[Almost everything below derives from the book by Prof. Andrea Nicolotti, Il Processo Negato, which I would translate loosely as “Verdict suppressed.” Quotes from the primary sources adduced are taken from that book, which has not been translated into English. Almost all the documents are transcribed in full in the book’s 59 appendices, and most of the originals are in the Vatican Apostolic Archive, “Varia 16” .]1
“De Authenticitate S. Sindonis Taurinensis”
On 4 July 1901, the designated consultant of the Sacred Congregation for Indulgences and Sacred Relics, Fr Franz Beringer, author of the definitive ‘Indulgences, their nature and their use,’ presented his formal conclusion to an inquiry held into whether the Shroud was authentic or not. It is a 37 page document, in Latin, detailing precisely his investigations and considerations, which eventually concludes:
“Sed ut tandem longam istam tractationem concludam, haec mihi in praecedentibus probata esse videntur:
Pro authenticitate Sindonis Taurinensis nullum plane in antiquitate christiana fundamentum solidum existit: rationes enim vagae atque narrationes in hunc finem posteriori aetate excogitatae nihil pro ea efficere valent.
Contra eisudem Sindonis authenticitatem probationes adsunt certae et evidentes; static enim ac ipsa medio saeculo decimo quarto Lireyi apparuit, ab auctoritate ecclesiastica competente semel iterumque ac tertio ut falsa reliquia fuit rejecta, eo tantum cultu permisso, qui repraesentationibus vel imitationibus instrumentorum Passionis exhibere potest.”2
“But to finally conclude this long discussion, the following seem to me to have been proven in the preceding sections:
In favour of the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin absolutely no solid foundation exists in Christian antiquity: vague reasons and narratives invented for this purpose in later times notwithstanding.
Against the authenticity of the Shroud there are certain and evident proofs; for when it appeared in Lireiy in the middle of the fourteenth century, it was rejected by the competent ecclesiastical authority three time as a false relic, with only the worship due to representations or imitations of the instruments of the Passion allowed.”
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For years, since Kenneth Stevenson’s book “Verdict on the Shroud” was published in 1981, the Shroud has been thought of in juridical terms by lawyers, quasi-lawyers and pseudo-lawyers of an authenticist frame of mind, all of whom have convinced themselves that if it were ever genuinely “brought to trial,” they would have enough evidence to “prove beyond reasonable doubt” that it was authentic, or it least, if the case were presented in the opposite way, to establish that it could not be proved beyond reasonable doubt to be medieval.
I think the opposite, of course, but I find it difficult to imagine the circumstances of a court case in which the authenticity of the Shroud could be a matter of conviction or acquittal. Maybe an insurance claim, and the value of the object being crucial to the case? One is reminded of the famous “Monkey Trial,” in 1925, in which the truth or falsity of Evolution was “put on trial,” although the case was actually about whether a teacher had broken the law by teaching Evolution (which he had), rather than whether Evolution was true or not.
The Shroud enjoyed something similar in 1900, when Cardinal Richelmy, Archbishop of Turin, formally enquired of the Sacred Congregation for Indulgences and Sacred Relics, whether Canon Ulysse Chevalier should be reprimanded for publishing an opinion of his own without consultation,3 in contradiction of the decree of the Council of Trent called “De Invocatione, Veneratione, et Reliquiis Sanctorum, et Sacris Imaginibus,” whose last paragraph reads:
“Quod si aliquis dubius, aut difficilis abusus sit exstirpandus, vel omnino aliqua de iis rebus gravior quæstio incidat, episcopus, antequam controversiam dirimat, metropolitani et comprovincialium episcoporum in concilio provinciali sententiam exspectet, ita tamen, ut nihil inconsulto sanctissimo Romano pontifice novum aut in Ecclesia hactenus inusitatum decernatur.
“But if any doubtful or difficult abuse is to be eradicated, or if any more serious question arises about these matters, the bishop, before settling the controversy, shall await the opinion of the metropolitan and co-provincial bishops in a provincial council, so, however, that nothing new or hitherto unusual in the Church shall be decreed without consulting the most holy Roman Pontiff.”
Cardinal Richelmy framed his suit in two parts, the second of which concerned Ulysse Chevalier, as described above, but firstly enquired whether the Papal Bull of Clement VII of 6 January 1390 should be interpreted as disproving the authenticity of the Shroud, and it was this to which Fr Beringer devoted the vast majority of his investigation, with the conclusion quoted above. As to whether Chevalier had done anything wrong, it was the opinion of Beringer that since the Shroud was quite clearly not a relic, the provisions of the Council of Trent regarding relics did not apply, and anyway all Chevalier had done was to reproduce documents which were already in the public realm, and therefore his work was literally nothing new.
Franz Beringer finished his report with the advice that the Shroud be gradually and quietly withdrawn from public veneration, a suggestion that was then debated by the whole Congregation for Indulgences and Sacred Relics, the minutes of this discussion being recorded by Archbishop Francisco Solaro.4 All were agreed that the inauthenticity of the Shroud had been established, but all varied in their ideas about what they should do with the knowledge. Some thought that to do nothing would be best, permitting continued veneration of the relic whether it was authentic or not, while others feared that if it became generally known that they had known it wasn’t authentic and done nothing about it, the Church may be put into disrepute. Others thought that it was impossible to be completely sure it wasn’t authentic, so they should not put themselves into any position from which it would be impossible to withdraw if new evidence overturned their opinion. The consensus seemed to be that ‘moral authenticity’ could carry sufficient weight to justify the veneration of a relic, even if it was well known and generally accepted that it had no ‘material authenticity.’ Beringer disagreed, pointing out that some “false indulgences” that he had uncovered in the course of research into his two volume book on the subject, had been successfully repudiated.5
This decision fortunately – if not wholly fortuitously – tied in with the fact that the Shroud was an extremely important totem of the city of Turin, the Duchy of Savoy, and thus the Kingdom of Italy, in the person of Victor Emmanuel III, who was already quite antagonistic enough towards the Catholic Church without needing the additional snub of the repudiation of his family treasure.
Beringer’s report must have passed on to some appropriate authority in Rome, where an unknown assessor wrote numerous critical and sometimes rather sarcastic footnotes on the document and then added his own opinion at the end.6 He demands the medieval sources for Beringer’s assessments (which suggests that he has not read Chevalier’s books, where all the sources are scrupulously referenced), he insists that nobody should question sacred relics without official commission, deplores the fact that if relics needed to be formally authenticated then not only the Shroud, but the Holy Lance, the Crown of Thorns, the Veronica, and countless other less famous relics would have to be repudiated, and says that if the Lirey clerics really thought it was a fake, then they wouldn’t have been so insistent that Marguerite de Charny give it back to them.
At the Vatican the report was quietly suppressed. Someone from the Vatican Secretariate of State wrote “Riferito al S. Padre. Sua Santità ha detto essere meglio di lasciar cadere la cosa.” (“Referred to the Holy Father. His Holiness has said that it would be better to let the matter drop.”)
In Turin, however, there was a severe reaction against both the report and Ulysse Chevalier. The Jesuit priest Fr Giammaria Sanna Solaro, a leading promoter of the Shroud’s authenticity and author of ‘La Santa Sindone che si venera a Torino,‘ acted as spokesman for the authenticists and after gathering all the arguments he could, he sought an audience with Pope Leo XIII. A letter to Chevalier from Monsignor Albert Battandier, secretary to Cardinal Jean-Baptiste-François Pitra, an advisor to the Congregation of Bishops and Regulars, and the Commission for the Examination of New Institutes, describes what happened.7
“Les Jésuites ayant eu veut de ces travaux et du résultat défavorable pour la thèse du P. Sanna Solaro, et lui obtinrent une audience du souverain pontife. Ce Rév. Père se jeta aux genoux de Leon XIII et lui parla longuement en faveur de l’authenticité de la relique du Saint-Suaire. Leon XIII écouta tout sans dire, puis répondit: Mon Rév. Père, nous avons fait examiner avec soin toute cette question et nous devons vous dire “non sustinetur.” C’est-à-dire on ne peux défendre l’authenticité de cette relique.”
“The Jesuits, having taken note of this work and the unfavourable result for Fr Sanna Solaro’s thesis, obtained an audience for him with the Pope. This Reverend Father threw himself at Leo XIII’s knees and spoke at length in favour of the authenticity of the relic of the Holy Shroud. Leo XIII listened to everything without saying a word, then replied: ‘My Reverend Father, we have had this whole question carefully examined and we must tell you “non sustinetur.” That is to say, the authenticity of this relic cannot be defended.”
“Non sustinetur” is a formulaic expression frequently found in similar pronouncements, and meaning more or less the opposite of the better known “Nihil obstat.”
It seems that the Pope had commissioned some kind of inquiry of his own to help him adjudicate, either independent of or in association with the Sacred Congregation for Indulgences and Sacred Relics. Nevertheless, in spite of his decision regarding the material authenticity of the Shroud, theological and pragmatic considerations nevertheless suppressed all the formal documentation regarding it, although the discussion, both as to the authenticity of the Shroud and the authority of Ulysse Chevalier, bubbled away in private correspondence and the religious press for years.
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1). Andrea Nicolotti, Il Processo Negato. Un inedito parere della Santa Sede sull’autenticità della Sindone, Viella publications, 2015
2). Appendix 11 in Il Processo Negato, from the Vatican Apostolic Archive, Varia 16.
3). Appendix 9 in Il Processo Negato, from the Vatican Apostolic Archive, Varia 16.
4). Appendix 13 in Il Processo Negato, from the Vatican Apostolic Archive, Varia 16.
5). Franz Beringer, Les Indulgences: Leur Nature et Leur Usage, 1893. Ironically two of the false indulgences to be suppressed were attached to the carrying of an image of the Shroud and to the reciting of a particular prayer, both supposedly awarded by Pope Clement VIII.
6). Appendix 12 in Il Processo Negato, from the Vatican Apostolic Archive, Varia 16.
7). Appendix 38 in Il Processo Negato, from the Bibliothèque d’Étude et d’Information, Grenoble, R9089
Hi, Hugh,
You claim that you’re “not trying to persuade” (regarding the controversial question of the Turin Shroud’s authenticity) yet, in reality, you go beyond that and refer (in your response here and elsewhere) to its being a “medieval artefact.” In referring to it in this way you are, of course, making it a foregone conclusion that the Shroud–as Jesus’ purported actual burial cloth–is a fake.
Also, the juridical metaphor is perfect for the effort involving determine the Shroud’s authenticity, because it involves advocates (like actual lawyers such as myself or people behaving in the manner of lawyers) presenting evidence for the purpose of persuading either a third party or parties (the jurors) who are prompted to arrive at a conclusion–which, just like in court, could end up being a “hung jury”–where someone just cannot make a decision given the evidence presented (such as is the situation with Kelly Kearse.) What is “on trial” is the Shroud’s authenticity as the burial cloth of Jesus and, if so, was it created through a natural (but not artistic process), an artistic process or a miraculous process.
Seriously, who gives a hoot about the formal inquiries that have been conducted in the past? The value of a formal inquiry is not that it was conducted but whether or not whether the inquiry, itself, had the information to assess that it needed to assess and whether or not those making determinations had the requisite knowledge to make a reliable enough determination that our mind can rest easy on its being correct (the highest form of this is, of course, the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard used in a criminal trial for convicting someone of a crime. The “crime” in a trial concerning the Shroud would be whether or not the body images and blood images were a result of a forgery or if by a natural process, the “crime” would be in presenting naturally formed images as something miraculous (by which to persuade others that the Christian religion is True.) Any past formal inquiries have the very serious deficit of not having the evidence that we now have regarding the Shroud. They didn’t have the benefit of knowledge and evidence from such people as Vignon, Barbet, Bucklin, Zugibe, the STURP team, the Italian team from the 1978 and early 1980’s (Giovanni Riggi, Biama Bollone, etc. ), Fanti, Di Lazzaro, De Caro, etc. So, I really don’t see how there is any value whatsoever to examining what a bunch of people thought who lacked the benefit of assessing the scientific, medical and forensic information that we now have about the Shroud. This is why I think that this is all a bunch of “noise” to drown out the “signal” that people need to receive concerning the high volume of highly credible evidence that supports the Shroud’s authenticity.
As you know, Hugh, I don’t try to throw in everything but the kitchen sink into my arguments for authenticity. That’s a dangerous practice that many authenticists have yet to realize or, worse, who resist acknowledging. Such “kitchen-sink authenticists” are routinely the ones who only wade in the popular-level information–much of which is true but some of which is only somewhat true and some of which was once considered true (given the current degree of understanding of certain scientific matters–such as the cross-reactivity issue for the purpose of determining the species of the blood on the Shroud) but no longer true (given advancements in scientific knowledge.) So, this can muddy the waters. I’m not happy about that, but “it is what it is.”
I habitually focus on the “signal” which is the results from the chemical and physics-based testing that was performed on the Shroud, itself, or specimens removed from the Shroud (through either the sticky-tape samplings or thread removed from the Shroud) as well as the medical and forensic evidence that we have from top experts in the field on this matter. I don’t “contaminate” my “case” for the Shroud’s authenticity (see, another juridical comparison) with evidence that can be validly rebutted by the skeptics. I have zero interest in arguments that won’t hold water.
Best regards,
Teddi
Hi Teddi,
I’m afraid you’re misunderstanding the nature of my blog. I’m not “trying to persuade” anybody of anything. I’m merely collating some interesting information about the fascinating medieval artefact we call the Turin Shroud, which few people know about as the relevant literature has never been translated into English. I was inspired to do so by William Red’s mention of “juridical science,” which I deplored in a previous post, and also by the recent publication of Otangelo Grasso’s new book, subtitled “A Forensic Summary of the Evidence.” The Shroud has been made part of an extended juridical metaphor for fifty years, although as I mention above, I find it difficult to imagine circumstances in which its authenticity or not might play such an important part that it could be said to have been judicially “tried.” On those very rare occasions when a formal inquiry has been conducted, it has been found inauthentic, and I have no doubt myself that if it were to happen again it would be found inauthentic again, but that, of course, is just my opinion.
Best wishes,
Hugh
Hi, Hugh,
I see that this is, once again, more “noise” that is attempting to drown out the “signal.” Tisk, tisk, tisk . . .
First, who gives a hoot what Father Franz Beringer has to say about anything? Before becoming a priest, was he a surgeon in battle like Dr. Barbet, or did he have a prior career as a forensic medical examiner or was he a chemist? What, pray tell, makes his opinion worth listening to? What’s more–what is the basis of his opinions concerning the Shroud that can be thought to be reliable? Diddly- squat, it appears . . .
Beringer’s both bold and bald claim that it seems to him (through their, apparently, at best, very limited and uninformed trial or, at worst, sham trial, that “absolutely no solid foundation exists in Christian antiquity” that favors the authenticity of the Shroud (of Turin) is preposterous. At best, this was a “trial” with “jurors” that were as ignorant as the “lawyer/s.” At worst, the “lawyers” and “jurors” might have been quite antagonistic (as some–typically not well-informed–Christians still are, today) to even the concept of Jesus’ burial shroud existing with His image on it–thereby rendering this a “kangaroo court”–as opposed to one filled with details that, at that time, had not even been known. However, what should have been known–if any of the lawyers or arbiters were worth their salt, was the detailed description that archbishop Gregory Referendarius of Hagia Sophia gave in his sermon the next day after the Image of Edessa was brought to Constantinople on August 15, 944–to a great fanfare that was morally demanded for the return of Jesus of Nazareth’s sacred burial cloth into Christian hands.
Perhaps Beringer was unaware that Gregory’s description of the blood involved the use of the word “clot.” That, right there, along with his description of the body images that–contrary to what is often claimed–had to be full body images as Gregory was referencing the side wound–which, obviously, was not on a frontal facial image.
I will, however, cut Beringer and the others who participated in this mockery of a “trial,” because they did not have the information that we now have from STURP’s investigation, from the studies of Vignon, Barbet, Zugibe, Fanti and others. But, I can’t give this slack to you, Hugh, for trying to persuade people with this, because you, indeed, know more than most that there are very, very sophisticated pieces of evidence which continue to point to the body images on the Shroud as being of a miraculous process–not a natural or an artistic one.
Best regards,
Teddi