Vatican speaks of the Shroud of Turin’s missing years
The Shroud of Turin, long revered as the burial wrap placed on the body of the crucified Christ, was in Constantinople in 1204 when the city was sacked during the 4th Crusade. The Shroud disappeared for over 100 years, resurfacing in the mid-1300′s. A Vatican researcher has announced that the Shroud was apparently taken and hidden by the Knights Templar in an effort to protect it from other groups who, they believed, would do it harm.
Barbara Frale, a researcher in the Vatican Secret Archives, said the Shroud had disappeared in the sack of Constantinople in 1204 during the Fourth Crusade, and did not surface again until the middle of the fourteenth century. Writing in L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, Dr Frale said its fate in those years had always puzzled historians.
Times ArchiveHowever her study of the trial of the Knights Templar had brought to light a document in which Arnaut Sabbatier, a young Frenchman who entered the order in 1287, testified that as part of his initiation he was taken to “a secret place to which only the brothers of the Temple had access”. There he was shown “a long linen cloth on which was impressed the figure of a man” and instructed to venerate the image by kissing its feet three times.
Dr Frale said that among other alleged offences such as sodomy, the Knights Templar had been accused of worshipping idols, in particular a “bearded figure”. In reality however the object they had secretly venerated was the Shroud.
They had rescued it to ensure that it did not fall into the hands of heretical groups such as the Cathars, who claimed that Christ did not have a true human body, only the appearance of a man, and could therefore not have died on the Cross and been resurrected. She said her discovery vindicated a theory first put forward by the British historian Ian Wilson in 1978.
The timing of articles like this one is something I always find fascinating. It seems these “big, new discoveries” about Jesus always seem to appear at Easter and Christmas and the various news and cable channels all run their special reports, usually to give air to various challenges to the teachings of the Church.
That said, I think it’s plausible that what Dr. Frale has concluded is true. The Templars were in the right place and the right time period to have done this and, accusations of later crimes aside, it would have fit with their stated mission objectives. Certainly interesting from a historical perspective.
Comments
Comment from Ric James
Time April 9, 2009 at 12:57
OK, well the research has placed the Shroud in Constantinople during the 4th Crusade and specifically there when that city was sacked, as I quoted above, in 1204. So the Shroud’s “first provenance” was considerably before 1357. You are welcome to your opinion on that and, in any case, I’m not the one making the assertion. That would be Dr. Frale whose research and credentials I have no reason to question.
I might, however, question whether the Templars would have kept this relic anywhere it was well-known that Templars would be. The entire reason they evacuated it from Constantinople was to keep it from falling into the hands of other groups – again, citing Dr. Frale above, those such as the Cathars who were clearly interested in destroying it. I certainly wouldn’t have kept it someplace with my logo on the door. So the question is, indeed, “where?” and I don’t think anyone has enough data yet to answer that one. We might never.
You are well aware of my stance on the matter of the Inquisition – I find it to have been unjustifiable – but I do not ascribe every move made by every person claiming to be working for an Inquisition to either the Pope or the Catholic Church. I do not concede that Clement V was “Philip’s man” at all. I do agree he could do little to stop the King of France once he decided he was going after the Templars, however.
All of which is beside the point. I took note of the article for its historic significance and I look forward to hearing more as more is uncovered.
Comment from Bob James
Time April 9, 2009 at 11:25
I’m afraid the “conclusion” offered by Dr. Frale is, putting politely, “questionable”.
The Templars were supressed as an order beginning Friday, October 13, 1307 by order of King Philip IV of France and Pope Clement V. The Vatican to this day holds to the claim that Philip acted on his own, taking Clement by surprise, and that Clement tried very hard to get the Templars decent treatment during their 5-year imprisonment and torture, but that is also questionable. It’s more likely that Clement was actually Philip’s man, and did what he was told… until 1312, when he issued Vox in excelso at the Council of Vienne, which dissolved the Templars permanently, and granted most of their remaining holdings and properties to the Hospitallers.
For Frale to conclude that the Templars had the Shroud would beg the question of “where”? The Shroud’s known provenance begins in 1357, in Lirey, France. An artifact of this significance, had it been in the Templars’ possession, would have been in the commandarie in Paris, and we know that facility’s valuables were not recovered by Philip (who had been after the Templars’ treasure to pay off/eliminate his debts). In fact, Philip was outraged because not so much as a piece of altar plate was left in Paris, indicating that the Templars had been tipped off. Speculation is that the entire treasury had been spirited away to the Templar naval base in Rochelle, loaded onto several ships, who cast off in the middle of the night… never to be seen again.
So the likelihood that the Shroud was in Templar hands and then resurfaced 50 years after the entire order was arrested in France is low. Very romantic, mind you, but romance makes poor history. Add to that the fact that the Templar confessions were extracted by torture, and that almost all the confessions were recanted as soon as the man was no longer being tortured, and you have more evidence that the reports of “idol worshipping” during initiation rites was a fantasy in the minds of the inquisitors, rather than a true recollection on the part of the Templar.