Anna C. Hersey

The Shroud of Turin is a piece of linen which is purported to be the burial cloth of Jesus Christ. It measures 4.4 meters by 1.0 meter. In the center of the cloth, the faint front and back imprint of a man’s body can be seen. The man’s image bears signs of crucifixion. What appears to be blood accompanies wounds on the head, side, wrists, ankles, and back. Although the image is nearly invisible to the naked eye, it exhibits an unusual property: the image itself serves as a photographic negative, and the details of the face and body become a clearly recognizable image only when viewed in negative.

The existence of the Shroud of Turin was first concretely documented in 1350. In 1532 the Shroud was damaged by a fire in the Sainte Chapelle in Chambéry, France, where it was being housed. In 1578 it was moved to the Cathedral of Turin, Italy, and has remained there since. On special occasions the Catholic Church has authorized public display of the Shroud, offering curious spectators a rare glimpse of the famous faded image.

The Shroud is one of the most studied and scrutinized artifacts in history. It has been photographed thousands of times and subjected to numerous rigorous scientific tests by reputable scholars and experts in all disciplines using the most advanced technology available. And yet the dispute rages on. Is the Shroud of Turin the burial cloth of Christ? Or is it simply a clever fake?

Many scientists hold firmly to the belief that the Shroud is authentic, while others insist it is a forgery. This paper will outline the evidence pointing to the First Century and Middle Eastern origin of the Shroud. Different aspects of the Shroud will be described, including dating techniques, the linen, the image, and the blood stains. As the evidence will indicate, the Shroud of Turin is truly the burial cloth of a man crucified during the First Century in the Middle East.

Critics of the Shroud’s authenticity cite as evidence the radiocarbon dating of the Shroud. Radiocarbon dating approximates the age of an ancient object by measuring the amount of carbon 14 it contains. Any living organism (such as the flax plant used to make the linen of the Shroud) contains a fixed amount of carbon. When the organism dies, the radioactive carbon-14 decays at a known rate. By measuring the amount of carbon-14 present, the age of the object may be determined.

The Shroud was carbon dated in 1988 and the results were announced at a highly publicized press conference. The scientists conducting the experiment dated the Shroud between 1260 and 1390. Does this mean the Shroud is a fake? Definitely not. First of all, carbon dating is not always accurate. The world-renowned archaeologist Spyros Iakovidis said of the method,

In addition, some scientists cite the presence of bacteria and fungi, which now infest the Shroud, as the cause of inaccurate results. In one experiment, Leoncio A. Garza-Valdes determined that the linen was more than 60 percent contaminated with bacterial and fungal byproducts, more than enough to skew the results of the carbon dating (Garza-Valdes 49).

Further evidence shows that the carbon dating results are wrong. During the International Botanical Congress this past August, Avinoam Danin of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem announced that pollen grains in the fiber of the Shroud were similar to those on the Sudarium of Oviedo. The Sudarium is believed by some to be the burial face cloth of Jesus and has well-documented origins in the First Century. The similarity between the two pollen samples and also blood samples on the Turin and Oviedo cloths (they both contain traces of type AB blood) link the two shrouds to the same time period. Further, the pollen samples found on both cloths are species found only in the vicinity of Jerusalem in the spring (Angel).

The weave of the Shroud’s linen is three-to-one herringbone twill, resembling the weave used today for denim material (Hoare 16). Ancient textile experts have repeatedly examined the material and the weave, looking for clues of its origin. Generally it is agreed that analysis of the weave itself is inconclusive; the herringbone twill weave is characteristic of both First Century and Medieval textiles alike. However, in 1973 Belgian Professor Gilber Taes of the Ghent Institute of Textile Technology examined the Shroud and found traces of cotton throughout the linen threads. This suggests that the equipment used to weave the Shroud had also been used for cotton. The specific cotton found within the Shroud, Gossypium herbaceum, is found only in the Middle East (Wilson 71). Even more important is the absence of any wool fibers, which certainly would have been present on any European loom. Therefore the Shroud is not of European origin (Hoare 17).

The image on the Shroud of Turin offers some of the most convincing evidence of its authenticity, although the process by which the image was formed is still unknown. Those disputing the Shroud’s authenticity attack the uncertainty of its origin, claiming that the image was painted in Europe during Medieval times. However, microscopic examination shows that the image was not painted by an artist; there is a definite absence of any colored foreign matter and brush strokes. Other evidence clearly suggests that the Shroud is not the work of an artist. A forgery of this scale would be impossible. First of all, the image is so faint that an artist would not be able to see his work at close range. The image can only be viewed from more than four or five feet away. Second, the medical accuracy with which the image is depicted would have been far beyond the scope of any artist at the time the Shroud surfaced. The Shroud is also a negative image which appears positive when photographed. Even today, with the help of modern technology, the formation of a negative image is very difficult.

One of the most striking characteristics of the image is its three-dimensional effect. When the cloth came in contact with the crucified body, the darkness of the stain at a given point was proportional to its proximity to the skin. In other words, the closer the Shroud to the body, the darker the stain (Hoare 38). This information may be extrapolated to create a three-dimensional image of the crucified man, the height at each point determined by the shade of the stain.

In 1976 the Shroud was viewed using a VP-8 Image Analyser, which converts two dimensional images to three dimensional images. A normal photograph or painting will appear distorted using this method. However, the Shroud produces an eerily life-like image when viewed with the VP-8.

Blood stains on the Shroud provide a graphic depiction of the crucified man. Although a substantial part of the blood stains have been replaced by bacteria and fungi, numerous scientists have corroborated the fact that at one time the Shroud was stained with blood. In fact, actual DNA has been isolated and cloned; the source of the blood has been determined to be a male human (Garza-Valdes 42).

Numerous coroners, doctors, pathologists, and criminal experts have examined the image on the Shroud of Turin. The blood stains are medically accurate; they are consistent with the wounds suffered by Roman crucifixion. Dr. Robert Bucklin, deputy coroner and forensic pathologist at the Los Angeles County Hospital, examined negatives of the Shroud and described the wounds:

Further examination of the Shroud’s image shows how realistic the blood stains and wounds are; these could not have been the work of a Medieval artist.

As the evidence indicates, the Shroud of Turin is of First Century and Middle Eastern origin. At one time it shrouded a man who died a brutal death by crucifixion after being scourged and beaten. But was this man Jesus of Nazareth? Hundreds of men, Christians and criminals alike, were crucified in the first century by the Roman government. There is no way to be sure that the Shroud of Turin was the burial shroud of Jesus. For many Christians today, this issue remains a matter of deep faith.

Selected Bibliography