- The team simply declared that the samples used for dating were merely portions of a 16th century patch and that the rest of the shroud is genuine. They had no supporting evidence to declare that the rest of the shroud is authentic and either refused or were incapable of furnishing additional samples for testing.
The STURP Team concluded that the Shroud material dated to 1260–1390 AD, with 95% confidence. It was a book by Shroud Researcher Brendan Whiting that challenged the sample. One sample (approximately 1” by 6”) was taken from an edge and divided into three separate samples (approximately 1sq inch each), which in turn were sent to 3 independent labs for radio carbon 14 dating. Whiting’s book floated the idea that a 13 Century reweaving repair was done to the edge. His book was based on differences between the edge and the main part of the Shroud.
2, There isn’t a single historical account of this shroud until the 14th century which, interesting enough, falls directly in line with the radiocarbon dating of samples taken from it.
References to the Shroud are found in the sixth and seventh century text. The Shroud was supposed to have been housed in the church of Our Lady of Blachernes in Constantinople when that city was sacked during the fourth Crusade in 1204. The first documented appearances of the Shroud are in 1353, previous appearances are not considered well enough substantiated.
- That historical account consists of a Bishop denouncing the shroud as a forgery; a view which was shared by his predecessor following an examination of it, an inquiry into its origins, and a confession of an artist who allegedly produced it. He believed, following the inquiry, that it was commissioned by a contemporary member of the clergy who had been “consumed with the passion of avarice.”
In 1389 letter, Bishop Herni of Poitiers wrote that the Shroud was a forgery on the basis that the image was not mentioned in the Gospels. In the letter, he wrote it was a painting (STURP found no trace paint or pigment in the image). The Bishop offered no evidence and the painter was not named in the letter.
- Despite odd claims to the contrary; the Shroud has been reproduced using methods and materials commonly available and affordable during the Middle Ages.
These reproductions rendered what visually looked like the image, but were not the same as the image on the original Shroud, which scientists are still having an impossible time figuring out what it is.
- The image on the shroud is inconsistent with the account of Jesus’ burial in the Bible. His body was wrapped in strips of linen, not whole cloth, and his face was covered with a separate cloth.
John describes a burial cloth folded up by itself. The Shroud is believed to have been wrapped around first, a separate cloth placed over the head, then the strips of linen where used to bind everything in place.
- The images are not consistent with the state of Jesus’ body i.e. lying down. The “blood” on the shroud is flowing down the body which would only occur if the subject is either standing or sitting up. It should be flowing to the side and behind the body.
The blood may have flowed down while the body was upright, then dried, remaining that way when later horizontal.
Walter McCrone’s samples were confiscated following his discovery of pigment.
The samples were loaned to McCrone for examination by Chemist Ray Rogers. McCrone refuse to give them back. Ray Rogers had collected 32 sample tapes that included thousands of particles of matter taken from the Shroud. On his way back to Los Alamos from Turin, he stopped in Chicago and loaned the samples to McCrone. There were several stipulations: The samples were to be studied by microscope in Chicago. The particles were not to be removed from the tapes. The samples were to be returned as soon as McCrone had examined them. McCrone violated the agreement. He damaged some of the sample tapes and then he refused to return them. Finally, Rogers had to fly to Chicago to retrieve them with a US Marshal via a court order. In his book, Rogers (considered the world expert in thermal analysis) states that Anderson, who was McCrone’s Raman microscopy expert, observed that the samples acted as organic material when he subjected them to the laser, but McCrone refused to accept the observation, for he wanted the conclusion that the image was painted with hematite.
God Bless
