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The Quest for Jesus in Shroud research

Louis C. de Figueiredo

According to Msgr. John P. Meier, the worlds foremost Jesus of history researcher, there are so many books about Jesus that a Buddhist sinner may well be condemned to three reincarnations in order to read all of them. Awarded two a al gold medals when studying Bible and theology in !ome, Meiers enormous erudition cannot be "uestioned. #t is only ossible to take his dry humour a bit further and add that if the desired results are not achie$ed, and the oor sinner is obliged to return to this world of material things to face the same unishment, he will find many more iles awaiting his erusal. %hat is what can be said about the number of books about Jesus. &ne of these a eared recently in the 'hroud booklist and takes the reader to #ndia, where, according to the author, he li$ed and died after sur$i$ing the crucifi(ion. Many eo le know that this is actually an old story, which began around a hundred and fifty years ago, and, de ending on the author, can be di$ided into two arts, re) and ost) crucifi(ion. As for the source, it is formed by three strands, only the last one being fairly recent. %he first author was *icholas *oto$itch, definitely not known as a scholar, and classified as a s y in the #ndia !ecords &ffice, containing documents from +,-- to +./0, the eriod s anning British rule in #ndia, reser$ed in the British 1ibrary. And what did *oto$itch write2 3e wrote a book claiming he had found manuscri ts in the Buddhist monastery in 3emis, #ndia which constituted nothing less than concrete roof of Jesus 4ourney to #ndia. 3is find was dismissed as a hoa( in the $ery eriod in which he made the announcement, raising "uestions about his $ery secret agenda that ha$e not been answered to this day. %he second strand came from the eaceful #slamist re$i$al mo$ement founded in #ndia at the end of the nineteenth century by 3a5rat Mir5a 6hulam Ahmad by claiming ri$ate re$elations and announcing that he was the Mahdi, the romised messiah of #slam. #t emerged less than a decade after Ahmad bin Abd Allah of 7gy tian 'udan had made the same claim with a $iolent a roach, his Mahdist warriors killing 6eneral 6ordon in the midst of a war that was brought to an end by the $ictory of 6eneral 8itchener in the Battle of &mdurman. %he third and last strand is "uite recent and takes the form of a few lines in the Bhavishya Purana, 3indu religious te(ts that are su osedly ro hetic and ha$e become the ob4ect of an ongoing contro$ersy. %he inclusion of these te(ts as an integral art of the Jesus in #ndia story comes as the biggest sur rise. All three strands are wo$en together to lead to the !o5abal tomb, near 'rinagar, in the #ndian state of Jammu 9 8ashmir, where Jesus :as ;u5 Asaf< is said to be buried ))) ne(t to a Muslim saint. =hat can one make of all this2 >irst of all, it is not hard to figure out that 3a5rat Mir5a 6hulam Ahmad resorted to distorting the 6os els as art of his strategy to get Jesus out of the way and make room for himself as the Mahdi and Messiah of #slam. =hat he claimed is in fact a dis ute within Islam, for which reason ?hristian theologians ha$e ignored it, but it has emerged in the 'hroud media unnecessarily. As for the rest in the bo(, the iecing together of isolated data leads to many "uestions that re"uire answers. %hese are@

%he 3indus in #ndia cremate their dead and scatter the ashes on large water bodies like a ri$er or sea. 3ow is it that a tomb was unnoticed, with absolutely no record, in a region where Muslims ))) who bury their dead ))) only began to establish themsel$es in the +/ th century, more recisely in the year +AB-2

3arsha Cardhana :AD E.- F ,/0<, the last king of *orthern #ndia, whose kingdom e(tended to 8ashmir, was known as a atron of arts and literature and took a dee interest in religion, making a blend of Buddhism and 3induism for his own use. =hy is it that the co er inscri tions and literature roduced during his reign make no mention of Jesus2 %his is strange considering that it has been asserted that Jesus came into contact with both Buddhists and 3indus and made some im act

'urely some information about ;u5 Asaf ))) robably a 'ufi mystic ))) must ha$e been a$ailable to the eo le who buried 'yed *aseeruddin ne(t to him2 %o deny this is like saying they took it for granted that Asaf was Muslim and acted against their own beliefs.

=hy do the car$ed foot rints with crucifi(ion wounds reser$ed in the !o5abal tomb look similar to the Buddha ada, or Buddhas foot rints with the Dharmachakra wheel, found in se$eral laces in #ndia and neighbouring regions2 %he toes of the right foot are of the same length, as seen in both feet in the Buddha adas, while the left foot looks more normal.

%he car$ed foot rints are said to ha$e been disco$ered only in +.EG, after the wa( residue on the floor was remo$ed. *obody noticed them for one thousand and nine hundred and fifty years2

=hy is it that only 3olger 8ersten and 8urt Berna :3ans *aber<, well)known names in the story, are cited in connection with the car$ed foot rints and no e( erts were consulted for a real 4udicious assessment2

#t is claimed that the crucifi(ion wounds seen in the foot rints reser$ed in the tomb are similar to the wounds in the feet in the 'hroud image. #s there scientific study that can demonstrate this2

%he manuscri ts referring to Jesus that *oto$itch claimed to ha$e seen are an essential art of the 3oly 'cri ture of the Jesus in #ndia story. =hy are they not a$ailable for e(amination2

=hy is there no mention that *oto$itch changed his story in the reface of his second edition by reducing the si5e of the manuscri ts ))) from two $olumes to a cou le of ages scattered in other books without titles ))) when the &rientalist Ma( MHller challenged him2

=hy is nothing being said about the resoundingly negati$e analysis Strange New Gospels by the Ba tist biblical scholar 7dgar J. 6oods eed ublished by the Ini$ersity of ?hicago Press2 =riting in the Catholic Biblical Quarterly Juentin Juesnell used his methodology to e( ose another hoa( ))) the one er etrated by Morton 'mith.

3ow much did *oto$itch understand about religion2 3e wrote in his book that Jesus so4ourned si( years among the Buddhists where he found the rinci le of monotheism still ure. 3ow can there be monotheism in a non)theistic system, where there is no deity2 Buddha was the first atheist to ha$e founded a religion successfully.

=here all those inscri tions about Jesus in #ndia and why ha$e they not been hotogra hed and made a$ailable2 ?onclusions must be drawn from e(isting dataK otherwise they are o en to the charge that they are su lied by means of imagination.

3ow old are the co ies of the Bhavishya Purana2 Are there any rior to the eriod of British administration of #ndia to ro$e that it is not mainly a nineteenth)century redaction2 #f Jesus is mentioned, so are Moses and Jueen Cictoria it seems, and 4udging from the $iews of scholars such as !.8. !amanu4an and Mori5 =internit5, it is e$idently a com osite te(t or o en system, some sort of =iki edia, the difference being that there was inter olation instead of editing.

=hy is it not mentioned that 'wami Abhedananda ne$er saw the manuscri ts *oto$itch claimed to ha$e disco$ered2 %he original was said to ha$e been in Pali and he was shown an e(act translation in %ibetan, which he could not read, and had it translated.

=hy is Jesus referred to with two different names in the Jesus in #ndia story2 #n the Bhavishya Purana he is called #sa Putra, while he is ;u5 Asaf in the !o5abal tomb. #sa is definitely Jesus in Arabic and his name in #slam, so how did it a ear in an ancient Hindu document, centuries before the ad$ent of #slam in #ndia2 %he 3indus ha$e always called Jesus Yeshu.

#t is the 3indu wandering monk 'wami Ci$ekananda ))) rofoundly influenced by Jesus, like Mahatma 6andhi, both of whom considered Jesus as avatar, 6od incarnate ))) and not Abhedanda who is a towering figure in 3induism and has a beautiful 3indu tem le named after him in #ndia. 3e dismissed *oto$itchs claims, stressing that as the Jagannath %em le in Puri, #ndia was originally Buddhist, Jesus could not ha$e learnt from Brahmin riests there. 'o why ha$e his $iews been swe t under the rug in the ro aganda ))) including some with clearly olitical ends ))) that is being made about Jesus in #ndia and the !o5abal tomb2

=hy are the *asranis, an ancient originally Jewish)?hristian community in the south of #ndia, not mentioned2

3ow 'wami Ci$ekananda, who li$ed during the same eriod as 3a5rat Mir5a 6hulam Ahmad, would ha$e reacted to the recent ro aganda is not hard to guess. Insatisfied with the im ersonal, all) er$asi$e Brahman, the Iltimate !eality, he sought a ersonal 6od and found in Jesus ))) firmly rooted in history ))) a good e(am le of the incarnation of the ersonal 6od on earth and welcome in his Cedanta 3induism. But, whate$er he may ha$e thought, the "uestions raised abo$e do need answers in an issue that has de$elo ed with an American researcher demanding D*A analysis of the tomb while claiming to be a descendant of Jesus after she traced her family genealogy in a museum in Demarest, *J. As far as the 'hroud media is concerned, and in $iew of the fact that the usual academic rocess has been circum$ented, it would ha$e been better to obtain easily a$ailable information and refrain from establishing links with the Jesus in #ndia story and the !o5abal tomb, articularly that one where dangerous comments about Jesus ha$e been made while itting one religious tradition against another. #t is almost daily news that the blood of innocent eo le is being shed in the 7astern art of the world. 'uch is the situation there that it has rom ted statements by Po e Benedict LC# and Dr. !owan =illiams, the Archbisho of ?anterbury and the most senior bisho of the ?hurch of 7ngland. After all, it is not fresh news that the caretakers of the Muslim !o5abal tomb are aware of much su osition going under the guise of fact and are recorded to ha$e stated that ;u5 Asaf and 'yed *aseeruddin are buried here and both are Muslims. %he other incidents that took lace in the area are also a$ailable for anyone to see in older news items, among which is the BB? saying that it is all an eclectic continuation of *ew Age ?hristians, unorthodo( Muslims and fans of the Da Cinci ?ode. Also, contrary to what was also asserted in the agenda)dri$en ro aganda, the !o5abal tomb is not needed to e( and Jesus role in history. %hat role was defined more than a century ago by the e() seminarian !enan. As an historian, and not as a riest in the guts, as *iet5sche, whose inter retation of history differed from that of 3eidegger, ortrayed him to ursue his own ends. &f course, the main reason to re4ect the !o5abal tomb ))) like the Jesus family tomb that came under the scathing assessment of Dr. Amos 8loner, former District Archaeologist of Jerusalem ))) is that there is significant historical e$idence of the resurrection of Jesus, making ske tical theories more com licated and thus im robable. %he literature on this art of the ?hrist)e$ent is $ast. 'uffice it to say here that the arties res onsible for Jesus e(ecution must ha$e had agents around to make sure he was dead before being taken to the tomb. !oman centurions certainly knew how to deli$er a fatal thrust with a lance, which was not e$en necessary in the case of Jesus, but they had to make sure he was dead in order to tell Pontius Pilate, who was afraid of losing his ost as refect of Judaea, that the mission was accom lished. %here is no reason to doubt that the same mob in$ol$ed in demanding his crucifi(ion was also resent in 6olgotha and, had something gone wrong, would rush to tell ?aia has, who in turn, would ha$e news for %iberius. #t would ha$e been an e(cellent o ortunity to ha$e Pilate sent back to !ome. 3e antagoni5ed the Jews and was known to ha$e massacred some Pharisees. =hat the 6os els say is that some of the religious authorities s read the rumour that Jesus body was stolen, not that he sur i ed the crucifi!ion. 6amaliel, Jose hus and Paul were the leading Jewish minds of the eriod in !oman)occu ied Palestine and knew what they were talking about. >or a Jew resurrection meant bodily resurrection :Daniel +B@B< and not 6reek hiloso hy and that was what the a ostle Paul, the self)identified Jew of the tribe of Ben4amin, was referring to. =hich is why it is necessary to oint out that to embellish or distort biblical e$ents with imagined details not consonant with the truth is something "uite easy. %hat is what the #srael Anti"uities Authority a ears

to ha$e felt in relation to the Jesus family tomb, with a number of "ualified e( erts on both sides of the story. 'o when it comes to one dissident grou seeking su ort in what is a arently a mediae$al tomb with no hard documentary and archaeological e$idence to resent but only a string of roblematic and unsubstantiated claims, the case becomes e(tremely uncon$incing, in fact highly sus ect.

Directing attention now to the roducti$e side of 'hroud research, which is try to know if the Man of the 'hroud is Jesus, a number of eer)re$iewed and other a ers oint to the fact that the matter is highly com le(. %he widely)re orted results roduced by Paolo di 1a55aro and the 7*7A team ma" hel in understanding the energy in$ol$ed in the roduction of the 'hroud image. >ormer >B# ' ecial Agent and 'hroud researcher Phili 7. Day$aults disco$ery of the 'anliurfa mosaic, an image also described in 'hroud historian #an =ilsons book The Shroud. Fresh light on the 2000-year-old mystery :Bantam Books< is another iece of good news demonstrating how the 7dessa cloth and the 'hroud are linked.

%hat at least some lants and flowers from the Jerusalem region are clearly $isible on the relic is e$ident in the beautifully illustrated book The Botany of the Shroud by A$inoam Danin, 7meritus Professor of Botany at the 3ebrew Ini$ersity of Jerusalem, who is also inclined to belie$e that the Man of the 'hroud is Jesus. #t is of course likely that with his trained eye he sees a lot more than a layman. Infortunately alynology is not Danins field and a more com lete study of the ollen grains on the 'hroud remains at a standstill till the collection that once belonged to Dr. Ma( >rei)'ul5er is a$ailable for e(amination by a "ualified e( ert. 'till, it is ossible to 4udge from what has been written that >rei, a criminologist, did a good 4ob on the whole, better than what Iri Baruch and Prof. %. 1itt did ))) ut together.

%he fact that images of lants and flowers from the Jerusalem can be seen on the 'hroud lends credence to this authors contention that the relic has nothing to do with what can be seen on the Jos ice Mattress #m rint, robably the result of the ara sychological henomenon known as telergy. Any ' iritualist connotations can therefore be ruled out, for genuine ara sychological henomena are s ontaneous and ha$e to be distinguished from religion. Additional su ort for this oint of $iew also comes from an un ublished a er by Prof. 6iulio >anti, at the Ini$ersity of Padua, who has disco$ered some 8irlian characteristics in the #m rint. >anti has been working hard on some fi$e different areas of 'hroud research and so we can shortly ho e to see what has been described as ieces of a big mosaic that tend to show the authenticity of the 'hroud. As for the $arious hy otheses about how the +.GG carbon dating test may ha$e been skewed nothing can be said with certainty as long as there is no second direct e(amination of the relic, and, gi$en the current state of affairs, it does not seem ad$isable to demand the destruction of another iece of the relic for another test. 'uch an assertion is bound to raise eyebrows, but then, as Professor ?hristo her !amsey of the &(ford !adiocarbon Accelerator Init ad$ises, one has to make sure that all of the hy otheses to be tested are clearly laid out so that the rele$ant tests can be undertaken. %he rationale behind this is clear and con$incing. =hat is to be a$oided is another set of measurements and ha$e this followed by new hy otheses that re"uire further tests. %he roblem is@ how is that to be done if there is no consensus2 A rofessing ?hristian who understands ?hristianity $ery well, !amsey kee s his religion and science a art and told the BB? that the 'hroud issue has nothing to do with science against religion but with finding out what the right answer is. >or that reason he has shown his willingness to o en the doors of the &(ford laboratory for another round of carbon dating, confident that the +.GG test rests unchallenged. %hat is e(actly where the battle begins. %here is an abundance of literature that has been roduced by 'hroud scientists and scholars, and scientists with no links to 'hroud studies as well, where the accuracy of carbon dating, e$en in general, has been called into "uestion. But since a descri tion of what has been written in this conte(t is not within the sco e of this article the best source to learn what the contro$ersy is all about is #an =ilsons book. 3e mentions 1indow Man, initially dated by the British Museum to A-B?, &(ford to AD +--, and 3arwell to AD A--. %he museum now says that he died between B B? and AD ++., the dating ha$ing been obtained on a range of sam les in the late +.G-s.

Lindow #an. $hotogra%h b" the author. %his is of course a case where the dating is on water)logged tissue, which is roblematic, but so is the linen cloth of the 'hroud. #t has already been ointed out that $icissitudes it has gone through may, in the end, a$e the way to the conclusion that it really is unsuitable for carbon dating. 'uch a ossibility makes historical research, which will de end largely on new findings, e$en more im ortant and scientific studies may also bring fresh news about the image)formation rocess. %hese are things that will be discussed for a long time, so meanwhile, going back to the area of biblical studies, we see J. P. Meier writing about the true Jesus who had died rose in the fullness of his humanity into the full resence of 6od. %hat is a reasonable e( lanation without the need to go into details. But Po e Benedict LC# goes further when he states that the !esurrection does not stand outside or abo$e history. #t oints beyond history but has left foot rints in history. =hether the %urin 'hroud is one of those foot rints remains to be seen.

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