Jewish believer in the Shroud

Science photographer Barrie Schwortz considers it ironic that he, an Orthodox Jew, is spending much of his time trying to convince Christians that the Turin Shroud may well be an artifact of Jesus. As Christendom is entering the holiest season in the church year, Schwortz joined a group of international scholars Friday appealing to Cardinal Severino Poletto, archbishop of Turin, to permit a new carbon dating of the 14-foot cloth bearing the features of a crucified man.

At the last test of this kind in 1988, a majority of scientists concluded that the Shroud was woven between 1260 and 1390 A.D.-- and that the images on it were the work of a medieval artist.

But earlier this year chemist Raymond N.Rogers, a retired fellow of Los Alamos National Laboratory, stated in a scientific paper that the 1988 test was "not valid for determining the age of the Shroud."

Rogers who died of cancer March 9 at the age of 80 was a close friend of Schwortz who runs an elaborate Web site called shroud.com.In a scholarly article in the journal Thermochimica Acta, Rogers explained that in 1988 only a sample the size of a postage stamp was tested.

This sample, he added, turned out to have been taken from a medieval patch that had "completely different chemical properties than the main part of the Shroud relic."

The patch contained cotton and had been dyed to match the rest of the Shroud whose threads were pure linen spun from flax.Rogers, a Protestant who had been involved with the Shroud project for decades, suggested that this cloth is between 1,300 and 3,000 years old.

Rogers was the leader of the chemistry group for the Shroud of Turin Research Project, a team of scientists who performed the first in-depth examination of the cloth in 1978.

Schwortz was STURP's "documenting photographer" then."I am still Jewish," he said, "yet I believe the Shroud of Turin is the cloth the man Jesus was wrapped in after he was crucified."

"That is not meant as a religious statement," Schwortz cautioned, "but one based on my privileged position of direct involvement with many of the serious Shroud researchers in the world, and a thorough knowledge of the scientific data, unclouded by media exaggeration and hype."

In an interview with United Press International, Schwortz quipped it was "proof of God's sense of humor" that he as a Jew should have been given this task."But I have no underlying bias.I am simply obligated to the truth."

But then, Schwortz went on, "God always chooses a Jew to be a messenger."

There was no word from Cardinal Poletto's office Friday about the scholars' request to reconsider proposal submitted by Rogers and William Meacham, a Hong Kong-based archaeologist for a new carbon dating of the Shroud.

"After the publication of Rogers' article this year, there has been a great renewal of interest in the Shroud, especially the possibility that it is older than the carbon dating indicates," the scientists' appeal states.

"All the world now wants to know whether the 1988 carbon dating result is in fact erroneous.We urge you, therefore, to grant the very small (amount) of material requested in the Rogers-Meacham proposal, consisting of 60 milligrams (about a spoonful) of carbon dust and fiber bits already removed from the Shroud."

In separate interviews with UPI, both Schwortz and Meacham complained about what Schwortz termed as "Italian stonewalling" of all outside attempts to reopen the case.

"Is it Italian pride?" Schwortz wondered, adding that there has been considerable resentment about the American involvement since 1978. "Americans dominated Shroud science," he said.

Cardinal Poletto could not be reached for comment Friday.

But Rogers and his colleagues were not spared the wrath of fellow Americans.Earlier this week, scientific consultant Steven D.Shafersman accused STRP of "shoddy science."

In a paper issued on The Skeptic World Site, a largely atheist Web publication, Shafersman blasts STURP for its "hopelessly incompetent and unscientific" analyses.

In the meantime though, other astonishing news is coming in about the Shroud.University of Padua researchers have detected a second facial image, though faint, on the back of the cloth.

According to researcher Daniel Porter, the nature of this second face is such that it virtually eliminates artistic methods, while giving credence to the hypothesis that a natural amino/carbonyl chemical reaction formed the Shroud's images.

Italian police experts have, meanwhile, used a computer to create a phantom picture of the young Jesus based on the facial images found on the Shroud.The result was the face of a 12-year-old boy exuding serene cheerfulness.

The face looked much like the portrayal of the young Jesus by the German Renaissance painter Albrecht Duerer (1471-1528), observed the Milan newspaper, Corriere della Sera.On the other hand, the paper mused, "it would probably also have pleased Tizian (Titian)."

My hypothesis (not "theory") is that Wilson's idea is partially correct--only, it was not the cloth that was placed above the gates, but a piece of statuary. When it came time to cover up the image (for whatever reason) a cloth was hung in front of it, and over a period of several hundred years the three-dimensional image from the "hard" prototype became transferred to the cloth through the agency of ionizing radiation originating from radioactive elements that are present to varying degrees in all sedimentary rocks ... the extent to which such ionizing radiation would affect the cloth being a function of its distance from the prototype.

Quite frankly, Mr. Ramsbotham, I can see why Barrie dismissed your hypothesis.

Nothing in the science or historical scholarship suggests such a scenario. First of all, the Mandylion is only a facial image, according to history and art. While it may have been the folded in four double layer (tetradiplong) Shroud encased in a frame, it certainly was not a 14 foot by 3.5 foot "tile" or "carving". The legends surrounding the Image of Edessa ALL refer to a cloth that Jesus pressed to his face and sent to King Akbar. Later rulers of Edessa paraded the image around the city on a regular basis... something that could not have been done with a 14 foot carved or cast stone.

Your hypothesis does not explain how the blood stains got on the Shroud... nor the fact that said blood stains pre-exist the image. They could not have been placed after the fact of the image formation because there is no image underneath any of the blood stains.

Your hypothetical "tile" or "statuary", if it is the prototype for the shroud image, flies in the face of all Eastern artistic tradition and style. Nothing has been found even slightly similar. You must postulate a sculptor with the skill of Michaelangelo, with the encyclopedic knowledge of Jewish customs, crucifixion techniques, and the intent to make a statue that would be offensive to the people it was intended to be seen by, to even start this concatation of improbable events to result in a mysterious cloth that befuddles science in the 21st Century.

Your hypothesis just doesn't meet the tests to even be considered seriously.

You cite Ray Rogers interest in ionizing radiation. Barrie will be publishing Ray's last paper sometime in the next month or two that addresses this very issue. It seems that Rogers was able to obtain some radioactive materials to test its effect on Linen and has prepared a paper that shows that the image was NOT formed by any form of ionizing radiation. Such radiation causes noticeable microscopic damage to linen fibers and such damage is NOT present on the Shroud. Ionizing radiation also penetrates into the objects it hits... and the image is purely a surface phenomenon... no penetration. The other problem is that radiation from such sources as native rock, as you postulate was the source, emits in a purely random direction. The image on the Shroud is collimated... whatever formed the image made its effect only up and down and not sideways at all.

The other fact is that we now know pretty much WHAT the image is composed of, if not HOW it was formed. The image is a amino/carbonyl chemical change in the starch fractions left on the surface of the fibers from the retting process. It, according to Rogers (in peer reviewed work) is most likely formed by a Maillard Reaction of these starch fractions acting with Putrecine and Cadaverine, gasses that exude from dead bodies starting shortly after death. This reaction takes place in a very thin coating (160 - 400 nanometers) 1/100 the thickness of a human hair, on the fibres of the linen. It is very brittle and can be removed chemically and also by merely scraping. It is not suggestive at all of any modality requiring radiation for creation.

It's interesting, too, to note that these shroud "researchers," are willing to embrace any theory, no matter how far-fetched (see Schwortz's website for the past five years) that tends to uphold the idea of the Shroud as a genuine relic, but refuse to deal with any thought that might hold it up to a different light. People like Schwortz and Wilson can probably be forgiven for this, because they're not scientists, nor do they pretend to be (unless the constant repetition of the words "peer reviewed" qualify to lend that distinction) but others, like Jackson and Rogers, should give up any claim to the title, at least as regards the object of their adoration.

You attack the scientists doing the research on the shroud as having "adoration" for the shroud. Nothing could be farther from the truth. You select Jackson and Rogers in particular... yet ALL of their work has been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals after months of being vetted by other scientists. Journals like Thermochemica Acta in which Rogers' latest research was published in January after seven months of peer-review. It is scientists like Jackson and Rogers, Adler and Heller, who have DISPROVED those "far-fetched" theories, (pardon me) like your own, through solid science and research.

You denigrate "peer-review" as though it were being invoked as a mantra. It is a time tested way of assuring that scientific articles meet certain standards for publication. ANYONE can be published in non-peer-reviewed journals... but to get into a peer-reviewed journal requires a much high standard of accuracy, that the science must be sound, and that people with expertise in the same field find the work worthy of publication. It also provides the author with a panel of editors that may find flaws or errors in their reasoning and allows them to re-address those issues before publication... or to withdraw the article if the criticisms are fatal to their research.

The work of researchers on the Shroud has appeared in such peer-reviewed journals of science and technology as:

Applied Optics
IEEE 1982 Proceedings of the International Conference on Cybernetics and Society
Canadian Society of Forensic Sciences Journal
Archaeological Chemistry III
ACS Advances in Chemistry
Journal of Biological Photograph
X-Ray Spectrometry
Materials Evaluation
Archaeology
Industrial Research and Development
Analytica Chimica Acta
Thermochimica Acta

Peer-review means that the work has passed the inspection of people equally if not better qualified in the field under study. It means that the work is acceptable and meets the standards set for publication. It often means the work has been checked and re-checked and CONFIRMED by other methods. It is not merely a mantra invoked to give unqualified work a stature it does not deserve.

Investigators for the Shroud of Turin Research Project (STURP) include:
Joseph S. Accetta, Lockheed Corporation*
Steven Baumgart, U.S. Air Force Weapons Laboratories*
John D. German, U.S. Air Force Weapons Laboratories*
Ernest H. Brooks II, Brooks Institute of Photography*
Mark Evans, Brooks Institute of Photography*
Vernon D. Miller, Brooks Institute of Photography*
Robert Bucklin, Harris County,Texas, Medical Examiner's Office
Donald Devan, Oceanographic Services Inc.*
Rudolph J. Dichtl, University of Colorado*
Robert Dinegar, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories*
Donald & Joan Janney, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories*
J. Ronald London, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories*
Roger A. Morris, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories*
Ray Rogers, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories*
Larry Schwalbe, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories
Diane Soran, Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratories
Kenneth E. Stevenson, IBM*
Al Adler, Western Connecticut State University
Thomas F. D'Muhala, Nuclear Technology Corporation*
Jim Drusik, Los Angeles County Museum
Joseph Gambescia, St. Agnes Medical Center
Roger & Marty Gilbert, Oriel Corporation*
Thomas Haverty, Rocky Mountain Thermograph*
John Heller, New England Institute
John P. Jackson, U.S. Air Force Academy*
Eric J. Jumper, U.S. Air Force Academy*
Jean Lorre, Jet Propulsion Laboratory*
Donald J. Lynn, Jet Propulsion Laboratory*
Robert W. Mottern, Sandia Laboratories*
Samuel Pellicori, Santa Barbara Research Center*
Barrie M. Schwortz, Barrie Schwortz Studios*

The majority of these people are scientists... who recorded every step of their research and submitted it for peer-review before publication of their conclusions. The checked and re-checked their work. They prepared protocols that were vetted by other members and changed where flaws or miscalculations were found. They were prepared to do good science. While some may have a religious background, many did not and others were from different faiths that would have nothing to gain by promoting Christianity.

Barrie Schwortz is Jewish, as are A. Adler, D. Lynn, and D. Devan, all members of STURP. In addition, some members were atheists, others agnostic, some Catholic, and some Protestant. They went with the expectation of proving it was a painting... and were proved wrong. Barrie states that he keeps asking himself "What's a nice Jewish boy like me, doing here?" He states that the researchers are following the science.

I don't have the time or stamina to get as long-winded as you have about this topic, but let me make some observations:

First, I can't possibly do any better than Ian Wilson in refuting the notion that the Mandylion was "only a facial image." His work in that regard was stellar, though to my knowledge it has not been peer-reviewed.

By "later-rulers" of Edessa, I assume you mean those rulers who existed after the image was re-discovered. You certainly coudn't have been referring to Abgar's immediate successors, because according to the legend, the image was hidden a short time after his death. By the time of the re-discover, there was indeed a cloth image, and the "tile" was eventually sent to the city of Hierapolis as a gift.

The idea that the "blood" preceded the image is a product of the casual observation of a single fibril by one of the researchers in the case (I can't recall who, but the entire scenario is outlined by Heller in his book on the shroud). It was an offhand observation, that has become perpetuated over the years by people who should know better--the same people who are the first to crow over the "scientific" backing for the shroud as a relic, but who revert to theories based on faith and casual observation when the science doesn't support their beliefs.

If there were a hard prototype upon which the cloth image was based, that prototype was probably a form of sculpture in stone. Sculpture in stone does not "fly in the face" of any artistic tradition or style. I've heard this type of rationale used in answer to those who postulate a medieval origin for the cloth, and in that regard, I would find it a valid form of argumentation--but only as it regards a process, and not an artistic style.

As to the knowledge of crucifixion techniques and Jewish customs, they would have been instantly accessible to anyone working in the time period I postulate, i.e., the first or second centuries A.D. However, I have seen nothing in the corpus of shroud knowledge to suggest that the portions of the shroud upon which those ideas are based (techniques and customs) are anything other than what is recognized as "blood." I'm convinced, at least until someone can prove otherwise, that the "blood" was added after the fact by someone who needed the image to state more than it was stating. And the "blood flows" are very illogical and unconvincing--as much as they would be if you tried to paint them onto the surface of a two-dimensional photograph.

I believe it was Jackson who first came up with the idea of ionizing radiation having been responsible for the image on the cloth--a short burst of high-energy radiation, or something along those lines. He dismissed the idea (as do others) on the grounds that an event of that type would have destroyed the cloth. I think he's right. But what I'm suggesting isn't a short burst of high-energy radiation, but an extended exposure to low-energy radiation; the exact opposite of what Jackson postulated. Radiation is probably key to the solution of how the image was formed. It gives you exactly what you need to explain the properties of the image. In that regard, I'm certain that the scenario I'm presenting is wrong on many of its details--perhaps all of them. But until I see something infinitely better, I'll remain convinced that long-term ionizing radiation is the key we're looking for. In fact, I think I can state that it's not the scenario I'm hawking, but the principle behind it.

Finally, I'm not poking fun at the concept of peer-review. As Dickens once said, it was not religion that he satirized, but the cant of religion. Similarly, it is very easy to tell that the big names in Shroud research have bought into the notion of the shroud as a relic, and remain content to use science to advance that idea, so long as the science upholds their belief. If you think any evidence of this is wanting, simply examine the work over the past sixteen years, following the Carbon-14 revelations. Logic would have dictated that the best form of rebuttal to those findings would have been the provenance of the specimens, but that's not how it was done.

Okay, let's say it is a burial shroud of a crucifixion victim. Science cannot in any way, yet thought of, confirm that it is the shroud used by Jesus.

It was rare that crucifixion victims were buried in tombs. We only have one archeological example: the 1968 discovery of a crucifixion victim, named Johanan ben Ha-galgol, found near Jerusalem at Giv’at ha-Mivtar; a crucifixion victim nailed through the wrists and reburied in an ossuaries.

On the rare occassion that someone was buried in the traditional late-Second Temple Jewish manner of burial used by those who could afford it or had a benefactor (as seems to be the case for Jesus) a chain of highly certain events took place. Within hours heavy amines gases would be emitted from the body. Any linen cloth manufactured in the manner outlined by Pliny the Elder in the first century, because it would likely have an evaporation surface of starch fractions and saccharides, and would thus become brown in places as a result of a natural amino/carbonyl reaction. Ray Rogers has shown that to a very high degree the brown color would have image properties. So far, so good. There are problems of diffusion yet to be resolved, if in fact they can be resolved. The fact of the matter is that the Shroud does contain just such a brown, caramel-like substance where there is image.

Could it be Jesus? Consider this: After about two to three days (depending on ambient temperatures, humidity and body chemistry) liquid decomposition products form. These would immediately ravage the cloth and any image that might have formed. By the time anyone opened the tomb for reburial in an ossuary (typically a year) there would be no flesh and certainly no whole cloth.

Could it be Jesus? If a crucifixion victim was buried in a tomb his shroud could only exist if the tomb was open and if the cloth was separated from the body within about three days.

I INFER from the evidence at hand that it was the Shroud of Jesus.

I discuss this in more detail at http://www.shroudstory.com/faq-burial-of-caiaphas.htm

Dan Porter

Let's consider some of Ray Rogers own words. The last sentence says it all:

The primary effect of all kinds of radiation is to heat the material it hits. This statement includes electromagnetic radiation (visible, ultraviolet, and infrared radiation); ionizing particles such as protons, electrons, and alpha particles; and non-ionizing particles such as neutrons. You can feel the heat when you hold a lump of plutonium, a flask of tritium, or a recently irradiated accelerator target. Intense irradiation can cause enough heat to explode explosives and burn metals (think of laser effects).

Cellulose molecules are folded back and forth in a fairly regular arrangement, and they show the properties of crystallinity. This is called a "fibrillar structure." When you rotate the stage of a petrographic microscope with crossed polarizers while looking at a linen fiber, straight lengths change from black through colored to black again every 90?. The fiber is birefringent and has an ordered structure.

When cellulose fibers are heated enough to color them, whether by conduction, convection, or radiation of any kind, water is eliminated from the structure (the cellulose is "dehydrated"). When water is eliminated, C-OH chemical bonds are broken. The C? free radicals formed are extremely reactive, and they will combine with any material in their vicinity. In cellulose, other parts of the cellulose chains may be the closest reactants. The chains crosslink. Crosslinking changes the crystal structure of the cellulose, and you can see the effect with a polarizing microscope.

When cellulose starts to scorch (dehydrate and crosslink), its characteristic crystal structure becomes progressively more chaotic. Its birefringence changes, and not all parts of a straight fiber go through clear transitions from dark to light at the same angle. Zones of order get smaller and smaller. It finally takes on the appearance of a pseudomorph and just scatters light. A significantly scorched fiber does not change color as the stage is rotated between crossed polarizers.

Proton-irradiated fibers by Rinaudo. Little, white, straight lines cutting across the fiber are the paths of the protons.

Specific types of radiation cause specific types of defects in the crystals of flax fibers. For example, protons ionize the cellulose as they pass through the fiber. This warps the crystals, making the protons' paths birefringent. You can see where they went in the fiber by the straight lines of their paths (see the "Proton-irradiated" figure).

Neutron-irradiated fibers from the Lyma mummy wrapping by Moroni. Observe the small, white, vertical streaks made by recoil protons between the bright growth nodes. There is also a faint haze in the background that was made by an associated gamma flux from the re actor.

Not all kinds of radiation ionize the material they penetrate. Neutrons and neutrinos donot have any electrical charge. Neutrinos hardly interact with matter at all, the fact that made them so difficult to detect. They have practically no chance of being stopped as they shoot through the entire diameter of the earth. The effects of neutrons depend on their energy, but they normally interact with hydrogen-containing materials to produce "recoil protons." They knock a hydrogen nucleus out of the material, producing an ionizing proton. You can see the ionization streaks of these (usually lower energy) protons (see the "Neutron-irradiation" figure).

The crystal structure of the flax fibers of the Shroud shows the effects of aging, but it has never been heated enough to change the structure. It has never suffered chemically significant irradiation with either protons or neutrons. No type of radiation that could produce either color in the linen fibers or change the 14C content (radiocarbon age) could go unnoticed. All radiation has some kind of an effect on organic materials.

This proves that the image color could not have been produced by thermal or radiationinduced dehydration of the cellulose. Image formation proceeded at normal temperatures in the absence of energetic radiation of any kind.

What about some kind of opaque material painted on a fine translucent cloth such as silk, used as the mask? It would not have to be glass. Just a hypothetical.

I dont know.

If you read N.D. Wilson's article, it took many, many attempts with multiple panes done repeatedly over weeks of time and then he seemed to find only a subset of those to be of any use.

My gut reaction is that a woven material would simply not be clear enough.

But that is only speculation, of course, as Mr Wilson did not use a woven material and does not seem to have considered the first step in making historical facsimilies - be sure to use available materials and processes from the time in consideration.

But I respect his effort here.

I dont want to see some iconic image revered as the last clothe Our Dear Lord wore on this Earth unless it is.

I also want to be certain as to its implications. Since the Mailard process pretty much proves He did die and and that the cloth was removed from Him after his death, it places the fact of an empty tomb on the Day of Pentecost on solid factual ground without only relying on Apostolic testimony.

Though that testimony, vetted by the sacrifice of their own lives, is more than sufficient, it has always bothered me that the more significant relics of Jesus life did not seem to have been kept. Now it seems that many artifacts have been verified by science and history and that is more comforting to me on a sentimental level.

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