The Shroud of Turin

[patrick457]

Thanks again for your efforts.

Did the phrase “non est verum sudarium Domini nostri Ihesu Xpisti” originally included in the public announcement survive the various edits of Clement’s January bull or was that stricken too?

The ‘corrected’ version looks pretty much like this. (Text in bold are added portions.)



… q(uod)q(ue) / ostendens dictam fig(u)ram du(m) maior ibid(em) couenerit p(o)p(u)li multitudo pu(bli)ce p(o)p(u)lo aliquoties saltem dum sermone(m) ibid(em) fieri contigerit p(re)/dicet & dicat alta & intelligibili voce omni fraude cessante q(uod) figura / seu representacio predicta non -]est/-] ostendunt ut verum sudarium d(omi)ni n(ost)ri ih(es)u xp(ist)i sed -]quedam pictura/-] tamqu(am) / -]seu tabula facta in/-] figuram seu representacionem dicti sudarii q(uo)d fore d(i)c(i)tur / eiusd(em) d(omi)ni n(ost)ri ih(es)u xp(ist)i …

Whereas the January bull is much more direct in its wording (quod figura seu representacio praedicta non est verum sudarium Domini nostri Iesu Christi, sed quedam pictura seu tabula in figuram seu representacionem sudarii “that the aforementioned figura seu representacio is not the true shroud of our Lord Jesus Christ, but a pictura seu tabula made in figura seu representacio of the shroud”), the corrected version softens it a little (quod figura seu representacionem praedictam non ostendunt ut verum sudarium Domini nostri Iesu Christi, sed tamquam figuram seu representacionem dicti sudarii “… that they are not exhibiting the aforementioned figura seu representacionem as the true shroud of our Lord Jesus Christ, but as if a figura seu representacio of said shroud”).

In other words, whereas the first version stipulated that that the exhibitors declare the cloth outright to not be the real shroud of Jesus but a man-made replica of it, the revised version simply requires the exhibitors to declare that the cloth is not being exhibited as the genuine shroud, but as a figura seu representacio of the item.

I should add: whereas Chevalier’s fin 1388 attribution to the memorandum makes it appear as if Clement’s January bull was written in response to it (i.e. the memorandum was sent, and Clement agreed with its allegations that the Shroud is man-made, hence the expression pictura seu tabula), as far as we know now, (1) the memorandum was apparently never actually sent to Avignon, because Clement never refers to having received any letter or some such communication from d’Arcis (and given how the original manuscripts of it are still in draft form and lack a date and a signature, we can’t even be 100% sure that it was actually authored by Bishop d’Arcis as claimed - we only think that d’Arcis could be behind it because of his known role in the debacle) and (2) Clement himself backed off from outright saying that it is man-made and allowed for continued veneration of the cloth, if the revised May version and the June bull are of any indication.

 

[patrick457]

I’ll add:

Whereas the January bull is much more direct in its wording (quod figura seu representacio praedicta non est verum sudarium Domini nostri Iesu Christi, sed quedam pictura seu tabula in figuram seu representacionem sudarii “that the aforementioned figura seu representacio is not the true shroud of our Lord Jesus Christ, but a pictura seu tabula made in figura seu representacio of the shroud”), the corrected version softens it a little (quod figura seu representacionem praedictam non ostendunt ut verum sudarium Domini nostri Iesu Christi, sed tamquam figuram seu representacionem dicti sudarii “… that they are not exhibiting the aforementioned figura seu representacionem as the true shroud of our Lord Jesus Christ, but as if a figura seu representacio of said shroud”).

In other words, whereas the first version stipulated that that the exhibitors declare the cloth outright to not be the real shroud of Jesus but a man-made replica of it, the revised version simply requires the exhibitors to declare that the cloth is not being exhibited as the genuine shroud, but as a figura seu representacio of the item.

Essentially, what Clement is advising here is prudence. The de Charnys were apparently absolutely convinced that the shroud they possessed was the genuine article, and so the ceremonial that accompanied the exhibitions were lavish in nature, as befitting (what they believed to be) a true relic of Christ. The memorandum itself hints at this:

Although it is not publicly stated to be the true shroud of Christ, nevertheless this is given out and noised abroad in private, and so it is is believed by many, the more so because, as stated above, it was on the previous occasion (i.e. in 1356/7) declared to be the true shroud of Christ, and by a certain ingenious manner of speech it is now in the said church styled not the sudarium (shroud) but the sanctuarium (relic), which to the ears of the common folk, who are not keen to observe distinctions, sounds much the same thing.

You have to remember that the Crusades brought a huge influx of relics to Western Europe, not all of them authentic. (The shroud itself seems to be one such item.) The fourth Lateran Council of 1215 addressed the issue of fake relics and their trade by stipulating that they are not to be sold, and that new relics cannot be venerated publicly unless given papal authorization.

From the fact that some expose for sale and exhibit promiscuously the relics of saints, great injury is sustained by the Christian religion. That this may not occur hereafter, we ordain in the present decree that in the future old relics may not be exhibited outside of a vessel or exposed for sale. And let no one presume to venerate publicly new ones unless they have been approved by the Roman pontiff. In the future prelates shall not permit those who come to their churches causa venerationis to be deceived by worthless fabrications or false documents as has been done in many places for the sake of gain.

The ambiguous choice of words in the revised 1389 bull (unlike its original version) intentionally leaves open the question of whether the Lirey shroud is painted or not. Veneration of the sudarium is allowed (visiting the church where it was is indulgenced even), but the exhibitors must keep the relic’s status open by not declaring publicly that it is the genuine shroud, or acting as if it is. This is also the reason why the bull also stipulated that the ceremonial during the exhibitions should be simplified.

 

[cornbread_r2]

…]

I should add: whereas Chevalier’s fin 1388 attribution to the memorandum makes it appear as if Clement’s January bull was written in response to it (i.e. the memorandum was sent, and Clement agreed with its allegations that the Shroud is man-made, hence the expression pictura seu tabula), as far as we know now, (1) the memorandum was apparently never actually sent to Avignon, because Clement never refers to having received any letter or some such communication from d’Arcis (and given how the original manuscripts of it are still in draft form and lack a date and a signature, we can’t even be 100% sure that it was actually authored by Bishop d’Arcis as claimed - we only think that d’Arcis could be behind it because of his known role in the debacle) and (2) Clement himself backed off from outright saying that it is man-made and allowed for continued veneration of the cloth, if the revised May version and the June bull are of any indication.

Thanks again for your detailed response.

One last question if I might…

If Clement wasn’t responding to a d’Arcis memorandum, then to what and/or whom was he responding?

 

[cornbread_r2]

Thanks again for your detailed response.

One last question if I might…

If Clement wasn’t responding to a d’Arcis memorandum, then to what and/or whom was he responding?

ETA

If Clement wasn’t responding to a d’Arcis memorandum, then why would the pope command his silence under threat of excommunication?

 

[patrick457]

ETA

If Clement wasn’t responding to a d’Arcis memorandum, then why would the pope command his silence under threat of excommunication?

This isn’t a conspiratorial, ‘let’s keep this under wraps’-type of silence. Clement ordered d’Arcis not to oppose the exhibitions at Lirey. Always so long as the rules fixed in the Bull are scrupulously observed, d’Arcis cannot complain about it or take action against it any more. D’Arcis himself in the bull claims to have threatened to excommunicate the dean of the Lirey church if the exhibitions continued. The provisions in the Bull made it so that the custodians of the shroud cannot be subject to excommunication unless by a decision of the Apostolic See.

In other words, if d’Arcis tried to oppose the pope’s decision to allow the exhibitions to continue by say, excommunicating the people at Lirey, he’ll be excommunicated himself.

Actually, this wasn’t the first time d’Arcis was ordered to stop interfering with the exhibitions. The July letter to Geoffroy II AFAIK already ordered him to silence. In fact, the January bull is pretty much in essence a rehash of the July letter, with some of the concessions granted back then being annulled: the July letter granted Geoffroy II the right to exhibit the shroud “whenever opportune,” which was apparently he had resisted the protests of d’Arcis. The January bull curtailed some of those rights.

(Another thing to keep in mind here: Clement was actually related to the de Charnys. Geoffroy II’s stepfather was his uncle.)

Thanks again for your detailed response.

One last question if I might…

If Clement wasn’t responding to a d’Arcis memorandum, then to what and/or whom was he responding?

If d’Arcis actually sent the memorandum, we would have expected to find citations or allusions to it in the bull or the letter to d’Arcis. I mean, Clement in his letter to d’Arcis refers to a now-lost petition from Geoffroy II; just from the official documents, we can reconstruct a list of eight petitions from him. The same, however, cannot be said of the memorandum. There’s no reference to it or citation from it.

It’s possible that d’Arcis might have expressed his complaints in some other manner (say, via the papal nuncio?) But the memorandum - the two drafts of it we have - would not have been the one that reached the (anti)pope. Besides, by September the royal court was already involved in the debacle in some way (remember, d’Arcis filed a complaint against d’Arcis to the royal court, which issued a warrant to the bailli of Troyes to confiscate the shroud but ended up simply proclaiming it royal property while the actual thing stayed in Lirey); IMHO there’s no way Clement would be ignorant of that.

 

[Churchman25]

I know there is alot of speculation but I think that the evidense showed in the movie points to the fact that it wrapped Christ.

 

[thistle]

I know there is alot of speculation but I think that the evidense showed in the movie points to the fact that it wrapped Christ.

There is no evidence. Everything is speculation and nobody has got round the carbon dating the cloth as medieval. Claiming the piece of cloth tested was a repaired piece or it was corrupted by a fire is irrelevant. It has not been dated back 2000 years.

Why do you think the Church has not declared it to be authentic? It is because it does not know if it is genuine or not.

 

[patrick457]

There is no evidence. Everything is speculation and nobody has got round the carbon dating the cloth as medieval. Claiming the piece of cloth tested was a repaired piece or it was corrupted by a fire is irrelevant. It has not been dated back 2000 years.

Or claiming that the piece of cloth was invalid because it was one part of the Shroud that was handled the most during the pre-modern period and thus contaminated or that there was somehow a computer hacker who duped the C-14 labs or whatever.

The way I see it is this. I’ll admit that yes, I believe the Shroud is genuine, but even if it were a man-made item, I still think the carbon dating result of 1260-1390 for it is wrong.

Forget about trying to date the cloth back to 2,000 years ago or claiming that the figure is Jesus. Even ignoring that, I believe that every other evidence we have so far would still require us to put it earlier than just 800 years. If it were artificial / man-made I’m more inclined to believe that it came from the East rather than being a Western European product - I think the references to the supposed burial cloths of Jesus, and specifically, a shroud purportedly His being in Constantinople do refer to the Turin Shroud.

I mean, the Byzantines could also conceivably pull this sort of stuff (I mean, speaking of the Old World, in terms of science and technology the Muslim world and the Byzantine world were advanced, at least when compared to the kingdoms of Western Europe), and after all, the Shroud could be related to the epitaphios used in Byzantine liturgy - something AFAIK at least a number of people on both sides have agreed with. And it was the Eastern Roman Empire that had to go through the Iconoclast controversy, and consequently, images of Jesus or Mary ‘not made by human hands’ (either genuine or fake) were big in Byzantium because it provided the orthodox iconodules ammunition against their iconoclast contemporaries.

At least I think the Byzantine origin (whether it came into Byzantine hands or the Byzantines themselves made it) theory has more going for it than the camera obscura theory, or that Leonardo da Vinci made it (which is the weakest theory of them all - since the Shroud is on record even before Leonardo was born).

 

[7_Sorrows]

I find the topic on the Shroud of Turin to be fascinating!

I choose to believe it is the shroud that wrapped Jesus.

 

[HelenRose]

There is no evidence. Everything is speculation and nobody has got round the carbon dating the cloth as medieval. Claiming the piece of cloth tested was a repaired piece or it was corrupted by a fire is irrelevant. It has not been dated back 2000 years.

Why do you think the Church has not declared it to be authentic? It is because it does not know if it is genuine or not.

My thoughts (for what they are worth) The shroud may be the shroud of Jesus but if it is not I do not believe that it is a hoax. It may have been the work of an artist with extremely rare knowledge who created the shroud as a work of art. No one has been able to explain it.

It is a mystery no matter how we may look at.

I don’t see any reason to argue about it though. The Church is wise in not declaring it one way or the other.

 

[abucs]

There is no evidence. Everything is speculation and nobody has got round the carbon dating the cloth as medieval. Claiming the piece of cloth tested was a repaired piece or it was corrupted by a fire is irrelevant. It has not been dated back 2000 years.

Why do you think the Church has not declared it to be authentic? It is because it does not know if it is genuine or not.

Hi Thistle,

I’m Australian but living in the Philippines.

You might be interested in the following links:

Reports :

telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/9958678/Turin-Shroud-is-not-a-medieval-forgery.html

theshroudofturin.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-tests-by-prof-giulio-fanti-show.html

shroudstory.com/2013/03/27/giulio-fanti-the-image-of-a-man-who-lived-between-280-bc-and-220-ad/

Video :

youtube.com/watch?v=I4c4812XA9A

 

[thistle]

Hi Thistle,

I’m Australian but living in the Philippines.

You might be interested in the following links:

Reports :

telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/9958678/Turin-Shroud-is-not-a-medieval-forgery.html

theshroudofturin.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-tests-by-prof-giulio-fanti-show.html

shroudstory.com/2013/03/27/giulio-fanti-the-image-of-a-man-who-lived-between-280-bc-and-220-ad/

Video :

youtube.com/watch?v=I4c4812XA9A

I’ve never claimed it is a forgery. In my view it is medieval art. It does not matter what anyone says about it the FACT is that so far it has not been dated back beyond the middle ages.

Also, only the Church could declare it to be the actual burial cloth of Christ and they have not and will not because there will never be 100% certainty.

It is simply left to Catholics to believe it or not. I don’t believe it is genuine and my faith is not weak so I do not need to hang my hat on things like that.

 

[abucs]

It does not matter what anyone says about it the FACT is that so far it has not been dated back beyond the middle ages.

The scientific tests in the links have dated it back past the Middle Ages.

Raymond Rogers test for Vaniliin also gives a date well before the Middle Ages.

greatshroudofturinfaq.com/Science/Dating/rogersmindchange.html

greatshroudofturinfaq.com/Science/Dating/vanillin.html

 

[The_Serpent]

It should be mentioned that the visionary Anne Catherine Emmerich claimed there were multiple “Shrouds”. An original, and three miraculous copies made by laying new cloths upon the original.

tanbooks.com/index.php/life-of-jesus-christ-and-biblical-revelations-from-the-visions-of-ven-anne-catherine-emmerich.html

:ballspin:

 

[thistle]

The scientific tests in the links have dated it back past the Middle Ages.

Raymond Rogers test for Vaniliin also gives a date well before the Middle Ages.

greatshroudofturinfaq.com/Science/Dating/rogersmindchange.html

greatshroudofturinfaq.com/Science/Dating/vanillin.html

As I said carbon dating has NOT put it earlier than the Middle Ages. Speculation is not evidence.

 

[Kakieanne]

Scientists have been wrong before so for something like this, I don’t put much faith in them. They will try to tell you when it was made but they haven’t a clue about how it was made. I choose to believe that it is the shroud of Our Lord and because it is His face, I love it.

 

[abucs]

There is no evidence. Everything is speculation and nobody has got round the carbon dating the cloth as medieval. Claiming the piece of cloth tested was a repaired piece or it was corrupted by a fire is irrelevant. It has not been dated back 2000 years.
.

It does not matter what anyone says about it the FACT is that so far it has not been dated back beyond the middle ages.

As I said carbon dating has NOT put it earlier than the Middle Ages. Speculation is not evidence.

Scientific results cannot be so easily dismissed as speculation.

Scientific results and mathematical statistical results point to an invalidation of the carbon dating of 1988.

Subsequent scientific testing now suggests a time well before the middle ages.

What exactly about these scientific results do you object to?

Regards.

shroud.com/pdfs/stlheimburgerppt.pdf

 

[thistle]

Scientific results cannot be so easily dismissed as speculation.

Scientific results and mathematical statistical results point to an invalidation of the carbon dating of 1988.

Subsequent scientific testing now suggests a time well before the middle ages.

What exactly about these scientific results do you object to?

Regards.

shroud.com/pdfs/stlheimburgerppt.pdf

The only convincing test will be carbon dating. The existing carbon dating proves the cloth cannot be be the burial cloth of Christ because its not 2000 years old. No point people complaining/speculating about the cloth being in a fire, or a repaired piece was used or the cloth was somehow otherwise corrupted or the type of weave or pollen found. All that is irrelevant. It has not been carbon dated back to the time of Christ.

 

[patrick457]

Radiocarbon Dating of the Shroud of Turin: shroud.com/nature.htm
C-14 Debate from the Shroud Newsgroup (Rodger Sparks, William Meacham): shroud.com/c14debat.htm

 

[Hugh_Farey]

Thistle is correct in that the only reliable scientific dating of the Shroud has been the radiocarbon dating to about 1350. There have been two other attempts to date the fabric, by Ray Rogers, and by Giulio Fanti.

Rogers surmised that as fabric ages, it loses vanillin, and found that as the Shroud contained no vanillin, it must be “quite old” (his words). He was aware that his attempt to quantify the age by using the Arrhenius equation was fraught with uncertainty, as the rate of reaction depends so much on temperature. “If the shroud had been stored at a constant 25°C, it would have taken about 1319 years to lose a conservative 95% of its vanillin,” he claimed, and if it had been stored at colder temperatures, even longer. He did not point out that at 140°C, it would have taken 2 minutes, and his attempts to show that during the 1532 fire, when the box containing the Shroud was allegedly heated to the temperature of molten silver (962°C), some parts of the cloth might have escaped heating altogether, are thoroughly unconvincing. (See: shroud.it/ROGERS-3.PDF)

Giulio Fanti carried out a series of mechanical tests on minute fibres extracted from the vacuumings of Riggi di Numana in 1978. He surmised that fabric fibres weaken with age, and tested fibres from several old fabrics of known date in an attempt to produce a correlation graph, against which the mechanical strength of his Shroud fibres could be compared. This was partially successful, and although his various tests gave very widely different possible ages, he trusted that averaging them together would produce a reliable estimate. However, he did not take into account that another way of weakening fibres is to bend, fold, mechanically distress, heat, or chemically affect them, all of which had occurred to the Shroud, and particularly to his fibres, which had become detached from it, so that they could be sucked up by Riggi’s vacuum. Clearly, any mechanical weakening due entirely to oxidation with age must be added to any other mechanical weakening of the fibres, which would of course give a date considerably earlier than the correct one.

There have been various attempts to discredit the radiocarbon date, none of them at all successful, although they all seemed possible when they were proposed, and were taken seriously. The first was the rather feeble hope (also expressed above) that because “scientists are sometimes wrong” therefore all scientific expressions can be assumed to be false if required. The second was that the fabric might have been contaminated by a coating of more modern material, which failed when it was pointed out that such contamination would have to have been thicker than the cloth itself to produce the required shift in date. The third was little more than the hope that radiation of some kind, from earthquakes, fire or miracle, might have altered the proportion of C14 atoms in the cloth, something which has not been tested or demonstrated in any ancient archaeological artefact, let alone the Shroud. The fourth was the hope that under some circumstances (such as the 1532 fire), contemporary atmospheric C14 might be added to the cloth; but experiments attempting to do just that at Oxford University failed. And finally, there is the hope that the ancient fabric of the Shroud might have been replaced, in some places, such as the corner selected for the radiocarbon testing, with more modern threads. There is no evidence for this, although there are still some who hold out for “invisible mending” as a way of not being able to differentiate new threads from old.

Of course, there is circumstantial evidence - none of it wholly incontrovertible, but some worth considering - that the Shroud is from earlier than the mid 14th century, but in terms of science, the radiocarbon dating is still the only direct calculation of its age.