The Shroud of Turin: What's Your Opinion?

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I agree with the above. I believe the Shroud is the burial cloth of Jesus, but should it be proven not to be, it wouldn’t faze my faith one bit.

Some people have tried to ascribe it to a camera obscura, but if that’s the case, where are all the other camera obscura creations?

The Shroud is unique.
 
Dan_Defender said:
One thing the Shroud image shows is that the hand wounds are near the wrist in the space of Destot, which is where you would expect to see them in the case of a crucifixion victim, not in the palms as has been depicted through the centuries.
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Right, they would not be in the palms at all. That helped convince me the Shroud is the burial cloth of someone and not a forgery. And most crucifixion victims were not crowned with thorns.
 
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One would think that in all probability an artist concocting a forgery would have placed the wounds in the palms since that what artists did.
 
Good to see some new posters joining in.

Undead-rat:
  1. The dirt on the Shroud. A single speck of limestone was identified microscopically by Joseph Kohlbeck as aragonite, of which about a quarter of all limestone is constituted. Parts of Jerusalem are built on aragonite limestone, as are parts of France, particularly, funnily enough, the Aube Valley near Troyes.
  2. “But, as a certain prosecution attorney has proven, the Shroud’s C-14 dates are not an indication of a 14th century origin, but, rather, proof of a miracle.” This is untrue. A certain prosecution attorney has proposed a miraculous origin for the anomalous date, and suggested a test by which his proposal can be tested. This test has not been carried out, so his proposal has not been demonstrated.
  3. “As for Hedges statement, the correct interpretation of the C-14 dates indicate that a miracle did take place here. His refusal to entertain that idea as being “wholly unscientific” is just plain silly.”
    This is very wrong, on several counts. Firstly neither you nor anyone else knows what the ‘correct interpretation’ of the C-14 dates is, so to declare the Shroud a miracle on those grounds is unwarranted. Secondly, Hedges was entirely correct that a miracle is outside the realm of science either to substantiate or to discard. No scientific test can demonstrate that something non-scientific has occurred.
Rasoleil:
The image on the Shroud appears to be made of the degraded cellulose of the Shroud itself, possibly augmented by an iron based pigment, of which very little remains. We do not know whether the Shroud as we see it today is the same as it was when it was made. Some earlier commenters said it had been washed and boiled in oil. A realistic possibility is that it was painted or dabbed with an iron based pigment in a slightly acidic medium, from which most of the pigment has been washed away.

Wilson has written nearly a dozen books on the Shroud, all very sensible and well worth reading, although I do not agree with his ultimate conclusions.

ConstantLearner:
“Some people have tried to ascribe it to a camera obscura, but if that’s the case, where are all the other camera obscura creations?” I agree with you. I don’t think ‘lost’ technologies are a sensible way of explaining the Shroud, although they are not completely impossible.

The Shroud is indeed unique.

The bloodstains marking the wound in the back of the hand are consistent with a nail through the palm (see my post above). We have no way of knowing whether crowning with thorns was common, rare or unique.

(name removed by moderator):
“It’s been proven over and over again when scientists “crucified” corpses to study.” No, of course it hasn’t. Wherever did you get that idea? The only pathologist to crucify a single corpse, possibly two, was Pierre Barbet in the late 19th century.

Both Pierre Barbet and Fred Zugibe carried out experiments on amputated arms, but came to exactly opposite conclusions, Barbet that a nail through a palm could not support a body, Zugibe that it could. Neither considered the possibility of the victim standing on a footbar, although Byzantine crucifixes almost invariably include one.
 
Hope1960 said:
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benjamin1973:
That’s right. If I see a man walking on water, I will not think it’s a miracle. I’ll ask “How did this dude perform this trick?”
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Undead Rat, I didn’t see your response to this post. How do you respond?
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I didn’t reply. I have found that it is best not to feed the troll.
 
Hugh_Farey said:
Hedges was entirely correct that a miracle is outside the realm of science either to substantiate or to discard. No scientific test can demonstrate that something non-scientific has occurred.
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Sir, on about March 7th you wrote:

“Although I disagree with much that Antonacci and Rucker have written* I applaud the fact that they have come up with a clearly defined idea that can readily be disproved.”

*TEST THE SHROUD, Antonacci, 2015

Antonacci and Rucker’s “clearly defined idea” is additional C-14 date testing of Shroud samples that would be closer to the image. Their prediction is that a sample taken from the center of the back image would yield an impossible future date. That would scientifically prove that Jesus’ corpse had vanished from the inside of His burial cloth. I suppose that smart people like yourself will find a way to disagree with that conclusion, even though you have indicated that you would not.
 
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Popes have only spoken infallibly since 1870, when Pius IX first asserted infallibility in matters of faith and morals. As I recall, papal infallibility has been asserted only twice since then; in 1896, when Leo XIII declared that Anglican orders are null and void; and in 1950, when Pius XII declared that the Ever-Immaculate Mother of God had been assumed into heaven body and soul.
 
Hugh_Farey said:
  1. The dirt on the Shroud. A single speck of limestone was identified microscopically by Joseph Kohlbeck as aragonite, of which about a quarter of all limestone is constituted. Parts of Jerusalem are built on aragonite limestone, as are parts of France, particularly, funnily enough, the Aube Valley near Troyes.
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In “THE SHROUD” Wilson devotes three pages to how Roger and Marty Gilbert’s reflectance spectroscopy (together with Sam Pellicori’s Wild microscope) identified dirt on the Shroud and how Dr. Kohlbeck analyzed his carefully selected dirt sample.

" . … he [Kolbeck] found it to be exactly the same rare aragonanite variety as that [the sample] sent from Jerusalem, and with the same trace amounts of iron and stontium.
". . .Kolbeck took both sets of samples to Dr. Ricardo Levi-Setti of the University of Chicago’s Enrico Fermi Insitute. Among Levi-Stti’s equipment was a then state-of-the-art scanning ion microprobe with which the wavelengths emitted by the two different samples could be readily compared. Studying together the spectra emitted by the two different samples, the two scientists saw there was an unusually close match (fig. 6).

Sir, perhaps you will provide the Forum with your spectral analysis of the Arube Valley limestone (which you find so funny) so we can compare that graph with the ones that Wilson gives us on pg. 68.
 
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I would recommend looking into the book “Witnesses to Mystery: Investigations into Christ’s Relics” by Grzegorz Gorny. It has an excellent section on the Shroud, addressing about anything one could inquire about (the history, scientific findings, etc.). As a bonus it includes many detailed pictures.

Personally, I have zero doubts about the authenticity of the Shroud.

Hope this helps!
 
undead_rat said:
I suppose that smart people like yourself will find a way to disagree with that conclusion, even though you have indicated that you would not.
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I have no expectation that any such result will be obtained.
undead_rat said:
I am not looking at the passage right now, but I seem to remember that His disciples had been rowing for hours.
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They were fishing. Their distance from the shore cannot be determined from the time they spent in their boat.
undead_rat said:
n THE SHROUD, Wilson devotes three pages […]
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I have emphasised the importance of primary sources before. Spectrographic analysis of a rock results in a graph of a lot of little spikes along the x-axis. The distance of each spike along the x-axis shows what element it represents, and the height of each spike is related to its proportion in the sample. All samples of aragonite show very similar elements, including iron and strontium. The spectrum of the Shroud’s aragonite was published superimposed on the Jerusalem aragonite, so that it is (deliberately?) difficult to compare them… It’s not even clear whether the two samples contain the same elements, but careful observation shows that where two spikes coincide, the spike heights are very different, showing that the relative proportions of the elements is different. Googling “spectrographs of aragonite” will give you comparisons with other samples, although I have not found one from the Aube valley.
 
Ooh, that’s a bit harsh.

I don’t think it’s fair, or honest, to call somebody who disagrees with you a troll. Trolls, as I understand, have little to offer in the way of argument or evidence, make repetitive claims which they do not substantiate, and enjoy being personally abusive. Also, I believe trolls never use their own names. I really don’t think that applies to me, do you?

Alas, I have relinquished the newsletter for the British Society for the Turin Shroud, but while I was editor, as well understood by its readership, I was never anti-Shroud, nor did I promote an anti-Shroud agenda. I did not disguise the fact that I personally think the Shroud is medieval, but gave full rein to anybody who wanted to publish evidence that it wasn’t.

Now what’s come over you? The CAFs are public discussion forums, not personal conversations. Whatever you introduce, even if off-topic, even if individually addressed, is fair game for the community. Regarding the walking on water, you cannot be definitive about how far Jesus walked, or how far the boat had gone, or how far it was from shore. To point this out is not flippant, incorrect or dishonest.

The idea that I have recently turned to the CAFs “for an audience” is unfounded. The Shroud has turned up several times on these forums, and I have participated in the discussion every time I noticed, though I think there was one last Summer which I missed. The current format of the CAF has not kept its old archives, but I was active long before 2016.

Why do I post here? Because a good scientist is always looking for ways in which he might be mistaken. I relish every challenge to my ideas, because it sends me back to the data from which they derive, and forces me to re-examine them. A good scientist must be open to new evidence, or just a new challenging idea, and participating in forums seems one way of keeping the door open. I’m not too bothered about proselytising, as it happens - the style is inevitable given the format - it’s the examination of evidence (preferably new) that’s important.
 
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Posters, it’s an opinion thread. We all have our own opinion for varying reasons. No one is trying to force anyone to change. People are just stating their belief and trying to back it up. Let’s just respect one another and be friendly. Our beliefs don’t have to change, and none of us is going to prove the Shroud authentic or fake on this thread.
 
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I don’t think that the Shroud was particularly well known or celebrated until after Secundo Pia, followed by others, took the first photographs of it. Those revealed a much clearer picture of the face on the shroud. Because the shrould itself was similar to a photographic negative, it did not seem all that impressive. I mean, now many people frame and hang negatives of their loved ones? But the first photographs of the Shroud were similar to printing a positive image from a negative, not only making the features clear, but raising awareness of the shroud.
 
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