THE bloodstains and markings on the Holy Shroud of Turin correspond to the brutal treatment of Christ described in Gospel accounts of his crucifixion, a latest study suggests.
The study, published by the University of Padua, is by Professor Giulio Fanti, co-ordinator of the international Shroud Science Group. Fanti, a professor of mechanical and thermal measurements, is the creator of various works on the Shroud over 25 years, and is convinced of its authenticity.
The Shroud is a home made twill linen cloth measuring 4.4 by 1.1 metres which incorporates the image of the back and front of a person, most clearly revealed in a photographic negative taken in 1898.
The Vatican, given ownership in 1983, has not officially pronounced on its authenticity. In 1988, it was carbon-dated to the twelfth century, although some scientists claim that the testing was carried out erroneously on a bit of medieval cloth.
The latest study reports: “There are tons of of reddish spots of various sizes and shapes which nearly completely overlap the body image imprinted on it, and which seem perfectly consistent with the different sorts of torture suffered by Jesus who was wrapped in it as a corpse.
“Bloodstained marks on the top consistent with a crown of thorns, blood marks on the hands and feet with crucifixion, and a bloodstain on the chest with the post-mortem spear wound that Christ received.”
The presence of creatinine particles with ferritin, often a by-product of muscle contractions, provides microscopic confirmation of “very heavy torture”, he says. The right eye of the Shroud’s body image is “more sunken and apparently furrowed by a vertical mark”, indicating that the victim was “blinded by a blow to the top”, or wounded “by a thorn from the crown placed on Jesus’s head”.
The 11,300-word study, which incorporates medical and forensic images, concludes that the likely explanation for Jesus’s “relatively early death on the cross” was “hemopericardial infarction”, brought on by kidney and liver failure from “flagellation and microcytic anemia”.
“Jesus was severely scourged and nailed to the cross — he died and his corpse was placed within the sepulchre in Jerusalem and wrapped within the Holy Shroud.”
It continues: “The strong uremia that produced an accentuated shrinkage of the amount of the erythrocytes within the blood caused serious problems in oxygen exchange during respiratory. To compensate for these physical problems, Jesus had to extend his respiratory heavily, in addition to the frequency of his heartbeats, which prompted a heart attack because the fundamental explanation for death.”
Although apparent references to the Shroud were made within the early centuries, the thing’s documented history dates from its exhibition in 1353 on the French town of Lirey, from where it was acquired by the royal House of Savoy.
Damaged by fire in 1532 while housed in a chapel at Chambéry, it was taken to Turin in 1578, and has remained in a specially designed chapel near town’s cathedral since 1683, aside from several transient periods of wartime concealment.
In his latest study, Professor Fanti argues that the image on the Shroud was produced by radiation or an “electric-type energy” of unknown origin, “probably connected with the Holy Fire of Jerusalem which emanated from the corpse and reacted with the linen”.
Features of the facial image, he argues, “accurately coincide” with depictions of Christ on Byzantine coins from the seventh century, suggesting that the Shroud was “seen through the Byzantine Empire”.
His study refers to previous investigations, including those of 1980 and 1981 which confirmed the existence of human blood and fluid produced by pulmonary edema on the Shroud. The “different directions” of blood rivulets, bearing “different macroscopic characteristics”, indicate that the body was held in an upright position and later rotated and rested on its side, while traces of local clay and limestone also indicate a “quick burial”, the brand new study says.
Professor Fanti writes: “Jesus probably lost not less than a 3rd of his blood, thereby causing hypovolemic shock — a powerful reduction in the amount of blood circulating within the body resulting from various hemorrhages and body fluid losses.
“Due to uremia, the red blood cells significantly reduced their ability to exchange oxygen, thus causing a notable tachycardia, which was also accentuated by tonic and clonic contractions, or muscle spasms, resulting from the hypertension of the limbs nailed to the cross. . .
“During Jesus’s last hour before dying on the cross, a reduced blood flow to the kidneys was also brought on by hypovolemia and severe dehydration.”
Professor Fanti writes that his study was “partially supported by a non secular group that requested anonymity”, which had backed his forensic work on other objects. The results, he says, are “fully consistent” with the outline of Christ’s scourging and crucifixion within the Gospels.
In an interview in February 2023 with Italy’s La Voce dell’Ionio, the Professor dated his interest within the Shroud to a faculty visit, aged ten, saying that he was personally convinced that this development was a “work of God”.
