The Shroud Codex - Jerome R. Corsi [44]
“Is he having an epileptic seizure?” one of the paramedics asked Dr. Castle.
“I don’t think so,” Castle answered. “I know the symptoms look like that, but there’s nothing in his case history to suggest he is an epileptic.”
“What’s going on, then?” the paramedic asked urgently.
“It’s hard to explain,” Castle answered. “I’m his psychiatrist as well as his physician. I know it looks like an epileptic seizure, but I don’t think it is. How far are we from the hospital?”
“Five minutes tops!” the driver shot back. “I’m doing the best I can!”
BARTHOLOMEW’S MIND WAS tripping in time once again.
In a jolt, he was back in ancient Jerusalem, this time being roughly led by a group of Roman centurions into a courtyard. His hands were bound with a rope the centurions used to force him forward against his will. After a few steps, he gave up struggling, realizing it was to no avail. He was headed to wherever the centurions were leading him. Once inside a small inner courtyard, the soldiers used the rope to fix his bound hands to a round iron ring that had been driven at about waist height into a small marble pillar ominously positioned at the courtyard’s center.
A dozen or more soldiers poured into the courtroom, fighting with each other for position to get the best view from which to enjoy the intense beating they knew was about to take place.
Bartholomew could feel his robe being torn violently from his body. In an instant he was stripped naked, shamed to be standing there, completely exposed and totally vulnerable in this company of rough men.
“So this is the King of the Jews,” the soldiers taunted, bending in mock bows before him as if he were on a throne, taking turns to approach him and spit on his naked body, aiming squarely for his face and genitals.
Struggling to recover from the insult, Bartholomew filled with fear as he saw two centurions with bulging arm muscles take up wooden-handled whips. Each flagrum consisted of three leather straps with lethal-looking, dumbbell-shaped lead weights attached to the ends.
Bartholomew froze in terror as the two centurions positioned themselves on each side, ready to get at his back, positioned out to them from the pillar. The centurion on the right was slightly taller than the centurion on the left, but both were impressively strong and had legs that looked like tree trunks.
The soldier on his right extended his left arm and flagrum above his head to get his full weight and force behind the blow he was about to flay across Bartholomew’s back. Bartholomew buckled upon the impact. He cringed as the metal dumbbell ripped into his skin, then tore away tissue as the centurion forcefully pulled the flagrum away. In tandem, the second centurion lifted his whip with his right arm and repeated the scourging from Bartholomew’s left side.
IN THE AMBULANCE, Castle and Morelli could not comprehend what was happening. Even though he was strapped tightly to the stretcher, Bartholomew’s body twitched violently every few seconds. He screamed in pain and his head thrashed from side to side. Castle concluded that Bartholomew was experiencing some inner agony that was yet another manifestation of his neurosis, but Morelli was simply mystified. He took out his prayerbook and stole in preparation to give Father Bartholomew extreme unction, the final rites given by a Catholic priest at the death of one of the faithful.
Right then, Castle became alarmed to see that Bartholomew’s shirt was filling with blood. He quickly loosened the stretcher straps around Bartholomew’s shoulders so he could unbutton his black priestly shirt and examine him.
Exposing Bartholomew’s chest, Castle could not believe what he was seeing. Accompanying every violent movement of Bartholomew’s body, new wounds were appearing as if from nowhere. Castle’s mind raced. It almost looked like Bartholomew was being wounded from the inside, especially since no one in the ambulance was striking him and there was no outside explanation for why new wounds were showing up right then before Castle’s eyes.
Bartholomew looked as if he were