“Just this,” Morelli continued. “The blood evidence on the Shroud either means the image was imprinted on the linen of the Shroud by a body that had suffered the injuries we see, or by a forger who painted in blood and appreciated not only the anatomical nature of the wounds, but also the exact nature of the blood flow that would have resulted from crucifixion wounds while the victim was alive, as well as from the serum flow that would have continued even into death.”
“I don’t rule out an expert forger,” Castle said directly. Morelli had a point. “Many people in the Middle Ages were as brilliant as today, even if they lacked our modern technology.”
“The forger would have had to have been sufficiently brilliant to have painted onto the Shroud serum stains not visible to the naked eye, anticipating that in later centuries we would have and use the type of ultraviolet fluorescence technology we would need to check for serum in attempting to document the authenticity of the Shroud,” Morelli added.
“Are you saying Leonardo wasn’t that brilliant?” Castle countered.
“In Leonardo da Vinci’s day, the study of anatomy was pretty primitive and the understanding of blood composition and circulation was not well advanced,” Morelli responded.
Middagh interrupted this discussion to draw everyone’s attention to a point in the discussion he wanted to make sure no one missed. “There’s an important conclusion we can draw about the blood we find on the Shroud,” Middagh said. “The bloodstains that penetrate through the Shroud and show up on the backside of the Shroud are very different from how the body image formed on the Shroud. We know the blood and serum inhibited the image formation on the Shroud. The Shroud of Turin Research Team in 1978 had instruments that could detect parts per billion of any substance on the Shroud, and the scientists concluded there is no body image under the blood and serum stains. What this means is that the blood flows from life and the blood serum draining from the body after death were both imprinted on the Shroud first, when the body was laid on the Shroud and it was pulled over the head to cover the front part of the body. The body image formed on the Shroud at a later time. In other words, frontal and dorsal body images appear to have been imprinted on the Shroud simultaneously, sometime after the body had rested in the Shroud and after all blood fluids had stopped draining from the body.”
“What exactly is your point?” Castle asked.
“My point is simple,” Middagh answered. “We know from studying the Shroud that there were two distinct steps in which the image was formed: first the blood was deposited by direct contact, then the body image was formed subsequently by a process we don’t understand.”
“What can you tell me about the wrist wounds?” Castle asked Middagh, wanting to know what the Shroud might tell him about Father Bartholomew’s stigmata.
Middagh searched through his slides until he found the one he wanted, a close-up of the wrist wounds on the man in the Shroud. The image he displayed on the projection screen showed somewhat more of the man’s body than did the close-up of the hands and wrists that Morelli had brought with him from the Vatican.
Middagh continued: “Most classical pictures of Jesus show him being crucified by being nailed through the palms of the hands. But as you can see here, the man in the Shroud appears to have been nailed through the wrists. It is an interesting detail, but none of the four gospels that discuss the crucifixion—Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John—say whether Christ was tied or nailed to the cross. Most of the ancient crucifixion nails recovered by archeologists in excavations throughout the wider regions of the Roman Empire give no indication what limb they had pierced. But we know the ancient Romans nailed people to the cross if they wanted the crucifixion to be particularly brutal or particularly short, and Church tradition supports that Christ was nailed to the cross.”
Castle wanted to make sure he understood the negative image he was looking at. “Don’t most negatives have a mirror effect in which, for instance, right is transformed to left in the negative?” he asked. “The negative shows the left arm crossed over the right arm. Is this really the other way around?”
“You’re right, in that sorting out the right/left orientations of various images of the Shroud is confusing, even for experts,” Middagh said. “But since the Shroud itself is a negative image, the mirror-effect reversal occurs in what we see in the Shroud with the naked eye. If you look at the Shroud, it appears the right hand is crossed over the left. I’m showing you a photographic negative, which once again reverses left to right and vice versa. In other words, the photographic negative has it right. In the corpse of the man in the Shroud, the left hand was crossed over the right. All the photographic negatives I am going to show you are correct for the left/right orientation of the man in the Shroud as he was buried.”
“Thank you for explaining that,” Castle said. “I’m beginning to get the point that the photographic negatives are perhaps the best way to see the crucified body of the man in the Shroud.”
“I agree,” Middagh said. “I’m showing you the negative photographs because the image is more clearly seen when the brownish-red image on the Shroud is transformed into the white and gray-tone shadings of the negative. Also, I’m showing you the negative photographs because the left/right orientations you see in the negative are true to the left/right orientation of the crucified man himself. If you don’t follow all this technical discussion precisely, it doesn’t matter. Just remember that the images I’m showing you have been flipped appropriately so you are looking at the body the way it would have looked in death.”
Studying the wrist and forearms image, Castle could see the wound in the wrist of the man in the Shroud correctly positioned in the carpal area, the right place for a crucifixion, and the absence of the thumbs in the image confirmed once again Castle’s presumption that driving a nail through the wrist in that location had probably damaged the median nerve, causing the thumb to bend back reflexively into the palm of each hand. All this was consistent with his earlier discussion with Morelli and with Dr. Lin’s analysis of Father Bartholomew’s wrist wounds.
Looking closely at what appeared to be two streams of blood flow on the left forearm, Castle judged both streams of blood had come from the same puncture wound in the wrist. He estimated that the arms would have been extended at about a 65-degree angle with the horizontal to cause the blood to flow in the pattern he was observing on the forearms. The blood flows appeared to extend from the wrist to the elbow, which would have been consistent with the outstretching of the arm in crucifixion. Castle was beginning to have no doubt that in the Shroud he was looking at the image of a crucified man.
Whoever forged the Shroud in medieval times had to have a remarkable understanding of human anatomy and the mechanics of crucifixion to have produced an image that would stand up to current medical analysis confirmed by twenty-first-century technology.
“Again, we don’t know exactly what the cross that Christ died upon looked like,” Middagh said. “Typically the vertical beam of the cross stood permanently implanted at the place of execution. The victim often carried the crossbeam to the place of crucifixion, with the crossbeam carried on the shoulders, behind the nape of the neck, like a yoke. The Roman executioners pulled back the condemned man’s arms to hook them over the crossbeam to hold and balance it. At the place of crucifixion, the victim was nailed to the crossbeam at the wrists, or the arms were bound and tied to the crossbeam. The Roman executioners then used forked poles and maybe a pulley to lift the crossbeam up to where it could be slotted into a notch at the top of the vertical beam to form the cross. Depending on how deep the notch was cut, the crossbeam might have been flush with the vertical beam, like the cross-stroke on the letter T, or maybe it fit into a deeper slot, forming the traditional four-point cross we see in most religious paintings from the Renaissance period until today.”
Castle listened, with his mind translating what he was hearing into medical detail. With the massive trauma the arms of a crucified man suffered fro
m bearing the weight of his body, especially as the horizontal beam of the cross was lifted to the vertical beam, there was no doubt nails had to be placed through the wrist. Otherwise, the crucified man could fall off the crossbeam as it was being elevated to the vertical beam of the cross. If the crucified man were to stay on the cross any length of time, the arms would end up supporting his weight, so the wrists had to be pinned to the crossbeam firmly enough so as to not come loose. Had the Shroud of Turin demonstrated anything different, it could be disqualified immediately as an artist’s rendering. Whether Father Bartholomew appreciated the medical facts of crucifixion or whether he was merely manifesting what his subconscious recorded from the Shroud, Castle did not know. But Father Bartholomew’s stigmata were also in his wrists, not the palms of his hands.
Looking closely at the projected image, Castle clearly recognized what appeared to be the scourge marks he saw manifested on Bartholomew yesterday. Looking at the photographs of the Shroud that Morelli had shown him from the Vatican, Castle had not focused on the scourge wounds, although those were obviously apparent in the body above and below the crossed arms, once you began looking for them. “Are those the scourge wounds that appear to cover the body?” Castle asked Middagh.
“Yes,” Middagh said. “Let me show you a close-up image of the scourge wounds suffered by the man in the Shroud.”
Middagh projected onto the screen a dorsal image showing the scourge wounds on the shoulders and back of the body.
“As you can see, the man in the Shroud shows signs of an extensive beating from a whip. The scourge wounds are especially heavy on the shoulders and the backs, extending down the buttocks and the back of the legs. I have other images here that show the same pattern of scourge marks on the man’s front side, although there are not as many scourge wounds on the chest or front of the legs as there are on the backside.”
Seeing these wounds now, Castle could see the obvious resemblance to the wounds he saw on Bartholomew Sunday.
“We have to get detailed photos of Father Bartholomew’s wounds,” Father Morelli said insistently. “From what I saw of Father Bartholomew in the ER, I believe the wounds he suffered all over his body will match precisely what we are seeing as the scourge wounds on the Shroud.”
Silently, Castle agreed.
“If this is the historical Jesus Christ we are looking at in the Shroud, then the wounds on the Shroud document exactly where Jesus was beaten,” Morelli said. “I believe we are going to find one-for-one that Father Bartholomew has exactly the same wounds that we are seeing on this slide right here, not more and not fewer, but precisely these.”
“I’ve already ordered Dr. Lin at Beth Israel Hospital to take very detailed examinations of Father Bartholomew’s body wounds, not just photographic, but also CT scans, as well as a full-body MRI,” Castle commented, “as soon as Father Bartholomew is strong enough to undergo that.”
“We look forward to seeing the results of those tests,” Archbishop Duncan said.
“My guess, Archbishop Duncan, is that Father Morelli’s supposition is correct,” Castle added. “I too suspect Father Bartholomew suffered these exact wounds Sunday night. Where we differ is most likely in the interpretation. Even if the wounds Father Bartholomew suffered are identical in every detail to the scourge wounds we appear to see on the man in the Shroud, that still does not prove Father Bartholomew is manifesting miraculously the wounds Christ suffered in his passion and death. Father Bartholomew told me he has studied the Shroud for a long time. His years of study undoubtedly impressed on his subconscious all the details of the Shroud we are looking at today.”
Archbishop Duncan was skeptical. “Do you really believe the subconscious is that powerful?”
“Yes, Archbishop Duncan, I do,” Castle said without hesitation. “Your subconscious is what keeps your body going. You depend on your subconscious to keep your heart beating and your blood circulating. Your subconscious regulates your breathing. You have to consciously override your subconscious to hold your breath. I could go on. What do you think keeps you alive during the night? It isn’t your conscious mind.”
Anne was fixated on a more fundamental part of the discussion. “Does all this mean my brother was scourged exactly like Jesus was scourged at the pillar?” she asked, her voice giving away the horror she felt at the thought.
“Maybe yes and maybe no,” Castle answered. “Not to be flip, but I don’t want us jumping to conclusions. First off, we don’t know that your brother’s wounds are going to match what we are seeing here exactly, not at least until I compare the hospital photos of his wounds to the wounds we are seeing on the Shroud. But most important, I don’t want anybody jumping to the conclusion that Bartholomew is suffering a repeat of Christ’s passion, not even if the wounds are identical. I’m a psychiatrist and I’m interested in what’s going on in Father Bartholomew’s mind. For me, his body manifests his mental reality, possibly his religious beliefs. That’s as far as I’m prepared to go right now.”
“We all understand,” Archbishop Duncan said, making sure everyone in the room knew he was not disagreeing with Dr. Castle’s analysis by insisting on any different interpretation, at least not right now. “I understand your point about the subconscious. We don’t want to jump to any conclusions here.”
While they were talking, Middagh found and displayed another image from the Shroud, this time a detailed close-up of a group of scourge wounds on the upper back of the man in the Shroud. The close-up clearly showed the dumbbell nature of the wounds.
“The ancient Romans typically scourged a man before they crucified him, both to further punish him as a criminal and to weaken him so he would put up less resistance when they ultimately fixed him to the cross,” Middagh said. “The Romans could also control how long a man would survive the crucifixion by how severely they beat a condemned man. The more vicious the scourging, the shorter the time a crucified man would live on the
cross. Judging from the beating the man in the Shroud received, the Roman executioners wanted him to die pretty fast. Jesus went up to Jerusalem at the time of his death to celebrate Passover. Traditionally, the Last Supper is interpreted as a Passover meal. From the beating the man of the Shroud received, the Romans may have wanted Jesus to die fast, so he could be buried before sundown on the Sabbath.”
Castle listened to the historical explanation but his mind was focused on the wounds themselves. The dumbbell nature of the wounds from the Shroud seen in close-up looked exactly like the wounds he observed on Bartholomew.
Middagh picked up on this exact point. “As you can see here in the close-up of the scourge wounds on the upper back, each wound shows the dumbbell-shaped weights the Romans fixed into the ends of the leather straps of their whips. Typically, the Romans used a handheld whip, or flagrum, a short handle with two or three leather thongs attached. Sometimes, instead of a dumbbell piece of metal, the Romans just fixed two small metal balls on the ends of the leather thongs, a configuration that caused the wounds to look like dumbbell wounds just the same.”
Anne could not believe what she was seeing. “How could Father Bartholomew be beaten like that and survive?” she asked Castle in disbelief.
“Right now, we are not sure how your brother was injured,” Castle answered, irritated that hospitals were notorious rumor mills. All Anne had to do was ask a few questions and the nurses and orderlies would probably have filled her in on all the gossip about her brother. Immediately, Castle’s mind flashed on the television reporter who accosted him leaving the hospital last night and on the crowd of silent believers who held vigil outside the hospital with their lit candles in the darkness. How much additional information did Fernando Ferrar have by now to broadcast on television?
Reluctantly, Castle realized this was going to be an impossible story to contain, even if he gave no press conferences. He suspected Anne was already concluding her brother was replicating the passion of Christ. He was certain that in no time at all the story that Father
Bartholomew had been mysteriously scourged by unseen assailants would be circulating throughout New York City, possibly around the world, now with the added detail that the scourge wounds he manifested were exactly like the scourge wounds on the Shroud of Turin, wound for wound, blow for blow.
Just then Castle’s cell phone rang. It was the hospital. Bartholomew was coming out of sedation. The nurse on duty was calling him as instructed, so he could be there to examine the priest as soon as he was once again conscious.
“I’m sorry,” Castle told the group in his conference room. “But we’re going to have to resume this at another time. The hospital just called and Father Bartholomew is coming around. I’ve got to get there immediately.”
“I want to come with you,” Anne said urgently.
Morelli chimed in: “I’d like to go as well.”
“No,” Castle said politely but firmly. “Neither one of you has any medical training as far as I know. I’m sure there will be an appropriate time for you to visit with him, but now I need to examine my patient alone.”
“I’d like some time to speak with you privately,” Anne said. “Can we arrange a time to get together?”
Thinking quickly, Castle realized he could use the drive time questioning Anne, to find out exactly how she fit into Father Bartholomew’s life and why nobody seemed to know anything about her, until now. Asking to meet with him privately, Anne must have seen the same need to explain her background in more detail, Castle guessed.
“Okay, you can ride with me in the car to the hospital,” Castle said. “That will give us a few minutes to get started.”
“Thank you,” Anne said appreciatively. “When we get to the hospital, I promise I will stay out of your way.”
“Father Morelli, you join Anne in the waiting room of the ICU at Beth Israel, if you want, this afternoon,” Castle instructed. “If everything goes well, you and Anne should be able to visit with Father Bartholomew for a few minutes later today, after I examine him.”
The Shroud Codex Page 14