Researchers in Jerusalem announced that they’ve found a burial shroud that almost certainly dates to the early 1st century AD, during the time when Jesus walked the earth. It’s significant because it provides some idea of how the body died (probably TB), but more importantly because of the weave of the cloth. It’s a much simpler weave than is found in the Shroud of Turin, the cloth thought to be the burial shroud for Jesus’ body between the Crucifixion and Resurrection.
By Dianelos Georgoudis – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0,
For some, that brings doubt not about the Shroud of Turin, but about the new discovery. I am certain that some will think that because of the differences between the clothes, they will think that the newly found shroud is fake, because they “know” the Shroud of Turin is Jesus’ burial shroud.
This announcement comes just two months after an Italian professor of organic chemistry made it known that he had produced an almost identical copy of the Shroud of Turin, using various pigments and common painting techniques. Professor Luigi Garlaschelli says now that he has the process down, he thinks he could create another reproduction in about a week.
In my younger years, I felt sure that the Shroud of Turin really was what people believe it is. It made sense to me that whatever Godly energy that radiated from Jesus when He was resurrected could have left an afterimage on the cloth that surrounded him at the time. As science worked more on the Shroud, I held to my faith. Surely God would have left some physical evidence of one of the most important events in the history of Christianity.
As I’ve aged (matured?) though, I’ve begun to have doubts about the Shroud, as well as the many other religious relics attributed to Jesus Christ. That is not to say I’ve doubted the existence or the deity of Jesus. But I doubt that we will ever find any object that can categorically and convincingly be tied to Jesus’ time on earth. I honestly and truly believe that we’re never going to find the real tomb of Jesus, or anything relating to the Crucifixion or Resurrection.
Why? God commands against idols, and He knows how we as humans would idolize the sites, and the objects. Witness the thousands of years of bitter controversy about the Shroud. Much of the New Testament is about faith, and faith doesn’t need objects, but rather experiences. Faith is defined as “confidence or trust in a person or thing,” or “belief that is not based on proof.” This latter definition is the more important one, I think. Having physical proof of Jesus’ presence on earth would negate the need for faith. Jesus told Thomas after the Resurrection, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:24-29 NIV).
If Jesus said this to Thomas, would He make it easier for us to believe by seeing?
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