Shroud of Turin Blog

Carbon dating on a mummy at the Georges Labit Museum in Toulouse, France showed that it was from about 1800 B.C.

The tests had laid waste to the opinion of some Egyptologists that it was only from around 700 B.C. That is a whopping difference of more than a thousand years. Thirty-eight hundred years old was the verdict. That should have been the end of it. But it wasn’t. Scientists had tested the mummy’s linen wrappings to arrive at the earlier date.  In 2009, only months before Dawkins’ book was published, scientist tested some bone taken from the mummy’s spine and concluded that the mummy was from about 700 B.C. after all. So, which is it? It is hard to say until someone can explain why the carbon dating of the linen cloth was so different than it was for the bone material. The floors of carbon dating laboratories are littered with such anomalies. In many cases these anomalies are eventually explained. Some have not been.

See: The Mummy at the Georges Labit Museum in Toulouse in chapter The Flat Earth Society

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.

John Dodge over at smartplanet has written a level-headed article entitled So what if the Shroud of Turin is a fake. I have no problem with his skepticism. I do with perception of facts. I once shared his skepticism about the Shroud. No longer. But I do share the so what: I’ve inserted some comments in bold:

In 2004, a 10-year-old cheese sandwich with a likeness of the Virgin Mary reportedly sold for $28,000 on eBay. And on slow news days, local TV stations report Virgin Mary sightings on fogged windows and in cloud formations.

Many like me discount such fantasies as ridiculous, but what counts is the meaning of the cheese sandwich in the eyes of the beholder. Quite frankly, the site of a freshly grilled cheese sandwich makes me hungry.

That brings us to the Shroud of Turin, which was in the news again last week. I don’t pay a huge amount of attention to such things, but if someone asked me if the shroud was really Christ’s burial garb, I’d say “nonsense.”

Last week, Italian chemist and professor Luigi Garlaschelli also said “nonsense” after he recreated a shroud using the image of one of his students.

The Shroud next to Garlaschelli’s student (r.) credit: publicbroadcasting.net

“Luigi Garlaschelli created a copy of the shroud by wrapping a specially woven cloth over one of his students, painting it with pigment, baking it in an oven (which he called a “shroud machine”) for several hours, then washing it,” according to a CNN story (see pic). “Then for the sake of completeness I have added the bloodstains, the burns, the scorching because there was a fire in 1532,” Garlaschelli said.

He claims his tests prove that some of the unique characteristics of the shroud such as the absence of paint or pigment can be replicated by an artist or his case, a scientist. Shroud defenders have long argued the shroud cannot be recreated.

Two points: 1) Garlaschelli was not able to create an image that has the same chemistry, physical properties and unique so-called 3D (height-field) characteristics of the image. He admits this. It looks something like the Shroud but that is not the point. 2) Only some Shroud defenders have made the claim that the image cannot be recreated. Most are more tempered saying that, so far, no one has been able to reproduce the images. Dodge would have us believe that authenticity proponents are “God-of-the-gaps” sorts. Not so.

Garlaschelli, also a professor at the University of Pavia,  is not the first to debunk the shroud. In 1988, three universities conducted carbon dating tests and concluded it was created between 1260 and 1380. That, of course, set off a firestorm. And some like RomanCathlicbog.com have rushed to discredit Garlaschelli’s findings, claiming he was funded by an “Italian association of atheists and agnostics.”

I agree that the funding issue is immaterial. In fact, the fact that he is a member of the funding organization is immaterial.

As for the carbon dating, the statement is true but misleading. In 2005, a peer-reviewed paper published in a scientific journal concluded that the tests were invalid. Now, you don’t have to accept that. But you should not ignore it. Mention it or mention it and explain why you disagree. You might want to note that the work was done by someone who was trying to defend the 1988 dating. You might want to mention that this work was later independently confirmed by a forensic material analyst at Georgia Tech as well as by a team of nine chemists at Los Alamos.

Actually, the official Vatican position on the shroud is quite rationale, focusing more on what the it means to believers rather than defending its authenticity.

“For the believer, what counts above all is that the shroud is a mirror of the Gospel. We cannot escape the idea that the image it presents has such a profound relationship with what the Gospels tell of Jesus’ passion and death, that every sensitive person feels inwardly touched and moved beholding it,” Pope John Paul II wrote of his 1998 visit to the Turin Cathedral where it is housed.

Agree!

John Paul II also said that proving or disproving its authenticity should be left to scientists. Who can argue with that?

Agree!

I have no problem with people believing what they want and I know faith has served powerfully in the lives of many. What the shroud represents is more important than whether it’s real on not. Unless someone invents a time machine so we can get a `film at 11′  eyewitness account, it will never be definitively proven one way or the other although the carbon tests seem pretty convincing.

I also think that heathen Garlaschelli who confesses to being a non-believer is onto something. As for the cheese sandwich, I have a hard time swallowing it, but someone willing to pay 28 grand didn’t.

So what if the Shroud of Turin is a fake – SmartPlanet

Russ Breault writes:

There have been numerous attempts to replicate the Shroud. Another one was announced recently by an Italian scientist presenting at a paranormal conference. It appears to be just the latest version of many such attempts and was funded by the Italian Association of Atheists and Agnostics.

As of this writing all the details of their image are not yet available. According to press reports, they took a volunteer, covered him in red ochre pigment along with a mild acid solution. The body was wrapped. After leaving an imprint from the ochre it was heated to simulate aging and then washed to remove the pigment. The result is an image that looks Shroud-like. The claim is that by using materials available during the Middle Ages, it proves the Shroud is a medieval fake. Is that the case?

One of the things proven by numerous tests is that pigment is not responsible for the image. We won’t know what they have really achieved until they make samples available to be analyzed under a microscope. The problem with all such attempts that use reverse engineering to re-create a Shroud-like image is that it is not a credible argument. We can make an artificial diamond that looks real, but it is still not an authentic diamond. Making something that looks like the Shroud does not prove it is a medieval fraud.

The qualifying criteria are very specific. The image must be so superficial that it penetrates only the top two microfibers, about the depth of a single bacterium. There can be no coloration beyond the crowns of the fibers and no image on the side of the fibers or under the fibers. For this we need a microscope to validate. The image must demonstrate to be an accurate negative image and also possess accurate distance information where parts of the body still reveal an image even though not in direct contact with the cloth of distances up to 4 cm. However this is only half the problem. There are two sets of images: body image and blood image.

Interestingly, there is no image under the blood meaning that the order of events is blood first followed by image. This is the correct sequence if authentic but nearly impossible for an artist. As such, according to the article, they added blood after the image was already created. That fact alone invalidates their claim.

Another interesting fact is that the blood on the Shroud is not painted blood. They didn’t just go out and kill a goat and paint the blood on the cloth. The blood chemistry is very specific. It is blood from actual wounds. We do not see whole blood, we see blood clot exudates, blood that oozed out of the wound. There are very few red blood cells because they appear to be on the body forming the clot. We see blood components such as bile, bilirubin, heme, serum but not whole blood. Some blood flowed before death but most after death. The side wound and the blood that puddled across the small of the back are post-mortem blood flows…blood that flowed after death and show a clear separation of blood and serum. Even the scourge marks on the back reveal a distinctive halo effect under UV light, where the blood contracted leaving a ring of clear blood serum. There is also evidence of gravity, that these wounds were inflicted while the body was upright. The blood also has a high bilirubin content which would have been released into the blood under conditions of severe stress. Bilirubin has a bright red color which also explains why much of the blood on the Shroud still has a reddish tint instead of turning black which generally occurs with old blood.

There is more evidence on the part of forensic specialists and coroners that indicate a body was in the Shroud and the body died from the wounds that stain the cloth. How the image got there is anyone’s guess but one thing is for sure, the blood was on the cloth before the image. This one fact alone negates this recent claim of successfully faking the Shroud image.

Russ Breault is a lecturer and researcher on the Shroud of Turin. He has participated in numerous international conferences and is President of the Shroud of Turin Education Project, inc. He conducts multi-media presentations at colleges, univeristies and churches across the country including Auburn, West Point and Duke. He has addressed the American Chemical Society and has appeared in numerous national documentaries.

Is the Shroud of Turin a Fake?

According to Tricia Ro at Hollywood Reporter:

The latest character to go 3D? Jesus Christ.

Grizzly Adams Prods. is doing a 3D remaster of "The Fabric of Life," a docudrama that examines physical evidence of Jesus’ resurrection.

European theatrical release of the film is timed to coincide with the first public viewing in more than a decade of the Shroud of Turin, believed by millions of Christians to be the burial cloth of Jesus. The shroud’s bloodstained surface is emblazoned with a negative image of the undistorted front and back sides of a man who appears to have been severely beaten and crucified.

Using laser technology, a team of Dutch scientists was able to convert two-dimensional photographic negatives of the image on the shroud into an anatomically accurate hologram of the crucified man. The image will be able to be viewed in 3D in the new version of "Fabric," which is targeted for release in April.

‘Fabric of Life’ revived in 3D

Italian Scientist Reproduces Humans Using Materials Available in the Middle Ages Thus Proving that the First Humans Were Manmade

ROME (Reuters) – An Italian scientist says he has reproduced a human being, a feat that he says proves definitively that humans, which Christians say are made in the image of God, are medieval fakes produced using materials and techniques that were available in the middle ages.

A scientifically-made mannequin, measuring 6 feet, 2 inches tall, looks eerily like Luigi Garlaschelli, the scientist himself.

"We have shown that is possible to reproduce something which has the same characteristics as a human being," Luigi Garlaschelli, who is due to illustrate the results at a conference on the para-normal this weekend in northern Italy, said on Monday.

A professor of organic chemistry at the University of Pavia, Garlaschelli made available to Reuters the paper he will deliver and the accompanying comparative photographs.

The mannequin resembles the back and front of a bearded man with long hair with his arms crossed on his chest. He has two hands, two feet and a single head with two eyes and two ears.

Since Darwin, evolutionary biologists have believed that humans evolved along with other animals and plants from a common ancestor. But scientists have thus far been at a loss to explain why some people smoke cherry flavored pipe tobacco since it offers no evolutionary advantage.

Garlaschelli, who received funding for his work by an Italian association of atheists and agnostics, expects people to contest his findings. “They didn’t believe me when I reproduced the Shroud of Turin, Quantum physics and the Egyptian pyramids, thus proving that they, too, were medieval creations. “

“It works for me,” said PZ Myers, pastor of the Morris, Minnesota Pharyngula Church of Fundamentalist Atheists. “I was getting tired of evolution, anyway. I believe everything I read in the newspapers so long as it doesn’t conflict with my beliefs. If humans are manmade, that’s fine. I still don’t need to believe in God.”

Garlaschelli said the funding for his work by his own organization of like-minded atheists had no effect on his results. "I always start with results," he said. “That way, I always arrive at the desired conclusion.”

Opinion piece from My Catholic Source:

Does the New Replica Disprove the Authenticity of the Shroud of Turin?

By: Ed Kelley

I love it when you can smell the bias right up front: "Shroud of Turin Once Again Proven a Fake". What can you expect from CNN and from a San Francisco "alternative" daily column by Tommi Avicolli-Mecca, author of something called "Smash the Church, Smash the State: The Early Years of Gay Liberation"? Hardly unbiased sources, are they?

As I look at the pictures, and read the articles one thing is for certain – they have made a cloth that looks like the face on the Shroud, but so far, that is it. The Shroud has undergone decades of research – it is the most studied relic in history – and yet there are still many characteristics that scientists cannot explain or reproduce. Several attempts to make a "copy" of the Shroud have scientifically turned out to be ridiculously simple by comparison to the actual Shroud. Some attempts to reproduce the Shroud have contained a few of the characteristics of the Shroud. Others have contained different characteristics of the Shroud. But none have even scratched the surface of the hundreds of known, unique and scientifically proven qualities that the Shroud holds. Most of these authentic characteristics would not be identifiable except for the many, very sophisticated modern tests that it has undergone. No attempted reproduction of the Shroud has passed more than a few of these scrupulous exams.

Only time will tell as to how accurate a copy this will turn out to be. I have rarely heard of any reproduction attempt that has continued to be studied after it has been initially revealed and held up as a "true copy" of the Shroud. Most likely, like all the other "explanations", it will turn out to be hollow ‘gotcha’ attempt, a "Hah!, look what we have done! We have created a copy that ‘proves’ the Shroud is a fake." Then, after the 15 minutes of fame has worn off, this fake will be tossed into the scrap-heap of other so-called proofs that go no further in their scientific study than the highly flawed radio carbon dating which "proved" the Shroud was a medieval fake based on a sample cut from an area still disputed as not being part of the original Shroud fabric.

The true Shroud is a photographic negative and the pictures shown in recent articles appear to show an image similar to the Shroud. Let’s assume that the pictures in the articles exhibit the same photographic negative characteristic as that of the Shroud. That makes it similar to the Shroud in one instance. The scientific community and their biased media accomplices should be asking if it also projects 3D characteristics under the VP-8 Image Analyzer. The Shroud does. Only one other "copy" has shown some 3D characteristics, albeit very distorted and disfigured. The Shroud’s 3D image is surprisingly detailed and clear.

They used pigmented paint, heating and washed the cloth afterwards to leave a stain on the cloth fibers. They suggest that the Shroud was similarly painted and that the pigment simply wore off over the centuries. Not true. The Shroud cloth’s fibrils, the fine strands of material that form the woven-together threads of the cloth, are not stained. The fibrils that make the image have decomposed at a more accelerated rate that the rest of the cloth fibers, making the sepia colored image that can only be seen at distance. There is no seepage of materials or stains. The image does not go beyond the uppermost strands of the threads. How can these scientists conclude that this was made by "paint" when there is no stain, just discolored fibrils? Are the threads of the cloth they made stained through the threads with the pigment they used? I’ll bet they are. An important note that frustrates scientists skeptical of the true Shroud – the only test that they have come up with that simulates rapid decomposition of the fibrils similar to Shroud – is enormous bursts of radiation, causing the exposed (upper fibrils on each thread) to decompose at a more rapid rate. (Can you say "Resurrection"?)

Other materials such as pollens that are only found in specific geographic regions that put the cloth in specific geographic areas are also on the Shroud. They did not "wear off over time" so why would we assume that pigment would be completely gone?

Why are there descriptions and drawings that show specific details on the true Shroud that predate any modern dating methods?

Is their image still visible when backlit or does it disappear like the image on the Shroud, indicating that there is no actual material comprising the image such as paint or stain?

Recently, scientists who work with and test the actual Shroud found that image information is on the topmost fibers of the other side of the cloth. But there is no image the fibers in the center of the threads. Can these scientists explain this? Get back to me when you have finished putting an image on the other side of your shroud and clean up the likely stained interiors of all the threads on your image. Make sure they line up exactly. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

Why did they put blood on after they made the image? Tests show that there is no image under the blood stains on the Shroud, indicating that the cloth was touching the body before the image on it was created. Please remake your image and put on real human blood before heating and washing the cloth.

One could go on endlessly about how remedial an attempt this is at actual scientific study. File this under "One more critical self-proclaimed scientist attempts to make a Shroud copy and ends up looking the fool". We may never know for sure exactly how the image was made on the Shroud of Turin. But one thing is certain – few other relics are as truly miraculous as the Shroud. And, if it is a fake, and all of these critics have "proven" that it is, why are they still trying so hard?

MyCatholicSource.com News & Opinion Page

Moscow, October 6, Interfax – The Russian Orthodox Church does not intend to change its view of the Shroud of Turin after a group of scientists at the University of Pavia, Italy, stated that the Shroud was a fake.

"The scientists make their research and arrive at different conclusions, however, the Church is not in the position to approve or disprove anything. This is the authority of scientists who use different methods which always are limited in their capacities," head of communication service of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Relations Priest Georgy Zavershinsky said Tuesday to Interfax-Religion.

According to him, the Church’s attitude to scientific discoveries and achievements always takes into account that "eventually, anything may change, and the research work may continue, and today’s conclusions may be challenged."

Thus, Father Georgy noted that the attitude of the Russian Orthodox Church to the Shroud "remained unchanged, along with its standpoint on the previous research which had proved that the Shoud of Turin is not a fake."

Fr. Georgy favours the worshipping of the Shroud by believers.
"The existence of the Shroud has led many people to God, and this is only beneficial for the Christian Church in Europe," the priest said.

Interfax-Religion