The Shroud of Turin is the purported burial cloth of Jesus. The burial cloth itself is about 11 feet long where, according to Jewish burial customs, the body is laid at one end and the cloth is then brought over the top of the head, then covering the front of the body. Kinda like a big “U”.
So, where did the Shroud’s story begin? The first documented historical mention of the Shroud was from 1354 -1355. Geoffrey DeCharny had it housed in a church in Lirey, France. Who he obtained the Shroud from is unclear. Some speculate he obtained it from the Knights Templar, but it is not certain. When Geoffrey DeCharny passed, the Shroud was given to his granddaughter, Margaret. In turn, Margaret removed it from the church and hid it to protect it during the 100 yrs war and sought out a permanent place for its safekeeping. Margaret was not married, was in a state of financial insecurity, and had no heir to give it to for protection. So, she decided to give the Shroud to the Savoy family in exchange for the Shroud’s protection and personal financial security. It has remained in the possession of the Savoy’s and came under control of the Holy See in 1985.
Here is where it gets interesting. The year is 1898 and the Shroud was now displayed in the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Turin Italy. In honor of the 100th anniversary of the Savoy Dynasty, the latest technology (a camera) was going to take a picture of the Shroud. The first picture of the Shroud was taken by Secondo Pia, an Italian lawyer. Mr. Pia was in no way prepared for what he was about to experience. As the film was developing, the image of a crucified man began to clearly emerge! It was as though the negative was a positive and that the Shroud as seen by the human eye was the negative. Everyone was astounded at what they witnessed! Years later, the buzz continued and caught the attention of another photographer, Giuseppe Enrie. He also took a photo of the Shroud in 1931. Photographic technology had improved somewhat since 1898. The developing process produced the same results, however with even greater detail.
The Shroud of Turin fell under great scrutiny and scientists became very interested in the Shroud, not so much as a religious relic but as a scientific artifact. The Shroud of Turin Research Project was founded in 1978. It was a team of 33 scientists from all over the world. However, things went quickly awry. In1988, Michael Tite ( a self-proclaimed atheist) and crew labeled it a “medieval hoax” after a shoddy carbon dating test was done on a repaired scrap of fiber from the Shroud. In addition, there was supposed to be 7 labs unknowingly carbon dating this contaminated sample, however, only 3 actually did. The Shroud was in a fire in 1532 and parts of it were repaired by the nuns who tended to it. This bad press lingered for several years. I actually remember when all this carbon dating kerfuffle took place. My first reaction was – Didn’t they say it was in a fire in the Middle Ages? Won’t that throw off a carbon dating test? I didn’t buy into this apparent definitive result and, thank goodness, neither did many other scientists.
The Shroud was also examined by scientists at JPL, Los Alamos, Sandia Labs and the Air Force Academy. None of them could explain how the image was produced in the Shroud. It wasn’t paint or a stain and it superficially laid on top of the linen. Each Lab concluded the image was not man-made. Two Air Force Academy physicists Prof. Eric Jumper and Prof. John Jackson used a VP8 image analyzer on the Shroud. A VP8 analyzer is used by NASA to study the surfaces of planets to as to get an image of their topography. When applied to the face of the image on the Shroud of Turin, the face became 3D! This imager did not produce the same results on any other picture – just the Shroud.
The dating issue was solved as time progressed and technology became more advanced. Pollen samples show that the Shroud was in Jerusalem and the way the linen has degraded, they can date it around 2000 years. There are also coins over the eyes (another Jewish burial custom of the time) turned out to be a coin that was only in circulation for a few years during the time of Jesus. Two years ago, the Institute of Crystalography used wide angle X-ray scattering to date the Shroud. The date came in at a narrow margin of 2000 years.
Okay… so it was a crucified man – but was it Jesus? The brutal way this crucified man was tortured is not typical of Roman crucifixion. The number of lashes he received, the crown of thorns, the severe beating and the lance wound to the heart – all reported in the Gospels, are present. Each one of these horrendous acts is historically atypical and having them present on one man is statistically impossible. Scientists were able to determine the blood type as well. It is AB. AB is rare and mostly found in Middle Eastern men. It’s interesting to note that this blood type is also found in documented Eucharistic miracles.
Because of today’s technology, there is now a preponderance of evidence that the Shroud of Turin is the burial cloth of Jesus. Another conclusion is that the image was most likely made by perfectly parallel particle beams of light consisting of 34 thousand trillion watt of energy in a 40th of a billion of a second. There have been over 500,000 hours of scientific research (so far) spent on studying the Shroud of Turin. Also,102 academic disciplines have submitted articles in peer reviewed journals. The trend of calling the Shroud of Turin a “Medieval Hoax” is quickly approaching the dust bin of history, and it is science that is placing it there.
Personally, I find it no surprise that it took today’s technology to start decoding Shroud. And, they are still finding more on how the image was transferred using laser technology. It’s as if the Shroud was left to us knowing in the future, at the right time, when we have the right technology, humanity will need this discovery most. Or… is the timing just a coincidence?
As St. Thomas Aquinas once said, “For those who have faith no explanation is necessary. For those without faith, no explanation is possible.”
If you are interested in delving deeper into this subject, I suggest you read Body of Proof, By Jeremiah Johnston. He documents much of the interesting scientific evidence in full detail.
