The Shroud of Turin Mysteries

The Shroud of Turin Mysteries

Filed in: History

If you say that the Vatican has premeditated tried to hide the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin seems like a paradox at a first glance. Why would they have to deny a truth like that? Yet, there are voices who claim that a confirmation of the authenticity the sacred relic could radically change our conception about the Western civilization. In front of such evidence, the history should be inevitable rewritten.

Thousands of articles, books and treaties were written about the Shroud of Turin. Dozens of experts have tried to prove its authenticity or the fact that is a medieval fake. By its nature, the Shroud of Turin born even today such paradoxes: to be proved as fake and to destroy a myth of the millions of faithful Christians, or its authenticity to be recognized hitting in the same Christian religion foundations.

Vatican and the conspiracy theory about the Shroud of Turin

Those who support the idea of a Vatican conspiracy, including the journalists Jonathan Vankin and John Whalen, are convinced that the recognition of the Shroud of Turin’s authenticity would create a storm in the Christian world. But why?

The design and the way that the man whose face remained on the shroud was buried  are the same as those of a small Israel sect that  proliferated between the centuries II BC and I AD – esséniens. To be mentioned that the esséniens are also the authors of the Gnostic manuscripts found at the Dead Sea, writings that largely remained unpublished after their discovery in the twentieth century. To admit that the whole Christianity draws its origins from this sect would mean a denial of the principles promoted by Catholicism, that there was no Christianity before Jesus – a real heresy. Besides, if Jesus would have been part of the Gnostics, it means that the Vatican has persecuted and killed dozens of followers of an authentic Christian religion. Only the climax of the anti-Gnostic campaign, the Albigensian Crusade against the Cathar (1209 – 1229), resulted in legislating the Inquisition and nearly 20,000 casualties.

Did Henri de Poitiers and Pierre D’Arcis (the first bishops who demanded the Shround of Turin’s exposure forbidden) know these details? Have they and those who followed them tried to impose a “monopoly” on Jesus’ image and history? We will probably never know the answers to these questions. The fact is that despite dozens of tests and historical evidence, the true origin of the Shroud of Turin will remain unknown for a long time.

In a press conference held on Tuesday, April 7, 2009 in Rome, Barbara Frale, researcher of the Vatican Secret Archives, said that the Templar Knights secretly held and worshiped the Shroud of Turin for over 100 years. The announcement not only makes light about the century in which the Shroud of Turin vanishes from the  public’s attention, but also it’s an evidence its age and contradicts the radiocarbon tests indicating that indicated it as a fake from the 14^th century.

However, Barbara Frale did not say if the relic it’s authentic or just a fake, still leaving enough room for doubts  and questions.