Why an Atheist Thinks the Shroud of Turin is the Real Deal

The Sudarium Envisioned

Many envision this cloth as flat, like a napkin or a towel, placed on Jesus’ face or used to wrap his head after he was taken from the cross. D. A. Carson in his recent, monumental commentary, The Gospel According to John, tells us:

The corpse was customarily laid on a sheet of linen, wide enough to envelop the body completely and more than twice the length of the corpse. The body was placed on the sheet that the feet were at one end, and then the sheet was drawn over the head and back down to the feet. The feet were bound at the ankles, and the arms were tied to the body with linen strips. The face was bound with another cloth (soudarion, a loan-word from the Latin sudarium, ‘sweat-cloth’, often worn in life around the neck). Jesus’ body was apparently prepared for burial in the same way. (29)

Others disagree in one or two minor details. The arms may be bound at the wrists but not tied to the body. Others argue that the soudarion might have been removed prior to the body being enshrouded. Others, such as the great biblical scholar and Anglican bishop, John A. T. Robinson, famous for his book, Honest to God, thinks that the soudarion was a chin band tied around the head to keep the corpse’s jaw closed. We don’t know, one way or the other; not from history, for it is inadequate on this point.