Stephen E. Jones

Shroud of Turin quotes: Unclassified quotes: May 2009

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The following are quotes added to my Shroud of Turin unclassified quotes in May 2009. See copyright conditions at end.

2009: , Feb, Mar, Apr, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec.

5/05/2009
"Of course many medieval relics were copies or out and out forgeries; no one disputes that. .... That does 
not matter; the highly intelligent and cultured men and women who saw it in the twelfth and thirteenth 
centuries believed it was genuine. ... What is important in this context is the belief that the image of Christ 
enclosed within the latticework Grail was not made by human hands. They should have known the 
difference; there were enough representations of Christ's head in paint and mosaic for them to be able to tell. 
If men like Robert de Clari, Louis VII, Henry of Champagne and the thousands of others whose names we do 
not even know believed that the Mandylion was genuine, that, in the end, is all that matters. So far as they 
were concerned it was the genuine Shroud of Christ. ... If their contemplation of it had the same effect on 
them as the sober reading of David Willis's factual medical account of Jesus' sufferings as revealed by the 
Shroud had on me, that is enough." (Currer-Briggs, N., "The Holy Grail and the Shroud of Christ: The Quest 
Renewed," ARA Publications, Maulden: UK, 1984, pp.154-155. Emphasis original)

5/05/2009
"The history of the Shroud since the mid-fourteenth century is so well documented that it can be said with 
some certainty that the forgery must have been committed before it passed into the hands of the Duke of 
Savoy. In other words while it belonged to the de Charny or de Vergy families or the Templars. There is 
simply no genius of this calibre known to art historians capable of creating such a masterpiece at this period. 
But that does not mean there was not such a genius; after all, he could have worked in total isolation and 
produced no other work of a comparable nature. So let us assume that he did live in some remote monastery 
or castle unknown to the rest of the world outside. Why did he draw Christ in this particular way - with 
frontal and dorsal image of the body? what could his reasons have been? Hardly for monetary gain. There is 
no record of the Shroud having been bought or sold before the mid-fifteenth century. If the artist had been 
commissioned by, let us say, Geoffrey I de Charny or by Jean or Guillaume de Joinville even by the 
Templars, he would surely have demanded a high price for his work. As for them, there would have been no 
point in commissioning such an extraordinary work unless they could see some profit from it. Even after the 
de Charnys exposed it to the public at Lirey, or even after it had gone to St Hippolyte-sur-Doubs, where it 
was seen by more people than at any other time until the twentieth century, it does not seem to have been 
the source of great wealth. Many copies of it were made at that time, but none of them came close enough to 
the original for them to be mistaken for anything other than the work of artists who were more or less 
competent." (Currer-Briggs, N., "The Holy Grail and the Shroud of Christ: The Quest Renewed," ARA 
Publications, Maulden: UK, 1984, p.155) 

5/05/2009
"Of course many medieval relics were copies or out and out forgeries; no one disputes that. .... That does 
not matter; the highly intelligent and cultured men and women who saw it in the twelfth and thirteenth 
centuries believed it was genuine. ... What is important in this context is the belief that the image of Christ 
enclosed within the latticework Grail was not made by human hands. They should have known the 
difference; there were enough representations of Christ's head in paint and mosaic for them to be able to tell. 
If men like Robert de Clari, Louis VII, Henry of Champagne and the thousands of others whose names we do 
not even know believed that the Mandylion was genuine, that, in the end, is all that matters. So far as they 
were concerned it was the genuine Shroud of Christ. ... If their contemplation of it had the same effect on 
them as the sober reading of David Willis's factual medical account of Jesus' sufferings as revealed by the 
Shroud had on me, that is enough." (Currer-Briggs, N., "The Holy Grail and the Shroud of Christ: The Quest 
Renewed," ARA Publications, Maulden: UK, 1984, pp.156-157)

5/05/2009
"Concerning his work, which involved comparing the earliest known paintings of Christ found in the 
catacombs and alleged to be made by eyewitnesses, Morgan cautiously concluded: `If other researchers, by 
examining these reproductions of the earliest portraits of Christ, if that is what they are, can agree to any 
extent that they portray the same man as the Shroud of Turin image depicts, *then we can take the date of 
the existence of the Shroud back to the time of Christ.*... If the congruent features are sufficiently 
convincing, and I suggest ... they are, then this discovery must add weight to the already considerable 
weight of evidence for authenticity.' [Morgan, R., `The Holy Shroud and the Earliest Paintings of Christ,' 
Runciman Press: Manly NSW, Australia, 1986, pp.121-22, italics added.] If these early art works, some of 
which are believed to be first century, could be subjected to the overlay technique developed by Dr. 
Whanger .. and have the same level of congruence, it would again provide strong corroboration for the 
Shroud's existence before the Middle Ages." (Stevenson, K.E. & Habermas, G.R., "The Shroud and the 
Controversy," Thomas Nelson: Nashville TN, 1990, p.71. Emphasis original)

5/05/2009
"Furthermore, in a recent conversation, Morgan told me [Stevenson] that he has now acquired an original 
photograph of the Templecombe image that is of a much finer quality than that which was published by 
Wilson and which again lends credence to the iconography theory ... The Templecombe image is the 
surviving link between the Shroud of Turin, a painted copy of the Templars' `treasure,' and the `miraculous 
image of the Savior.' It is strikingly similar to the Shroud in color and imagery. Its discovery strongly 
suggests that the Templars had the Shroud in their possession-again raising serious questions over 
positing a medieval origin for the Shroud. Morgan's book, _The Holy Shroud and the Earliest Paintings of 
Christ_, [Morgan, R., "The Holy Shroud and the Earliest Paintings of Christ," Runciman Press: Manly NSW, 
Australia, 1986, pp.121-22] brings out much evidence for a professional historian to follow up in detail." 
(Stevenson, K.E. & Habermas, G.R., "The Shroud and the Controversy," Thomas Nelson: Nashville TN, 
1990, p.71)

5/05/2009
"Currer-Briggs after providing intricately detailed historical research for The Holy Grail and the Shroud of 
Christ, in which he strongly bolsters Wilson's Templar connection said: `There is simply no genius of this 
caliber known to art historians capable of creating such a masterpiece at this period.... Highly intelligent and 
cultured men and women who saw it in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries believed that it was genuine ... 
that the image of Christ ... was not made by human hands.... They should have known the difference: there 
were enough representations of Christ's head in paint and mosaic for them to be able to tell.... [To them] it 
was the genuine Shroud of Christ.' [Currer-Briggs, N., "The Holy Grail and the Shroud of Christ," ARA 
Publications: Middlesex UK, 1984, p.156] The only medieval voice alleging forgery appears to be Bishop 
Pierre d'Arcis, who claimed that the image was "cunningly painted:" But he never turned up the artist who 
allegedly painted it, and the reigning Pope subjected the Bishop to "perpetual silence" on the matter-a 
peculiar demand that raises questions concerning d'Arcis' motives, or at least as Ian Wilson states, leads to 
the conclusion that there was "more to the affair than any of the documents tell us." [Wilson, I., "The 
Mysterious Shroud," Doubleday & Co: Garden City NY, 1986, p.82]" (Stevenson, K.E. & Habermas, G.R., 
"The Shroud and the Controversy," Thomas Nelson: Nashville TN, 1990, p.71) 

5/05/2009
"If other researchers can, by examining the earliest portraits of Christ which I have reproduced in this book, 
agree to any extent that they depict the same man as the Shroud of Turin image depicts, then we can take 
the date of the existence of the Turin Shroud back to the time of Christ. In other words if we look at the man 
of the Shroud and the man of the eye-witness paintings (if that is what they are), then we are probably 
looking at two independent depictions of the same person. If the congruent features are sufficiently 
convincing, and I suggest that from visual comparisons of the material in this book, they are, then this 
discovery must add to the already considerable weight of evidence for the authenticity of the Shroud of 
Turin." (Morgan, R., "The Holy Shroud and the Earliest Paintings of Christ," Runciman Press: Manly NSW, 
Australia, 1986, pp.121-122)

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