I mean, I just assume he was a grifter whose disciples kept on grifting after he died. It should be noted that the earliest anything was written about him specifically was about fifty years after he supposedly died. Which is why there’s a lot of retconning going on between the various accounts.

Either way, we know there were a lot of mystics in the area and time in question, and leading up to that, it was the jewish leadership’s MO to just knife them and leave their bodies in a ditch somewhere. Which. Romans kinda took issue to that. They don’t like incidental and unofficial killings. (and the leaving the bodies in the ditch… untidy!)

So, the jewish leadership had to get “creative” and convince the roman goverment he was a really bad dude. Which. He then started on about being “king of the jews” and that… well… Rome takes issue with rebellion. Totally reasonable to imagine that all happened. What happened next… not so much. but then, he was a grifter and his disciples learned the grift,