Returning to what I think is the original inquiry, the folded sudarium has always intrigued me as well. Without having any scholarly basis to think it, it has always seemed to me to be a powerful image of calm, and of unhurried action. Surreptitious body-snatchers would hardly bother to fold a face cloth. Nor would an escapee who had dodged death. This image of an almost timeless unhurriedness was, to me, captured well in the final scene in Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ”. The peace and unhurriedness of Jesus in that scene, to me, conveys something of the contrast between time and eternity. When I saw that scene, I immediately thought of the folded face cloth, though that is not portrayed, because of the way the character portraying Jesus acts.
We don’t know, of course, how it got folded. Perhaps an angel did it out of respect. Perhaps Jesus did it to convey a calming message. Perhaps, being among God’s creatures, and subject to His command, it folded itself. But it’s intriguing, and is perhaps meant to be.
I like this thought.