Vatic Note: This appears to be a legitimate problem with the age determination of the shroud. If there were in fact repairs done on the shroud by those caring for it, and it was done in the middle ages, and those repairs were included in the samples tested, than we do have a problem. I suspect they are going to try to get additional samples and retest and make sure the samples are only of the original cloth and no repair clothes included. Will try to find out how that is going and get back to you.
What makes this interesting is the fact that it is someone of the Jewish faith that is making this an issue on the side of Christians, in that the shroud may prove that Christ did exist.
Is the Shroud real? Probably.
http://www.tedxviadellaconciliazione.com/speakers/barrie-schwortz/
and http://shroudstory.com/2011/07/25/tales-of-blood-type-ab-negative/
by Dan Porter, TedX Talks
The
Shroud of Turin may be the real burial cloth of Jesus. The carbon
dating, once seemingly proving it was a medieval fake, is now widely
thought of as suspect and meaningless. Even the famous Atheist Richard
Dawkins admits it is controversial.
Christopher Ramsey, the director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Laboratory, thinks more testing is needed. So do many other scientists and archeologists. This is because there are significant scientific and non-religious reasons to doubt the validity of the tests. Chemical analysis, all nicely peer-reviewed in scientific journals and subsequently confirmed by numerous chemists, shows that samples tested are chemically unlike the whole cloth. (VN: "...unlike the whole cloth....", from which the samples tested were taken. That is a big factor in the credibility of the test results.)
It was probably a mixture of older threads and newer threads woven into the cloth as part of a medieval repair. Recent robust statistical studies add weight to this theory. Philip Ball, the former physical science editor for Nature when the carbon dating results were published, recently wrote:
“It’s fair to say that, despite the seemingly definitive tests in 1988, the status of the Shroud of Turin is murkier than ever.”
If we wish to be scientific we must admit we do not know how old the cloth is. But if the newer thread is about half of what was tested – and some evidence suggests that – it is possible that the cloth is from the time of Christ.
No one has a good idea how front and back images of a crucified man came to be on the cloth. Yes, it is possible to create images that look similar. But no one has created images that match the chemistry, peculiar superficiality and profoundly mysterious three-dimensional information content of the images on the Shroud. Again, this is all published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
We simply do not have enough reliable information to arrive at a scientifically rigorous conclusion. Years ago, as a skeptic of the Shroud, I came to realize that while I might believe it was a fake, I could not know so from the facts. Now, as someone who believes it is the real burial shroud of Jesus of Nazareth, I similarly realize that a leap of faith over unanswered questions is essential.
My name is Dan Porter. Please email me at DanielRobertPorter@gmail.com
What makes this interesting is the fact that it is someone of the Jewish faith that is making this an issue on the side of Christians, in that the shroud may prove that Christ did exist.
Is the Shroud real? Probably.
http://www.tedxviadellaconciliazione.com/speakers/barrie-schwortz/
and http://shroudstory.com/2011/07/25/tales-of-blood-type-ab-negative/
by Dan Porter, TedX Talks
The
Shroud of Turin may be the real burial cloth of Jesus. The carbon
dating, once seemingly proving it was a medieval fake, is now widely
thought of as suspect and meaningless. Even the famous Atheist Richard
Dawkins admits it is controversial.Christopher Ramsey, the director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Laboratory, thinks more testing is needed. So do many other scientists and archeologists. This is because there are significant scientific and non-religious reasons to doubt the validity of the tests. Chemical analysis, all nicely peer-reviewed in scientific journals and subsequently confirmed by numerous chemists, shows that samples tested are chemically unlike the whole cloth. (VN: "...unlike the whole cloth....", from which the samples tested were taken. That is a big factor in the credibility of the test results.)
It was probably a mixture of older threads and newer threads woven into the cloth as part of a medieval repair. Recent robust statistical studies add weight to this theory. Philip Ball, the former physical science editor for Nature when the carbon dating results were published, recently wrote:
“It’s fair to say that, despite the seemingly definitive tests in 1988, the status of the Shroud of Turin is murkier than ever.”
If we wish to be scientific we must admit we do not know how old the cloth is. But if the newer thread is about half of what was tested – and some evidence suggests that – it is possible that the cloth is from the time of Christ.
No one has a good idea how front and back images of a crucified man came to be on the cloth. Yes, it is possible to create images that look similar. But no one has created images that match the chemistry, peculiar superficiality and profoundly mysterious three-dimensional information content of the images on the Shroud. Again, this is all published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
We simply do not have enough reliable information to arrive at a scientifically rigorous conclusion. Years ago, as a skeptic of the Shroud, I came to realize that while I might believe it was a fake, I could not know so from the facts. Now, as someone who believes it is the real burial shroud of Jesus of Nazareth, I similarly realize that a leap of faith over unanswered questions is essential.
My name is Dan Porter. Please email me at DanielRobertPorter@gmail.com
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1 comment:
"in that the shroud may prove that Christ did exist."
But who was he? That is another story.
http://apolloniustyaneus.blogspot.gr/2013/12/turin-shroud-proof-or-doom-for.html
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