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by
Ken Mondschein
For centuries, the Shroud of Turin, a 14-foot-long, three-foot-wide sheet
of linen imprinted with the ghostly image of a bearded man bearing a crown
of thorns and wounds in his wrists, feet, and side, has been the object
of devout veneration. However, modern science has raised many questions
about the holy relic’s true origins. According to the most accurate
tests available, the shroud was made no earlier than the 13th century.
Still, despite such high-tech investigations, scientists have been unable
to resolve the controversy to the satisfaction of all.
In the Middle Ages, holy relics could be found everywhere,
from the mightiest cathedral to the humblest parish church. Some, such
as the tunic of the Virgin in Chartres Cathedral in France, were the object
of pilgrimages. Others were obtained at great risk, as when a cadre of
Venetian merchants pilfered St. Mark’s bones from Alexandria in the
ninth century. Some were even fought over, such as when Edward I captured
the Holy Rood (a piece of the True Cross) from the Scots in 1296.
Not only were such objects thought to work miraculous cures,
but they enabled people to touch holiness, bringing something of the sanctity
of heaven, the reality of the Bible, and the promise of a better world
into their own lives.
Because these items were in such demand, it was perhaps inevitable
that people would begin manufacturing them. (It is a common joke amongst
medievalists that if all the pieces of the True Cross were gathered together,
there would be enough wood to create an entire forest.) Yet the fabrication
of such relics is not fraud in the modern sense because of the belief
inherent in medieval religion. Much like how a scale replica of a jet
airliner is a representation ofa real 747, so, too, did medieval people
believe that a vial of holy blood—real or fake—participated
in the sanctity of the real blood of Christ.
The Shroud’s
Obscure History
The history of the Shroud of Turin is, for these reasons, somewhat obscure.
Though the first written evidence comes from 1357, when it was recorded
being in a a church in Lirey, in southern France, many people insist that
the shroud is much older. Supposedly, the relic passed from one of Christ’s
disciples to King Abgar V of Edessa sometime in the early first century
and thence to Constantinople. In 1204, it was stolen from the Byzantines
by French knight Geoffrey de Charny during the Fourth Crusade.
But if the shroud is so venerable, why was it not mentioned
in the historical record—including the New Testament—earlier
than the mid-14th century? Indeed, as early as the 1380s, churchmen such
as Pierre d’Arcis, the Bishop of Troyes, were speaking of the shroud
as a forgery. In 1900, based on the examination of medieval reports, letters,
and decrees, French priest and medieval historian Cyr Ulysse Chevalier
published his claim that the shroud was a fake. Since its provenance leaves
much to be desired, an alternate means of investigating the mystery of
its date was required.
Dating
the Shroud
Since the 19th and early 20th centuries, critics have pointed out that
the image of Jesus on the shroud is not anatomically correct, but rather
shows unusual elongation and asymmetry that is reminiscent of medieval
religious iconography. Others countered this argument with the fact that
the direction of the blood flow on the body depicted on the shroud was
the same as if the figure had died with its arms outstretched, not lying
supine.
Moreover, believers noted that the nail holes depicted on
the figure on the shroud were in the figure’s wrists, not its hands,
which is now believed to be the way people were crucified during Roman
times.
Then in the 1990s, Swedish textile expert Mechthild Flury-Lemberg
noticed that the style of the cloth’s weave, as well as its stitching,
matched those used in ancient Israel around the first century AD. Therefore,
either the medieval forgers of the shroud had a detailed knowledge of
ancient textiles (which is highly unlikely), there are fortuitous similarities
between medieval and ancient textiles, or the shroud’s cloth was
indeed created in the first century AD.
However, according to Dr. Walter McCrone and his associates,
who conducted tests on the shroud in 1979 and 1980, the image is composed
of red ochre and vermilion, in a binding of egg tempera. Both red ochre
and vermilion are common pigments used in paint. Tests for body fluids,
meanwhile, were negative, all of which suggest that the image had been
painted on, not naturally created by human blood and/or sweat.
In 1988, the shroud was again tested, this time by radiocarbon
dating conducted by separate labs in England, Switzerland, and Arizona.
The tests revealed that the shroud dated from no earlier than 1260 and,
most likely, from around the mid-14th century, about the time it first
appeared in the historical record.
However, Stephen Mattingly, a professor with the University
of Texas Health Center, suggests that the tests might have been made inaccurate
by bacteria that may now contaminate the shroud, and that the bacteria
that is present in such appreciable concentrations that its age cannot
be properly carbon-dated. Those who put their faith in the accuracy of
the radiocarbon dating, however, point out that to alter a first-century
date to a 14th-century date requires contaminants weighing roughly twice
as much as the tested material.
Is the Shroud of Turin the image of Jesus of Nazareth? Dismissing
the evidence to the contrary, true believers are unlikely to concede that
the venerated relic is a forgery. So for the time being, the date of the
Shroud of Turin remains a mystery of science… and of faith.
from
issue #8
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