Posted on 04/28/2013 12:51:20 PM PDT by NYer
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Even with modern scientific technology, the Shroud of Turin continues to baffle researchers.
Barrie Schwortz was the documenting photographer for the Shroud of Turin research project in 1978, an in-depth examination of what many people believe to be the burial cloth of Jesus.
Raised in an Orthodox Jewish home, "it took me a long time to come to terms with the fact that I'm a Jew and involved with probably the most important relic of Christianity," Schwortz told Catholic News Service.
"Isn't it funny how God always picks a Jew to be the messenger," he said.
Schwortz said that he, along with the other members of the research team who came from various faith backgrounds, had to set aside personal beliefs and focus on the shroud itself rather than any religious implication it might carry.
"We were there to gather information ... to do empirical science and do it to the best of our abilities," Schwortz said. "It doesn't have anything to do with my personal religious beliefs. It has to do with the truth."
The Shroud of Turin is a 14-foot linen that has a full-length photonegative image of a wounded man on the front and back of the cloth. The scientific team spent five days analyzing the chemical and physical properties of the shroud, paying special attention to the topographical information showing depth that was encoded in the light and dark shading of the cloth.
"Our team went to Turin to answer one simple question: How was the image formed?" Schwortz said. "Ultimately, we failed.
"We could tell you what it's not -- not a painting, not a photograph, not a scorch, not a rubbing -- but we know of no mechanism to this day that can make an image with the same chemical and physical properties as the image on the shroud."
Testing has been performed on the shroud since the initial analyses, and the results continue to be contested. In 1988 carbon testing dated the cloth to the 12th century, leading many to conclude that the shroud is a medieval forgery.
In a paper published in 2005, chemist Raymond Rogers, member of the 1978 research team, challenged the claim that the shroud is a fake. He said the sample used in the 1988 carbon testing was a piece used to mend the cloth in the Middle Ages and that the methodology of the testing was erroneous.
Even though the controversy over the origin of the cloth does not seem like it will be determined any time soon, Schwortz said the shroud can still be regarded as a bridge between science and faith.
"I think the implication of the shroud, for those particularly of the Christian faith, is that this is a document that precisely coincides with the Gospel account of what was done to the man Jesus," he said.
Schwortz said the public online technical database -- www.shroud.com -- that the team created should be used as a tool to learn more about the physical attributes of the shroud, but that individuals should draw their own conclusions about what it means for their faith.
"People often ask me, 'Does this prove the resurrection?'" Schwortz said. "The shroud did not come with a book of instructions. So the answer to faith isn't going to be on that piece of cloth, but more likely in the eyes and the hearts of those who look upon it."
You are citing NON-peer reviewed twaddle. The sources are citing works by Joe Nickell. His scientific degree is in English Literature. . . and although your source is Wikipedia, that is repeatedly edited to attempt to correct the record but the skeptic just replace the peer-reviewed stuff with misleading information that does not tell the true facts. For example one of the mentions on their cites a peer reviewed article as citing work about a statistical paper done in 2010 that examined the dates reported from the 1988 tests and the contamination causing the tests being 200 years off. The Wikipedia article FAILS to include the authors’ conclusions that in their opinion the tested sample which SHOULD have been homogenous and not having such a variance, that the tested sample WAS NOT HOMOGENOUS! And as such was an invalid contaminated sample!!! In their opinion, each tested subsample could have just as easily come from totally DIFFERENT samples rather from the same original source. The odds of them being the same source material were in the millions to one level! That is how distorted that Wiki article has changed the actual peer-reviewed science to push the non-authentic agenda. The authors of that statistical article came down on FALSIFYING THE TEST! Not supporting it!
Joe Nickell, incidentally, has been shown to distort the truth in many other of his so called “facts”. . . facts that when investigated are easily shot down. A liar in small unimportant things is frequently a liar in large important ones. None of the scientists on the skeptics side, the few they have, are working in their fields of expertise. Those investigating the Shroud invariably are.
I see you like to quote myths as truths or raise strawman questions. The Catholic Church did an inventory of such registered prices of the True Cross about ten years ago and found that there are only sufficient pieces to account for about two-thirds of the patibulem, the cross bar from which Jesus' was hung, the part his arms were nailed to. There is nowhere near enough to build those proverbial chapel, barns, cathedrals, or your dozens or hundreds of full size crosses. By the way, I am not Catholic.
on the wrist -
something the forensic scientists now say would be correct, becasue, if in the hand, the weight of he hanging body would rip them out
Also, anciently, the word “hand” was understood to include the wrist where it joins what we now call the hand -
Leonardo was a genious - that's a given. HOwever, that old saw is the easiest disproven -
Even the sceptics who fervently want the Shroud to be a fake admit that it dates back to at least the 12th-13th century - Leonardo was born in 1452, died in 1519. Even HE was not that brillinat.
“I discount his findings discounting asphyxiation as a mode of death.”I
t is your opinion that there was not a footrest, but saying “the position of the feet suggest this” is just an assumption, hence your word “suggest”.
An important point of Dr. Zugibe’s work is that the assumption of the footrest was just to establish the point that the palms could support a nailing if the footrest was there, i.e., some conditions could allow for the palms being nailed. Dr. Zugibe’s best anatomical estimation was that the nail went from fold of the thumb on the palm and exit through the upper wrist — which would have given better support.
Another important point is that if the victim’s arms were at 60 to 70 degrees from vertical (which seems to be the common case), the volunteer-victims reported no problem breathing in the SAGGING position. So, when sagging, and footrest or not, they could still breathe. No reason, then, for pushing up against the foot-nails.
We can assume Christ was having serious lung problems from scourging, and he MIGHT have died from asphyxiation because of that, but it was not purely the position on the cross that did it. It was massive trauma, not a simple explanation of asphyxiation.
Discount away — your opinion, and as far as I can tell, not backed up by medical findings.
I’ve heard a high percentage of scientists who study the shroud convert to Catholicism.
My opinion is backed by other medical findings in peer-reviewed publication, just not Dr. Zugibe's with whom I have personally discussed them. . . and I have discussed my discounting of Zugibe's theories with other medical and forensic specialist who are also Shroud researchers at symposia. They too discount it. Other forensic pathologists disagree with Zugibe's assumption of the existence of a foot rest, which distributes the force of lifting the body's weight over the surface of one foot, rather than concentrating the weight on the wound of a one centimeter nail driven through the most painful part of the foot. A pedulum was most likely found on crucifixions in Rome, not in the outlying provinces. It was a costly addition to the stapes, not likely to be added to a cross for common criminals. . . they tended to wear out rapidly with repeated use as the nails were repeatedly driven in and pulled out, eroding the wood. Besides, the comfort of the condemned was not of importance. Discomfort was.
Having a fit, uninjured volunteer find he has no trouble breathing while hanging from a padded wrist restraint does NOT present the same degree of agony or anywhere near the ability of a victim who has been beaten and scourged to inhale while impaled on a nail through his feet and hanging on similar nails through his wrists. Zugibe's findings were roundly criticized on these grounds in peer review. Other volumetric measures not so subjective as the opinion of the volunteer as to their ability to breathe, measured loss of lung capacity and the ability of the diaphragm to function in that unnatural position. Add the accumulation of fluid in the lungs from the beatings and trauma and asphyxiation is not an unlikely possibility.
Zugibe's finding that his volunteer could breathe while dangling flies in the face of the historically widely reported practice of crucifragium, the breaking of the legs of crucifixion victims to hasten their deaths when necessary, a practice the executioners were quite familiar with and even had a term for the practice. This practice was reported by Josephus as a common event. These are facts, not opinion.
Dr. Zugibe tested whether a nail through the palm of a cadaver could support the weight of the average body of a man matching the proportions found on the Shroud. He did NOT try with a living, struggling man to see what would happen over time to the wound through the palm. He is to be credited for confirming the work of other forensic pathologists that showed a nail through the wrist would support the weight of a body.
Zugibe's also came to the opinion, unlike every other investigator and forensic pathologist that the body was washed, despite numerous pieces of evidence to the contrary and little convincing evidence supporting his contention. He, cannot for example, reconcile his washing conclusion with the transferred blood tracks on the arms. . . for if the body had been washed before the Shroud were placed on the body, the blood tracks would have been washed away and simply not there to be transferred to the Shroud. He is not the be-all-and-end-all of scientific research or facts, not even in forensic study.
bumpus ad summum
Wrist. People were never crucified via nails through the hands. That would not support their body weight; the nails would have merely torn through.
Ray Rogers never believed the Shroud was from the middle ages.
Thanks — I’ll take all that into account.
Interesting, I didn't know that. I saw a fascinating documentary on the Shroud. It included Sue Benford, Rogers and others. In it I thought Rogers stated he believed the Carbon dating tests were correct.
Rogers expressed skepticism of Benford's theory on the testing being performed in a patched area. He had to be pushed to go and re-examine the fibers left over from the sampling.
It was then he noticed the weave was different and changed his mind on the validity of the carbon tests. I believed he died shortly thereafter.
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