Sorry, but your ignorance is showing. The scammers of the period WERE in the business of scamming ignorant peasants... and ignorant priests. The pilgrims who made donations were ignorant peasants. The priests were not much more educated beyond studying Latin and the Bible. Relics brought in donations to perpetually needy churches and chapels. That was NOT the case where the Shroud was involved. The Shroud was in the possession of Geoffrey De Charney, he was not a crook, in fact, he was the author of the French Code of Chivalry, and the Standard Bearer for the King of France, who in battle was the knight chosen to fight at the King's side! HE paid for the building of a Chapel in Lirey to house the Shroud and fully funded it, and accepted no donations! In fact, he nearly bankrupted his family doing so. It was this bankruptcy that resulted in the Shroud being finally sold after Geoffrey's death to the House of Savoy, the Royal Family of Italy... where it also was not used to gather donations.
The Shroud of Turin is the single most studied object in history. And it is not studied today by psuedoscientists but rather by people who are top experts in their fields of study who publish their findings in scientific journals. I am quoting from those peer-reviewed scientific journals that have stood up to criticism by others in the same areas of expertise. It is the SKEPTICS who refuse to publish their works for criticism.
And you are wrong... the specific type of Travertine Aragonite type that was found on the Shroud IS unique to a twenty mile radius around Jerusalem and it is NOT from Aragon Spain... The Catholic Church WAS indeed taken in by many "cheap fakes" at the time. It was unnecessary because SCIENCE was non-existent. There IS NO EVIDENCE of your claim... none what so ever. To date, only one other shroud has been found in a Jerusalem tomb... because Jewish burial practices cause a shroud to decompose with the body... and a year after burial, the family returns to collect the bones and toss them into a central ossuary with the rest of the ancestral bones. The cloth would not survive.
Your argument that using an old shroud would account for the hemoglobin is absurd as well... it would require finding a shroud that covered a body that spilled its blood, further limiting the pool of available shrouds. In addition, since that hemoglobin is found ONLY in the blood stains matching the blood stains of a crucified man, are you claiming the found shroud MATCHED that too? More absurdity on absurdity. The blood stains on the shroud have been identified by world renowned scientists whose specialty IS in blood and its derivatives to be human blood, with all of its proper and expected components... and to have come from a body that was in extreme trauma. The high bilirubin content, created by that trauma, explains why it has remained reddish, when most ancient blood becomes black with age. Again, Stormer, this has been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals, subjected to retest, and confirmed. The ONLY scientist who found other wise was Walter C. McCrone, a microscopist who claimed he saw Iron Oxide and Vermillion paint in his optical microscope, something that not one of the hundreds of other scientists who HAVE looked have been able to find, and declared the Shroud image a painting.
Through science we now KNOW what the shroud image is composed of, and it is NOT paint. It is not something that could have been applied by any technology of the 12-14 century... or even of the 21st Century... although it could have come about by natural means. The image is a subtle chemical alteration of the soap-bubble thin coating of the fibers of the flax of the linen that was applied before the cloth was woven in the retting process when it was washed with Soapwort. Somehow, only in the area of the image, the coating has turned to a caramel-like substance, 180-600 nanometers thick, and is thinner than most bacteria. It is essentially a similar substance that gives beer and toast its color and can be created by heat, or chemically. This change in the coating does not exist inside the threads or under the blood stains... indicating the blood stains were made before the image was.
No, you are the one using pseudoscience and psuedoscholarship to push YOUR agenda. I actually do follow the peer-reviewed science.
Ouch, that’s gonna leave a mark.
It takes an inordinate amount of suspension of disbelief to conclude, despite all evidence to the contrary, that the Shroud was a Middle Ages hoax.
If pollen and fabric technology were the only factors, yes, it is possible that the hoaxer found a well-preserved shroud from a grave in the Holy Land. Given that no one at the time had the instrumentarium to tell the difference, and the fact that e-Bay was not invented yet, that is an unlikely effort on the hoaxer’s part, but it is possible.
If you take into account the unknown imaging technology of the Shroud, the tale of a hoaxer producing a fake, even from historically accurate material, crumbles.
Happily awaiting links to the peer-reviewed journals you cite. Specifically those discussing your claim that the shroud is “the single most studied object in history”, your claimed geochemical evidence, and the bilirubin content.
Thanks so much for your logical and insightful comments to demonstrate the Shroud is truly a miracle of Christ’s Resurrection!
The non-believers simply cannot provide a 21st century answer to explain the shroud - that in itself should be enough to convince the doubters.
But like socialists, they are unwilling or unable to intellectually grasp the factual reality.
As an aside, I visited the Turin/Milan area a few years ago on business. My guests took me to dinner in a restaurant located in a narrow alley in downtown Turin - the downtown being MUCH larger than I imagined.
After dinner, we walked the area including passing the Church that holds the Shroud. Although it was night, it was lit quite brightly and the feeling as I walked by was unbelievable!
Thank you for the ping...and for your excellent post #13! Really appreciate all that you do.
Excellent post. I have only half- heartedly followed the evidence on the Shroud. Your post has given me the incentive to research further. Thanks.