First we have a cloth made of linen in a city called Turin. Then we have the media keeping a misleading controversy going just to make money. Lastly we have pretentious scientists, artists and self proclaimed experts stating they have the answer just for 15 minutes of fame. Fame in a media that loves to keep the controversy alive and making money.

The Shroud has been on display in Turin now for several weeks. People from all walks of life and religions have lined up to look upon this cloth for three minutes or so. In addition, the Shroud of Turin is the most studied artifact in the history of humankind. The bottom line: all unpretentious scientists know all the facts that prove this linen cloth is 2,000 years old.

For example, the 1988 Carbon dating test now faces data showing the sample tested was a repair patch done in the middle ages on the edge. Cotton was within the sample, while the main body of the cloth is linen. So the Carbon dating test results were correct, but the sample tested was wrong. Nevertheless most of the media stays away from presenting these facts in fear that their money making Shroud controversy will come to an end.

Even Barrie Schwortz, who is an orthodox Jew and the lead scientific photographer with the STURP team that researched the Shroud in 1978, now defends all the facts that show the Shroud is authentic.

In addition, modern science has not be able to reproduce the image with all the parameters, details, or the same level of resolution. They are unable to do so with modern technology nor with the best technology of the middle ages. Science may someday come to terms and give an explanation to how the image formed on the Shroud, but as of now they are incapable. For those who do not like the word incapable in the world of science, realize this: Until scientists, who are people, present an answer that they currently don't have, then yes, they are incapable. Science doesn't have an answer, because scientists are incapable of providing one. Yet, for unpretentious scientists like myself, we do not fear using the one word answer that does explain the image. That word is resurrection.

- LJ
Author of UPPER ROOM, THE WAY: 33AD to 57AD
Author and Publisher's profits go to help the poor from sales of this Historical Novel.

After 35 years of real peered reviewed science, we know the Shroud is NOT a painting, NOT a scorch, NOT a photograph, and NOT a fake from a few hundred years ago. Carbon Dating tests were done on a cotton repair job performed around the mid 1300s. So the test was right, but then wrong, because the whole body of the Shroud is Linen, not cotton. Dozens of additional facts show the Shroud to be 2000 years old including a second cloth in Spain with records going back to 400AD. This cloth is known as the Sudarium of Oviedo. The "exact" same blood stains and bodily fluid marks from around the face on the Shroud match the ones on the Sudarium. The reason is because the cloth covered the same person... Jesus. All unpretentious scientists know this data.


Skeptics, are now sacrificing any creditability grasping at singular points to state the Shroud is a medieval forgery, while ignoring the multitude of facts that prove otherwise. The biggest fact ignored is the one against the claim that a medieval forgery was done to fool the primitive minds of the times. The fact is that whatever was done in the 1300s we can do better and faster today with all our technology, but somehow after 35 years and thousands of tests, we can NOT duplicate the image with all its properties on the Shroud. No modern day mind with today's technology or even with old 14th century crafts can reproduce the image on the Shroud.

In the end, an unpretentious mind will realize who else could this cloth cover other than Jesus. His legs were not broken, He wore a cap of thorns and He rose from the dead leaving an image on his Shroud as the last miracle to be fully understood today with our modern technology. Only because of the resurrection, a new faith was born and His followers were eventually called Christians. For two thousand years their faith grew and they didn't need to see Jesus' Shroud.

- LJ
Author of UPPER ROOM, THE WAY: 33AD to 57AD
Author and Publisher's profits go to help the poor from sales of this Historical Novel.

We tend to separate ourselves from specific details of any tragedy. That information is always the most difficult to block out and always truly upsetting. Nevertheless, we have a part of the entertainment media that strives to shock those, who will watch, with new versions of visual suffering. The end results create a desensitized audience, thus constantly requiring new ways to present visual shock. However, they too will leave out details that everyone would relate with, in fear of those details turning the most devoted fan.

The majority of us do the same with Jesus' crucifixion, we avoid the details because they prove how callous evil is in reality. Thus, to understand what Jesus did for us, is to learn the details. From the research of Dr. Pierre Barbet, Dr. Frederick Thomas Zugibe, and scientific teams that examined the Shroud of Turin, the following provides details on what Jesus endured just with the cap (crown) of thorns.

Medical experiments by Dr. Zugibe and the image on the shroud, shows the pattern of blood flow attesting to a cap and not a crown of thorns previously depicted in movies. The medical details of what this cap of thorns would do to anyone are appalling and only one person was given this cap or crown by the Romans to signify the king of Jews. His name is Jesus.

On the shroud there are sections along the head showing blood flow and the hair is saturated with dried blood. This will cause the hair to remain flat to the face on both sides. As for enduring the effects, that seems impossible:

When a Roman soldier struck Jesus with a reed, hand or any object, excruciating pain would have traveled across His face, into His ears and through His forehead. Yet, even feeling a breeze upon His face would initiate severe pain.

The perception of pain in the head region comes from two major nerves. The trigeminal nerve for the front half of the head and the occipital, which is for the back half of the head. The trigeminal nerve passes through the face, including the eyes, jaw, lips, nose, cheeks, and tongue. The extremely painful condition called trigeminal neuralgia would be activated by the thorns and triggered by any slight touch, movement of the jaw, speaking or swallowing. Even temperature changes would create a stabbing pain radiating around the eyes, across the forehead, into the lips, nose, cheeks and tongue. This is agonizing pain and reported to be the worst anyone can endure. Jesus had this pain as he walked all the way to Calvary and until he died on the Cross.

All this would have created a state for traumatic and hypovolemic shock as He bled profusely. Along with feeling unsteady, short of breath, feelings of vomiting, Jesus collapsed under the weight of a patibulum, the horizontal part of the cross. This caused additional pain and paralysis of the right arm as I wrote about in my July 20, 2014 blog called: Suffered Ad Infinitum Until Death

- LJ
Author of UPPER ROOM, THE WAY: 33AD to 57AD
Author and Publisher's profits go to help the poor from sales of this Historical Novel.

I received the booklet on the left upon entering the event at St. John's University. The theater was at capacity except for a few unoccupied seats. Media was present, some security, professors, priests, nuns, church groups and many students of science, photography, theology or philosophy majors.

Barrie Schwortz was introduced by my publisher and proceeded to passionately talk for just over two hours. Not one human in that audience comprehended the passing of that much time. Ironically, words spoken in Mr. Schwortz introduction referenced our current realm in time and space. Then when the presentation concluded, time and space seemed to have stood still. This attribute can only describe presentations that are professional, exciting, intriguing, joyous, serious, factual, casual and astonishing. Mr. Schwortz meets all this criteria and more.

I was happy that my historical novel Upper Room The Way, played a small part in this event and I hope some in the audience download the story. I am proud that not only I, but also my publisher will make all proceeds go to those who are in need.

I left, as I arrived, knowing as Mr Schwortz knows... This is not about us, it is about the Son of God. Thus, I am in agreement with the whispers I heard in the audience about Barrie Schwortz:
"He is a modern day prophet."

- LJ
Author of UPPER ROOM, THE WAY: 33AD to 57AD
Author and Publisher's profits go to help the poor from sales of this Historical Novel.

Barrie Schwortz was the Official Documenting Photographer for the Shroud of Turin Research Project, the team that conducted the first in-depth scientific examination of the Shroud in 1978.

Today, he plays an influential role in Shroud research and education as the editor and founder of the internationally recognized Shroud of Turin Website, the oldest, largest and most extensive Shroud resource on the Internet, with more than ten million visitors from over 160 countries. In 2009 he founded the Shroud of Turin Education and Research Association, Inc. (STERA, Inc.), a non-profit 501(c)(3) corporation, to which he donated the website and his extensive Shroud photographic collection, as well as many other important Shroud resources, in order to preserve and maintain these materials and make them available for future research and study. He currently serves as the President of STERA, Inc.