Blood Splatter Discovered On Shroud Of Turin, Could Belong To Jesus Christ

Along with the Holy Grail and the Spear of Destiny, the Shroud of Turin is one of the most sacred religious relics on the planet. The piece of linen, measuring 53 square feet and containing the faint image of a man, is believed by millions of Christians from around the world to be the cloth Jesus himself was buried in after death.

Ever since a photo negative of the linen captured by Italian amateur photographer Secondo Pia revealed an image of a body over 100 years ago, scores of researchers have analyzed the image as well as the blood stains and fabric to try and confirm or dismiss the linen’s authenticity. But after years and years of studies, tests, and debates, they came to the conclusion that it is still hard to tell. No one knows for sure. Some say the blood on the cloth belongs to Jesus while some claim that the face of Jesus was painted on by counterfeiters in medieval times. 

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The biggest focal point for skeptics is a carbon-14 dating conducted in 1988 where a small piece of fabric from the corner of the shroud was sent to labs at the University of Oxford, the University of Arizona, and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. All three places confirmed that the material dated back to 1260 and 1390, which is more than a thousand years after Jesus was alive. That seemed like a huge piece of evidence to dismiss the authenticity of the shroud, but soon researchers found that the carbon dating that came from the top edge of the shroud produced a much different date than a piece taken from the bottom edge of the cloth. 

But here’s the thing: even if the image was from medieval times and not from the time of Jesus, there is still the mystery of how the image of the man was created in the first place. Every scientific attempt at replicating the image has failed so far. This has caused the shroud of Turin to become not only one of the most sacred relics but also one of the most mysterious.

Recently, researchers in Italy analyzing the shroud of Turin have discovered the blood of a torture victim on the cloth, thus supporting claims it may have been used to bury Jesus. The new findings, titled New Biological Evidence from Atomic Resolution Studies on the Turin Shroud, was published in a US scientific journal that was carried out by The Instituto Officina dei Materiali in Trieste and the Institute of Crystallography in Bari.

The study says that the cloth contains 'nanoparticles' usually not found in the blood of someone healthy. According to Elvio Carlino, a researcher at the Institute of Crystallography in Bari, Italy the cloth reveals the 'great suffering' of a victim 'wrapped up in the funeral cloth.'

According to professor Giulio Fanti of the University of Padua, the blood contained high levels of creatinine and ferritin, substances found in patients who have suffered from devastating traumas like torture. According to him, 'the presence of these biological nanoparticles found during our experiments point to a violent death for the man wrapped in the Turin Shroud.'

The Shroud of Turin has been an intensely debated topic in the world of science ever since. If these findings are true, then they will completely shatter the skeptic theory that image on the cloth was forged by counterfeits.

Elvio also said that 'these findings could only be revealed by the methods recently developed in the field of electron microscopy' and  'the nanoscale properties of a pristine fiber taken from the Turin Shroud.'

Even though this study sheds a bit of light on this ancient mystery, there are still numerous questions that we have yet to answer. Was this shroud the same exact cloth Jesus Christ was buried inside when he died? How was the image of the man created on the cloth created?

Italian physicist Paolo Di Lazzaro told National Geographic: “It is unlikely science will provide a full solution to the many riddles posed by the shroud...A leap of faith over questions without clear answers is necessary—either the ‘faith’ of skeptics, or the faith of believers.”

If you want to see the shroud for yourself, it is currently on display at St. John the Baptist Cathedral in Turin. At the moment, we can only wait for more evidence regarding the Turin's Shroud before we fully reveal it's mysterious origins. 

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Sources:

• https://www.rt.com/viral/396609-turin-shroud-blood-torture/ 
• https://www.livescience.com/52567-shroud-of-turin-dna.html 
• http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/04/150417-shroud-turin-relics-jesus-catholic-church-religion-science/ 

Jesus Was a Shapeshifter According to Ancient Egyptian Texts

The figure of Jesus Christ is undeniably a spiritual and cultural character of significant importance in human history. Jesus Christ is the pillar of one of the largest and most powerful religions of the world, which is probably why most people find it difficult to question the premise of the Christian faith.

For many of us, it remains a mystery how much of what we are taught about the “Son of God” is true to the original figure that lived over 2,000 years ago. Over the centuries that passed and even in the modern times, there are those who believe that the Jesus Christ we know now is not who he was in reality, but is instead only a version of him that was institutionally adapted by the Church to fit its ideals. Stories about him, his abilities and qualities which were up to the premise established by the Church were kept, while those that didn’t were allegedly deemed fraudulent or inaccurate and were heavily discredited.

Though the Bible had become canonized more than a millennium ago, many apocryphal stories have managed to survive and endure even up to now. More recently, a newly deciphered Egyptian text, which dates back almost 1,200 years, details a part of the crucifixion story of Jesus Christ with apocryphal plot twists, some of which have never been heard of before.

1,200-Year-Old Ancient Egyptian Text with Controversial Data About the Crucifixion Story of Jesus

In March 2013, reports flooded the headlines about a 1,200-year-old Egyptian text that tells the story of the life and crucifixion of Jesus, while also supposedly providing conflicting data that could potentially change the story about Jesus Christ.

The text is written in the Coptic language, and is one of fifty-five Coptic manuscripts that were found in 1910 by villagers digging for fertilizer at the site of the destroyed Monastery of Archangel Michael of the Desert near Al Hamuli in Egypt. Apparently, the monk in the tenth century had buried the monastery’s manuscripts in a stone vat for safekeeping.

The monastery ceased its operations around the early 10th century, and the text wasn’t rediscovered until around the spring of 1910. Then, American financier J.P. Morgan purchased it along with other texts in December 1911. His collections, and the particular text about the crucifixion story of Jesus, are currently housed and protected in the Morgan Library and Museum in New York City. A second copy of the ancient text is also available at the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania, but is mostly illegible.

The ancient Egyptian text was written in the name of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, a distinguished theologian who lived during the fourth century. A translation of the text was carried out by Roelof van den Broek of Ultrecht University in the Netherlands, and he published the contents of the text in the book “Pseudo-Cyril of Jerusalem On the Life and the Passion of Christ: A Coptic Apocryphon.”

Based on van den Broek’s translation, not only does it describe Pilate as a faithful disciple and not a traitor, it also recounts a dinner with Jesus prior to his crucifixion in which Pilate offered to sacrifice his own son to spare the life of the Messiah. The text also controversially described Jesus as possessing the magical ability to change shape, which explains why Judas had used a kiss to positively identify Jesus. The ancient text also puts the day of Jesus’s arrest on Tuesday evening instead of Thursday evening, which contravenes the current Easter timeline observed by Christians.

Pontius Pilate’s Dinner with Jesus

While apocryphal stories about Pilate are known to exist from ancient times, van den Broek claimed that he has never seen one before in which Pilate had offered to sacrifice his own son in the place of Jesus.

According to this ancient Egyptian text, Pilate prepared a table and ate with Jesus prior to his crucifixion. Pilate later told Jesus that when the morning comes, he would give the people his only son so that they could kill him in Jesus’s place. However, Jesus comforted him and revealed that he had the ability to escape his fate if he chose to. Then, Pilate looked at Jesus and he saw the Messiah turn “incorporeal” and “did not see him for a long time.”

The text also mentioned that Pilate and his wife both had visions that night that show an eagle - which is a representation of Jesus – being killed.

According to van den Broek, this sympathetic portrayal of Pilate in this ancient text is unsurprising since Pilate is regarded as a saint in the Coptic as well as Ethiopian churches.

The Reason for Judas’s Kiss

In the canonical Bible, the apostle Judas betrayed Jesus in exchange for money and used a kiss to identify him leading to the Messiah’s arrest. While the text did not refute the apostle’s betrayal, this apocryphal tale did explain why Judas had to use a kiss to identify Jesus --- Jesus was allegedly a shape-shifter.

According to the 1,200-year-old ancient Egyptian text, arresting Jesus was not that simple since he did “not have a single shape” and “his appearance changes.” “Sometimes he is ruddy, sometimes he is white, sometimes he is red, sometimes he is wheat colored, sometimes he is pallid like ascetics, sometimes he is a youth,” and “sometimes an old man.”

This conundrum led Judas to suggest using a kiss as means to positively identify him. Had he simply given the arresters a description of Jesus’s appearance, the Messiah could have easily changed shape. But by kissing Jesus, Judas revealed to the people exactly who he is.

The controversial meaning behind the kiss of Judas goes way back. This “shape-shifting” explanation of Judas’s kiss is first found in the work of ancient writer Origen, a theologian who lived between 185-254 A.D. In his work, “Contra Celsum,” Origen stated that “to those who saw [Jesus], he did not appear alike to all.”

Jesus’s Arrest on Tuesday?

The ancient Egyptian text also mentions that the date of Jesus’s Last Supper with the apostles and subsequent arrest took place on a Tuesday. In fact, in this old text, Jesus’s actual Last Supper was not with his disciples but with Pontius Pilate. And in between his arrest and supper with Pilate, he was brought before Caiaphas and Herod.

This information is a significant deviation from what are written in the canonical texts. To present-day Christians, the Last Supper and the arrest of Jesus happened on a Thursday evening, and they observe the event every year as “Maundy Thursday” as part of the services of Holy Week.

However, the way the Egyptian text relates the story of Jesus’s arrest to have taken place on a Tuesday evening makes it seem as if the canonical story about his arrest on a Thursday evening did not actually exist.

So, with all these controversial and supposedly “earth-shattering” information about Jesus Christ, one very important question comes to mind: Is this 1,200-year-old ancient Egyptian text based on real life?

To van den Broek, the answer is “not exactly.” For him, the discovery of the text doesn’t mean that the events detailed in it have actually happened, but that some people who lived at the time of the tale’s existence appear to have believed in them.

In fact, according to van den Broek, the ancient text while written in the name of St. Cyril of Jerusalem may not have actually been written by him. Near the beginning of the text, the writer claims that a book has been found in Jerusalem which contained the writings of the apostles on the life and crucifixion of Jesus.  However, it is very unlikely that such a book was found in real life. Instead, van den Broek theorized that a claim like this would have been used by the writer in an attempt "to enhance the credibility of the peculiar views and uncanonical facts” detailed in the text by means of “ascribing them to an apostolic source.”

Nevertheless, though the accuracy of the details written on this ancient Egyptian text is highly doubtful, the text itself is considered authentic. This meant that 1,200 years ago in Egypt – at a time in which the Bible had already become canonized – many still read and believed in various apocryphal stories to the point that books about them remained popular among Egyptian Christians, especially among monks.  

And so, this ancient Egyptian text, while not a reliable source of information about the real story of the life and crucifixion of Jesus Christ, offers us a glimpse of what people people thought of and believed about the Christian messiah over a millennium ago, allowing us to understand how far the Christian faith has come and how much the religious institution evolved since then. 

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Sources:

http://www.livescience.com/27840-shape-shifting-jesus-ancient-text.html
http://www.ancient-origins.net/unexplained-phenomena/ancient-text-describes-jesus-shape-shifter-001361
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=343TrN9KehcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Pseudo-Cyril+of+Jerusalem+on+the+Life+and+the+passion+pilate&hl=en&sa=X&ei=8uBDUeeIHIGhqgGb0IDwAg&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Pseudo-Cyril%20of%20Jerusalem%20on%20the%20Life%20and%20the%20passion%20pilate&f=false
http://www.ancient-code.com/jesus-christ-was-a-shape-shifter-according-to-ancient-egyptian-text/
https://www.seeker.com/shape-shifting-jesus-described-in-ancient-egyptian-text-1767301334.html
http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/jesus-was-a-shapeshift-ancient-text-reveals-and-an-eagle/news-story/b8fafdd26477f40df7041bae4ff9e004
http://listverse.com/2013/12/28/10-mystical-facts-about-ancient-egypt/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyril_of_Jerusalem
http://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/treasures-from-the-vault-2013?id=74
https://alinsuciu.com/2012/10/12/guest-post-roelof-van-den-broek-pseudo-cyril-of-jerusalem-on-the-life-and-the-passion-of-christ/
http://www.mythicistpapers.com/2016/04/27/jesus-the-shape-shifter-pt-3/