(John 20:6-7) All of this evidence is compelling, and there is no reasonable way to dismiss it. This latter fact is driven home most obviously by the Bible itself, which states specifically that Jesus was “wound in clothes” (not folded in a shroud) and indicates that Jesus’ face was not wrapped but merely had a “napkin” placed over it. On top of all of that, there is (i) the fact that no Jewish burial traditions include surrounding a person in one cloth folded over at the feet. Then there is (f) the existence of an anatomically impossible flat footprint on the back of the Shroud, (g) the fact that the tests for blood in the “wounds” of the Shroud came up negative, and (h) the (aforementioned) fact that the long hair seen in the Shroud defies gravity (since it is parallel with the body, instead of falling to the back of the head as it would if the body were lying flat). , (d) the fact that Bishop Pierre d'Arcis and his predecessor Bishop Henri, of the 1300’s, told the Pope it was fake and even (e) had a confession by the forger. Other evidence that the Shroud is a fake includes (c) the fact that the first creditable mention of it is in 1357 C.E. Indeed, it would be quite a coincidence if all the samples, and all the tests, all separately just happened to have exactly the same flaws. The fact that both explanations are often espoused in the same breath makes it even more obvious that both are contrived attempts to save the original theory from the evidence that refutes it. Did they get the wrong result because they did a bad test on a clean sample, or because they did a good test on a contaminated sample? It can’t be both. In addition, the explanations they give-the cloth tested was from a medieval restoration, the dates were inaccurate because of faulty methods or contamination-are not only untestable (since the tests were already run on the samples in question, there was no way to go back and check whether those particular samples were contaminated or whether the tests were done improperly) they are contradictory. Of course, defenders of the Shroud rushed to explain away this evidence but this move was also unscientific as it is a clear example of an “ ad hoc excuse ”-a vain unfalsifiable attempt to save a theory from contrary evidence. Needless to say, none of these things are what the Shroud depicts. Indeed, since energy radiates in all directions, if energy radiating from Christ’s body somehow left an image on his burial shroud, it would just be a blurry silhouette. Similarly, it also would not depict the hair flowing down to the shoulders when a man with long hair is lying down, his hair falls back towards the ground. Thus, if someone’s face somehow “radiated” and recorded an image on a cloth, when flattened out that cloth would depict whole representations of each part-nose, eye socket, and ears-all pointing in the same direction. A cloth wrapped around someone’s head, for example, lays flat against their nose, eye sockets and ears. But an image produced in this way would be highly distorted it would not look like a painting or photo, as the Shroud does. That said, if the darker spots on the Shroud corresponded to where the fabric would have been closest to the skin of a person it was wrapped around, because the body emanated energy as it resurrected, the 3D image could indicate that it was wrapped around someone as the image on it was produced.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |