Turin Shroud may be genuine after all

UPI via The Washington Times ^ | 10/9/2002 | Uwe Siemon-Netto

[SteveH]

GURAT, France, Sept. 24 (UPI) -- The Turin Shroud bearing the features of a crucified man may well be the cloth that enveloped the body of Christ, a renowned textile historian told United Press International Tuesday.

Disputing inconclusive carbon-dating tests suggesting the shroud hailed from medieval times, Swiss specialist Mechthild Flury-Lemberg said it could be almost 2,000 years old.

[truthandlife]

Your link to the article is no good:

The real link is here:

http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20020924-122802-9689r

[truthandlife]

Your link to the article is no good:

The real link is here:

http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20020924-122802-9689r

[Desdemona]

She related she discovered identical forms of weaving and high-quality sewing on textiles found at Masada, the ancient fortress in southeastern Israel. They hailed from the year 73 AD.

According to the Berne scholar, other first-century cloths found in the Red Sea region showed weaving patterns similar to those of the Turin Shroud.

"All these things are mosaics that don't prove anything scientifically," she insisted.

No, but the plot thickens....

[ALS]

You go ahead, I'll be more realistic and go with no rag worshipping.

btw - which god wants us to worship cloth again?

[ALS]

Thank you. Learned it all in the bible. You should give it a whirl...

[dogbyte12]

The problem here is that "relics" in the middle ages, were often bogus. It was estimated that if you combined all the pieces of wood from the cross that different churches claimed to have, you would have enough material to build a house.

The fact that the Shroud of Turin really has no proper authentication, in the form of history is a problem as well. If Mary took the shroud, it was recorded, and it passed from one hand to the next, it would be much easier to be believed that this is the shroud that Jesus was buried in.

It, of course, is all a matter of faith.

[aShepard]

That's the rebuttal of the radiocarbon dating? "I don't see how this could have been done, therefore it must have been magic, therefore the radiocarbon dating can simply be disregarded

I've often wondered that since the shroud was involved in a fire in the 1500's, that resulted in burning portions of the cloth, whether the carbon based smoke from the building materials involved in the fire could have permeanated the shroud with a few hundred year old wood carbon tracings, thus masking the true date of the underlying cloth.

If, as this article states, spoonfuls of soot were removed from the surface, my thoughts may have some validity.

[lepton]

If it was that, test results show it must have occurred no later than 36 hours after the dead man's bloody body had been wrapped in this expensive shroud.

A notable claim with nothing to support it, or even describe it. I hate articles like that.

[lepton]

The rebbutal of the radiocarbon dating is that the samples included deposited material on the surface - some of which was clearly of much more recent origin than the cloth. The cloth has been handled (and kissed) for hundreds of years - not to mention having water stains in locations from when it caught on fire.

Does not normal Corbon dating sampling take off the surface material before doing a dating - such as taking material from the inside of a tooth, or inside a skull, or from the center of a piece of wood?

[lepton]

And about him saying "looks exactly like Jesus"...we have no idea what Jesus looked like.

This is certainly a circular argument on the part of the speaker...as the image on the shroud was well known enought that painters have certainly long used the image to derive their view of Christ from it.

[j.havenfarm]

Come on, ALS, I know you want to. You got the "rag worshipping." You've got that tantalizing word "again." Any folks in particular you want to link these words to?

[lepton]

Radiocarbon dating is not interested in the total amount of carbon, but rather the relative quantities of carbon isotopes. If the shroud was burnt, and its carbon impregnated into other portions of the shroud, that is not likely to make a significant difference in the test results...however if other cloth or wood was burnt with it, or the water was fetid or otherwise contaminated, that introduction of "new" carbon would affect the tests.

[Physicist]

About contamination and radiocarbon dating

Let's suppose that the Shroud of Turin as it exists now is made up of two components: a shroud dating to 35 A.D. and contaminants of very recent origin. Let's suppose the worst-case scenario, and assume that the contaminants were dumped in just before the dating. The question is, how much contamination would we need to make the Shroud look as if it were made in 1275?

Let's define Ms = mass of Shroud, M1 = original mass, M2 = Mass of contaminants. Thus:

M = M1 + M2

But if we assume a natural C14 concentration of C, and know that the half-life of C14 is 5568 years, we also know that:

C*Ms*(-727/5568) = C*M1*2^(-1967/5568) + C*M2

0.9135*Ms = 0.7828*M1 + M2

Solving for the M1 gives

M1 = 0.3983 Ms, which means that

M2 = 1.51*M1, i.e. that the amount of contaminants in the Shroud outweighs the original Shroud by a factor of one and a half.

If we posit that the contaminants date to the fire of 1532, which the Shroud survived, the contaminants must outweigh the original Shroud by a factor of almost four and a half.

'Nuff said.

[Physicist]

Please consider #53.

[Physicist]

I wrote: C*Ms*(-727/5568)

Of course, this is supposed to be C*Ms*2^(-727/5568). I performed the calculation correctly, even if I didn't write it down correctly.

[ALS]

you're closest :)

[steve-b]

If you believe that the cloth hails from the Middle Ages then you must also believe that a man looking exactly like Jesus

And their baseline for what Jesus actually looked like is...?

[steve-b]

And about him saying "looks exactly like Jesus"...we have no idea what Jesus looked like. I'm partial to Caravaggio's powerful version, myself.

A carpenter before power tools were invented would tend toward the burly side, methinks, and not much resemble the rather willowy traditional representations.

[phil1750]

A carpenter before power tools were invented would tend toward the burly side, methinks, and not much resemble the rather willowy traditional representations

Not necessarily. Poor nutrition, constant fasting, tremendous self disipline.

We don't know if this is the image of Christ, but all images of Christ dipected for centuries have been referenced to the Shroud.

[null and void]

And their baseline for what Jesus actually looked like is...?

The biblical description of the wounds JC received. The scourge marks, thorny crown blood spots (not typical of an ordinary crucifixion), unbroken legs (also atypical), nail holes, wound in side.

Other than that he must have had a very ordinary appearance for people of that time and place, Otherwise Judas wouldn't have needed to betray him with a kiss, he coulda just said "Go get the really tall guy with the big nose, blond hair, small ears, and a limp."

In other words, the shroud shows an image of a corpse that matches what little the Bible describes about his physical appearance. (If we were supposed to worship his image he would be described in vivid detail)...