Why is it that some things that connect to another sometimes get tucked away so it doesn’t give a complete answer to a longstanding mystery? Most people have heard about the Shroud of Turin and how it’s been stuck in a longtime tug-of-war over whether it was truly the burial cloth of Jesus or just an impossibly brilliant fake from the Middle Ages or slightly before. But not everybody probably knows about the Sudarium of Oviedo (Spain) that seems to be the missing piece that appears to prove the Shroud of Turin as real. A lot of people may not know exactly what a sudarium is either. It has Latin origins and basically means “sweat cloth.” The Sudarium in question here is said to be a cloth that was wrapped around Jesus’ blood-stained head after death and separated from the famous shroud after having been together at one time in the tomb.
Because there’s basically two sudariums in the world that are believed to be a cloth that was wrapped around Jesus’ face (one called the Veil of Veronica that was said to be owned by Veronica of Jerusalem who wiped sweat off Jesus’ brow and imprinting an image of His face)–there may be some skepticism, especially when the various versions claiming to be the Veil of Veronica haven’t really been tested. Fortunately, we all know the Shroud of Turin has been tested extensively–but so has the Sudarium (the cloth used in Jesus’ death) as the subject of this article that’s been in a cathedral in Oviedo, Spain since the 700’s A.D. The connections made between the two are really quite beyond extraordinary when test results are seen together–and really shouldn’t be ignored. Yet, the Shroud frequently isn’t connected to the Sudarium in most mainstream TV specials done on the subject.
The route the Sudarium took to get to Spain was as circuitous as the Shroud path to Turin, Italy. Based on the forensic tests in recent years of pollen on the Sudarium, it definitely has Jerusalem origins. Other pollen extracts also trace the Sudarium to Palestine as early as the 500’s where it was stored in a cave until Persia invaded the area around 614 A.D. That’s when it began quite a journey throughout the Middle East, Africa and into Europe–first going to Alexandria and into North Africa within a span of two years. After that, it very well could have ended up in the hands of the Persians had it not been moved again due to the inevitable conquering of Alexandria. Thanks to a bishop in Seville, Spain who was taking in those escaping the onslaught of the Persians (shades of protecting the Jews from the Nazis in WWII)–fleeing Christians who brought the Sudarium along in an ark managed to put it into safekeeping there.
The Sudarium went into the safekeeping of another bishop and moved around various places in Spain before ending up in a cave (it seems a lot of religious relics had to be hidden in caves for a time) as protection from Muslims invading the area during the 700’s. The famous story of it ending up in Oviedo is when King Alfonso VI opened the chest containing the Sudarium after his ancient ancestor King Alfonso II had it stored away in a nearby cathedral after the above-mentioned Muslim invasion. Hopefully many are aware of El Cid (yes, we’ve all seen the Charlton Heston movie) being in the presence of the King and his sister opening the chest and taking out the Sudarium to obvious extreme reverence. This was in March of 1075–and so began the more open veneration of the Sudarium in the cathedral in Oviedo up to this present day.
The connective strings to the Shroud of Turin…
While the ancient traveling stories of the Sudarium makes some scientists doubt the legitimacy of it being the real head cloth of Jesus after the crucifixion, it’s been the earlier-mentioned pollen samples and exact symmetry of blood spots on the cloth lining up with the Shroud that makes it hard to ignore as being more real than we could ever imagine to be possible. Of course, scientists feud with other scientists over the legitimacy of the test results. Some might contend that test results are altered by scientists with Christian beliefs to make it look real. On the other hand, most scientists don’t do that, because they believe in empirical evidence rather than anything supernatural. However, the results of the Sudarium might put some scientists between a rock and a hard place due to much of the irrefutable empirical scientific evidence giving more credence to the Shroud being exactly what it’s said to be: The burial cloth of Jesus.
So far, all the scientific testing done on the Sudarium has been done primarily in Spain (via the Investigation Team of the Spanish Centre for Sindonology) and not by any other country or the U.S. other than the contribution of a criminologist from Switzerland. Based on the blood stains that are still visible on the cloth, it was fairly clear that the person who expelled the stains was placed upright when the wrap-around cloth was wrapped around the head. One of the most fascinating pieces of evidence within the stains on the cloth is a liquid that came from the person’s nose (expelled from the lungs) due to a pulmonary edema as what happens when there’s an asphyxiation. Some might not think that Jesus could have had the signs of asphyxiation after being crucified, but due to the twisted shape of his body after death–it would have caused the fluid to develop in his lungs and expel through the nasal passages in death.
And then there’s the blood stains on the Sudarium that has one of the most fascinating and probably little-known pieces of evidence: It was AB blood…which is exactly the same type from the blood stains found on the Shroud.
This mind-blowing connection to the Shroud might just seem to be coincidence to some people. It may be–even though the studies were smart enough to take images of the Shroud and line up the position of the blood, the body fluids, the body position and see how they matched with the stains on the Sudarium. When you start to hear lines of “beyond coincidence” by scientists in some of the evidence found, it makes you wonder if all the key evidence of both being real is there–yet not always broadcast to the masses for whatever reasons you want to muster…
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Before a lot of the most compelling studies took place, it was proven that whoever the person was (identified as a definite man with Jewish features) had to have been crucified. Based on the blood markings and the fluids–it also appeared that the man’s head was twisted slightly as would happen in a crucifixion. And, based on the where the blood markings were, the thorns placed on Jesus’ head (as seen in many illustrations depicting the crucifixion) were present on this person’s head, based on the evidence that the cloth was pinned to his head from the back.
My above mention of the pollen studies (conducted by a Swiss criminologist named Dr. Max Frei) proved the circuitous route of both the Sudarium and the Shroud. It should be noted that Dr. Frei studied pollen samples on the Shroud, too. But while some of those pollen studies could be contested in some circles, one of the most startling was detecting myrrh and aloe that was said to be used on the burial cloth (and actually mentioned as being used in the bible). The particular pollen found from around the time of Christ was a special kind endemic only to the area of Jerusalem.
If this wasn’t compelling enough–the proportion of the blood stains with where they are on the Shroud were found to be perfect matches. In fact, after an examination of a polarized image of both the Sudarium and the Shroud side by side–it was said to show so many alignments (the scientists who did the studies say up to 70 perfect alignments on the front and 50 alignments on the back of each), that it would have to be beyond coincidence that they weren’t used together on the same person.
Other scientists, so far, haven’t tried to contest any of the findings, despite probably being denied in doing the same tests.
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The most emotional feelings behind the original use of the Sudarium was in the realization that Jesus’ face was so disfigured–the Sudarium cloth was wrapped around his head before he was taken down to be buried in the tomb. This proves His suffering enough for the sake of mankind and shouldn’t necessarily have to require another viewing of Mel Gibson’s extremely violent “Passion of the Christ” to feel the profound sacrifice and pain.
Obviously, when science and religion meet, though, you get controversy as well as some possible inroads to solving some of life’s deepest mysteries. The studies on the Sudarium proving what those in Oviedo think it is have been extremely methodical and quite hard to deny. Unfortunately, it seems to be results that only those interested in the subject in a busy world are privy to or scientists who’ve been studying it (or trying to debunk it) for years. For Christians who want a possible key piece of evidence to prove the physical and ethereal existence of their savior–it wouldn’t hurt to investigate more on this subject in internet searches. The more you learn, the more fascinating it becomes.
Even if the overwhelming connective evidence doesn’t become as widespread as it should (for more profound reasons than can possibly be expounded on here)–how it helps your personal faith is all that should matter.
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