Among the many scientific and pseudo-scientific investigations into the Shroud of Turin, the presence of pollen and plant material has been promoted as strong evidence linking the Shroud to Jerusalem and the biblical narrative of Jesus’ crucifixion and burial. Organizations such as the Sign From God Foundation proclaim with conviction:
Fact: Dust and pollen found on the Shroud are native to 1where, according to the Bible, Jesus lived and walked.
Not good! While appealing to devotional instincts, such a claim is both scientifically tenuous and rhetorically manipulative.
The Origins of the Pollen Argument
The case for Middle Eastern pollen traces back to the work of Swiss botanist Max Frei-Sulzer in the 1970s. Using adhesive tape, Frei collected dust particles from the Shroud and identified dozens of pollen types, many of which, he claimed, were native to the Levant. Later botanists, such as Avinoam Danin and Uri Baruch, supported Frei’s findings by identifying pollen and floral imprints consistent with springtime flora in the Jerusalem region.
This line of evidence became a cornerstone for those asserting the Shroud’s authenticity. If the cloth contained pollen from plants that only grow in the Holy Land, the reasoning went, it must have once resided there. For many, that was a “gotcha” moment — science, at last, validating Scripture.
Enter the 2015 DNA Study
However, a landmark study published in Scientific Reports (an open-access journal from Nature) in 2015 disrupted that narrative. Researchers analyzed dust from various regions of the Shroud and extracted both plant and human DNA. The results painted a much more complicated picture.
Plant DNA was identified from a remarkably diverse set of species, including some native not just to the Middle East, but also to Europe, East Asia, and the Americas. Similarly, the human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) came from multiple haplogroups, spanning Southern Europe, the Near East, North Africa, and even India. Such findings are not consistent with a cloth originating in 1st-century Judea.
Instead, they suggest extensive contamination over time — the natural result of centuries of exposure, handling, display, and veneration. Pilgrims touched the Shroud, kissed it, carried it in processions, and stored it in containers that likely held clothing, relics, and other devotional objects. Every such interaction left behind biological traces: skin cells, hair, plant fragments, pollen.
The Problem with the “Jerusalem Pollen” Argument
Against this backdrop, the Sign From God organization’s claim that the presence of Middle Eastern pollen proves the Shroud’s biblical provenance becomes not only unpersuasive but misleading. It relies on a post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy — assuming that because some of the pollen is native to Israel, the Shroud must have been there. But the presence of such pollen could just as easily be explained by centuries of contact with people, objects, and environments from the region, without requiring that it ever was in the environs of Jerusalem.
Moreover, if we were to extend this logic consistently, we might conclude that the Shroud visited not only Jerusalem, but also China and Tennessee — since the 2015 study identified plant DNA from regions as far-flung as East Asia and the Americas. Should the Sign From God organization thus argue that the cloth once wrapped Confucius or Davy Crockett? Of course not. But their selective interpretation of evidence invites exactly this sort of satirical rebuttal.
Toward a More Honest Appraisal
None of this proves the Shroud is a medieval forgery — nor does it disprove the possibility of a miraculous origin. What it does show is that physical traces on a widely traveled, widely handled, and widely revered object cannot be taken as definitive evidence of geographic origin without rigorous controls against contamination. Such controls were simply not possible across the Shroud’s long and complex history.
In this light, the 2015 DNA study serves as a scientific cautionary tale. The data, far from bolstering the Shroud’s claim to Middle Eastern authenticity, remind us how vulnerable such artifacts are to centuries of cumulative influence. It urges us to interpret claims like those of the Sign From God organization not as settled facts but as theologically driven marketing—devotional certainty masquerading as scientific proof.
Conclusion
The Shroud of Turin remains a religious enigma and a subject of ongoing fascination. But science demands responsibility. It demands that we distinguish between inference and proof, between possibility and persuasion. The pollen found on the Shroud may include grains from Jerusalem, but so too, evidently, from countless other places. The actual journey of the Shroud, then, is not just one of geography, but of human belief: how people have wanted to see in it a sign, even when the signs point in too many directions to say anything with confidence.
Hi, Dan
We all have a tendency to overstate the evidence that we believe supports our position–on the Shroud’s authenticity or lack thereof or anything for that matter. I’m afraid this applies to you as well. Here is the statement you are criticizing as excessive:
“Dust and pollen found on the Shroud are native to 1where, according to the Bible, Jesus lived and walked.” Here is how you characterize this statement: “While appealing to devotional instincts, such a claim is both scientifically tenuous and rhetorically manipulative.”
The factual assertion is absolutely true and is not challenged by the presence of pollen from other regions of Asia, Europe and even elsewhere on the globe. Also relevant is the quantity of pollen grains from each region as that would reflect time of exposure. Max Frei, who first popularized this issue in the late 1970s, concluded that 3/4 of the pollen grains on the Shroud were from plants that grow in Palestine and 13 types were unique to that area. By the time of the 2015 DNA study, the Shroud had been exposed many more times and to specific scientific analysis so we can expect that the accumulation of pollen grains would have continued to build up and vary in variety of type and origin. But quantity matters. After hundreds of years of exclusive presence in Europe by the late 1970s, it is striking that 3/4 of the pollen present on the Shroud was from Palestine. Here is a link to an article that discusses Frei’s Shroud research. https://shroud3d.com/addendum/max-frei-pollen/#:~:text=In%201973%2C%20Frei%20used%2C%20as%20mentioned%20before%2C%20adhesive%20tapes%20to%20remove%20dust%20samples%20from%20various%20locations%20on%20the%20Shroud%20and%20analyzed%20this%20dust%20using%20a%20light%20microscope%20and%20a%20scanning%20electron%20microscope.%20He%20successfully%20identified%2049%20species%20of%20pollens%2C%20among%20them%20from%20plants%20typical%20of%20the%20desert%20regions%20around%20the%20Jordan%20valley%2C%20and%20specifically%20adapted%20to%20live%20in%20soils%20with%20the%20high%20salt%20content%2C%20found%20almost%20exclusively%20around%20the%20Death%20Sea.%20Frei%20also%20found%20pollens%20from%20plants%20that%20he%20identified%20as%20indicating%20that%20the%20Shroud%20had%20spent%20some%20time%20in%20a%20terrain%20with%20steppe-type%20vegetation.
Whether you agree with the Sign from God organization or not, their statement is plain and correct factually. And the 2015 DNA study is deficient as an analysis attempting to date the Shroud (which it probably was not trying to do) for its failure to quantify the pollen grains found and to identify the locations for them. Minute portions from all over the globe might have collected just from blowing winds in the vicinity of where the Shroud was exposed but large portions point convincingly to extended stays in places where these plants grow.
Jim
After hundreds of years of exclusive presence in Europe by the late 1970s, it is striking that 3/4 of the pollen present on the Shroud was from Palestine.
The problem is that Max Frei deliberately traveled to areas indicated by Ian Wilson’s historical study like Palestine and Edessa to probe pollen from the plants growing in those specific regions. He did not have a collection of all possible pollen forms all over the world! And later on he identified the pollen from the Shroud with similar pollen gathered during his voyages. But probably his identifications were overoptimistic and may include false positive identifications based on superficial similarities. Generally the attitude in the 70s and 80s were overoptimistc (in many aspects) and many people believed that the final and unambiguous evidence is at hand. The reality showed it is much more complex. The pollen story is very complex and I do not want to go into details. Just to say that every specialist seem to differ in the identity of the same pollen gathered form the Shroud. The interpretation and signification of pollen evidence also varies. I don’t claim the pollen evidence is worthless. But there is still much work to do.
Mr. Porter’s “Not Good #1” blogpost seems about half correct as a criticism of that “dust and pollen” claim by the new “Sign From God” Shroud evangelization group, if that was all they wrote (I haven’t checked). The claim is true, at least for the pollen – I can’t judge the dust, but also meaningless as evidence for the Shroud’s authenticity without more and relevant details accompanying it.
But Porter’s own counter-claim also seems mistaken, as do those of that 2015 DNA study he cites, in not quantifying, as commenter “Jim” observes, the amount of pollens found on the Turin Shroud from each geographical region of the world. There is actually a large proportion of it consistent with the Near East. The brief and vague claim by the “Sign from God” group should therefore read, at the least, “Much of the….” (And they could delete the unnecessary “according to the Bible,” because most people know where Jesus lived and don’t need a source citation for that.) Or, if the precise species remains uncertain in many cases, the genus still often narrows down the location to desert plants, and not to those growing in the famous arid deserts of northern France and Belgium.
The skeptical comment by “O.K.” criticizing Max Frei also seems a bit flawed. Frei very naturally searched Israel and Turkey for pollens. Those were the obvious places to look, closest to Europe and thus by far the most relevant to the Shroud. The Gobi Desert, the Amazon, Australia, etc., can be ruled out by reasonable people as potential ancient locations for the Shroud. Their pollens are thus irrelevant, as are many others. Besides, Frei was working alone and in his spare time. He had no team of 20 researchers to help him. He deserves more respect or sympathy from mere armchair researchers.
My own baby steps in Shroud palynology may have led some useful new thoughts. Just a year ago I posted several comments on Hugh Farey’s medievalshroud.com blog, skeptical of his related “Sewers and Cesspits” blogpost of March 20. If anyone here is a pollen buff, they might like to read those comments. Hugh’s too. Sometimes in life and science near-sighted experts in specific fields can have their horizons widened by an ignorant newcomer.
John L.
The skeptical comment by “O.K.” criticizing Max Frei also seems a bit flawed. Frei very naturally searched Israel and Turkey for pollens. Those were the obvious places to look, closest to Europe and thus by far the most relevant to the Shroud.
The problem is that it produces a kind of circular argument. Frei travelled to Turkey and Palestine based on Ian Wilson historical research. He found pollens there that matched with those from the Shroud. Thus he supported the Ian Wilson conclusions. But there is always a possibility that he pollen from the Shroud could match as good to other pollens form other areas such as Gobi desert, Amazon, Australia etc. Simply we do not know how reliable were Frei’s identifications. And later attempts to validate his claims by other scholars led to the string of contradictions and different opinions among them. Until the matter is unambigously resolved, we cannot make any strong conclusions based on pollen evidence.
Hi O.K.,
I’m sorry to say that I don’t quite follow your reasoning. But maybe it’s just me. It seems that if Frei’s pollens which he collected in the Levant and Turkey truly matched many of those he found on the Turin Shroud, that would be a very strong indicator of the Shroud’s former historical presence in and transit through those lands. It would not matter if some (few) pollens from many thousands of miles farther away perhaps also seemed to match those on the Shroud.
But the biggest problem with Frei’s claims is the level of specificity in his Shroud pollen identifications. Many researchers have criticized him for his repeated “species” claims about many of them. But if we simply set those aside as questionable, there remain his genus level identifications which could still tell a lot about the geographical distribution of the pollens. Wider than just Jerusalem or even Israel, yes, but not nearly so wide as to include northern France and northern Italy (Turin). Or are many of Frei’s mere genus level identifications of desert plants/pollens in serious doubt? I wouldn’t know. I haven’t followed the TS pollen question since I briefly dabbled in it last year. But if so, that would be a rather amazing mistake for Frei to have made. I’ll be happy to admit it if anyone offers proof. Please tell me if you know. Otherwise it seems to me that we might be fairly confident about the origin of many of those TS pollens in the Near East. The case seems probable or very probable, let’s say, though not conclusive. Your thoughts?
But yes, of course, far too few researchers have investigated the subject.
John L.
You can quibble about this detail or that.The point is that 1,2,3 and 4 at the sign from God website are factoids (questionable truths). It resembles the fine art of selling snake oil to gullible people. I would think the board would be horrified. It tarnishes shroud science and history for everyone who encounters it. My brother is trying to convert me to the shroud but I called him and asked him if he had seen this. He still thinks the shroud is genuine but says that if he had seen this website first he would have probably run for hills and never given it another look.
Hello, Ashlee,
You attack points 1, 2, 3 and 4 on the “Sign From God” website as being “factoids” and “questionable truths.” Well, EVERYTHING is questionable except knowledge of one’s own consciousness. So, there is that. But, just because something is questionable does not mean that it is not really True. Other than our own consciousness, nothing else is provable to a 100% certainty. So, there are degrees of confidence that we can have in various claims.
You allege that what is written resembles the “fine art of selling snake oil to gullible people.” This is a very reckless statement that is not grounded in the reality of what the evidence is for the Shroud’s authenticity. Snake oil salesmen perpetrate frauds on people. Sign From God, a non-profit charitable organization, is not doing anything like this.
I am on the board of directors of this organization, although I was not on the board at the inception of this group. You will notice that there are no authors listed for the information presented. If you get a group of people who have deeply studied the Shroud of Turin and who believe in its authenticity, and if you put them in a room and ask them about their opinions about various pieces of Shroud evidence, you will find that there will be many disagreements about many matters, because there are a myriad of little details that are involved with the many, many pieces of evidence that point to the Shroud of Turin’s authenticity as Jesus of Nazareth’s actual burial cloth. No group of authenticists are in “lock-step” with every single piece of evidence. But, there are many pieces of foundational evidence that we are, indeed, in agreement with that still unite us in our understanding that the Shroud of Turin is the authentic burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth.
There are, in fact, a few things that are listed that I would subtly re-word so that they do not fall prey to the attacks of skeptics who are always trying to play the “Gotcha Game,” and there are a few pieces of evidence that I disagree with. But, there are some board members who would disagree with me about my opinions about this. Again, there is nothing mentioned at the bottom of that list of facts that show which board members wrote this or which agree with what was written. So, while there will be some not very meaningful disagreements on a few points of evidence, this does not change the Truth of what we all wholeheartedly know about the Shroud of Turin’s authenticity and what it is.
I would strongly encourage you to learn more about the Holy Shroud and not just rely on some quick snippets on our website or any website that are just meant to stimulate interest in learning more about the details about this incredible cloth which I, speaking for myself, wholeheartedly believe was miraculously created.
All the best,
Teddi Pappas
Hello, again, Ashlee,
I would like to encourage you to read a paper regarding the Shroud of Turin that I recently published. I am a criminal defense attorney, not a physician, but I consider myself to be a very careful and thorough researcher who learns what science and medicine she needs to learn in order to successfully support the claims that I make. You will find that there is a very lengthy introduction to my paper on rigor mortis and cadaveric spasm that gives many important foundational pieces of evidence that support the Shroud of Turin’s authenticity as the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth. The points that I make in my introduction all have citations so that people wanting to learn more about specific points can know precisely where to go. Most (if not all) of the citations in the introduction are available for free on the website shroud.com which is the best website to go to for information on the Shroud. Of the greatest importance for people to read are the papers published by the Shroud of Turin Research Project (“STURP”) team members. Many of these papers were published in very high quality peer-reviewed scientific journals like “Applied Optics.” Many of these scientists writing these papers were working at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratory and at the U.S. Air Force. They were involved in the United States’ national security and defense. Other very important Shroud scholars were chief medical examiners as well as medical examiners that were supervising a team of medical examiners. So, please keep that in mind as you read what is written and WHO wrote it.
https://urfjournals.org/open-access/beyond-imagination-evidence-of-rigor-mortis-and-cadaveric-spasm-on-the-shroud-of-turin.pdf
All the best,
Teddi
Hi Ashlee,
a). I thoroughly recommend Teddi’s paper on Rigor Mortis, which is meticulously researched. However, there are two sides to most aspects of Shroud research, so having done so, please also read my review of it at medievalshroud.com. I fear I do not agree that the data she presents lead to the conclusions she derives from it.
b). I don’t wholly follow what you mean by points 1, 2, 3 and 4 on the Sign From God website. The “Facts About the Shroud” page is a rather disorganised collection of statements, from “facts” to random guesses, but they are not numbered. I agree with you in principle though. Some of them are uncontroversial, others disputed, and some just plain wrong. A whole section of the “Facts” page is devoted to the history of Shroud before 1350, which is at best speculative and comprehensively disagreed with by other authenticists, let alone medievalists such as myself.
c). Should you ever be asked to lend your name to an organisation whose aims you support, please go through its website and other publicity material for information – “facts” if you like – with which you disagree, and ask for them to be removed or changed before you join, or at least for your reservations to be noted. Otherwise you can hardly object if you are held responsible for them.
Hello, Everybody,
I make an extraordinary effort to be as precise and as accurate with my work as I can. That takes a tremendous amount of time, and my focus has been on the work product that is directly produced by me–not that which is produced by others (and, especially, which might be imputed to me because I am on the board of directors for an organization.)
As such, to maintain my independence and so that people can judge my work solely by what I do, I resigned today from the board of directors of “Sign From God” and from the “Sign From God’s “National Shroud of Turin Exhibit Team.”
It is a great organization, and I know that it will continue to do a lot of good in terms of teaching people about how, truly, the Shroud of Turin is the genuine burial cloth of Christ’s with His blood and body image on it. My rigor mortis paper alone proves all that really needs to be proven about the Shroud of Turin to show that it is authentic. There are citations and what is written there has been very closely scrutinized by me.
Best regards,
Teddi
My paper with many important highlights of evidence that goes towards proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the Shroud of Turin is the authentic burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth.
https://urfjournals.org/open-access/beyond-imagination-evidence-of-rigor-mortis-and-cadaveric-spasm-on-the-shroud-of-turin.pdf