April 04, 2004

Shroud of Turin: More fodder for the debate. I thought this seemed like a good Sunday post. Apparently the sewing style "belongs firmly to a style seen in the first century AD or before." Your call.
  • So many reasons not to take it seriously. Survival of a real cloth of that age would be remarkable, but we know there was a medieval industry churning out fakes by the hundred. Carbon dating is excellent evidence; the scruples voiced here would be more worthy of attention if they had been voiced before the results were known. Sewing style is a very weak argument at best. You could argue that a particular technique could not have been used before its invention at a given date - but how can you say a shroud would never have been stitched in a particular way after a particular time? You wouldn't, moreover, get an image like this from cloth wrapped around a body - this is a pure front view like a painting or photograph.
    But what if it were an authentic relic of Jesus? So what? It might help prove he existed, but even the sceptics don't generally doubt that. It certainly wouldn't prove he was God - in fact, I should say it was pretty good evidence that he was thoroughly human - and thoroughly dead. No disrespect to serious Christian conviction implied or intended - I don't think faith rests on the provenance of a cloth.
  • even if it's authenticated as 1 A.D or before, how can anyone prove that it's any specific individual's shroud...? the character* of jesus was only one of many who were killed in precisely the same manner, and surely many corpses were covered in cloth. *i don't neccessarily dispute the historical existence of a christ figure, but there are documents that point to the biblical jesus having been based on 2 different men who lived 100 to 300 years apart from each other, who were both considered by a group of people in their respective times to be the son of god.
  • I heard a presentation a while ago that was really interesting - in it, the historian was suggesting that the medieval world had a different sense of authenticity than we do. He was primarily talking about paintings and images of Christ and the Apostles, and other older Saints, but I wonder if relicts would also fit. Basically, he suggested that they weren't concerned about having a picture of Jesus done from life, because there was this implicit assumption that any artist would copy the portraits from before him - which had been copied from the portraits before them, and so forth. That they were new didn't make them less accurate, since they represented the image accurately. I wonder if many might have thought of the shroud that way - if they knew it was fake, it didn't matter, since it represented what must have existed - and since the original is gone, we should venerate through this. But that said, both Erasmus and Calvin raised lots of typically modern questions about the authenticity of relicts - and so did the medieval English Lollards, as well as other non-organised heretics.
  • I am a Christian myself, but my faith certainly does not rely on the Shroud of Turin being authentic or not. I am primarily interested in the subject because of the mystery involved. It will, of course, never be solved to everyone's satisfaction. There's a lot of good discussion here, though, and I find it all very interesting. There is a part of me that would really like for the shroud to be genuine. However, the sceptic in me will never accept it 100%. And ultimately, it does not matter. True faith has to be based on more than a flimsy, stained cloth. Still, it would be cool to have some physical evidence of the man; even if it proves nothing.
  • "The discovery of the stitching along with doubt about the carbon-dating all add to the mountain of evidence suggesting this was probably the shroud Jesus was buried in."- Guscin You have to love that logic. I have no idea what the population was in the middle east at the time of Christ's death and subsequent resurrection but over a generational period of 30 years 1000 men seems very reasonable. So even if this shroud is from the correct time and the correct place there is only a 1/1000 chance that it is the shroud of Christ. To conclude that something with a less than 1/1000 chance of being right is probable doesn't come close to science.
  • Of course it's a fake, one only has to read the Gospels to realise that the whole story of Christ is a concoction that 'outs' itself continually. It's a myth, or he was a false prophet. Matthew 24:34 is the kicker. In any case, the body on the Shroud's wounds do not fit with the details ascribed to Yeshua ha-Nostri's execution, and the shroud itself suggests that the victim was *alive* when the imprint was made, thus Christ was not dead when removed from the cross (gnostics will be familiar with this concept). Ironically, if one accepts the Shroud as 'genuine' (whatever that means), the Gospels are shown to be inaccurate, something that threatens the foundation of the faith itself; irrespective of the errors, condradictions and clear absurdities of the Bible as a whole, and the New Testament in particular. But as a fake, it's an extraordinary work of art. The skill, the mystery of how it was made is transcendant. The Shroud proves, ironically, not the divinity of Jesus, but of the amazingly endless creativity of man. Who made it? How was it made? What genius or horror was behind this process? These questions will certainly never be answered. My current favorite theory is that the shroud was that of executed Knights Templar Grand Master Jacques de Molay, his personal Templar Shroud in which his body was wrapped prior to his final immolation. De Molay certainly looked like the guy on the shroud, and he was nailed to a door (which was repeatedly slammed) in some dreadful mockery during his torture, in just such a posture that the victim appears to have undergone. Interesting possibilities.
  • 1. Get hold of the following ingredients: a bas-relief 1 or 2 centimetres deep (which you can buy, for example, in stores selling religious trinkets), a linen cloth, some iron oxide and a binding agent (paint shop), and a sponge. 2. Wet the cloth and mould it to the bas-relief, tamping it down so it fits the contours tightly. 3. Let it dry in the sun, or use a hair-dryer. 4. Put a little iron oxide in a saucer. Moisten the sponge with some of the binder. Tamp the sponge in the iron oxide, then onto the cloth. Add blood stains with vermilion paint if desired. 5. All done. You can take a photo and check that, just like the Shroud of Turin, the image is more easily seen as a negative, since the eye more readily perceives light shapes on a dark background. Cost: about $20 Time to make: 30 mins Lasts: several centuries. *translated on the fly from Charlie Hebdo 24/6/98, no warranties, express or implied, are given.
  • Sure, Wolof, but how do I grow a beard?
  • Ask me again when you're 70.
  • Baldrick: "Yeah, yeah -- fingers are really big at the moment. Mind you, for a really quick sale, you can't beat a nose. For instance, the Sacred Appendage Compendium Party Pack: you get Jesus' nose, St. Peter's nose, The Apostle of St. Francis' nose, and (picks up a pair of false breasts) er, no -- they're Joan of Arc's."
  • You know, a little vinegar would probably get out those stains. Club soda, maybe?
  • If it's really he's, maybe he'll claim it when he comes back. Just don't get in his way because he sounds pretty pissed off.
  • he's = his Clearly, some force is trying to prevent me from posting properly.
  • >>2 different men who lived 100 to 300 years apart tracy, that's a new one on me! where is that theory from? that's interesting stuff.
  • i like how when religion gets involved, needlework styles take precedent over carbon dating. in related news: a trebuchet was featured on the discovery channel the other day. clearly that trebuchet was from the middle ages, since the style of construction used dates back to the middle ages. the guys on "antiques roadshow" determined that an amish-made dresser was an antique, based on the historically accurate pattern of dovetail joints used to secure the sides together. this shroud thingy and the related controversy is pretty funny to me. although as a religious object of obsession, a chunk of stained cloth isn't nearly as creepy as a bunch of random body parts in fancy boxes.
  • Shroud? Pffft. I wants me my holy foreskin.
  • "holy prepuce" -- Damn. Wish I'd known about that when I was looking for a user name for MeFi.
  • Not to be confused with the holy hand grenade, of course.