CHRIST’S LAST MIRACLE
C DeSalvo
The Shroud of Turin’s first recognized public display occurred at a country church in Lirey, France in 1353.
A Modern Photograph of the Shroud of Turin
Courtesy of Holy Face Association - www.holyface.com
The
Shroud is an old linen cloth nearly four feet wide and 14 feet long. On it are two full-size negative images
(light and dark are reversed as are left and right) of the full front and back
of a totally nude man, plus human blood, lymph and other bodily secretions. The depicted male is 30
to 45 years of age, nearly six feet tall, about 170 pounds in weight, with
beard, mustache and shoulder-length hair.
The two images have their heads near the center of the
Shroud’s length and their feet at opposite ends of the linen. The
placement of the images is consistent with a burial where the dead body was
placed on its back upon half the length of the Shroud, with the feet at one end
of the linen, and the head near the middle of it. The other half of the Shroud apparently was pulled over the head
and draped over the whole front of the body until the other end of the cloth
covered the toes.
The
strange designs that appear on both sides of the body image are burns to the
folded cloth that happened when a church, where the Shroud was stored, caught
fire.
Many
believe the linen cloth truly wrapped the crucified body of Jesus. Others claim that the Shroud is a fake, made
by one or more artisans in the 14th century.
John Walsh wrote: “The Shroud of Turin is either the most awesome and
instructive relic of Christ in existence ... or it is one of the most
ingenious, unbelievably clever products of the human mind and hand on
record. It is one or the other; there
is not middle ground.”
Is the
Shroud truly the burial cloth of Jesus?
Is it a fantastic, genuine witness to the greatest event in
history? Is it the last miracle of
Christ, left to us as preserved evidence that the Resurrection truly happened?
IMAGES
How the
images were formed is unknown. They are
not composed of any paints, particles or foreign materials, but consist of tiny
pixel-like spots of scorched carbohydrates on the tiniest fibrils of the
surface fibers of the linen. This
suggests that each “pixel” was individually created by modifications to the
fibrils.
There is no evidence of paint materials that soaked into any fiber of
the linen. There is no
directionality to the images as would exist because of brush strokes for a
painting.
As part
of Jesus’ Resurrection, perhaps Jesus’ body rapidly disintegrated into
fundamental particles. This could have
released billions of miniscule “sparks” of heat which scorched tiny burns only
on the surfaces of the outer fibrils of the linen Shroud, thereby creating the
front and back images of the naked, dead body.
The
Shroud images reveal the crucified man had a cap of thorns that covered the
whole head, not a wreath or circlet crown of thorns as is often depicted in
paintings and statues. The blood marks
were created by real blood. If the
Shroud covered a body, it must have been removed within one to three days
because there is no sign of body decomposition.
EVIDENCE
No
object in history has been subjected to a more thorough scientific examination
than the Shroud. The analyses of the
Shroud in 1969 to 1973 and 1978 to 1981 produced an enormous amount of data
that was collected by using the most modern scientific instruments and methods
available. The wounds, blood flows, clots and stains of the images are
surprisingly realistic. The images show
the man’s wrists and both feet with wounds that suggest piercing by large
nails. He suffered a severe beating,
consistent with the use of Roman whips with metal or bone ends. There is evidence that he carried a heavy
burden on his shoulders, and that he repeatedly fell and scraped his knees.
Also,
the Shroud images show many thorn punctures in the head, and a gaping wound to
the right side, that blood and secretions indicate was made after death. Scientists who examined the Shroud also
learned that it contains three-dimensional information (i.e. images of bones
and teeth within the body are sometimes observable), and the process that
formed the images acted uniformly through space over the whole body, front and
back, and did not depend on cloth contact with the body.
The
linen itself is woven by hand as a 3-to-1 reversing twill, herringbone pattern
with a Z twist. This is consistent with
fine linens made in Jesus’ time.
Also, paintings from the early centuries after Jesus’
death have several characteristics that suggest their artists were influenced
by the Shroud. These include hands
without thumbs (retracted into the palms), a long nose, and unique blood marks
on the forehead.
The
primary evidence that favors fakery is carbon-14 dating that was done in 1988
on linen samples cut from the edge of the Shroud. Those tests indicated the Shroud was created in 1325 AD, plus or
minus 65 years (i.e. 1260 - 1390 AD).
That range closely brackets the 1353 date when the Shroud first appeared. As far as the Shroud’s detractors were
concerned that settled the matter, the Shroud was a proven fraud – contrary
evidence be damned!
But the issue is not that simple. Carbon-14 dating is a delicate
procedure. It’s well known that tiny
amounts of impurities, within or attached to the sample being tested, can
greatly influence the results. In the
Shroud’s case, the samples taken for testing came from the worst possible
location, a corner of the Shroud where hundreds if not thousands of people could
have touched the Shroud to display it at religious services. Also, there
is evidence that the carbon-14 dating samples contained younger patches that
were invisibly rewoven into the Shroud to replace pieces cut from the Shroud
for gifts.
SUDARIUM
The Shroud is not the only relic claimed to have
covered the crucified Jesus. Another
smaller cloth, known as the Sudarium, also exists. The Gospel of John, Chapter 20, verses 6-7, reports the first
sighting of these cloths after the Resurrection: “Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb; he
saw the linen cloths lying, and the napkin, which had been on his head, not
lying with the linen cloths but rolled up in a place by itself.”
Unlike the Shroud, the Sudarium’s history is well documented. It was carefully maintained from the time of
the Crucifixion to the present. It
apparently is the cloth that was folded and wrapped across Jesus’ face while
his body hung on the cross and was around Jesus’ head while the body lay for a
time at the foot of the cross. Using a
cloth to cover the face and preserve the blood of a person who died a horrible
death is consistent with reported Jewish customs of the time. The Sudarium contains blood and body fluid
stains plus evidence of hands that held the cloth to Jesus’ face. There are no images on the Sudarium.
Comparisons of the Sudarium and Shroud provide the
following conclusions:
1. The
nose length is the same on both cloths.
2. The
Sudarium shows blood flows from the head-wounds and fluid stains from the nose
and mouth that precisely match the head and facial images and blood on the
Shroud. Both Sudarium and Shroud
covered the same head and face.
3.
Although the history of the Sudarium is more complete than that of the Shroud,
their histories are consistent.
Pollen was found on the Sudarium from plants and trees
typical of Oviedo and Toledo in Spain, Northern Africa and Jerusalem. Pollen found on the Shroud indicates it was
in Palestine, Turkey and central Europe.
Therefore, after Jesus’ death, the Sudarium was never at the same places
as the Shroud. Traces of what are
likely myrrh and aloe also have been found on the Sudarium.
But non-believers continue to claim that the Shroud is
a fake created by an ancient painter or artisan from the hinterlands of
France. If that is true, then how is it
that no one from the 20th and 21st centuries has been able to duplicate the
forgery? So far that challenge has not
been answered. Non-believers tend to
ignore the Shroud and Sudarium, and try to move the debate about God to other
arguments less devastating to their beliefs.
FAKING
THE SHROUD
How
might a 14th century artisan have designed and created a fake Shroud? First, this lucky, wealthy, secretive,
super-genius would have had to acquire or make a fourteen-by-four-foot linen
cloth woven in an ancient style. This
genius would realize that the cloth had to be exposed to Palestinian and
European air to acquire the appropriate pollens on it so that future scientists
would be fooled into thinking it was authentic.
He would
have had to determine how various blood flows occurred on a man beaten,
crucified and stabbed consistent with the Gospel descriptions. He then had to use real human blood to make
realistic stains on the fake linen.
Then he would have had to “paint” an image that fit perfectly with the
blood patterns (there are no images under the blood) using a fantastic
“painting” method that would alter slightly only the uppermost, tiniest fibrils
of the linen fibers and would leave no brush marks. This “painting” method would then never be used again. He had to use this method to “paint” two
full-size, frontal and dorsal images of the crucified man on the fake Shroud
including a frontal image that included wrist-exit wounds that no contemporaries
appreciated, three-dimensional teeth and bone images that couldn’t be
discovered until the 20th century, and no thumbs on the image.
The faker would, for unknown reasons, choose to create the blood flows and the images as negatives -- a decision that enormously complicated his task. And why should anyone have attempted such a complicated deception? -- To trick believers into paying to see a relic of Jesus? But why did he create such an enormously complex, false relic? In the 14th century gullible believers were easily tricked into paying for white feathers claimed to have come from the angel Gabriel’s wings.
Not even 21st century scientists know how the Shroud images were made because it wasn’t made by humans or by natural processes. If anyone doubts that, let him show how a 14th century artisan did it. The cost of such an effort should be minimal -- only simple tools, devices and technology existed in the 14th century. But no one can make a replica of the Shroud. Doesn’t that tell us something? Isn’t the definition of a miracle: An event not possible by any known natural or human means?
The existence of a miraculous Shroud proves the Resurrection occurred, and that in turn proves atheism is false.