Italian scientist reproduces Shroud of Turin

Yahoo ^ | 5 Oct 2009 | Philip Pullella

[Gamecock]

An Italian scientist says he has reproduced the Shroud of Turin, a feat that he says proves definitively that the linen some Christians revere as Jesus Christ's burial cloth is a medieval fake. The shroud, measuring 14 feet, 4 inches by 3 feet, 7 inches bears the image, eerily reversed like a photographic negative, of a crucified man some believers say is Christ. "We have shown that is possible to reproduce something which has the same characteristics as the Shroud," Luigi Garlaschelli, who is due to illustrate the results at a conference on the para-normal this weekend in northern Italy, said on Monday. A professor of organic chemistry at the University of Pavia, Garlaschelli made available to Reuters the paper he will deliver and the accompanying comparative photographs.

[Shethink13]

One can pay homage without being reverent. Reverence is the qualifying word which defines whether homage is worship or simple honor.

And the opposite it also true - you can show reverence without paying homage. Thank you for proving my point. Both characteristics are necessary for an action to be considered worship.

[Mr. Silverback]

Wasn’t there something about how the crucifixion wounds are in a different spot than medieval people thought they would be?

[TheThirdRuffian]

“You are not addressing the posts pointing out the problems with the carbon-dating,”

“There is nothing new, as far as I know, which would change the situation. These ideas have been raised previously and none has been shown to have any merit. Many hypotheses, such as contamination, fire changing the results and more dubious assertions have been made, but none has seriously challenged the 1988 dating,” Timothy Jull, a professor in geosciences at the University of Arizona who specializes in carbon dating, told Discovery News.

Indeed, numerous theories, such as a plastic coating built up on the linen by millions of tiny micro-organisms, have been presented to explain how the radiocarbon tests could have been inaccurate. All have been rejected by the scientific community.

In 1998, Ramsey himself tested the possibility that carboxylation of the cellulose in the linen during the 1532 fire could have produced a younger dating, but concluded that “carboxylation is not a systematic source of error in the dating of cellulose-containing materials such as the linen in the Shroud of Turin.”

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/02/28/shroud-of-turin-02.html

[TheThirdRuffian]

Point being, he was mediocre, but the point man above the bishop in France in question.

The bishop found the artist, and convinced the authority (be it anti-pope or pope at the time; such is war) at the time to issue a proclaimation.

Me, I defer to the local bishop at the time who said it was a fake, albeit a good-intentioned fake, to illustrate the Easter story.

[Jaded]

Bravo.

[Houghton M.]

1.It is clear from the Bible and from Jewish burial customs that several pieces of cloth bound Christ at His burial — not one large sheet like the shroud.

Close but no cigar. The Sudarium of Oviedo is the other cloth mentioned in John 20. It's image matches the Shroud's image perfectly.

2.In John 20:5-7 we find there was a separate piece wrapped around Christ’s head. Yet the Shroud of Turin depicts a face on the sheet.

See no. 1 above. Your fallacy lies in assuming that the Shroud advocates are claiming that the Shroud is the only burial cloth of Jesus. They've never claimed that. They claim that it is is one of the two mentioned in John 20.

3.The size of the shroud is 14 feet 3 inches by 3 feet 7 inches (434 centimetres by 109 centimetres). But the Bible says linen strips bound Jesus, not an enormous cloth (see John 19:40).

Same fallacy. The claim that the Shroud is the burial Shroud by no means excludes the use of linen strips at some other point in the deposition from the Cross and preparation of the body for burial. And John 19:40 doesn't say "strips" but "piece" (bandage, large strip"). If this is the of analysis you have been dpeending on, it's not very reassuring.

Walter C. McCrone, head of a Chicago research institute and a specialist in authenticating art objects, examined the shroud. He found a pale, gelatin-based substance speckled with particles of red ochre on fibres from the part of the cloth that supposedly showed the figure of Christ. He also found that fibers from the “wounds” had stains, not of blood, but of particles of a synthetic vermilion developed in the Middle Ages. He said the practice of painting linen with gelatin-based temperas began in the late thirteenth century and was common in the fourteenth.McCrone concluded that a fourteenth century artist had forged the shroud, and defended this view right up until he died on July 10, 2002.

In the 1980s, Jesuit priest Robert A. Wild expressed surprise that the bloodstains, if they were blood, showed no trace of smearing after all the movement and transport the body would have endured. Wild also noted that the hands of the body masked the genitals. He said this couldn’t be right. No matter how you arrange a body after rigor mortis, he said, the hands cannot cover the genitals unless you prop up the elbows on the body and bind the hands tightly in place. Yet this is not what the shroud’s image shows.

Ah, the McCrone thesis. McCrone was not some great head of a research laboratory but a decent chemist who made some decent contributions in his area of expertise. His investigations deserve real consideration and have been given such. Read the scientific counter-claims to McCrone and get back to me. He's the odd-man out on the pigment question and after his initial chemical analysis of the blood stains, he became as impassioned an anti-Shroudie as others are Shroudies. His chemical work deserves consideration; his painted cloth thesis is amateurish. If your forensic case rests on McCrone, it's by no means a clear-cut, "best-evidence," slam-dunk. But I give you credit for citing one piece of evidence better that the first three or so.

Hands over genitals? Can't be done, dear Fr. Wild says, unless the hands were bound in place. And how are you going to prove that they were not bound? But, okay, for now let's stipulate that Wild is right.

Oh, and, by the way, your numbering skips from 3 to 7 (the next item). Which website did you cut and paste this from? Trying to backpeddle and cobble together some stuff to back up your global slam-dunk claims?

7.The first record of the shroud’s appearance was in 1353, when Geoffrey de Charny presented it to the small local church in the French town of Lirey. Three years later, in 1356, the bishop of the region wrote to the pope, in Latin, telling of his annoyance that certain people wanted this “painted” cloth displayed as the burial cloth of Christ. The bishop added that his predecessor, Henry of Poitiers, “after diligent inquiry and examination,” had found the artist who painted it. The artist testified that “it was the work of human skill and not miraculously wrought.”

I've dealt with the pedigree issue elswhere on this thread and will not repeat it--go look it up. New documentary evidence of the pedigree is constantly being discovered. As historical artifacts go, this one has a damn good pedigree. It did not pop up at Lirey in 1353. This is not only "best evidence," this is stinkingly bad evidence. It's one of the ancient canards. If I were you, I'd have skipped from 3 to 8, if your goal is to show that the "best evidence" overwhelmingly screams "fake."

Interestingly, this date accords with the carbon-14 tests, which dated the shroud to about the first quarter of the 1300s. It also agrees with art expert Walter McCrone’s estimate of the age based on known painting styles

Next time you cut and paste from a website, you might take care to cut out the stuff that has already been refuted on this thread. Walter McCrone had no expertise in art. Whomever you cribbed this from reveals his lack of awareness with the immense forensic evidence and with McCrone's role in the whole controversy if he charactizes McCrone as an art expert, and he's badly informed about the last 15 years of Shroud research. You'd make a better case if you went to an up-to-date Anti-Shroud site.

9.The verses that tell of Joseph of Arimathea’s wrapping Jesus in linen cloth are Matthew 27:59, Mark 15:46, Luke 23:53, and John 19:40. Look in Vine’s Expository Dictionary, Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, and the Ryrie Study Bible. They all tell us the Greek words used in Matthew, Mark, and Luke (entulisso and eneileo) mean “to roll in, wind in”, “to twist, to entwine”, “to enwrap”, “to wrap by winding tightly”. Winding, twisting and entwining imply wrappings, or strips of bandage, rather than a single shroud.

But if they did mean a single sheet, then Matthew, Mark, and Luke would conflict with John 19:40, which is clearer by using the Greek word othonion, meaning “linen bandage” (Strong’s concordance). If the Bible writers had meant a single linen sheet like the shroud, the word used should have been othone (a single linen cloth, a sail, or a sheet). From this, it seems that all four Gospel writers were telling us that normal long strips of linen covered Jesus.

Again, close but no cigar. By this logic, then John 20 needs to mention strips of linen left behind in the grave, but it doesn't. This is the most convoluted, entwined piece of exegesis of these passages imaginable. Mt. 27:69 mentions a cloth and no strips. The author has to resort to a tendentious reading of the verb here to try to argue that the "cloth" in Mt. 27:59 is actually strips. Mark and Luke also do not explicitly say "strips." So the whole case rests on John 19:40 and the othonion. The author of your crib has to mangle the verbs of the synoptics to support his 'strips' theory of othonion. But othonion is singular, is it not? Where do you get the strips in the plural? Bandage in archaic English can refer to a large piece of cloth because it's referent is the size of the object it needs to "bandage" not the size of the cloth per se.

If this is "best evidence," I've got some oceanfront property in Arizona for you. This is tendentious evidence in the extreme. If you are going to put this up against the forensic evidence from the Shroud iteself, you need a more water-tight argument from the philology here.

The Ronman [sic] Catholic Church itself does not accept the shroud as authentic. In May 2008, the Roman Catholic Encyclopedia’s article on the Shroud of Turin stated there was good reason to doubt its authenticity. These included:

•the awkward fact that many similar shrouds existed which their owners claimed showed the genuine image of Christ

•a pope in the 1300s issued a pronouncement that when the shroud was exhibited, the priest must “declare in a loud voice that it was not the real shroud of Christ”

Perfectly consistent with the state of knowledge at that time--the evidence in favor of the Shroud comes from the late 1900s. Catholics before then were skeptical. Those who believe it authentic today have been convinced by the recent evidence. Citing a 14th-century pope on this issue now is evidence that the website you cribbed this from is clueless about the issues invovled here.

•the admission that “no intelligible account, beyond wild conjecture, can be given of the previous history of the Shroud” before it appeared at Lirey around 1353

Same silly fallacy.

•this shroud, like the others, “was probably painted without fraudulent intent to aid the dramatic setting” at Easter

Is this still the same 14th century pope or just some Numbnut's general statement? "Probably" -- best evidence for sure. This last one is the kind of wild handful of crap one throws up to see if it will stick to the wall.

You know, this last series of supposedly official Church stuff takes the cake. First off, the Catholic Encyclopedia is not The Roman Catholic Church. The fool whose website you cribbed is an ignoramus. Encyclopedia articles are written by scholars. They do not speak for the Church. Relics are authenticated, largely by pedigree, by the Congregation for the Rites (before 1983) and now by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. Individual cases like the Shroud may or may not have statements made about them by the bishops of the local diocese. None of these pronouncements are binding on Catholics.

But this does not come even from one of the Vatican offices or from any bishop. This is "best evidence"? It's garbage. There are two Catholic Encyclopedias, the original one in 1908, the New Catholic Encyclopedia of the 1960s, which was redone around 2003. I don't know where this is actually from. If it's from 1908, it's perfectly consistent with the state of knowledge about the Shroud in 1908. But most of the persuasive forensic and historical evidence comes from the last half of the 1900s.

If this is from the New Catholic Encyclopedia in the 1960s, it's perfectly imaginable that the author took a skeptical position; much of the forensic scientific evidence was in the future and the authors, like bishops, have an obligation to lean over backwards to be skeptics on issues like this. But the statements above sound a lot more like consensus of pious Catholic scholars ca. 1908. If so, it's just plain irrelevant. Yet you think it's "best evidence."

Apparently you've not been following the Shroud evidence very carefully or very long. You ought to avoid "best evidence shows it's a fake" until you've actuall read McCrone's arguments and then read the responses to them. He may be right, of course. But anyone whose case rests on McCrone (and of all that you adduced above, it's all laughable except McCrone who's not laughable but refuted nonetheless.

Now, do you want to go to another website and crib some more "best evidence"? Or perhaps actually read the evidence pro and con and perhaps, to your surprise, end up "thrilled" that the preponderence of evidence points overwhelmingly toward authenticity?

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

Yes. Different from the usual iconography.
Wounds in the wrist rather than palms.
And through the bones which would have fit with a real crucifixion.
But the lab studies of the Shroud in the 1970s revealed pollen strains
from plants in the Middle East from the first-century time period.

So if it was going to be claimed as a late medieval fake, you have an artist
with a time machine and knowledge of Middle Eastern botany.

The Shroud was also seen BEFORE the 1200s and there is documentation
for that. Along with iconography and art based on the face on the shroud.

[ArrogantBustard]

Read the article ... I guarantee you, in the year 1389 the Pope Clement VII in the article you linked (post #238) wasn't saying anything, to anybody, on any topic.

Please read your link from post #238 carefully ... the first few lines of the article will reveal the problem.

[Claud]

There is nothing new, as far as I know, which would change the situation. These ideas have been raised previously and none has been shown to have any merit.

The other hypotheses (fire carboxylation, bioplastic coatings), didn't pan out. That is widely acknowledged. The author however does NOT address the invisible reweave which HAS panned out and has seriously called into question the validity of the C-14 tests. If I remember right, even some of the lab workers who did the original sample in 1988 said this was a game-changer as far as they were concerned.

Again, READ the studies. They are out there.

I am not trying to make a Shroud believer out of you, it doesn't matter one fig theologically, but you keep stating things that are flatly untrue.

[Houghton M.]

It’s darn irrelevant what any 14th century pope said. Those who believe the Shroud is the burial shroud of Christ do so because of evidence adduced since 1900,esp. since 1970.

In the 14th century popes rightly were skeptical, based on evidence (lack of evidence).

Citing 14th century pronouncements only shows that you don’t understand that the authentication of the Shroud has taken place recently via forensic and historical (pedigree) evidence. Some who now believe in the authenticity were initially skeptical unbelievers in Christianity. Some remain non-Christian, many non-Catholic but all convinced by evidence.

And, as others have pointed out, no historical artifact can be provedn 100 percent to be authentically what it is claimed to be.

All I have said on this thread is that, judged by the standards applied to ALL other historical artifacts, the evidence that this is a 2000-year old burial shroud of a crucified man is overwhelming. I know of no other artifact studied so intensely with the vast preponderance (not 100 %, e.g., Walter McCrone) in favor of authenticity.

[Claud]

Bravo...well said!

[tblatham]

I agree with you. What about the scientist who did the 3D Hologram of the Shroud of Turin, and stated there was nothing like it in the world; no nothing.

An Easter Surprise:[b] A Quantum Hologram of Christ’s Resurrection ...
Apr 7, 2009 ... The Shroud of Turin is arguably the single most studied artifact in human ... In general relativity, an event horizon is a boundary in ...
www.jesuslives.co.za/.../an-easter-surprise-a-quantum-hologram-of-christs-resurrection/

Cryptic Science-Prophecy Monday, Part II « New Wineskins
Apr 13, 2009 ... (Scientific American, February, 2009). Physicists have yet to figure out what ... fascinated by the total absence of distortion of the Shroud [of Turin] image, ... In general relativity, an event horizon is a boundary in ...
www.newine.wordpress.com/2009/.../cryptic-science-prophecy-monday-part-ii/

Shroud of Turin Education Project
New Documentary with 3D Hologram. From: GRIZZLY ADAMS® PRODUCTIONS, ... Forensic scientists and chemists have determined that the bloodstains on the shroud ..... What Did Jesus Look Like as a Boy? Forensic experts use computer images ...
http://www.shroud2000.com/LatestNews.html

Science prooving the Resurrection of Christ - Jokeroo Community
1 post - Last post: 6 hours ago
A Quantum Hologram of Christ’s Resurrection? by Chuck Missler Dame ... The Shroud of Turin is arguably the single most studied artifact in human history. ... The phenomenon of the image brings us to a true event horizon, ...
www.board.jokeroo.com/.../135801-science-prooving-resurrection-christ.html

Best,

tblatham

[Houghton M.]

Several?

The only one that deserves any consideration is McCrone and others dispute his reading of the scientific evidence.

Many have alleged a priori that it’s pigment but to my knowledge, only McCrone claims this after scientific study. And the number of those who have studied it at the microscopic level and disagree with McCrone is legion.

If you are going to rest your case on McCrone (I notice you never mentioned the fact that others who did microcopic studies disagreed with him—you cite him alone—good editing, cherry picking), you have a weak case.

[Brookhaven]

IF any of this is actually true, all that proves is that the shroud existed in the 6th century. Some 500-600 years after Christ. Do you realize how long that is? If you traveled backwards from today that many years you could watch Columbus discover America—1492.

Presenting evidence something existed 500-600 years AFTER Christ is a long way from connecting it with Christ. The fact that they believed it was an image of Christ doesn’t mean anything.

By that time several sites had been identified that people believe to be Christ’s tomb (and there are documents from that time period showing people believed each one to be genuine.) Do those documents prove each site was actually Christ’s tomb? Of course not, because they can’t ALL actually be Christ’s tomb.

The fact that some people around 550 believed the shroud to be genuine doesn’t prove it is, any more than some people believing a specific site was Christ’s tomb PROVES it was Christ’s tomb.

There might be some evidence here that the sroud is older than 1200 (back to 550 say), but as far as it being genuine...I don’t see any. That doesn’t mean it isn’t.

[Joe 6-pack]

"Do we really need relics to support our faith?"

No. However, that doesn't mean we should simply discard them when we find them.

Just suppose Christ did in fact, leave an image of his crucified body behind. Do you think he did so whimsically simply because he could, or do you think he might have had some reason for doing so?

[Jewbacca]

“What would a non-Kosher Torah be?”

Well, it’s not so much that they are “non-kosher” as not in full requirement a “sefer torah.”

Like a printed study torah is fine for that, but it’s not a proper, hand-written, every letter perfect, torah.

Here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sefer_Torah

[Houghton M.]

Not quite. As I noted in a previous comment on “pedigree,” the pedigree starts with John ch. 20. There are plenty of realities that have a 400-year gap. Again, as I’ve said previously, if this were any other historical artifact, the forensic and historical evidence in favor of this one would be recognized without hesitation. We accept as authentic a host of artifacts with only 1 % of the evidence this has in its favor.

If you want to be skeptical of all historical artifacts whatsoever, be my guest.

But if you ever accepted unthinkingly the authenticity of the hundreds of artifacts you have seen in museums or in your family or circle of friends, then you should, in honesty, at least have an open mind toward this one until you’ve studied the evidence for yourself.

[Sudetenland]

Worship:reverent honor and homage paid to God"

Not to "God" alone (with or without the dramatic font), but any god. Pagans also worship their gods.

If all of these items in the Vatican's Reliquary are not worshipped to some degree or other, then why are they there? Why are they venerated? Why are the people here attacking this scientist? What difference does it make if the Shroud or any other of the relics are authentic or not?

Is not FAITH the only real evidence of God's existence? ...of Christ's existence? Then the only question that is relevent is, is your faith genuine or is it dependent on some artifact...or idol?

This whole dialogue began because some scientist threatened to expose the Shroud of Turin as a possible fake. For that possibility alone, he has been reviled and insulted.

It appears to me that, at least some here, need there to be physical proof of something that can only be proven by faith. You cannot secularly prove the existence of God nor can you likewise prove that Christ was the Son of God. All of these relics are mere distractions from what is true and real.

God is. Christ is the corporeal presence of God as he is the Son of God and the Holy Ghost.

That distraction is the very reason that God admonished us in Exodus 20:

"4. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:

It is not until the next verse that "worship" is invoked.

5. Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor serve them..."

So it is the existence of the image or idol itself that is offensive to God, not solely the worship...according to the Bible.

[ArrogantBustard]

From your link:

Naturally, one wonders

Naturally ... it was my first question ...

how a document with so many letters can be produced with no errors; of course, some errors are inevitable in the course of production. If the error involves a word other than the name of God, the mistaken letter may be obliterated from the scroll by scraping the letter off the scroll with a sharp object. If the name of God is written in error, the entire page must be cut from the scroll and a new page added, and the page written anew from the beginning. The new page is sewn into the scroll to maintain continuity of the document. The old page is treated with appropriate respect, and is buried with respect rather than otherwise destroyed or discarded.

At first glance, it would seem that “sefer torah" must be rarer than hens' teeth ... but procedure for correcting errors would seem to put the whole business just within the realm of possibility. The scribes and proofreaders must really love what they're doing.

[Brookhaven]

Just suppose Christ did in fact, leave an image of his crucified body behind. Do you think he did so whimsically simply because he could, or do you think he might have had some reason for doing so?

---

I’ll have to admit, this is the one thing that has bothered me about the shroud.

Descriptions of Jesus’ physical appearance seem conspicuous by their absence in the Bible. We can’t even say for certain the color of his hair.

It has always struck me that there was a reason for that. It seems at odds with the fact that there is a total lack of a physical description in the Bible, but we are presented outside the Bible with what amounts to a photograph of His appearance.