lpetrich

WHICH doctors?

And such a film would have been acquired when the shroud was manufactured, so it would be as old as the fibers. Which makes this hypothesis grasping at straws.

Also, the C-14 date is the right date for it being a fake, which asks too much of coincidence.

So what? Are these "scientists" willing to apply the same standards to the Cloak of Kandahar.

My conclusion: it would have been a fake created not long after Jesus Christ was executed.

And if the Cloak of Kandahar was discovered:

To date from ~600 CE, when Mohammed had lived.

To have pollen from plants that live in western Saudi Arabia, near Mecca and Medina.

To have scraped-off skin that has genetic material that is (1) human, (2) has Y chromosomes, and (3) is closest to genetic material from people nowadays living in western Saudi Arabia.

Would anyone convert to Islam?

donnerkeil

The two doctors I mentioned in my last post. Garza-Valdes and Mattingly.

Wrong. The fact that the bacteria from this film can be cultured, indicates that it is still active and hence would be considered a "new" carbon source if thrown into a C-14 dating experiment.

l-bow

donnerkeil,


I find it strange that a pro-shroud person like you do not know about McCrone. I find it stranger that you seemed to have not been aware of the counter-arguement I presented. Are you aware that there is an usenet newsgroup soley dedicated to the subject of the shroud, alt.turin-shroud?

MortalWombat

The combined weight of evidence points to the shroud as being a forgery:

1. No record of it can be found before the 14th century, where it first appears in Lirey, France. (Coincidentally, the C14 dating places the shroud in the 14th century.)

2. In 1389 Pierre d'Arcis, Bishop of Troyes, reported to pope Clement VII that the relic "had been cunningly painted, the truth being attested by the artist who had painted it, to wit, that it was a work of human skill and not miraculously wrought or bestowed."

3. In 1988 three independent laboratories dated the shroud to between 1260 and 1390. This was reported in the journal Nature. A reprint of the article can be found <a href="http://www.shroud.com/nature.htm" target="_blank">here</a>
Note: for those who keep mentioning biofilm contamination, this excerpt from the article may be of interest:
In addition, Garza-Valdes and Mattingly (the two who claim that biofilm contamination is responsible for the shroud's C14 date) have never published a peer-reviewed paper on their shroud work. Also, they are the only two people who have seen these bacteria and fungi. No one else has. Regarding the 60% increase to the diameter of individual threads of the shroud, note that it says "In some places, the coating increased the diameter of the fibers as much as 60%". How much is "in some places?" and of these, how many are in the 60% range? For the C14 to give a 1300 year error, the whole sample being analyzed must be contaminated with newly formed biomaterial to such an extent that you would need twice as much contamination in weight than the original material.

4. Samples of what was claimed to be blood failed a battery of tests in 1973. In the late 1970s, forensic microanalyst Walter McCrone, an expert in examining the authenticity of documents and paintings, identified the "blood" of the shroud as red ocher and vermilion tempera paint, and concluded that the entire image was painted.

5. The image of the figure on the shroud is anatomically awkward. The arms are much too long. If someone's arms are positioned as shown on the figure on the shroud, the hands should be folded over the lower abdomen, not over the groin as shown in the shroud. Try this yourself: In order to get your hands to cover your groin in a lying position, you must hunch your shoulders forward and straighten your arms. The figure in the shroud clearly has his elbows bent and the shoulders are clearly not hunched forward.
The body to head ratio of the figure on the shroud is 8 to 1, while the normal ratio is 6 to 1. Thus the head is too small for the body.
Additionally, the facial features on the shroud show the same stylistic features found in medieval art (for example, an elongated nose).

6. Images nearly identical to the shroud can be and have been reproduced in a non-supernatural way. See:
<a href="http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/craig.pdf" target="_blank">http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/craig.pdf</a>

lpetrich

That's no counterargument, for these reasons:

* In the absence of water, many bacteria will go into a dormant phase.

* Consider what the bacteria will eat. They will eat the Shroud material, such as plant proteins from the linen, and animal fats and other such substances used in making the Shroud. This means that their carbon-isotope content will be similar to that of the Shroud proper, and their presence will not alter the Shroud's measured age.

So these pro-Shroud arguments are essentially grasping at straws.

Finally, I note an absence of open-mindedness toward the possibility that the Cloak of Kandahar is (1) genuine and (2) can work healing miracles. Why believe in the Shroud of Turin but not the Cloak of Kandahar?

bgponder

To all:
<img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />
This is great fun. I give you all a hand, the subject is being well argued, for the most part, IMO.
However, suppose the Shroud does date from ca. 30 CE? Why should we suppose it is the burial cloth of Jesus? I think it is reasonable to suppose that: Lots of guys got crucified. Lots of guys had beards and long hair. Lots of said guys were probably scorned and ridiculed and abused before, during and after, such events being public entertainment, etc., so scourge wounds and even the head wounds(big leap to say it was a crown of thorns that did it) and other body wounds aren't necessarily indicative of it being JC's shroud. Just some poor guy (hell, maybe Barabbas screwed up again) who bears the marks of abuse and crucifixion.

Of course I am not addressing the issue of how the Shroud, if it is a shroud, came to have the image it bears--does anyone know of info on ancient burial cloths in general and how they do or do not compare with the Turin Shroud?

Peace and Shrouded Cornbread Barry

Agnostichero

So, I guess it's safe to say that you consider your reasons for believing in the miraculous nature of the shroud to be more logical than those of other believers, right?

If so, what are the reasons that compel you to hold such a belief?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Tercel

Coincidentally, I am in the middle of reading a book which discusses the Shroud of Turin. I know very little about the Shroud beyond what I read in this thread and the book. The book is “Jesus the Great Debate” by Grant R. Jeffrey. Now Jeffrey appears to be a fundamentalist, which I can hardly approve of, and when he deals with subjects I am more knowledgeable of he occasionally performs the typical fundamental apologist trick of quoting only sources agreeable to his case and glossing over the dissenters. On the other hand the actual information he presents appears to be completely true - it’s merely that it’s presented selectively.
At anyrate, he makes a number of points regarding the Shroud which I find interesting. I would certainly be interested to hear responses/rebuttals to these points. Please bear in mind, I am presenting his argument rather than my own here.

Mortal Wombat writes:
Jeffrey makes a reasonable case for the possibility that the shroud is to be identified with the linen cloth bearing Christ’s face that was supposedly presented by the apostles Thomas and Thaddaeus to the King of Edessa and he further suggests that this is to be equated with the cloth known as the “Mandylion” -a cloth apparently bearing the face of Christ- which was discovered when floods uncovered a hidden vault in Edessa in 544AD. The Muslims conquered Edessa in the 7th century. In 944AD the Byzantine Emperor Romanus sent an army to Edessa to retrieve the cloth and after negotiation the Muslims returned the cloth. Apparently from then on, the cloth was displayed once a year to the public until the sacking of Constantine by the French Crusaders in 1203. The Shroud of Turin then mysteriously turns up in France in the hands of a French knight in 1357.
Certainly, on the face of it, Jeffrey’s history appears plausible - though as I mentioned I know nothing on the subject more than what Jeffrey writes.

Jeffrey writes “The authenticity of this manuscript [containing the supposed letter of Pierre d’Arcis] is in serious doubt because the document is not actually signed by the bishop; nor is there any confirmation from the 14th century that there was any controversy surrounding the exhibition of the Shroud. Papal documents refer to the de Charny family, the Lirey chapel, and its religious relics in favourable terms that give no indication that there was any controversy concerning the Shroud.”

Jeffrey makes three points here:
1) It has apparently been alleged by critics that all three laboratories broke some of the 14 protocols established to ensure the tests were carried out without fraud.
2) The fire that damaged the Shroud in 1532 would have produced further carbon, possibly skewing the results of the dating
3) The Bioplastic layer. Jeffrey quotes Dr Harry E Grove who’s apparently some carbon-dating specialist as saying “This is not a crazy idea... A swing of 1000 years would be a big change, but it’s not wildly out of the question.

Apart from Jeffrey’s book, two points have come to my attention which I’ve been wondering about:
4) I’ve heard it alleged that there was another C-14 dating done informally which gave a 1st century AD result.
5) I’ve heard it suggested that the late dates from the 3 labs may have resulted because the fibres might have come by mistake from a patch in the shroud rather than a piece of the original.

According to Jeffrey:
A group of tests in 1978 and 1980 “proved conclusively” via 12 different scientific tests that the Shroud “definitely contained blood”. In addition, it was apparently further proven that the blood was human blood because tests produced “fluorescent antigen-antibody reactions” (whatever that means).
With regard to McCrone, Jeffrey notes that McCrone claimed to have found minute amounts of F2O3 on the shroud and alleged this indicated a forgery since this is an ingredient in paint. Jeffrey responds:
1) No one else has managed to detect this F203
2) It is possible that this iron has come from the blood confirmed to exist on the Shroud.
3) F2O3 is a recent ingredient in paint and wasn’t used in medieval times. (Jeffrey seems to think this particular objection completely destroys McCrone’s argument)
4) Various different tiny paint particles were found on non-image portions of the Shroud which Jeffrey puts down to contamination over the centuries.

This is contrary to the information provided by Jeffrey who points to several professionals apparently being impressed by the anatomical accuracy of the figure, and doubting that Medieval artists had sufficient knowledge to produce such an anatomically accurate figure.
Btw I did your “Try this yourself” -guided by a helpful colour photo of the Shroud in Jeffrey’s book- and had no trouble lying in the depicted position. ~shrug~

This" target="_blank">http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/craig.pdf[/quote]This</a> is obviously an important point surrounding the Shroud controversy.
Jeffrey insists that no one has convincingly demonstrated how the image on the Shroud could be produced. I have also heard this alleged elsewhere.
Do you have any information about what other scientists think of the suggestions in the paper you quoted? (Clearly the writers of the paper think they are correct but that doesn’t prove anything)

In addition, Jeffrey makes the following points in favour of the Shroud’s authenticity:

1) The body is apparently depicted in the state of rigor mortis and “No medieval artist could have duplicated with such perfection what would happen to a crucified body in death and rigor mortis”.

2) ”Each of the different wounds [according to Jeffrey there are appox 120 on the body] acted in a characteristic fashion. Each bled in a manner which corresponded to the nature of the injury. The blood followed gravity in every instance” -Robert Bucklin, who is apparently a very experienced coroner and a member of the team of scientists who examined the Shroud. While Jeffrey comments, “[medieval artistry] was quite rudimentary. Artists had little understanding of anatomy or how blood actually flowed from wounds.”

3) Apparently Nasa developed something called a VP-8 analyser which can be used to analyse 3D images. It reveals a 3D image of a person (Jeffrey’s got a picture of the results) which looks pretty much about right to me. According to Jeffrey, the analyser reveals photographs or paintings as only 2D. (I’m not sure I entirely follow his explanation about why the difference)

4) Apparently there’s some speculation that the figure may have coins over it’s eyes (apparently a common burial custom) and apparently if you do some image-enhancement you can make out some of the details of the coins and they appear to match those minted under Pontius Pilate. Although, Jeffrey does admit the existence of these coins is inconclusive.

5) The Shroud is supposedly made of linen flax cloth composed of hand-spun threads woven on a loom in a 3 to 1 herringbone twill. Apparently this was a common weave in antiquity, especially ancient Syria, but it was unknown in early medieval Europe.

6) An analysis of pollen dust on the Shroud apparently yields a number of matches from the locations the Shroud is known to have been in recent centuries, as well as 13 matches with samples that were “very characteristic of or exclusive to the Negev and Dead Sea area”, including 6 pollen samples which matched plants which grow only in Jerusalem.

7) Apparently there are images of burial spices on the shroud and careful analysis of these reveals images of 28 species of herbs and plants on the shroud which are grown in Israel and around Jerusalem. Jeffrey also notes the majority of these plants blossom in spring - during the time of the Passover.

8) Dirt found on the shroud microscopically matches in composition with dirt found in the Jerusalem area.

9) The Shroud depicts Christ unclothed while all other paintings and statues have him wearing a modest loin-cloth. It would seem unlikely that a medieval artist familiar with other medieval works would have depicted Christ this way.

10) The image on the shroud is a negative. Obviously it isn’t usual to draw pictures in the negative. In the link above the writers suggest this was because the image was drawn in a dark tomb. This would seem to me a doubtful idea since it would seem far easier to move the body being drawn into sunlight rather than go to the trouble of trying to draw an accurate image by half-light.


Anyway, some of Jeffrey’s points certainly look valid on the face of it, so I would be interested in hearing comments and rebuttals by those who know more about this than I do.
Tercel

MortalWombat

Looks like this Jeffrey needs to get some facts straight:

Jeffrey makes three points here:
1) It has apparently been alleged by critics that all three laboratories broke some of the 14 protocols established to ensure the tests were carried out without fraud.

Which critics? The journal article I linked to was published in an internationally recognized, peer-reviewed scientific journal. The reviewers didn't seem to find any flaws in it. (By the way, having been published myself in the biological sciences, I can attest first hand how critical and nitpicky reviewers can be).

2) The fire that damaged the Shroud in 1532 would have produced further carbon, possibly skewing the results of the dating

WTF? Since when does fire produce carbon? If he is talking about soot from the fire, then he apparently didn't read the journal article which states that the samples were cleaned by various means to get rid of any contaminating wax, dust, etc.

3) The Bioplastic layer. Jeffrey quotes Dr Harry E Grove who’s apparently some carbon-dating specialist as saying “This is not a crazy idea... A swing of 1000 years would be a big change, but it’s not wildly out of the question."

Let me reiterate again what was mentioned earlier:
According to McCrone, a simple calculation shows that a weight of modern biological material necessary to raise the shroud date 1300 years would weigh twice as much as the shroud by itself. Physicist Thomas Pickett from the University of Southern Indiana agrees, remarking that in such a case "it would be fair to say that the linen was contaminating the bacteria."

Apart from Jeffrey’s book, two points have come to my attention which I’ve been wondering about:

4) I’ve heard it alleged that there was another C-14 dating done informally which gave a 1st century AD result.

References please. You should know that "heard" and "alleged" don't count for much around here.

5) I’ve heard it suggested that the late dates from the 3 labs may have resulted because the fibres might have come by mistake from a patch in the shroud rather than a piece of the original.

Oh, for crying out loud. You think the scientists that collected the samples and the church officials overseeing the collection wouldn't have noticed this?


With regard to the alleged blood on the shroud:
<a href="http://www.mcri.org/shroudupdate.html" target="_blank">http://www.mcri.org/shroudupdate.html</a>


Take-home message: Old blood is not red. It is brown to black in color. The "blood" on the shroud is red, like someone who doesn't know about forensics would put on if he were trying to make something look like it was blood.

Tercel

If the conclusion is as clear cut as they suggest then I would find it hard to imagine Dr H.E. Gove making the comment he did - given that he appears to be a <a href="http://spider.pas.rochester.edu/mainFrame/people/pages/Gove.html" target="_blank">very experienced</a> researcher in the field of Carbon Dating.

Don't be silly: I was hoping you would know what I'm talking about and tell me more. I'm not trying to prove the Shroud is genuine, I'm merely trying to find out more about it.

If the patch was very carefully done it would seem possible to miss it, though obviously unlikely. However if the date from different places on the Shroud came back as significantly earlier, then it would seem to suggest that the original samples were of a patch.

I have worked out that McCrone thinks it's paint. But I'm a critical thinker: I'm hardly going to believe something just because one person says so. What do other experts say? -Do they agree with McCrone? Do they think he's spouting utter crap?
As far as I can tell so far, agreement with McCrone seems to be far from universal.

If it was that cut and dried then everyone (save the wacko fundamentalists of course) would be very certain the shroud is a forgery. That does not appear to be the case, which suggests to me that McCrone is talking crap.

I note you haven't addressed Jeffrey's other points. Is it because you don't know anything about them or because you'd prefer to gloss over the evidence against your prefered verdict?

Tercel

[ March 07, 2002: Message edited by: Tercel ]</p>