The Shroud Codex - Jerome R. Corsi [21]
“So you recommend I should study the negative images of the Shroud if I want to see the man more clearly?”
“Yes, that is exactly what I am saying,” Morelli said in confirmation once again. “I want you to have the clearest possible idea what the man in the Shroud of Turin looks like, for a very important reason.”
“What’s that?” Castle asked.
“I believe that when you meet Father Bartholomew you will agree he looks today just like the man in the Shroud of Turin. Father Bartholomew has the same double-pointed beard with a fork at the chin. They both have long hair covering their ears and draping over their shoulders. They both have the same face with square lines. If you permit me to interpret how they look, you will see in both the same quiet dignity, the same suggestion of inner peace despite the obvious pain and suffering. The same wrinkles in the brow.”
Castle quickly got the point. “So, what you are telling me is that if the man in the Shroud is Jesus, then Bartholomew today looks just like Jesus did the day he died. Is that right?”
“Yes, that’s precisely the point,” Morelli said slowly. “The Vatican is concerned that Bartholomew is becoming Jesus. What we don’t know is whether this is a psychological process or some other reality we don’t understand.”
With that, Castle appreciated even more deeply why the pope had asked for his help. “What you also don’t know is whether the Shroud is authentic or a fake. Isn’t that also what you are telling me?”
“Yes, it is, but before we get to that point, I want you to look at one more image.” Morelli pulled from his briefcase yet another photo of the Shroud of Turin. “This is a close-up photographic negative of the arms of the man in the Shroud. It shows the nail wounds on the wrists and the blood flows on the forearms.”
Castle examined the image carefully. Reading the medical file, Castle had observed that Father Bartholomew’s wounds were in his wrists, not in the palms of the hands. It was the same with the Shroud. The nail wounds were through the wrists, not the hands, and they looked remarkably like the stigmata wounds Bartholomew had suffered in his wrists. Anatomically, that made sense to Castle. The wounds in the arms could not have gone through the palm of the hand. The nails had to be driven through the wrist. Otherwise, the weight of the body would have ripped the nails loose.
Castle’s medical mind envisioned how a nail driven through the junction of bones in the wrist would hold an adult male’s weight. “A nail through the palm of the hand above the wrist would tear free over time,” he suggested. “The nail would have to be placed just right in the wrist. If the nail hit the major arteries in the hand, the person being crucified might die before they were ever lifted to the cross. Nailing a person to a cross must have been an expert operation that required experienced executioners.”
“Right,” Morelli confirmed. “The Romans crucified hundreds of thousands of people. They were very good at crucifixion. Crucifixion was designed to be a brutal and humiliating form of death, typically reserved for hardened criminals or traitors foolish enough to foment insurrection against Rome.”
“How long was Christ on the cross?” Castle asked.
“Christ hung on the cross for at least three hours,” Morelli answered. “He was not dead when the sun was going down. The problem was that Christ was crucified on Friday and he had to be buried before the Jewish Sabbath began, at sundown