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42 Sorry, but the idea that Jewish burials mirrored Egyptian burials is completely false. Jews had no interest in preserving their bodies for posterity. ...

McDowell never made any statements about Jewish burial rituals involving organ removal or embalming to preserve the corpse a la the Egyptian ritual.

Everything was targeted toward gathering deceased's bones unto the bones of his ancestors. ...

I was aware of the practice of them using ossuaries to store the bones after decomposition. What did they do with the ossuaries full of bones? Also, was there a socio-economic class distinction with the 1st century A.D. Jews who practiced this?

... The 1st Century practices are that a body is bound with strips of cloth at the wrists, ankles, and around (about) the face to keep the body from flopping and the jaws closed. Potsherds or coins are placed on the eyes (the coins possibly were borrowed from Greek tradition) to keep them closed. The face cloth was rolled into a kerchief and used as a binding for the jaw, passed under the chin, behind the ears, and tied over the crown of the head. ...

I had read of this also.

...The shroud is described as a sindon, a large, fine linen cloth, bought by Joseph of Arimethea ...

How was the shroud intended to be used during burial?

Your previous commentary about the hypothesized effects of bacteria contamination affecting the C14 tests was greatly appreciated.

Some of the Sanhedrin would have their bones kept separate, individual ossuaries for themselves and eventually their immediate families. And some were so full of themselves they want their bones to be separated from everyone and kept in the tomb by themselves in their own ossuary. These are found today. . . and one was found about 15 years ago that was claimed to have once contained the bones of James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus. . . except the last had been scratched in, not carved.

The Ossuary of James, purported to be the brother of Jesus

The limestone box was later tracked backwards to an antiquities dealer who was known to alter antiquities to "enhance" their value. . . and sell other fakes. He was arrested and convicted of fraud.

Most of the ossuaries are from 2nd to 3rd century.

How was the shroud intended to be used during burial?

There were two possibilities. One was for a smaller sindon. . . much shorter than the one used for the Turin. It would just be laid over the body. The longer Shroud would be laid down, the body laid on it, the herbs and aromatic botanicals packed around it, and the balance of the cloth drawn over the head toward the feet in a reverse sheet arrangement. Occasionally, they might bind it with some bands, time permitting. The idea is to keep the body and packing together.

Think of Lazarus being able to walk out of his tomb still covered in his grave clothes. He could not have done such a thing were he swaddled in bandages or tied tightly.

Poor families could get by with just a face cloth covering and a modesty cloth on the groin area. . . but it was frowned on.

The word Sindon originally meant SAIL. . . to give you an idea of the size of cloth it could be and sometimes a used sail was used. Rich people used purpose bought cloths for grave clothes.

McDowell never made any statements about Jewish burial rituals involving organ removal or embalming to preserve the corpse a la the Egyptian ritual.

Nor did I say anything about the whole nine-yard rituals of Egyptian mummification, but the tight bindings that wrapping in strips that were conflated by the people of the 1700s to the Jewish burial customs would have taken far too long to be able to get a body into any tomb by sundown as well as doing the ritual washing, anointing, getting the herbs, oils, cloths, and make the deadline. The family attempting to do this are literally working with a dead weight. Then, when they return a year later, they would have to extract the bones from a mess of tangled cloth. Not practical at all.

A sindon represented about six weeks of someone's work. It was a very expensive product. Any cloth was expensive in that period. In fact, up until the invention of the powered loom, cloth was one of the most valuable things in an estate. In Dicken's "A Christmas Carol", the thieves were stealing the LINENS. . . over anything else in Scrooge's house when the Ghost of Christmas Future showed him the shadows of things to come. . . because at that time, they had more value than almost anything else.