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The Image of Edessa remained in Constantinople until 1204 when it disappeared during the sacking of the city during the Fourth Crusade. Also known as the Holy Mandylion, it is the same cloth as the Shroud of Turin. |
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Some of the material in this essay is obsolete. Please refer to the The Searching for Sister Ann's Bishop Who Thinks Ann is Nuts An Episcopalian's Perspective -- AN ONLINE ESSAY -- By Daniel R. Porter |
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Part 12: The Image of Edessa Historians have long known about an ancient cloth bearing an image of Jesus. This cloth was known as the Image of Edessa, the Edessa Cloth, and later in Byzantine era, as the Holy Mandylion. Edessa was a cosmopolitan city in Jesus' day and one of the cities were Christian communities developed early as they did in Antioch. Edessa, now the city of Urfa in modern day Turkey, is situated about 400 miles north of Jerusalem. We can be quite certain now that this ancient cloth, which disappeared during the crusaders' sacking of Constantinople in 1204, is the Shroud of Turin. Legend has it that the cloth was brought to King Abgar V Ouchama of Edessa (13 -50 CE) by one of Jesus' disciples known to us as Thaddeus Jude (Addai). We know of this legend from Eusebius of Caesarea's early fourth century Ecclesiastical History. Therein, we learn of a document in Edessa's archives (since lost) purportedly written by King Abgar V and delivered to Jesus by an envoy named Ananias. Abgar supposedly asked Jesus to come to Edessa and to cure him of leprosy. Eusebius' history reports that the Apostle Thomas did send Thaddeus Jude sometime after Jesus' death and that he founded a church. Historians have been highly critical of this legend since Eusebius's history includes, as elements of the letter, references from the Gospels, which were written later, and theological concepts, which were developed later. It also must be pointed out that Eusebius makes no mention of the cloth. Another Syrian manuscript, the Doctrine of Addai, fills in some gaps. According to this document, which also mentions the letter, Ananias painted a portrait of Jesus "with choice pigments." A later document, the Acts of the Holy Apostle Thaddeus, written in the early part of the sixth century, adds more detail. It suggests that the image was formed when Jesus wiped his face on the linen cloth and it refers to the Edessa Cloth as a tetradiplon. We can only assume that this is legend. But from this material we can gather three very important clues:
Regardless of how the image-bearing cloth arrived in Edessa, it was discovered in the early sixth century concealed behind some stones above one of the city gates. It was a practice in some ancient cities of this area to mount a stone tile, with a picture of some favored deity, above the city's main gate. It may be that the Image of Edessa was simply stored behind such a tile as evidenced by some Byzantine iconography. It could well have been that because of severe floods to which Edessa was prone, the cloth was placed high in the city's walls for protection. There is also the very real possibility that it was hidden to protect it from invaders or to protect it during times of Christian persecutions. We know that during the many persecutions of the first three centuries, valuable relics, writings, and ceremonial items of the church were routinely destroyed. There is evidence of local persecutions in Edessa as early as the latter part of the first century and of Roman persecutions that persisted until Constantine became emperor. If, in fact, the Shroud was taken to Edessa in the earlier part of the first century, it might have been hidden for protection as early as the reign of Ma'nu VI, Abgar's son, who is thought to have reverted to paganism. What is not legend, nor speculation, is that the cloth, with an image of what was then believed to be a true and miraculous facial image of Jesus - described as a divinely wrought image and an image not made by hand - was found in the walls of the city in the sixth century. During repairs of the city walls in 525 CE, or more likely, during a Persian invasion of the city in 544 CE, the cloth was rediscovered and placed in a church built especially for it. It was, to the people of Edessa, the lost cloth of the "legend." In the late sixth century, Evagrius Scholasticus' Ecclesiastical History mentions that Edessa was protected by a "divinely wrought portrait" (acheiropoietis) sent by Jesus to Abgar. In 730 CE, St. John Damascene in On Holy Images describes the cloth as a himation, which is translated as an oblong cloth or grave cloth. This may be the first mention of it being a grave cloth. In 944, Emperor Romanus I sent an army to remove the Edessa Cloth and transfer it to Constantinople. There are many references to it after 944. In 1080, Alexis Comnenus of Constantinople sought assistance from Emperor Henry IV and Robert of Flanders to protect some of the city's relics including "the cloth found in the sepulcher after the resurrection." A Roman Codex in 1130 speaks of the cloth "on which the image, not only of My face, but of My whole body has been divinely transformed." We know that the crusaders looted the treasures of Constantinople and carried away many riches and relics. The Edessa Cloth disappeared along with other priceless treasures. There is some evidence that suggests that the Edessa Cloth, then known as the Holy Mandylion, was taken to Athens. About a year after Constantinople was plundered, Theodore Ducas Anglelos wrote in a letter to Pope Innocent III: The Venetians partitioned the treasure of gold, silver and ivory, while the French did the same with the relics of saints and the most sacred of all, the linen in which our Lord Jesus Christ was wrapped after His death and before the resurrection. We know that the sacred objects are preserved by their predators in Venice and France and in other places. In 1207, Nicholas d'Orrante, Abbott of Casole and the Papal Legate in Athens, wrote about relics taken from Constantinople by French knights. Referring specifically to burial cloths, he mentions seeing them "with our own eyes" in Athens. There is significant evidence that, in Edessa and also in Constantinople, the cloth was kept folded in such a way that only the face was visible. By folding the cloth, doubled in fours (tetradiplon) that is exactly what results - a centered face of Jesus on a horizontal folded cloth. In Constantinople it was sometimes ceremoniously unfurled, raised up like a vertical banner, in a way that showed Jesus as though rising from a grave. In 1201, Nicholas Mesarites, the sacristan of the Pharos Chapel (Pharos can be translated as Shroud or Lighthouse) where the Image of Edessa was kept, wrote: "Here He rises again and the sindon [=Shroud] ... is the clear proof ... still smelling fragrant of perfumes, defying corruption because they wrapped the mysterious naked dead body from head to feet." John Jackson, who was one of several physicists who physically examined the Shroud in 1978, used special raking light photography to reveal ancient fold marks on the Shroud. He found persistent creases exactly where expected and in the correct folding direction for just such a tetradiplon folding. The textile evidence, the pollen and floral images, the travertine aragonite limestone, and the Sudarium; all of these suggest the cloth's origin in Jerusalem from where its historical journey may have begun. But there is more to the pollen story that corroborates its journey. As would be expected, there are pollen grains that place the Shroud in Western Europe. It has been in Europe since the mid-fourteenth century. At times it was exhibited at open-air festivals and even carried into battle by medieval knights. But there are also some pollen spores that place the Shroud in the environs of both Constantinople and Edessa. This is important information that suggests that the Shroud of Turin was likely at these locales. It is more evidence that the Shroud of Turin is indeed the Image of Edessa.
Dan Porter is an Episcopalian and a member of Trinity Church, Wall Street, in New York City. He may be contacted by email at porter@shroudstory.com or by mail at 20 McIntyre Street, Bronxville, NY 10708. (c) Copyright 2001, Daniel R. Porter. All Rights Reserved. This article may be reproduced in full for any non-commercial purpose without further permission.
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