Shroud of Turin Blog

Science by Press Release (Again). Another Editorial Response by Barrie Schwortz

Once again we are being bombarded by media claims about the Shroud of Turin, although this time admittedly from a pro-authenticity position by researcher Barbara Frale. However, the same rules must be applied to these claims as those applied to the recent claims by anti-authenticity researcher Luigi Garlaschelli.

Frale claims she has "discovered" inscriptions on the Shroud that prove it is authentic. However, she is basing her conclusions on the work done by French researchers Marion and Courage (published in the late 1990’s) which made these same claims. Rather than submitting her work to a journal that could review and verify her research, she too, like Garlaschelli, is publishing her work in a commercial book (and only in Italian). In fact, the recent press coverage seems to be mainly designed to promote the sale of that book. Once again, we are seeing "science" reported by press releases rather than in the conventional scientific literature.

As for the Marion and Courage inscriptions themselves, these were carefully evaluated from a linguistic point of view in 1999 by Shroud scholar and language expert, Mark Guscin, who published his results in the British Society for the Turin Shroud (BSTS) Newsletter in November 1999. That article, titled, ‘The "Inscriptions" on the Shroud,’ was ultimately reprinted on this website and can still be found at this link: http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/guscin2.pdf.

In the end, Guscin concluded:

"So none of the inscriptions which some claim to be able to see make enough grammatical or historical sense. This in itself is enough to doubt their very existence on the cloth, but the clinching point was evident in the presentation of the work in the symposium at Nice (1997). The slides that Marion and Courage used showed the areas of the cloth where they could see the inscriptions, and then the various optical treatments they had subjected it to, and finally the inscriptions written in over where they were meant to be. They were only visible on these last slides. There was absolutely nothing visible on any of the other slides. If the inscriptions made any kind of sense then maybe a more sympathetic attitude would be called for, but as it is I think the whole affair is yet another example of things being seen on the Shroud in an attempt to come up with something new."

To make matters worse, Marion and Courage based all of their imaging work solely on the 1931 Giuseppe Enrie photographs, which have sadly been the basis for a vast array of claims of objects or writings being found on the Shroud. I say "sadly" because the high resolution orthochromatic film used by Enrie, coupled with the extreme raking light he used when making the photographs, created an infinite number of patterns and shapes everywhere on the Shroud. Since orthochromatic film basically only records black or white, any mid-tone grays of the Shroud image were inherently altered or changed to only black or only white, in essence discarding much data and CHANGING the rest.

The grain structure of orthochromatic film itself is distinctive: It is not homogenous and consists of clumps and clusters of grain of different sizes that appear as an infinite myriad of shapes when magnified. It is easy to find anything you are looking for if you magnify and further duplicate the image onto additional generations of orthochromatic film, thus creating even more of these shapes.

Although Enrie’s images are superb for general views of the Shroud (they look great), they contain only a small part of the data that is actually on the Shroud so they are much less reliable for imaging research purposes and have a tendency to lead to "I think I see…" statements. I would feel much more confident if these claims were based on the full color images of the Shroud which contain ALL the data available.

As I used to try and explain to Fr. Francis Filas, who first "discovered" the rather dubious coin inscriptions over the eyes and who had enlarged and duplicated the Enrie images (through at least five generations – and always onto orthochromatic film), there is a fine line between enhancement and manipulation. Fr. Filas first presented his findings to the STURP team in 1979 and frankly, not one of the STURP imaging scientists accepted his claims.

Since everyone now has the ability to manipulate images on their desktop, the number of these claims is increasing. Sadly, unless one knows exactly what they are doing, spurious claims will undoubtedly be the final result. I personally must reject any claims of secondary objects or inscriptions on the Shroud, particularly if they are based solely on the Enrie images.

As for Barbara Frale’s conclusions, I have not read anything more than the press releases we all have seen, so once again, very little information has been provided and certainly not enough for anyone to get overly excited by these latest claims.

As I mentioned in my last editorial, with the Shroud going on public display again next year, I am not at all surprised by this type of media coverage, no matter which side of the authenticity issue is touted. In the end, there is nothing here that resembles good, empirical science, at least not so far. As one who was a member of the team that performed the only in-depth scientific examination of the Shroud ever permitted, I am bound and obligated to stick to the facts, no matter which side of the authenticity issue they fall on. Sadly, the real facts are rarely found in commercial books or press releases or television documentaries. Remember, these media venues have no standards of scientific accuracy to adhere to and consequently, they rarely do.

Barrie M. Schwortz
21 November 2009

Richard Dawkins discusses the Shroud in his latest book, The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, (September 22, 2009). Obviously, he is being selective with evidence. Here is what he says:

[Carbon dating] has revolutionized archaeological dating. The most celebrated example is the Shroud of Turin. Since this notorious piece of cloth seems mysteriously to have imprinted on it the image of a bearded crucified man, many people hoped it might hail from the time of Jesus. It turns up in the historical record in the mid-fourteenth century in France, and nobody knows where it was before that. It has been housed in Turin since 1578, under the custody of the Vatican since 1983. When mass spectrometry made it possible to date a tine sample of the shroud, rather than the substantial swathes that would have been needed before, the Vatican allowed a small strip to be cut off. The strip was divided in three parts and sent to three leading laboratories specializing in carbon dating, in Oxford, Arizona and Zurich. Working under conditions of scrupulous independence—not comparing notes—the three laboratories reported their verdicts on the date when the flax from which the cloth had been woven died. Oxford said ad 1200, Arizona 1304 and Zurich 1274. These dates are all—within normal margins of error—compatible with each other and with the date in the 1350s at which the shroud is first mentioned in history. The dating of the shroud remains controversial, but not for reasons that cast doubt on the carbon-dating technique itself. For example, the carbon in the shroud might have been contaminated by a fire, which is known to have occurred in 1532. I won’t pursue the matter further, because the shroud is of historical, not evolutionary, interest. It is a nice example, however, to illustrate the method, and the fact that, unlike dendrochronology, it is not accurate to the nearest year, only to the nearest century or so.

It is a well written book, and for people who enjoy the subject of evolution, as I do, it is a good read. But, as with theology, he is careless with material he doesn’t understand. Too bad.

In case you missed it, t he Discovery Channel will be rebroadcasting “Unwrapping the Shroud: New Evidence” on Sunday February 1 at 9 p.m. EST and again 4 hours later at 1 a.m.  (Check your local listings). It will be broadcast on Discovery’s regular and HD channels.

This Shroud of Turin documentary was first shown in December and received numerous positive reviews. Part of it was recorded at Ohio State University during a conference of about 100 scientists, historians and other researchers last August.

Discovery is featuring the broadcast on their home page and that is warranted. In my opinion, it is the best documentary ever made about the shroud, even better than the 2002 PBS special. Watch it!

It clearly explains why the previous carbon dating has been shown to be invalid by peer-reviewed scientific studies including the work of Raymond Roger and subsequently a team of nine scientists at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

If you have wondered about the shroud, this is an excellent production. Even if you are skeptical, it will help explain why many people believe it is genuine or are at least open to the possibility that it is.

Source: Unwrapping the Shroud: New Evidence to be Rebroadcast on the Discovery Channel

When Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince get into the news, as they have recently with their new book, The Masks of Christ: Behind the Lies and Cover-ups about the Life of Jesus, invariably new discussion arises about their proposal that Leonardo da Vinci created the image on the shroud using a medieval proto-camera.

Historian Dan Scavone comments on the Picknett and Prince argument that the image was made using a magic lantern, a simple projector, and light-sensitive chromium salts in an egg white medium.

The argument that history’s proto-photo was a life- sized photo(!) on a fourteen-foot cloth(!) that was a composite(!): double corpse with daubed-on blood and, in separate processes, Leonardo’s own head front and back, is a priori far-fetched. The premise is more demanding of faith than is the authenticity of the Shroud. I am led to ask why Leonardo has left us his self-portrait in red chalk and not his photo, and why he would use another body when Vasari notes that his own physique was near-perfect, and everybody knows his exorbitant vanity.

Scavone also writes:

This question leads the authors to another assertion: Leonardo was a member of a secret society called the Priory of Sion, which esteemed John the Baptist over Jesus. Therefore, the apparent disembodied head visible on the Shroud man was Leonardo’s cipher for the decapitated Baptist. Leonardo’s use of his own photo, they argue, was owing to his inordinate vanity, the same that prompted him to encode his own face in his famous portrait of Mona Lisa, wife of Francesco de Giocondo. This theory was confirmed by Lillian Schwartz of Bell Laboratories and Dr. Digby Quested of London, who discovered that it matched up perfectly with the major lines of Leonardo’s face in the above-mentioned self-portrait at age sixty. Picknett writes “Leonardo was capable of subtly building his own image into that of his masterpieces; if he had done so with the Mona Lisa, why not with the Shroud?”

There is also plenty of evidence from science that demonstrates that this is not a photograph. Were it, it would not produce a 3D image. A photograph contains only reflective light data. It does not contain spatial data.

Publishers Weekly Nonfiction Reviews – 10/13/2008 – The Masks of Christ: Behind the Lies and Cover-ups about the Life of Jesus Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince. Touchstone, $16 paper (448p) ISBN 978-1-4165-3166-1:

Picknett and Prince are the authors of controversial and provocative works, including The Templar Revelation and The Turin Shroud, that challenge popular assumptions and bring into question much of what many consider truth. In their newest volume, the authors strike boldly and unreservedly against what they see as the mythos that transformed the historical Jesus into a God, namely, the Christ. Studying the traditions and tensions that surrounded the early Christians and filtering these through the lens of skepticism, they create a picture that is both challenging and disturbing. If they are correct, then the Christ of today’s Christianity is a corruption of the mission of the rabbi Jesus of Nazareth. In the end, they conclude that “it seems that even Jesus himself would once have agreed that Christians have been worshipping the wrong Christ for two millenia.” Tough words. Readers will decide for themselves whether the authors prove their case. (Nov.)

Personally, I think Picknett and Prince are themselves mostly conspiracy theory authors, whose evidence is mostly motives and circumstance, sometimes real and sometimes imagined. You should read their books to see how incoherent their theories are.

On his blog, “Ssnot! – God Snot, Where God’s Not!”, Tatarize writes: 

So I am apparently retarded. I watched something called the Shroud of Turin which was get this, about the Shroud of Turin and completely bogus nonsense.

The argument went like this,

The Shroud of Turin carbon dates to the 1360s. The Shroud of Turin was first seen around 1325. However, there were other fake shrouds which purported to be the burial cloths of Christ which dated back to the 11th century. So the Shroud of Turin dates back to the 11th century. There’s also some hood thing which dates back to the 5th century so clearly the Shroud dates back to the fifth century (because both of them have blood) that look nothing alike in pattern (it seriously overlays them and they look nothing alike). And therefore the Shroud of Turin is 5th century. However, we also know that the Gospels say Jesus was crucified and we have this cloth and so this cloth clearly dates back to the first century.

The first thing is to misstate the facts with a bit of incredulous drama. Let’s begin with the first sentence, “The Shroud of Turin carbon dates to the 1360s.” In fact, the results of carbon dating undertaken in 1988 estimated the date of the cloth between 1260 and 1390 C.E. This was reported in Nature, a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

If we focus on peer-reviewed scientific journals, which is appropriate, we discover that those carbon dating tests have been roundly discredited. One need only refer to Thermochimica Acta (Volume 425, Issues 1-2 , 20 January 2005, Pages 189-194) and Chemistry Today (July/August 2008) to understand why. Robert Villarreal who led a team of nine scientists at the prestigious Los Alamos National Laboratory, using some of the most advanced methods and spectra tools, confirmed the findings in those journal accounts. He stated that the sample area was significantly unlike the rest of the shroud. In other words it is almost certain that the shroud itself was not carbon dated.

Christopher Ramsey, the current head of the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit, a lab that participated in the original carbon 14 dating of the Shroud, states on the Oxford website (posted in March of 2008) that because of new information “further research is certainly needed.” He went on to say:

It is equally important that experts assess and reinterpret some of the other evidence. Only by doing this will people be able to arrive at a coherent history of the Shroud which takes into account and explains all of the available scientific and historical information.

Atheists are quick to point out, correctly so, that many Christians ignore scientific and historical evidence, particularly when it comes to evolution. Yet, some Atheists do exactly this themselves. It is fine to believe that the shroud is not the real thing, but do so with facts that are correct. Draw conclusions from those facts. Make a good case. Don’t be a fundamentalist. We don’t know in certain terms the age of the shroud or its provenance. To assert that it is fake in the absence of real evidence takes a leap of faith no less than it does to assert that it is real.

Let’s look at some other points from the posting:

1. “The Shroud of Turin was first seen around 1325.”  — Actually the correct statement is that the earliest known written record of the shroud in Western Europe was in 1349 C.E.
   
2. “However, there were other fake shrouds which purported to be the burial cloths of Christ which dated back to the 11th century.” — Let’s drop the word “fake” unless there is evidence to support that little bit of well poisoning. There is a drawing of what seems to be the shroud that dates to 1194 (late 12th century). There are documented descriptions of a burial shroud (not plural) from 944 that might be the Shroud of Turin. There is good but imperfect historical evidence that connects the dots between 944 and 1349. As with almost all records of artifacts from antiquity there are gaps in reliable documentation. This is normal. But one thing that seems quite certain, the same cloth documented in Constantinople in 944 is the same cloth that existed in the ancient city of Edessa in 544 C.E. Any trace that goes back beyond that, from a historical point of view ceases to be hypothesis and rests on the backs of legend and difficult-to-assess ancient writings.  So we really can’t say. Possibility and plausibility is the best that we can do at this time.
   
3. “There’s also some hood thing which dates back to the 5th century so clearly the Shroud dates back to the fifth century (because both of them have blood) that look nothing alike in pattern (it seriously overlays them and they look nothing alike).” — I suspect that Tatarize is referring to the Sudarium of Oviedo. The earliest plausible date for this cloth is the seventh century not the fifth. Records suggest that its journey to its present location began in 644 C.E. when Persians under Chosroes II invaded Jerusalem. To protect the Sudarium, it was moved out of the city to safety. We are uncertain of its route to Spain. It may have been first taken to Alexandria along with numerous other relics (real or otherwise, and stored in a chest or “ark”) and from there, in succeeding years, along the coast of North Africa ahead of advancing armies. Some historians have suggested a more direct sea route to Spain, but forensic pollen evidence indicates that the Sudarium was in North Africa, just as the presence of other pollen spores evidences that it was at one time in the Jerusalem environs. Whatever the route, we know that after it arrived in Spain, it was kept in Toledo for about 75 years. For some time after it arrived, it was in the custody of an early-medieval scholar, Isidore of Seville. Then in 718, to protect it from Arab armies, which had invaded Spain only seven years earlier, it was moved northward with fleeing Christians. In 761, Oviedo became the capital of a northern, well-defended enclave of Christians on the Iberian Peninsula and it was to this city that the Sudarium was brought for safekeeping. It has been in Oviedo ever since. As for the bloodstains matching the patterns of bloodstains on the shroud, it seems that they do. No the patterns don’t look alike. That isn’t what pattern matching is all about. It is at the margins, relative placement and the juxtaposition of certain features that the patterns match. It is fine to argue that they don’t match, but that argument requires more substance than a vague doesn’t look alike. “I think I see” and “I think I don’t see” are the weakest types of scientific argument: the tools of fundamentalist thinking.
   
4. “However, we also know that the Gospels say Jesus was crucified and we have this cloth and so this cloth clearly dates back to the first century.” — This point doesn’t make any sense. That is not what the BBC special said.
   
5. “The carbon 14 dating must be wrong! Perhaps some carbon-14 mixed into the linen via carbon monoxide. *tests* — Nope that doesn’t work at all. Still, it’s a mystery!” — That was a major weakness in the BBC documentary. So far as I know, only John Jackson of Colorado Springs thinks this is a possible explanation. Not a single scientist that I know agrees with him. But, yes, the carbon dating is wrong.
   
6. “I am utterly astounded at how many hoaxes people buy into lock stock and barrel.” — I agree. But it can cut both ways.
    
7. “In the end, I lost an hour of my time watching . . .” — Yes, I think you did.  And more time writing about it with a complete lack of understanding. Too bad.

Shroud research needs skeptics who will engage the science and the history of this unsolved mystery. That ultimately is the best way for Christians and Atheists alike to resolve the truth about this cloth.

RoyalBeatz07 thinks he has it figured out.

So the choices are simple, 1) Jesus Christ is the image on the Shroud of Turin and is left-handed! 2) Jesus Christ is the image on the Shroud and was desecrated by his followers! 3) Left-hander Leonardo Da Vinci is the image on the Shroud and he posed naturally. 4) A left-handed unknown individual is the image on the Shroud. 5) The experts can’t tell which side is the up side of the Shroud. Isn’t it interesting that a left-hander noticed it? When all the experts have looked at it, and run out of ideas, then it’s time for a left-hander to look at it. We see things that right-handers miss.

There is also the possibility that contrary to what RoyalBeatz07 thinks, Jesus’ followers accidentally put his left hand over his right even if (and this is arguable and speculative) it was the wrong thing to do. Filed under something to think about someday.

Let’s look a bit more at what Chet Raymo wrote (see Francis Bacon and the Shroud of Turin):

In the meantime, an objective observer should assume that the Shroud is a 14th-century religious icon or outright fraud. That is when the Shroud first appears in the historical record, and that is when carbon-dating assigns its origin. It was a time when religious icons were commonly manufactured or assumed. Why evoke miracles when a perfectly natural explanation is more plausible?

Who is invoking miracles?  Among all of the scientists I know who are studying the shroud, I know of no one who is invoking miracles to explain the carbon dated age of the cloth.

We’ve already said why we should not assume a scientific conclusion in the light of reasonable doubt about evidence. Assuming in this context is not scientific. But what about how Raymo tries to tie up his argument. Look at the second sentence: “That is when the Shroud first appears in the historical record, and that is when carbon-dating assigns its origin.”

Scientists rightly decry the use of historical evidence as scientific input. But that is where it should stop. They decry it, too, when history seems to contradict scientific conclusions. If there is disagreement, then science is the arbiter. In its most rigid form it is called scientism. Science is always right, they tell us. Raymo does it one better. He is using history, because it is convenient to do so. “I’m right,” he implies, “history supports what I say about the carbon dating.”

But does it?

First, let’s add a few words (in bold) to make part of his statement more accurate. Then let’s see if it is meaningful:

That is when the Shroud first appears in the existing and known historical record in Western Europe.

Museums are filled with items from antiquity whose earliest known records are much later. It is absurd to try and make a rational correlation between the dates of first written records about an item and its actual provenance. Moreover, there is actually a wealth of information that suggests that earlier records do exist and what we are dealing with is a gap:

There is a drawing of a shroud from 1192 (nearly a century earlier than the earliest carbon 14 date) that is clearly identifiable from particular features as the current Shroud of Turin. It is well known that a cloth with a purported image of Jesus existed in Edessa as documented by Eusebius of Caesarea in the early 4th century. According to Eusebius (and this must be considered legend) the cloth was brought to Edessa by the apostle Thomas or the disciple Thadeus (of the 70). In 544 a cloth with an image thought to be of Jesus was found concealed above a gate in the city walls of Edessa. That cloth was transferred to Constantinople on August 14, 944. It was, at that time, described as a full-length burial cloth with an image of Jesus and bloodstains. Following the sacking of Constantinople in 1204, it became the property of Othon de la Roche, French Duke of Athens and Thebes. He sent it to his castle home in the town of Besançon, France in 1207. At Eastertide, it was removed from castle and displayed in the Besançon Cathedral until the cathedral was destroyed by fire in March of 1349. Any records that might have existed may have been burned in that fire as all church records were destroyed. In that same year, Geoffroy de Charny, a French knight married Jeanne de Vergy, a grand-niece of Othon de la Roche, and delivered the shroud to the canons of Lirey, thereby creating the earliest extant record in Western Europe.

Now, given Raymo’s invocation of Francis Bacon (as I explained in a previous post) and his lack of desire to examine the evidence, we might be suspicious that he is unwilling to believe the evidence or is unaware of it. He tells us that he just isn’t interested in reading it.

For a long time it was the historical evidence that caused many people to doubt the carbon dating — not the miracle straw-man argument Raymo voices. Now it is the overwhelming scientific evidence that what was tested was not part of the shroud, probably because it way a repaired part of the shroud.  

If that wasn’t enough, Raymo drops in, “It was a time when religious icons were commonly manufactured or assumed.” That is certainly true. It is irrelevant. It’s an emotional argument full of irrationality. Some relics emerged during this time that were, in fact, real relics. History tells us why and that is why the shroud, if it is real or much older. The marauding, thieving French and Venetians of the Fourth Crusades brought numerous relics and treasures back to Europe. Over the years they began to emerge and for the first time they were documented in Western European records.

It is far better for a scientist to say we don’t know and to advance a hypotheses than to ask people to assume science is right despite evidence to the contrary.

• (Crossposted at One Episcopalian on Faith)

There is a wonderful early 3rd century text called the Acts of Thomas (not to be confused with the Gospel of Thomas). Many scholars argue it is Gnostic and the Catholic Church has called it heretical. But that does not diminish its significance for historians. It is the legendary story — true, partly true or false — of the apostle Thomas’ (Judas Thomas or Thomas Judas Didymus) mission to India and his martyrdom. Authorship is often attributed to the Gnostic poet Bardesane of Edessa, perhaps as early as 216 CE).

Within the Acts of Thomas is an extraordinary Syriac poem, The Hymn of the Pearl, (also known as the Hymn of the Robe of Glory and the Hymn of the Soul). The poem is thought to be older than the Acts of Thomas. It is inserted in different places in different versions of the Acts found among early Greek and Syriac Christian traditions.

Within the Hymn of the Pearl there are a few lines of poetry that are intriguing. These lines, referred to as the “two images segment,” seem to have been inserted into the hymn. This is one common translation of those lines with optional interpretations (other translations appear after the fold):

Suddenly, I saw my image on my [burial] garment like in a mirror

Myself and myself through myself [or myself facing outward and inward]

As though divided, yet one likeness

Two images: but one likeness of the King [of kings]

What could these lines possibly mean? The poem does not offer a clue.

If we infer from the context of the poem that the first-person speaker of these lines is Jesus (contextually justifiable in a stylistic sense and not a literal sense) then these words might be a wonderful description of the Shroud of Turin, Jesus’ purported burial shroud.

On the shroud, we find two images: one facing outward and one facing inward, though the modern interpretation is usually expressed as a front and back image.

This hypothesis is reinforced by the Legend of Abgar, as related by Eusebius of Caesarea in the early 4th century. According to Eusebius, a cloth bearing an image of Jesus was brought to Edessa by the apostle Thomas or the disciple Thadeus (of the biblical 70).

The words, “like in a mirror,” are puzzling. Several interpretations have been suggested: 1) The image is a collimated image as is, indeed, a mirror. 2) The image is reversed left to right, also an attribute of an image in a mirror. 3) The image is life size. 4) The image on the shroud is a negative and this is a primitive attempt to describe negativity.

There is little question that the Hymn of the Pearl, originated in the Mesopotamian city of Edessa. And it was in Edessa, in 544 AD, that the Edessa Cloth was discovered — the cloth that we now know, from solid historical records, was a full burial cloth in which . . .

You can see [not only] the figure of a face, but [also] the figure of the whole body.

-- The Codex Vossianus Latinus

The Rev. Albert Dreisbach, an Episcopal priest who studied the Shroud of Turin for many years asks us . . .

to ponder what these seemingly strange expressions might mean, if they do NOT have reference to the Turin Shroud . . .

Read the rest of this entry »

It starts with this:

So… since it didn’t pop up until the 1300’s… whatcha think of this “cloth that was the burial shroud of christ”?  Do you think it’s real? Sham? Somewhere in between?

It gets interesting when somebody calling himself OrthodoxyUSA chimes in. He is well informed. See Shroud of Turin – Christian Forums