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First of all, the thing is not a shroud, it's essentially a 14th century painting, created as one of a myriad fake relics for money and fame. Second of all, if

• appguy 2y ago
  Scientists have recently used a new x-ray imaging technique to date The Shroud to the 1st century. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-13758359/amp/scientists-discovery-jesus-cloth-buried-shroud-turin.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-13758359/amp...
  • tsimionescu 2y ago
    That study [0] is published in a non-peer-reviewed journal with a very low impact factor, Heritage. Additionally, their findings suggests the shroud was kept within a very narrow range of temperatures to support the 1st century hypothesis, which makes it even more suspect. Additionally, their findings contradict a very well established C14 dating technique, in an extremely well documented and thought out study, using 8 different world class laboratories, for which their only explanation is "contamination" (ignoring the fact that the sample is pristine by comparison with many artifacts routinely dated using C14). Also, if you want to cite a study, maybe find the link to the study, not a Daily Mail article. [0] https://www.mdpi.com/2571-9408/5/2/47 https://www.mdpi.com/2571-9408/5/2/47
    • wrzuteczka 2y ago
      These 8 laboratories shared the same sample collected from a corner of the shroud. The priests handling the shroud would always hold it by its corners. So the explanation is not as weak as it may sound.
      • tsimionescu 2y ago
        The priests handling the shroud didn't stop handling it in the 14th century. The fire it survived by dousing with water was from the 16th century. There is no reason whatsoever that all 8 laboratories happened to find the same contaminants from the same century.
      • atombender 2y ago
        The Carbon 14 dating process is not sensitive to pollution from, say, the sweat or sebum on the hands of people handling it. What's more, the sample was vigorously cleaned before analysis. The article (the one that this thread is about, not the study) addresses exactly this. The author makes the point is C14 dating is widely misunderstood by non-experts who still decide it's within their expertise to find fault with the it.
        • nsxwolf 2y ago
          It's susceptible to contamination from millennia-newer cloth fibers though!
          • atombender 2y ago
            Did nobody here read the article? The author covered this: > … to distort the result by 13 centuries the threads employed in the mending would have had to have been more numerous than the threads of the part to be mended Furthermore, the samples were examined by two textile experts, and later by a lab that looked for trace fabrics that could have affected the radiocarbon dating, and they all confirmed that the sample was the original fabric.
          • tsimionescu 2y ago
            If only there was evidence that any such fibers existed. Alas, there is not.
    • dpratt71 2y ago
      Believe it or not, it gets worse. The authors of this paper are the same folks who came up with this particular dating technique. And I can't find any evidence the technique has been independently validated. Not that that should count for much from this layman.
    • kergonath 2y ago
      > That study [0] is published in a non-peer-reviewed journal with a very low impact factor, Heritage. Haha, MDPI. lol. It’s worse than low impact factor.
• mock-possum 2y ago
  > you would have to explain how No, you’re making this too complicated. It happened miraculously because god is all-powerful and can do whatever, whenever. Boom. Solved. Easy.
  • graemep 2y ago
    I assume you are being sarcastic, but nonetheless worth pointing out that almost all miracles attributed to Jesus have some point and/or symbolic importance (e.g. to relive suffering, as an illustration of who he was, etc.). A miraculous shroud just seems showy.
    • BobaFloutist 2y ago
      The symbolic importance of striking barren a fig tree that had the audacity to not be bearing fruit out of season.
      • prewett 2y ago
        The usual interpretations are that the fig tree represents the people of Israel, the religious leaders of Israel, and/or the Temple-system. In Mark, Jesus curses the fig tree because it is not bearing fruit, then cleans out the Temple from being a exploitative financial business instead of a house of worship, then immediately afterwards the disciples observe that the fig tree withered. The implication is that the Temple-system is judged, which fits in with several other statements Jesus makes elsewhere (such as not one stone of the Temple being left in place, in Matthew, if I remember correctly). I've also heard that fig trees had sort of a pre-fruit, so it wasn't unreasonable to expect something, but I don't know if that's actually true or not. At any rate, the symbolic interpretation is still valid. (And, having been conquered by Rome, perhaps Israel was not in a season of fruit, either, strengthening the symbolic connection.)
      • deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    • codingdave 2y ago
      Honestly, how would we know what all the miracles were? For arguments sake, whether or not you are Christian, let us say that Jesus did wander around performing miracles. The Bible is certainly not an audit trail of everything he did. It is the stories that survived. There would certainly be a bias in which stories those were. It seems reasonable to assume other miracles would have occurred that were not recorded, in particular considering that one of his teachings was to do good for its own sake, not to have the good be noticed by others.
• kcplate 2y ago
  > Second of all, if you believed it were a real ancient shroud, you would have to explain how the image on it was produced. Corpses don't leave images on shrouds Well, they have haven’t they? I think you need to put yourself in the shoes of a believing Christian/catholic. There is really no need for them to try and explain scientifically what is explained miraculously. From the miraculous POV the act of resurrection itself may have created the image and since man cannot replicate that process, it’s impossible to explain it scientifically. But what we do know is that certain energetic particles applied to certain mediums do leave traces and can leave negative images. So even science helps to lend credence to their theory of a miracle So if it is an ancient piece of cloth and there isn’t a scientific explanation yet that adequately explains how the image could be produced and since you cannot prove that a God does or doesn’t exist…a believing Christian can easily rely on faith that it is what it is purported to be. So it’s up to you to prove them wrong, not up to them to prove that they are right.
  • patrickmay 2y ago
    You've got the burden of proof backwards there. It is absolutely up to those who claim the shroud is that of Jesus to prove it.
    • NateEag 2y ago
      He's describing the average Christian's perspective, not saying what he himself thinks.
      • kcplate 2y ago
        Correct, but it’s fair to say I don’t have an opinion on its validity at all. It may be, or it may not…neither of those states affect my own personal convictions. The shroud isn’t really for the unbeliever, it’s for the believer…as a reinforcement of their faith.
    • recursive 2y ago
      The nature of faith rejects the validity of such burdens of proof.
• d_theorist 2y ago
  Whatever else you might want to say about the shroud, one thing we know for sure is that it is not a painting. Analysis shows that the image is extremely superficial, only penetrating about 200nm into the fibres of the cloth. This is inconsistent with a painted image.
  • ted_dunning 2y ago
    Could easily have been sprayed on. This is a common technique done with a mouth tube in older times, a bulb sprayer later and an air brush most recently.
    • svieira 2y ago
      There is nothing on the fibers that is visible under a high powered microscope. Paint (even spray-paint) is quite visibly distinct from the fiber it covers.
      • tsimionescu 2y ago
        When it is relatively fresh, or well protected. Who know what is left after 600 years of handling and sunlight exposure and being saved from a fire.
        • svieira 2y ago
          We have known paintings from the time period - the paint is still visible under a microscope.
          • tsimionescu 2y ago
            Yes, because those paintings were preserved as paintings. And they were not designed in the first place to look like something other than a painting.
  • tsimionescu 2y ago
    I was using "painting" in the broader sense of "man-made work of mostly bi-dimensional visual art". I'd also say that I'm pretty sure the mysteriousness of the technique is way overblown. Sure, we don't know exactly what it was, but there are trace pigments on the cloth, and ~600 years of handling and being displayed without much protection, plus being doused in water ~500 years during a fire, will wash off pigments in ways we can't fully predict.
• pkphilip 2y ago
  1. There is no known painting technique - even now, for getting this image onto the shroud. There were no pigments or dyes in sufficient quantity to explain the image on the shroud. 2. About the second point - it remains a mystery but that in no way makes the shroud itself a fake.
  • kergonath 2y ago
    > 1. There is no known painting technique - even now, for getting this image onto the shroud. There were no pigments or dyes in sufficient quantity to explain the image on the shroud. It still does not mean that it has anything to do with Jesus. There are plenty of things we don’t know how to make anymore.
    • pkphilip 2y ago
      I am not saying that it has something to do with Jesus. But if someone is calling this a fake, they should be able to demonstrate how something like this can be created
  • kjkjadksj 2y ago
    Uv damage perhaps? Maybe make the imagery with selective application of sand and leaving it in sunlight?
  • tsimionescu 2y ago
    About the first point, that's true, but mostly irrelevant. There are many niche painting techniques lost to time. Even more so, no one can truly predict the effects 6 centuries of display and exposure and a fire will have on some obscure painting style. We know there are traces of pigments on the cloth, so probably at some point there was much more. It was almost certainly a much less convincing and haunting image at the time it was made, the centuries of wear have just hidden the more obvious marks. The second point was only in reply to someone saying "but what if it was some random shroud from the 1st century unrelated to Jesus?", and I merely explained why that makes much less sense than even the miracle explanation.
• svieira 2y ago
  > you would have to explain how the image on it was produced It was produced by Jesus Christ at His resurrection. He left it for us to see and ensured that its being set aside was recorded in Scripture (not with the others but rolled up in a separate place - https://biblehub.com/john/20-7.htm https://biblehub.com/john/20-7.htm). If you mean "how did Jesus create the image"? Well, I don't know, we can look at the image (as some have) and come up with some theories. My favorite one is the one that says it was in the moment that the angel rolled the stone away from the tomb Jesus briefly shone with light, imprinting on the shroud the image of His suffering. That's certainly not the only way it could have happened, of course, but I think it's a very fitting image.
  • jl6 2y ago
    He smartly ensured that the shroud was exactly consistent with a forgery so that He could sort those with true faith from those whose belief depends on earthly evidence.
  • tsimionescu 2y ago
    That much we already know is false. The "shroud" was not produced at the moment of Jesus's resurrection, it was produced about 1300 years later. This is not in dispute by anyone who cares about evidence, as any good Catholic should. A human forgery should not be worshipped like a divine miracle. Stupidity is not faith. The point I was making there was in response to someone saying that "even if it's a shroud, how do we know it is Jesus's shroud and not some random 1st century burial shroud", and I was explaining that random 1st century burial shrouds obviously don't have images of the dead person on them.