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ROME (Reuters) – An Italian scientist says he has reproduced the Shroud of Turin, a feat that he says proves definitively that the linen some Christians revere as Jesus Christ's burial cloth is a medieval fake.
The shroud, measuring 14 feet, 4 inches by 3 feet, 7 inches bears the image, eerily reversed like a photographic negative, of a crucified man some believers say is Christ.
"We have shown that is possible to reproduce something which has the same characteristics as the Shroud," Luigi Garlaschelli, who is due to illustrate the results at a conference on the para-normal this weekend in northern Italy, said on Monday.
A professor of organic chemistry at the University of Pavia, Garlaschelli made available to Reuters the paper he will deliver and the accompanying comparative photographs.
The Shroud of Turin shows the back and front of a bearded man with long hair, his arms crossed on his chest, while the entire cloth is marked by what appears to be rivulets of blood from wounds in the wrists, feet and side.
Carbon dating tests by laboratories in Oxford, Zurich and Tucson, Arizona in 1988 caused a sensation by dating it from between 1260 and 1390. Sceptics said it was a hoax, possibly made to attract the profitable medieval pilgrimage business.
But scientists have thus far been at a loss to explain how the image was left on the cloth.
Garlaschelli reproduced the full-sized shroud using materials and techniques that were available in the middle ages.
They placed a linen sheet flat over a volunteer and then rubbed it with a pigment containing traces of acid. A mask was used for the face.
PIGMENT, BLOODSTAINS AND SCORCHES
The pigment was then artificially aged by heating the cloth in an oven and washing it, a process which removed it from the surface but left a fuzzy, half-tone image similar to that on the Shroud. He believes the pigment on the original Shroud faded naturally over the centuries.
They then added blood stains, burn holes, scorches and water stains to achieve the final effect.
The Catholic Church does not claim the Shroud is authentic nor that it is a matter of faith, but says it should be a powerful reminder of Christ's passion.
One of Christianity's most disputed relics, it is locked away at Turin Cathedral in Italy and rarely exhibited. It was last on display in 2000 and is due to be shown again next year.
Garlaschelli expects people to contest his findings.
"If they don't want to believe carbon dating done by some of the world's best laboratories they certainly won't believe me," he said.
The accuracy of the 1988 tests was challenged by some hard-core believers who said restorations of the Shroud in past centuries had contaminated the results.
The history of the Shroud is long and controversial.
After surfacing in the Middle East and France, it was brought by Italy's former royal family, the Savoys, to their seat in Turin in 1578. In 1983 ex-King Umberto II bequeathed it to the late Pope John Paul.
The Shroud narrowly escaped destruction in 1997 when a fire ravaged the Guarini Chapel of the Turin cathedral where it is held. The cloth was saved by a fireman who risked his life.
Garlaschelli received funding for his work by an Italian association of atheists and agnostics but said it had no effect on his results.
"Money has no odor," he said. "This was done scientifically. If the Church wants to fund me in the future, here I am."

"The Catholic Church does not claim the Shroud is authentic nor that it is a matter of faith, but says it should be a powerful reminder of Christ's passion."

If you are trying to poke holes in someone's faith, you need a better target. Its long been assumed it was probably a hoax. And I'm Catholic.

You find nothing questionable about the Catholic Church's reluctance to openly associate with any of these "miracles" that they know the scientists can disprove? And yet they still wish to milk it and say it should serve as a "reminder" like as if Jesus was a real person.

I wasn't commenting on that, but ...

I think that the church has recognized and accepted a few things that bear relevance here. First, that historically it did not always act with integrity. Second, its a large umbrella, and those who follow the faith come from different cultures, respond in different ways, and have different faith needs. There are cultures in which relics are very important, and a large part of the tradition, and denying that those relics hold any value would be to tromp on the faith of all those people. Some people need structure and authority; some people need to figure things out on their own; some people need to believe in a God that is familiar to them, and takes the form of a man; some people find it easier to understand something less concrete. By and large, the Catholic church is trying to find a home for all those different types within its umbrella, because all those differences have more to do with path than result.

So when did god authorize his preachers to lie and deceive in the name of convincing others to buy into the Catholic "faith"? Cause the way you put it, it sounds more like they're scamming people and telling them what they want to hear.

Which makes it sound like you are one of those who think it is wrong to let young children believe in Santa Claus?

Which makes it sound like you are one of those who think it is wrong to let young children believe in Santa Claus?

Truth and fiction aren't always that clear a line.

God never authorized anyone to lie. But someone who was corrupt may have created that shroud, and God being very good at turning lemons into lemonaid may have allowed the object to increase the faith of those who needed that type of thing to believe. Once that is in place, do you yank the rug out from under them? Not really. You allow the science to speak for itself while allowing that there could be reasons to be inspired by the relic regardless. A bit like the story we tell our kids when they discover there isn't really a man in a red suit delivering their presents - that the spirit of Santa Claus is alive and well and living through his many, many helpers.

"4 You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth."

Seems pretty cut and dry where "god" stands on using mumified remains of grotto girls or manufactured rags as items of worship. And "god" didn't do anything, those are the decisions of men who care more about numbers and maintaining their empire*.

Why would it be wrong for children? I think it'd be wrong to continue to insist such a story once the kid figures it out

Truth and fiction isn't always a clear line but that blur involves real people, not mythic deities.


*No one has a nicer palace and no one has better gold or the finest clothes. Quite an opulent life for those who are supposed to have sworn a vow of poverty.

I wasn't commenting on that, but ...

I think that the church has recognized and accepted a few things that bear relevance here. First, that historically it did not always act with integrity. Second, its a large umbrella, and those who follow the faith come from different cultures, respond in different ways, and have different faith needs. There are cultures in which relics are very important, and a large part of the tradition, and denying that those relics hold any value would be to tromp on the faith of all those people. Some people need structure and authority; some people need to figure things out on their own; some people need to believe in a God that is familiar to them, and takes the form of a man; some people find it easier to understand something less concrete. By and large, the Catholic church is trying to find a home for all those different types within its umbrella, because all those differences have more to do with path than result.

If they don't want to believe carbon dating done by some of the world's best laboratories they certainly won't believe me.
Luigi Garlaschelli

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