Description
Evidence for the Reality of the Turin Shroud
Dr. Alan Whanger
April 7, 2016
Unfortunately, due to technical difficulties, neither audio or video recordings are available for Dr. Whangers fascinating talk. I guess you just had to be there.
Dr. Alan Whanger, and his wife and co-researcher Mary, first became aware of the Shroud of Turin in 1977 from seeing the face image on a book in a bookstore. Photography had been a lifelong major hobby of his, and the image intrigued him, so they bought and read the book. This led them to follow the frequent information coming out over the next couple of years about the 1978 public display of the Shroud and the scientific studies undertaken at that time.
Dr. Whanger’s casual interest became very focused in 1979 when a colleague who had been at St. Catherine’s Monastery in the Sinai Peninsula brought a photo of their much venerated 6th century icon, Christ Pantocrator, that a monk said had been painted directly from the Shroud face. Dr. Whanger and his wife concluded that if they could confirm that information, it would be strong evidence for the Shroud’s ancient origins. Seeking to be as scientific as possible, he developed an image analysis technique called Polarized Image Overlay Technique (PIOT) that enables one to observe and document in minute detail the points of congruence (PC) between two images. This technique will be shown in the presentation.
Dr. Whanger will give a brief history of the Shroud’s whereabouts, including its arrival in Turin about 420 years ago, followed by showing the many remarkable large features of the Shroud’s images. The Whangers worked with about 30 very high-grade second generation photographs made from photographs taken by Giuseppe Enrie in 1931, which show remarkable details not readily seen in later photographs because of deterioration of the images and yellowing of the fabric.
The following will be shown:
- How they can date the origin of the Shroud images to AD 30 by a Jewish lepton coin dated AD 29 imaged over the right eye, and a statue self-dated to AD 31, totally contradicting the 1988 carbon dating result of between 1290 and 1360.
- The remarkable congruencies between the bloodstains on the Shroud and those on the traditional Sudarium (face cloth) that has been in Oviedo, Spain since the 9th century.
- The work of Dr. Max Frei, a Swiss investigator who took sticky tape samples from the Shroud in 1973 and 1978 for microscopic study, especially for identification of the pollen grains. In 1988 the Whangers helped acquire Dr. Frei’s entire extensive collection which is now in their custody in Durham/Raleigh. Photographs of and from this unique collection will be shown.
- The value of careful detailed examination of high-quality photographs and other materials by showing images on the Shroud of hundreds of flowers (many identified by the late Israeli Professor Avinoam Danin, world authority on the botany of the Near and Middle East) and of all of the implements and materials used in the Crucifixion, including two Crowns of Thorns.
- The combined work of several researchers, including the Whangers, showing that the Shroud images resulted from complex vertically collimated radiation coming from both within the body and from the body surface at the moment of Resurrection.
This unique Shroud is one of the most studied and copied objects in existence. On display will be multiple posters illustrating various findings, as well as 3-D images and many photographs. A free 4”x6” 3-D photograph of the Shroud face will be available for each person attending.
The viewer is invited to reflect on this marvelous image that uniquely combines the secular and the Divine.
Dr. Alan Whanger, a native of Detroit, Michigan, earned both his undergraduate and medical degrees at Duke University. His post-graduate training includes residencies in general surgery (Cleveland), and psychiatry (Duke), and additional work in tropical medicine and hygiene (London), and in geriatrics (Duke). He is the author of numerous professional articles and book chapters. He is Professor Emeritus at Duke University Medical Center, beginning 1993. Along with his wife Mary, the Whangers have been internationally recognized Shroud researchers since 1979, and have presented on the topic at SFF twice before in 1994 and 2000. They developed the Polarized Image Overlay Technique for doing exacting image comparisons. They are co-founders of the Council for Study of the Shroud of Turin (CSST), a nonprofit organization whose mission is to do research on the Shroud of Turin and related relics of the Passion, to publish the findings, and to help establish a center for display, research, and education. He is Chairman of the CSST Board of Directors. She is Secretary of the Board and was Editor of the nearly 40 issues of the newsletter CSST NEWS. For more information please see their website at www.shroudcouncil.org.
