting approximately 20,000 words. Included is a surveying of indepedent secular accounts of Jesus and says, "These independent accounts prove that in ancient times even the opponents of Christianity never doubted the historicity of Jesus, which was disputed for the first time and on inadequate grounds by several authors at the end of the 18th, during the 19th, and at the beginning of the 20th centuries."

Even without the historical corroboration, I can't conceive that Jesus never would have existed. There were over 500 eyewitnesses just to Christ's resurrection and thousands more to other things he did. Time and again, Christians were tortured to death rather than say that Christ was a sham. (The Emperor Nero burned Christians at garden parties. Pliny, governor of Bithynia in Asia Minor, wound up killing so many Christians that he wrote the emperor Trajan to ask him for advice on whether he should continue to kill them all or just some -- and said that he tried to make them curse Christ "which a genuine Christian cannot be induced to do." [from Epistles X]) It doesn't make sense that there would be so many eyewitnesses to Christ willing to be tortured and killed if this was so many people just got together and made up.