Evidence for God from Science

Philip wrote:It is clear that no ancient forger had any ability to do what the Shroud analysis shows. And what other ancient burial shroud has been found with any such attributes? If it is a fraud from many centuries past, how is that possible - as not only was the expertise and technical ability not there (heck, it's not there TODAY!), but WHY would a forger go to such lengths - and to fool WHOM? Forged deceptions are always aimed at contemporary audiences. A clever painting would have more than sufficed to delude those in centuries past, where alleged pieces of the Cross and the lost Cup of Christ were a dime a dozen. Even the negative image was unknown until modern photography. No paint, no identified blood, no physical breaks within the blood, and an image modern science cannot replicate even just the LOOK of the scorches without using lasers and modern technology. None of this makes any sense for a forgery. PLUS the Church has had this in its possession for many centuries - and it had long considered it the burial garments of Christ - and BEFORE even the photographic negative was discovered, and also long before all of these other remarkable discoveries had been made about it. Did the Church just get unfathomably lucky that all these things correlate around an artifact that modern science cannot explain, and yet the Church always insisted was the burial garment of Christ? What are the odds of THAT?

Plus Philip how does a forger create X-ray images of the fingers, wrist, parts of the femur and parts of the jaw. All of these makes the foray theory strain credulity and that is putting it lightly.

“Plus Philip how does a forger create X-ray images of the fingers, wrist, parts of the femur and parts of the jaw. All of these makes the foray theory strain credulity and that is putting it lightly.”
Bippy123
When you say x-ray images of these parts are you saying that researchers have found bone or skeletal images in the shroud image? As if they were looking at an actual x-ray? If so, can you provide links to that please?
Also, has the blood on the sudarium matched the one on the shroud? What is the sudarium carbon date? Why is the blood red instead of black like ancient blood usually is?
Have researchers tried to see if the blood contains Y chromosomes? If they find it, that would prove either the shroud or the virgin birth is fake.

Hey JLAFAN good to see you here man. This is wallstreeter43 from the uncommon descent blog. Yes that is exactly what I'm saying that skeletal images were found on the shroud.

This video here http://youtu.be/EmMvc-AV24w shows how professor Whanger of the sturp team found this X-ray info, even though in this video he only talks about the fingers and wrists, there is also X-ray info found on the jaw and parts of the femur. There was a recent shroud presentation where they showed the Image of the jaw where you could see gums and teeth. There were a few dentist in the audience that said that it looks like the kind of image he would get when he would X-ray a patients teeth and gum, and he did this by placing an object in the mouth and X-rays would come out of it, which gives us a clue that these X-rays probably came from within the body of the man on the shroud.

Here is another video on how Whanger found the skeletal images on the jaw and face of the man on the shroud.
http://youtu.be/ojxqK59TvTo

The blood on the sudarium and the blood on the shroud are both type AB . The blood is red instead of black because it is bilirubin blood, and that was found by world reknowned blood chemist Alan Adler and his assistant, which they submitted for peer review. Bilirubin blood stays red, and bilirubin blood is blood from a person that's been severely tortured.

The sudarium was c14 tested but the person who examined and tested it said there was too much contamination to get a true date, though he got a 6th to 7th century date on it. The real clue here are the 125 points of congruence they found between the blood stains on the head of shroud image and the sudarium. In a court of law 25 points are needed for a match so the shroud and sudarium match is nearly perfect, even allowing forensic experts to determine the length of the nose on both relics to be 8 centimeters.

As far as the chromosomes, here is what I found. As far as DNA they couldn't go far beyond that because the DNA was eroded very badly.
http://fellowshipofminds.wordpress.com/ ... gin-birth/

In his book, The Physics of Christianity (Doubleday, 2007), Tulane University physicist Dr. Frank J. Tipler reasons that if the Gospels’ account of the virgin birth is true, then Jesus’ DNA makeup would have no Y chromosome because he did not have a human father, but instead have two X chromosomes. However, since Jesus was clearly male, he must have the SRY gene. But the SRY gene, instead of being in the Y chromosome, was inserted into a location where it is not normally found – inside one of the two X chromosomes imparted from Mary, his mother.

And that’s exactly what a team of Italian researchers found.

In January 1995, led by Professor Marcello Canale of the Institute of Legal Medicine in Genoa, a group of Italian researchers, including several workers who had invented the standard DNA test for gender, conducted a DNA analysis of the blood on the Shroud of Turin and on the Oviedo Cloth (also called the Sudarium of Oviedo). A recent report by scientists confirms that the Shroud is not a fake. Mark Guscin provides strong evidence that the Sudarium of Oviedo, Spain, is the cloth described in John 20:7 as being wrapped around Jesus’ head.

Here is Dr. Tipler’s account (from pages 183-187 of his book):

Normally, the results of a DNA test of the blood on such a famous object would be published in English in a major scientific journal. … Not so the results of this DNA test. The results were published, in Italian, in the very obscure Italian journal devoted to the study of the Turin Shroud. Furthermore, only the raw data were published. That is, the Genoa team published black-and-white Xerox copies of the computer output of the DNA analyzer. This is never, never done. Always, the data are presented in a neat table or figure, and they are accompanied by a discussion of their significance. The Genoa team made no effort to interpret their data.

But I was able to interpret the data at once. They are the expected signature of the DNA of a male born in a Virgin Birth! …

The Turin Shroud data show 107 (106+1) but not trace of a 112 base pair gene. The Oviedo Cloth data show 105 (106-1) but no trace of a 112 base pair. The X chromosome is present, but there is no evidence of a Y chromosome. This is the expected signature of … virgin birth, the XX male generated by an SRY inserted into an X chromosome. It is not what would be expected of a standard male.

Other explanations are possible. The DNA analyzed could be entirely contamination from people who later touched the Shroud and the Cloth. But we have witnesses that men touched the two samples also, and it seems incredible that no trace of male contamination would be seen…. Another possibility is that the Turin Shroud and the Oviedo Cloth are fakes and that the fakes used real blood from males they knew were born of virgins. This possibility, in my opinion, has zero probability.

The DNA data thus support the virgin birth hypothesis. The DNA data supporting a virgin birth also support the hypothesis that both the Turin Shroud and the Oviedo Cloth are genuine.

JLAFAN, I hope this helps
I sure wish we could get bornagain777 to come here and condense this thread into some super posts, he's much better at this then me lol

JLA, here are 2 more links to help you better understand the congruent matches between the shroud and sudarium.

http://theshroudofturin.blogspot.com/20 ... blood.html

http://www.shroud.com/guscin.htm

3: Coincidence with the Shroud

The sudarium alone has revealed sufficient information to suggest that it was in contact with the face of Jesus after the crucifixion. However, the really fascinating evidence comes to light when this cloth is compared to the Shroud of Turin.

The first and most obvious coincidence is that the blood on both cloths belongs to the same group, namely AB.

The length of the nose through which the pleural oedema fluid came onto the sudarium has been calculated at eight centimetres, just over three inches. This is exactly the same length as the nose on the image of the Shroud.

If the face of the image on the Shroud is placed over the stains on the sudarium, perhaps the most obvious coincidence is the exact fit of the stains with the beard on the face. As the sudarium was used to clean the man's face, it appears that it was simply placed on the face to absorb all the blood, but not used in any kind of wiping movement.

A small stain is also visible proceeding from the right hand side of the man's mouth. This stain is hardly visible on the Shroud, but Dr. John Jackson, using the VP-8 and photo enhancements has confirmed its presence.

The thorn wounds on the nape of the neck also coincide perfectly with the bloodstains on the Shroud.

Dr. Alan Whanger applied the Polarized Image Overlay Technique to the sudarium, comparing it to the image and bloodstains on the Shroud. The frontal stains on the sudarium show seventy points of coincidence with the Shroud, and the rear side shows fifty. The only possible conclusion is that the Oviedo sudarium covered the same face as the Turin Shroud.

4: The Temporal Aspect the sudarium before the Shroud

The sudarium has no image, and none of the facial stains of dried or drying blood visible on the Shroud, especially the stain on the forehead in the shape of an inverted three. The stains on the sudarium were made by a less viscous mixture.

This, together with the fact that the fingers which held the sudarium to Jesus' nose have left their mark, point to a short temporal use of the cloth and eliminate the possibility of its contact with the body after burial.

Jewish tradition demands that if the face of a dead person was in any way disfigured, it should be covered with a cloth to avoid people seeing this unpleasant sight. This would certainly have been the case with Jesus, whose face was covered in blood from the injuries produced by the crown of thorns and swollen from falling and being struck.

It seems that the sudarium was first used before the dead body was taken down from the cross and discarded when it was buried.

This fits in with what we learn from John's gospel, which tells us that the sudarium was rolled up in a place by itself.

5: Conclusions

The studies on the sudarium and the comparison of this cloth with the Shroud are just one of the many branches of science which point to both having covered the dead body of Jesus. The history of the Oviedo cloth is well documented, and the conclusions of this for the dating of the Shroud need no further comment.


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JLA, sorry about that buddy, I confused you with another JLAFAN.
My bad

JLAFAN, Here is another very crucial video of a more recent presentation of the shroud made by a doctor to high school students.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcKTkjWkqEU

In my opinion this is one of the best video presentation of the shroud. Pay close attention to the PRISTINE blood clots that he talks about.

Bibby

I am the JLAfan from uncommondesecnet. I recognized your wallstreeter handle. I will have to look into these more in depth when I get a chance but I have to admit, the x-rays and the xx chromosomes seem too hard to believe. I'm not saying it's not true but difficult to accept. It kind of seems very similar to a Ron Wyatt's "We found Noah's ark" or "chariot wheels in the red sea" type of claim. The more the shroud is studied, the more we may see "things" that aren't there in order to make it true. I think the rest of the evidences are very good but I wonder if some are going too far.

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JLAfan2001 wrote:Bibby

I am the JLAfan from uncommondesecnet. I recognized your wallstreeter handle. I will have to look into these more in depth when I get a chance but I have to admit, the x-rays and the xx chromosomes seem too hard to believe. I'm not saying it's not true but difficult to accept. It kind of seems very similar to a Ron Wyatt's "We found Noah's ark" or "chariot wheels in the red sea" type of claim. The more the shroud is studied, the more we may see "things" that aren't there in order to make it true. I think the rest of the evidences are very good but I wonder if some are going too far.

JLAFAN while I do admit that I haven't studied the xx chromosome info in detail, I have studied the xray info, and that's rarely argued against . Why do they seem hard to believe to you? As you start to research the shroud of turin you will begin
To understand why it's unlike any relic ever found. There are over 300 peer reviewed papers on it, with sturp publishing over 100 between 78 and 88 alone.



Dr. Alan Whanger is a Professor Emeritus of the Duke University Medical Center, but he isn't the only one who saw these xray quality images of certain parts of the shroud image.

http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/n37part3.pdf

For many years Shroud researchers have been puzzled by the striking `X-ray appearance of certain features of the Shroud. In particular there seems a very skeletal appearance to the hands, as has been observed by, among others, Dr. Giles Carter and Dr. John Jackson in the U.S.A., and Dr. Allan Mills of Leicester University here in the U.K.

Even the individual wrist bones can be identified, and it is plain where the nail went through the wrist. The eye sockets, the nasal bones, the sinuses and about 20 teeth accurate in detail including the roots can be rather clearly seen. These findings have been reviewed by a number of physicians, including three professors of radiology [italics mine - Ed.], who all immediately agreed that this shows an autoradiograph. ... These new detailed images show clearly that the reason for the appearance of the very long fingers and of the wide eyes is the underlying skeletal image.

JLAFAN , the images have been shown to dentists and radiologists and they all clearly agreed that these were autoradiographs. These are people who have looked at thousands of X-rays of the teeth and jaws. It isn't something that they want to see, it is something that they have been trained to spot. This isnt argued anymore by the experts in this field.

I was recently debating the many evidences of the shroud on another Christian forum, and after it all an atheist claimed that there was no way to know for sure this was the image of Jesus. He said for all we know another person could have resurrected lol.
Another person who was crucified the same exact way Jesus was crucified in the bible? And resurrected ?
Does this seem more reasonable to you then the resurrection of one man that made the claim to be God, whose apostles saw him resurrected and they all went courageously to their deaths for this belief?

The shroud makes atheists abandon science, reason and logic for a reason .

Philip wrote:

Your telling me the man needed signs and wonders to believe... yet Jesus never gave him a sign. It's clear from scripture that he believed solely on the words of Jesus.

I never said that the official needed signs and wonders - but clearly some DID need more than mere words (Jesus confirmed that) - and they were provided such as well. And the man in question was not the only person being addressed (thus the plural "you."). And certainly many today need more than just to be told to "believe!" That is all I am saying. Evidence is important for many to believe - and you've got a whole forum of guys here that will attest to that. But no matter the power of the evidence, our faith must still be placed in JESUS. Just because some wrongly worship things connected with our faith, does not diminish the One who is the Author of it, nor the persuasive power of the evidence He provides.

For me the shroud has no biblical foundation. How can you determine the shroud is a sign from God? Because it apparently defies scientific understanding...what's the standard by which you make your claim?
How do you know the shroud isn't demonic???

"For false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show great signs and wonders, so as to mislead, if possible, even the elect"

Realize that Jesus' signs were a fulfillment of scripture, every sign He performed had a theological meaning. Why did Moses supernaturally feed bread to the Hebrews in the wilderness? Because it was a picture of what Jesus would do when He supernaturally feed bread to the 5,000. It's a sign, Jesus is the true Prophet.

Obviously the greatest sign is the cross, but it's also a fulfillment of the Old Testament pictures of Calvary. Pictures like when Joshua raised his arms with staff in hand and a man on each side of him. As long as Joshua's hands were raised the Jews had victory in the battle. The analogy is self apparent. There far too many pictures and theological references of the cross in the OT to mention here. Why? because its the greatest sign of all.

I'm confident I can find more scriptural references warning against images and their worship, than anything supporting something like the shroud in the bible. In fact it seems that most scriptural references to "images" are linked to anti-christ. So I'm just curious...how do you know the shroud is a sign from God? Simply stating it's a scientific mystery doesn't impress the point. I need scriptural support, simply saying God uses signs and wonders lacks a theological understanding of what a "sign" signifies.

"that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders"

As always,
Be blessed Philip

Danieltwotwenty wrote:

tetelesti wrote:I never stated that signs and wonders weren’t from God, I merely pointed out the fact that I don’t believe the Shroud is a sign. Why? Again because it can and did become an object of idolatry. If you reference the links I provided earlier you’d see a prominent figure bowing before the shroud. It's well documented that it did become an object of worship. Idols are a subject that scripture clearly forbids.

The shroud is not an idol unless you make it one, I doubt anyone here would be praying to a piece of cloth or worshipping it, this is just a curiosity and possibly a miracules sign that our beloved Jesus lefts us, nothing more and nothing less.

Hmm...I can just as easily say, the shroud is only a sign from God if you make it one.
Anyways we don't believe in curiosities and possible miracles...do we?

"In pointing out these things to the brethren, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following. But have nothing to do with worldly fables fit only for old women. On the other hand, discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness"

If you find the cloth may become an idol for yourself, then run away from it and don't look back, but for the rest of us we can view it for what it is.

So what is the shroud? I ask this is all seriousness...

Telesti, the shroud is believed by many to be the burial shroud of Christ. This is obviously why we have this thread here.
No one on this forum is worshipping it. Did you see any post on this forum that implied it should be worshipped?

I Kings 6:23-36; 7:27-39; 8:6-67 - Solomon's temple contains statues of cherubim and images of cherubim
Last I checked these were Images, but cherubim were never worshipped. cheribum are angelic beings created by God.
If you take images too the extreme then we aren't even allowed to carry pictures of loved ones in our wallets.
As far as the shroud being biblical, it fits exactly the passion and crucifixion of Christ as it was in the gospels.
If it is the shroud of Christ, and it was caused by the resurrection then it's another witness to the resurrection.
As far as having no importance at all, maybe you can email mark Antonacci and August Accetta and tell them that they never should have studied the shroud in the first place, and then after that you can explain to It to Christ.

As far as it being from Satan, I could say that a picture of babe Ruth is from satan , would that mean that all images of babe Ruth should be banned because you have a fear of someone worshipping them, or worshipping images of Burt Lancaster?
If God allowed images of Cherubim in the most holy places of worship then images by themselves are not a sin, it's when we worship them , then it becomes a sin.

I doubt you can find anything in scripture that says researching evidence for the shroud being a sin. If so maybe u can email
Bible believing Christians like Gary habermas, and pastor Kenneth Stevenson amongst others and explain this to them.
Until then it's just a conspiracy theory with no evidence to back it up. You only have your own interpretation of scripture which obviously many Christians who have been studying the shroud disagree with.
God bless

tetelesti wrote:

Danieltwotwenty wrote:

tetelesti wrote:I never stated that signs and wonders weren’t from God, I merely pointed out the fact that I don’t believe the Shroud is a sign. Why? Again because it can and did become an object of idolatry. If you reference the links I provided earlier you’d see a prominent figure bowing before the shroud. It's well documented that it did become an object of worship. Idols are a subject that scripture clearly forbids.

The shroud is not an idol unless you make it one, I doubt anyone here would be praying to a piece of cloth or worshipping it, this is just a curiosity and possibly a miracules sign that our beloved Jesus lefts us, nothing more and nothing less.

Hmm...I can just as easily say, the shroud is only a sign from God if you make it one.
Anyways we don't believe in curiosities and possible miracles...do we?

"In pointing out these things to the brethren, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following. But have nothing to do with worldly fables fit only for old women. On the other hand, discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness"

If you find the cloth may become an idol for yourself, then run away from it and don't look back, but for the rest of us we can view it for what it is.

So what is the shroud? I ask this is all seriousness...

If you quote the bible, please provide book, chapter and verse.

That verse is talking about folk lore and fables, not real and tangible arifacts. By your reasoning we should abandon all scientific inquiry. You have pulled that verse way out of context and twisted it to mean what you want it too.

You say we "believe" in the shroud, please don't put words in our mouths, no one here believes in the shroud, our beliefs are firmly in the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We may have reasons to have beliefs about the shroud but we most certainly do not believe in it. There is definitely a distinction between the two or else pretty much everything becomes and idol in your eyes.

The shroud is what it is, like any ancient arifacts we can study them and learn things from them about history, culture and events that transpired long ago.

Like I said if you find that these types of things could be a stumbling block for your faith, then run far away. For the rest of us, we honor God in all things we do, we praise Jesus' mighty name because he has justified us through his blood and convicted us with his Holy Spirit and I have not been convicted that the shroud has become an idol for me, no more than any other interest I hold, because I honor God in everything I do.

Dan

How do you know the shroud isn't demonic???

Think about the absurdity of that question/implication. Why would Satan want to do anything at all to authenticate anything associated with Jesus' Resurrection or that would authenticate the accounts of that found in Scripture - ESPECIALLY a garment associated with Christ that would authenticate THE KEY foundation upon which the faith of ALL Christians everywhere is based - that Jesus lived, died hideously, and arose in THE miracle of miracles. Someone finds Jesus' supposed bones, "proof" that the Resurrection was faked, etc - I can see Satan getting behind such lies. But him getting behind something that authenticates the Resurrection? Absurd!

"And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.” And he called them to him and said to them in parables, “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end."
(Mark 3:22-26 ESV)

Satan conspires to make the Resurrection appear a fiction, a most extraordinary lie. Atheists and agnostics obsess over trying to shoot down any evidence that might authenticate it. Making the Shroud appear miraculous doesn't exactly fit with that agenda, does it?

Bippy, and everyone else here, I have a question for you. If some piece of evidence came forward that proved to you(let's assume this is a possibility for the sake of my question) that the shroud was not the shroud of Jesus Christ, what would that do to your faith?

Rick, finding out that the Shroud wasn't of a resurrected Christ wouldn't change a thing for me. In fact, until this past year, I thought it probably not of Christ. That Jesus is God, was virgin born, brutally killed, Resurrected, the hope of my eternal future - these I believe more than anything else. I merely consider various evidences - some which are authentic, some not. Some come along my faith so powerfully that I consider them to be authentic, as best a human can determine such. Some we cannot know for certain. But that so many things so improbably, so impossible, line up with Scripture - well, for me, that is one thing.

But my very early childhood faith, in my late teens, became more certain to me through my discovery of so many incredible evidences (science, prophecy, history, etc). But later, through an extremely severe and many-years lasting illness (one in which I knew could kill me), I experienced a series of connected, incredible miracles that were more important to my faith than even the most powerful of the evidences I had previously realized supported it. And also, through that, I powerfully experienced God close up and personal, in such depth that has been rare since. And the change I've seen in people who have become Christians further has validated that there is something about faith in Christ that dramatically changes people in ways that they could never, no matter how determined and motivated, do by themselves.

So whether the Shroud is authentic or not, changes nothing for me. But it does appear to have the hallmarks of what I would expect the real deal to have. But then again, NO evidence is 100%, nor can it ever be. Because my faith is in God/Jesus, not in evidences. But the evidences also bolster my faith, and helped me to discover that what I first believed as a child was in fact true. Collectively, in times of doubt, I can think about these things and my doubt quickly dissipates. But, as a child, I took a leap of faith that God has validated in many ways, with experiences and evidences - yet without His Holy Spirit, many I likely would not have recognized as being true.