Yodr777 posted in Christian Forums:
I’ve previously argued in favor of the Shroud of Turin on this forum, yet I don’t believe it is a necessary evidence for the resurrection of Jesus. Given that the shroud has been carbon dated to the middle ages, added to the fact that the first historical mention of the shroud wasn’t until the middle ages, I’m comfortable with believing that it may be a forgery. However, that would raise the question of how the remarkable image on the shroud originated. I find the possibility of it being produced by camera obscura very interesting.
I personally believe in the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection because of the Urantia Book,
Whoa! Full stop! The Urantia Book? . . .
which includes an eight hundred page biography of the life and teachings of Jesus that claims to be given by the apostle Andrew’s guardian angel. The Urantia Book’s account of the resurrection is far more detailed than the New Testament, providing more appearances of Jesus to various believers.
Forgoing the full 800 pages (no I have not read it), I’ll opt for a summary from Urantia News – Verifying History and Science in The Urantia Book:
The Urantia Book says the angels performed a time-accelerated elemental disintegration of Jesus’ body and this has intriguing correlations with the image found on the Shroud of Turin. It says that Jesus’ resurrected body was like that of angels and that his physical body still lay in the tomb after the resurrection and that the angels were given permission, upon request of an archangel, to cause the accelerated dissolution of his physical remains. This permission was requested and granted so that they would not have to witness the decay of his body. The correlations have primarily to do with the superficial nature of the image and current theories about corona discharge and nuclear medicine imaging . Additionally, there are intriguing correlations related to the Sudarium of Oviedo, a face napkin said to have covered Jesus’ face as part of the burial process.
I wonder if Fanti and Jackson know about this. I recall another criticism from a UBer. This time the topic was evolution. Someone who called himself Nautiusmaxi wrote to me, “When you mention Darwin you’re showing your ignorance as humans were not addressed in the Origin of the Species.” Maybe that was because Darwin knew (according to Wikipedia):
According to The Urantia Book, multi-colored human races originated suddenly in one generation and in one family, producing brothers and sisters that variously turned blue, yellow, red, green, orange, and indigo when exposed to sunlight. Their offspring subsequently favored the parent color. Later, Adam and Eve produced a violet race. In the book’s account, the blue, yellow, and red races were considered “primary”, and the green, orange, and indigo “secondary”. The green and orange races were driven to extinction, and the rest mixed over time.
I have no problem with whatever someone chooses to believe. That is just as true if someone is a follower of Urantia Book, an Atheist or a member of any number of religions and religious cults with which I disagree. If they publish and promote on the internet, then I am entitled to criticize in the same venue.
Nautiusmaxi had said, why “insult people who just might be on your side.”
It’s not about sides. It is about truth and if the truth is ultimately that I was wrong and the shroud is a fake, then that is the side I’m on.
Having said all that. I don’t put any stock in the Urantia Book. I don’t want anyone other than UB followers thinking the shroud is real because of this book. Yodr777 must not have read the full 800 pages or he wouldn’t have doubted the shroud. Right?
As Sue Benford noticed, a camera obscura would not change left and right hand sides, meaning the forger would have placed the wound on the left side. Awkward for a genius.
No one has a good idea how front and back images of a
crucified man came to be on the cloth. Yes, it is possible to
create images that look similar. But no one has created images that
match the chemistry, peculiar superficiality and profoundly
mysterious three-dimensional information content of the images on
the Shroud. Again, this is all published in peer-reviewed
scientific journals.
The Urantia Book is an amazing document. It says nothing
about the shroud except that it was thrown over a near-by cliff.
(meaning it was not destroyed) … but the way they explain why the
tomb was empty gives ample evidence that the shroud could be the
photographic image of Jesus. His soul resurrected but his body was
left behind. The angels were given permission to disintegrate his
body in an instant so they wouldn’t have to witness the natural,
slow, decomposition of his body. That flash could have created the
image, in my opinion. Here’s the quote: “The mortal remains of
Jesus underwent the same natural process of elemental
disintegration as characterizes all human bodies on earth except
that, in point of time, this natural mode of dissolution was
greatly accelerated, hastened to that point where it became
well-nigh instantaneous.” 189:2.8 If the Urantia Book is a fake,
it’s a doozy! Every word is the highest and best use of the English
language, there is no one making money on it, and it asks us to
look for the good in all religions that bring man closer to God.
Most people just keep a closed mind and won’t really read
it.
The Urantia Book’s account of the resurrection, if true, provides credibility to the shroud of Turin. That’s the point I was trying to get across.