Posted on 11/22/2009 2:29:32 PM PST by TaraP
ROME — A Vatican researcher has rekindled the age-old debate over the Shroud of Turin, saying that faint writing on the linen proves it was the burial cloth of Jesus.
Experts say the historian may be reading too much into the markings, and they stand by carbon-dating that points to the shroud being a medieval forgery.
Barbara Frale, a researcher at the Vatican archives, says in a new book that she used computer-enhanced images of the shroud to decipher faintly written words in Greek, Latin and Aramaic scattered across the cloth.
She asserts that the words include the name "(J)esu(s) Nazarene" — or Jesus of Nazareth — in Greek. That, she said, proves the text could not be of medieval origin because no Christian at the time, even a forger, would have mentioned Jesus without referring to his divinity. Failing to do so would risk being branded a heretic.
"Even someone intent on forging a relic would have had all the reasons to place the signs of divinity on this object," Frale said Friday. "Had we found 'Christ' or the 'Son of God' we could have considered it a hoax, or a devotional inscription."
The shroud bears the figure of a crucified man, complete with blood seeping from his hands and feet, and believers say Christ's image was recorded on the linen's fibers at the time of his resurrection.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
bttt
But if it says “made in China”, then not so much....
I truly believe this is the face of our LORD Jesus Christ
if you look in between the forehead you see a *Cross*
Staring at the face of the Shroud IMO you can feel the presence of being with the LORD..
They think they have it...they only need to get the whole last wor
“Be sure to drink your Ovalti..”
Ping!
Another study, by the Hebrew University, concluded that pollen and plant images on the shroud showed it originated in the area around Jerusalem sometime before the eighth century.
While faint letters scattered around the face on the shroud were seen decades ago, serious researchers dismissed them, due to the results of the radiocarbon dating test, Frale told The Associated Press.
But when she cut out the words from enhanced photos of the shroud and showed them to experts, they concurred the writing style was typical of the Middle East in the first century — Jesus’ time.
She believes the text was written on a document by a clerk and glued to the shroud over the face so the body could be identified by relatives and buried properly. Metals in the ink used at the time may have allowed the writing to transfer to the linen, Frale said.
She said she counted at least 11 words in her study of enhanced images produced by French scientists in a 1994 study. The words are fragmented and scattered on and around the image’s head, crisscrossing the cloth vertically and horizontally.
One short sequence of Aramaic letters has not been fully translated. Another fragment in Greek — “iber” — may refer to Emperor Tiberius, who reigned at the time of Jesus’ crucifixion, Frale said.
She said the text also partially confirms the Gospels’ account of Jesus’ final moments. A fragment in Greek that can be read as “removed at the ninth hour” may refer to Christ’s time of death reported in the holy texts, she said.
In her book “The Shroud of Jesus Nazarene,” published in Italian, Frale reconstructs from the lettering on the shroud what she believes Jesus’ death certificate said: “Jesus Nazarene. Found (guilty of inciting the people to revolt). Put to death in the year 16 of Tiberius. Taken down at the ninth hour.”
She said the text then stipulates the body will be returned to relatives after a year.
Frale said her research was done without the support of the Vatican.
“I tried to be objective and leave religious issues aside,” Frale told the AP. “What I studied was an ancient document that certifies the execution of a man, in a specific time and place.”
Frale’s work usually focuses on medieval documents. She is noted for research on the order of the Knights Templar and her discovery of unpublished documents on the group in the Vatican’s archives.
Earlier this year, she published a study saying the Templars once had the shroud in their possession. That raised eyebrows because the order was abolished in the early 14th century and the shroud is first recorded in history around 1360 in the hands of a French knight.
Her latest book on the shroud raised even more doubts among some experts.
On one hand, it is true that a medieval forger would label the object with Christ’s name, as were all relics produced at the time, said Antonio Lombatti, a church historian who has written about the shroud. The problem is that there are no inscriptions to be seen in the first place.
“People work on grainy photos and think they see things,” Lombatti told the AP. “It’s all the result of imagination and computer software. ... If you look at a photo of the shroud, there’s a lot of contrast between light and dark, but there are no letters.”
Further criticizing Frale’s work, Lombatti said that artifacts bearing Greek and Aramaic texts were found in Jewish burials from the first century, but the use of Latin is unheard of.
He also rejected the idea that authorities would officially return the body of a crucified man to relatives after filling out some paperwork. Victims of that form of execution used by the Romans would usually be left on the cross or were disposed of in a dump to add to its deterrent.
Lombatti said “the message was that you won’t even have a tomb to cry over.”
Another shroud expert, Gian Marco Rinaldi, said that even scientists who believe in the relic’s authenticity have dismissed as unreliable the images on which Frale’s study was based.
“These computer enhancements increase contrast in an unrealistic way to bring out these signs,” he said. “You can find them all over the shroud, not just near the head, and then with a bit of imagination, you see letters.”
Unusual sightings in the shroud are common and are often proved false, said Luigi Garlaschelli, a professor of chemistry at the University of Pavia. He recently led a team of experts that reproduced the shroud using materials and methods available in the 14th century — proof, they said, that it could have been made by a human hand in the Middle Ages.
Decades ago, entire studies were published on coins purportedly seen on Jesus’ closed eyes, but when high-definition images were taken during a 2002 restoration, the artifacts were nowhere to be seen and the theory was dropped, Garlaschelli said.
He said any theory about ink and metals would have to be checked by analysis of the shroud itself.
The last public display of the shroud was in 2000, when more than 1 million people turned up to see it. The next is scheduled for 2010, and Pope Benedict XVI has been asked to visit it.
The definitive information on all shroud questions is maintained by one of the original STURP team members Barrie Swortz at www.shroud.com
Here you will see that the so often touted carbon dating that set shroud origins in ‘medieval times’ has been scientifically debunked as of 2005 ( papers are included at the site)——unfortunately the media has not reported this as often as they continue to report the inaccururate carbon dating.
But interestingly, Swortz does not feel this latest claim to scientifically viable and explains it does not pass the standard of rigorous standards.
For the record, Barrie Swortz is an orthodox Jew but firmly believes the shroud is the burial cloth of the man Jesus.
fake fake fake, nobody filled out paperwork after a crucifixion sorry but fake fake fake
E.g "but *EXPERTS* claim -- implying that the only experts are against the authenticity of the Shroud.
Invoking the holy name of carbon dating -- implying that any disagreement with the results is on the part of (probably YEC) religious fundamentalists who couldn't follow scientific results anyway.
"believers say Christ's image was recorded on the linen's fibers at the time of his resurrection."
Again reinforcing the notion of religious faith alone, as opposed to "scientific" examination.
Might as well have been written by Joe Nickell.
Cheers!
No.
is the shroud of turin in the Bible? no, i don’t think so. why should we believe it to be authentic, if carbon dating doesn’t add up to the right date? the catholic church was duped. or they duped people on purpose. that was a long time ago. let it go, it’s not real.
I mean come on people, read your Bible. Read how Satan tried to turn Moses’ body into an idol. Read how the good king disposed of Moses’ brass serpent because people were idolising it.
Everything in God’s word says He would not be for this.
How does this prove or disprove the origin of the Shroud?
So, was it Jewish or Roman practice to label shrouds with the name of the putative occupant in several languages?
Was there no other iesu the nazarene to which it could apply?
And that feeling has some validity as evidence?
And my feeling of disgust and revulsion has what validity?
Mark 15:42-47
42 Now when evening had come, because it was the Preparation Day, that is, the day before the Sabbath, 43 Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent council member, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, coming and taking courage, went in to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. 44 Pilate marveled that He was already dead; and summoning the centurion, he asked him if He had been dead for some time. 45 So when he found out from the centurion, he granted the body to Joseph. 46 Then he bought fine linen, took Him down, and wrapped Him in the linen. And he laid Him in a tomb which had been hewn out of the rock, and rolled a stone against the door of the tomb. 47 And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses observed where He was laid.
New King James Version (NKJV)
Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Of course they don't offer a clue about these methods that were available.....
.....In my opinion, the shroud is so amazing, I seriously doubt it was a forgery.
They say the image is not ink.
Who back then would have thought about trying to create a chemically induced photographic negative on a piece of linen?
If this is how a forgery was made, why then was the photographic negative process not developed (no pun intended) to produce crude photocopies in that time? It would seem to me to be commercially useful.
If it wasn't a photographic negative process, then what was it if it wasn't ink?
I had heard the carbon dating was tainted by fibers from a later restoration and other contamination. The real date was not revealed in the test.
My gut says, the Shroud is the real thing.
It’s real and so is wrestling. Nobody can tell me different.
A commercial?!
“son of a #$#@!”
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