NEWS: Turin Relic No Longer Shrouded in Mystery

Drawing on a method previously used by skeptics to attack authenticity claims regarding the Shroud, Science & Vie got an artist to do a bas-relief – a sculpture that stands out from the surrounding background – of a Christ-like face.

A scientist then laid out a damp linen sheet over the bas-relief and let it dry, so that the thin cloth was molded onto the face.

Using cotton wool, he then carefully dabbed ferric oxide, mixed with gelatin, onto the cloth to make blood-like marks.

Nixon said:
NEWS: Common Sense Lost on Christians

In 1988, scientists carried out carbon-14 dating of the delicate linen cloth and concluded that the material was made some time between 1260 and 1390.
Their study prompted the then-archbishop of Turin, where the Shroud is stored, to admit that the garment was a hoax. But the debate sharply revived in January this year.

nisamcp said:
Didn't DaVinci make this as some kind of joke?

That's what my Roman Catholic HS taught me ages ago....

skeptik said:

The Catholic Church admitted more than 15 years ago that the Shroud is a hoax. This test does not need to prove that. All it does is to disprove the claim that the effect couldn't have been produced through painting.

Which it does in spades.

Raymond Rogers says his research and chemical tests show the material used in the 1988 radiocarbon analysis was cut from a medieval patch woven into the shroud to repair fire damage.

It was this material that was responsible for an invalid date being assigned to the original shroud cloth, he argues.

"The radiocarbon sample has completely different chemical properties than the main part of the shroud relic," said Mr Rogers, who is a retired chemist from Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, US.

in 1389 the Bishop of Troyes appealed to Clement VII, the Avignon Pope then recognized in France, to put a stop to the scandals connected to the Shroud preserved at Lirey. It was, the Bishop declared, the work of an artist who some years before had confessed to having painted it but it was then being exhibited by the Canons of Lirey in such a way that the populace believed that it was the authentic shroud of Jesus Christ.

skeptik said:
From the Catholic Encyclopedia

So, definitely a forgery, but not by Leonardo, who wasn't born until 1452.

how does that story account for the edessa cloth?

...just because someone admits to something doesn't make it true.

FreakPirate said:
I don't really understand what makes this cloth so damned important. At best it proves that some guy who looked like Jesus MAY have looked was dead at some point in the past. Is there something about it I'm missing?

lostarchitect said:

it's more the fact that it has been handed down and revered for such a long time, combined with the image on it that makes it's mysterious origins intesresting.

Nixon said:
NEWS: Common Sense Lost on Christians

lostarchitect said:

how does that story account for the edessa cloth?

...just because someone admits to something doesn't make it true.

[Edited on Jun 25, 2005 by lostarchitect]

(by at least 1506) A certain difficulty was caused by the existence elsewhere of other Shrouds similarly impressed with the figure of Jesus Christ and some of these cloths, notably those of Besançon, Cadouin, Champiègne, Xabregas, etc., also claimed to be the authentic linen sindon provided by Joseph of Arimathea.
(and the continuation of the paragraph from the earlier post)
The pope, without absolutely prohibiting the exhibition of the Shroud, decided after full examination that in the future when it was shown to the people, the priest should declare in a loud voice that it was not the real shroud of Christ, but only a picture made to represent it. The authenticity of the documents connected with this appeal is not disputed. Moreover, the grave suspicion thus thrown upon the relic is immensely strengthened by the fact that no intelligible account, beyond wild conjecture, can be given of the previous history of the Shroud or its coming to Lirey. (emphasis and parentheses added)

skeptik said:

But to answer your question: it doesn't account for the Edessa cloth. So what. There is no legitimate evidence (though it's a popular story) that the two are one and the same.

Also from the catholic encyclopedia:

Please note that this is in reference to the shroud from Lirey, which is indisputably the shroud now at Turin.

The fact is that in Medieval times, religious artifacts like this were manufactured frequently in order to encourage and awe the faithful. There is no reason to assume this is any different.

[Edited on Jun 25, 2005 by skeptik]

lostarchitect said:


sure, but i have no reason to take the catholic encyclopedia at face value, either. maybe it might be better to ask, if this isn't the edessa cloth, where is it?

skeptik said:

Not really.
If there is no reason besides mere conjecture to believe it's the same thing, then there is no requirement to account for its whereabouts. Perhaps it went back into the wall it was "discovered" in. Perhaps it was destroyed in a fire or flood sometime in the intervening years.
And besides which, if the Edessa cloth was a full-body burial shroud, why is there absolutely no contemporary mention of it as anything more than a facial portrait.

Remember, during most of the history of the Edessa Cloth Story, it was claimed to be Veronica's Veil, which would have absolutely precluded it being a full-body image, since Veronica only wiped Jesus' face.

FreakPirate said:
I don't really understand what makes this cloth so damned important. At best it proves that some guy who looked like Jesus MAY have looked was dead at some point in the past. Is there something about it I'm missing?