Turin is an important historic city situated in northwestern Italy about 140 KM southwest of Milan. In this historic city is located the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. And in this Cathedral is a relic which has captivated scientists, historians and theologians alike for centuries.
What is this relic or artifact which has brought science, history, theology, faith, photography and many other disciplines together in a way like no other historical piece? What is this artifact which has become the most studied and the most scrutinized historical material? Some have tried to dismiss it just as nothing but a medieval forgery. Some have tried to label it as just another one of the many catholic relics. Some have tried to brush it aside as just another dubious item of veneration created to gather attention. But today, for many people, it is undeniable that it has become the most valid proof of the most extraordinary event that took place in human history. And it is now turning even pure skeptics into ardent believers and propagators of this extraordinary event that took place in the Middle East some 2000 years ago.
This so-called relic is a 14 feet 5 inches by 3 feet 7 inches linen clothe which many people believe to be the actual burial cloth of Jesus Christ as the clothe bears the faint image of a bearded scourged crucified man whose features directly corresponds to the details of Jesus’ crucifixion found in the gospels. The scriptures tell us that after the death of Jesus on the cross, a prominent man by the name of Joseph of Arimathea went to the Roman governor Pontius Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus to bury it. Pilate granted the permission and Joseph of Arimathea took down the body of Christ from the cross.
Joseph of Arimathea laid the corpse of Jesus in a new tomb which he had bought for himself. It was a rich man’s tomb and, in accordance with Jewish tradition, he wrapped Jesus’ body with a linen clothe. The gospel of John mentions about Joseph of Arimathea burying Jesus with the help of another member of the Jewish Sanhedrin, Nicodemus.
Three days after the crucifixion of Christ, the tomb was found empty but the linen clothe which wrapped the body was still lying there undisturbed. When the people could not find the body, they were confused and dumbfounded. And it probably took them some time to sense that something extraordinary and unprecedented had happened because they realized it could not have been the handiwork of thieves who came and stole the body as there was no logic for thieves to leave the burial cloth undisturbed after stealing the body.
How this linen clothe ended up in Northwestern Italy is another story in itself. If this burial cloth actually originated in Jerusalem then it had gone a long way and through many hands to end up at its present location. Historians have said that there are records of the shroud being in Constantinople, the eastern capital of the Roman Empire and also of it being owned by people in France. Historians also say of it going through multiple hands over the centuries and being venerated even as an object of worship and healing. Scholars even say that the shroud of Turin survived many fires and other misfortunes. But people also argue that the cloth cannot survive for 2000 years still exhibiting all its vital characteristics.
In the year 1978 a group of roughly 33 American scientists and researchers were granted unprecedented access to the shroud of Turin to figure out what it actually was. On the night before they were to examine the linen clothe these people from various backgrounds were joking that they would prove within a few hours that the shroud was a forgery and that there was nothing to it and they were even gloating over the fact that they were being given free trip to the iconic city of Turin. But after examining the shroud the following day, none of them were joking or making fun of the shroud anymore because they had all realized that there was something extraordinary and unexplainable about the shroud.
After examining the shroud, all these experts from various backgrounds were certain that it was not a forgery. It was not a painting because there were no paints, no pigments, no dye, no brush stroke and also that the image on the shroud was only on the outermost thinnest part.
Moreover, once you get so close to the shroud the image becomes invisible and it would be visible only if you stand about 8 – 10 feet away from it. This was another feature which the scientists, photographers and other experts could not explain.
In 1976 also, some scientists viewed and captured the image with a technology called VP-8 Image Analyzer. This was a device used to capture images on heavenly bodies and it would provide a 3D image (Three Dimensional images). When these scientists observed the image on the linen cloth with their VP-8, they were astounded to find that the image on the shroud exhibited three dimensional (length, width and height) features. The scientists were baffled because a normal photograph or painting would not exhibit three dimensional features.
On May 28, 1898, the Shroud of Turin was first photographed by a lawyer and amateur photographer named Secondo Pia. When Pia developed the glass-plate negatives, he made a groundbreaking discovery. The image on the cloth contained the characteristics of a photographic negative. Reversing the light and dark areas Pia saw with his naked eye a strikingly clear positive portrait of a man and exclaimed “Oh My God”. And being a believer, Secondo Pia was convinced that he was literally looking at the face of Jesus Christ. If that was so, he became the first man to see the real face of Christ in almost 1900 years.
Another expert on the Turin shroud is Dr. Jeremiah J Johnston. He did his PHD in the resurrection of Christ and has written extensively on the subject. He also calls himself an expert on Roman crucifixion. And despite being a skeptic initially, Jeremiah says he is now fully convinced that the image of the crucified man in the shroud is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ.
According to New Testament scholar Dr. Jeremiah, the image on the Shroud of Turin was caused by an intense burst of light or cold energy travelling at an extremely high speed. Citing research in this field, he states that this imprint was created by 34 billion watts of energy, lasting just 1/40 of a billionth of a second. Johnston refers to the artifact as a “resurrection cloth” rather than a death cloth, claiming the image is the result of Christ’s body passing through the linen at the moment of resurrection.
Jeremiah also says that no human being in history was crucified the way Jesus Christ was crucified and the image on the shroud perfectly corresponds to the gospel accounts of how Jesus was crucified i.e. with the helmet of thorns, the way he was scourged , the spear piercing on his right side etc. This is why Jeremiah Johnston has no hesitation in saying that Jesus Christ himself took the first selfie in human history.
The image on the shroud is also extraordinarily thin (over 100 times thinner than a single human hair which is typically 50 to 150 micrometers). This is another aspect which science cannot explain or replicate.
Carbon dating was done on the shroud in 1988 by three prominent universities independently and it dated the shroud to the period 1260 -1390. However, recent examinations of the shroud with the newest technologies have once again proven beyond the shadow of a doubt that there is much more to the shroud than what meets the eye and that the 1988 carbon dating result is erroneous.
I am believer of Christ and I believe that Jesus Christ rose from the death. Therefore, someday, even if some scientists are able to prove that the Shroud of Turin is a fake and forgery, it will not change anything as far as my faith in Christ is concerned.
But after reading some much and watching so much documentaries on the Shroud of Turin, I believe that the Shroud of Turin must be the actual burial cloth of Christ through which he emanated when he rose And when I ponder over these arguments and deliberations I can’t help but think that science itself is reinforcing and corroborating what the gospel says about the man called Christ and it makes me believe that the greatest power in the universe himself walked on the surface of the earth 2000 years ago and left a scientific imprint which no known power on earth can duplicate even today.
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