Comments on: The Holy Sudarium of Oviedo

By: dobby

dobby — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 04:36:00 +0000

The Sudarium of Oviedo was a type of napkin that was used to cover the face of those who died a violent death so as to spare the family the sight of the face. It was also used to contain the blood and liquid flowing from the facial orifaces. Janice Bennett’s book describes the painstaking process a Spanish group has done to recreate how the napkin was placed on Jesus’ face. It would have been tied on while He was still on the cross, then used to staunch the flow of fluids as He was lowered to the ground and wrapped in the shroud. Once the shroud was in place the napkin was laid to the side. In keeping with orthodox Jewish burial customs, all cloths containing body fluids, especially blood, would be buried with the body. The body of a victim of a violent death would not have been washed so as to keep any blood and tissue with the body.

Janice Bennett’s book explains all of this. The blood patterns on the napkin match very well those on the Shroud of Turin.

Read it for yourself.

By: Iosephus

Iosephus — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 23:01:00 +0000

It was yesterday while listening to the "Victimae paschali laudes" that I remembered that the sudarium receives mention in this very famous Easter Sequence:

Dic nobis Maria,
Quid vidisti in via?
Sepulcrum Christi viventis,
et gloriam vidi resurgentis.

Angelicos testes,
sudarium et vestes.

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 22:56:00 +0000

Another point: If you look at the last link in my post, you will see a photo of the cloth. If it were forged, you would think that there would be some miraculous image of the Holy Face, or that the Blood would form some recognizable pattern. No, the cloth and Blood patterns look like a normal cloth placed over a face would — indistinct. There is no miraculous image, as on the Shroud (some speculate that the image on that cloth was “burned” into it during the Resurrection). That argues, I believe, in support of the Sudarium’s authenticity.

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 03:06:00 +0000

“Sacred Blood, Sacred Image”? Does the title, which recalls, “Holy Blood, Holy Grail,” highlight the authors opposition to that whole line of blasphemous books?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 23:25:00 +0000

That’s really interesting - I had never heard of the Sudarium Shroud. I saw the shroud of turin recently, well not the really thing, but where it was stored, because it’s only shown every 25 years or so. The man in the church who gave a talk about it said that it was consistant with the crucifixion according to the gospel of John among other very convincing and interesting facts. I bought the book they had there - very extensive scientific research on it. Going to look into this Sudarium Shroud now…

By: dobby

dobby — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 17:41:00 +0000

Janice Bennett has written an entire book on the Holy Sudarium of Oviedo titled: Sacred Blood, Sacred Image. It is published by Ignatius Press.

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Sat, 22 Jul 2006 03:47:00 +0000

The Janice Bennett interview also contains an interesting claim by one Isodad (or Ishodad) of Merv (fl. 850). He claimed that St. Peter put the Sudarium on his head when he healed people. Sounds strange, but there may be a parallel in Acts 19:12. St. Paul touched “towels and aprons” that then were “carried away” to be used to exorcize demons from sick people. The word for “towels” here is “soudaria” in Greek and “sudaria” in Latin — the same word for the face-cloth of Our Lord. So the Apostles really did use cloths like the Holy Sudarium when working miracles.

On another note, the Sassanid Empire of Persia was Zoroastrian. Zoroastrianism is a pagan religion, involving fire-worship and dual deities of good and evil. Although Chosroes II was a Zoroastrian, his queen (one out of a harem of 3,000) was a Jacobite heretic. In addition to recovering the True Cross during his invasion of Iraq, the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius destroyed a major fire-temple. Persia then fell to Islam in the time of Chosroes’ successor; the vengeance that Heraclius wrought when recovering the True Cross may well have inspired the Mohammedans’ confidence. So in addition to saving the Sudarium from hostile Zorastrians and Jews, its caretakers preserved it from falling into the hands of the Moslem invaders of Palestine a few decades later. For whatever that information is worth; I’m relying entirely on the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia article “Persia.”

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Sat, 22 Jul 2006 03:11:00 +0000

Thanks, Chattr, for your link. The interview with Janice Bennett identifies one of the other relics contained in the Oviedo “ark”: a chasuble that Our Lady miraculously gave to St. Ildefonso during an apparition. This must have been a famous miracle, because I saw at least one Renaissance-era painting of the same event at the Louvre.

By: chattr

chattr — Sat, 22 Jul 2006 02:41:00 +0000

In Sacred Blood, Sacred Image: An interview with Janice Bennett about the Sudarium of Oviedo | August 6, 2005:

The use of a sudarium was required when blood flowed at the time of death, because blood was believed to contain the soul of the individual as the “seat of life,” and was considered just as much a part of the body as the flesh. Any blood spilled at the time of death had to be buried, which would have included clothing, soiled linens and blood-soaked earth. The scene in Mel Gibson’s film The Passion of the Christ that portrays Jesus’ mother mopping up his blood after the scourging is not pious fiction. This practice was necessary so that the blood could be buried. …

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Sat, 22 Jul 2006 00:30:00 +0000

“If you link to the Jewish Encyclopedia citation for Chosroes II . . .” I link to this article in the main body of the post when I write about the “ethnic cleansing” of Christians. Thanks to Iosephus for pointing out that I wasn’t being clear when I referred back to this.

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 23:37:00 +0000

Er, “an” Israeli State. Now, what we need is for someone in the Vatican to let the purported Veil of St. Veronica be analyzed. It is supposedly kept in St. Peter’s Basilica. The problem is that some Sindonologists think that the legend of St. Veronica arose from copies made of the Mandylion cloth (i.e. the Shroud) when only the image of Christ’s Holy Face was exposed. I don’t know, but I think it would be much cooler if the Veil were genuine and lined up with the other cloths.

Question: why do some images of St. Jude Thaddeus show him with a medal with (I guess) Our Lord’s Face on it? If this association is ancient, then maybe it backs up the legend that St. Jude brought the Shroud to Edessa. Thanks for any info.

By: Tobias Petrus

Tobias Petrus — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 23:31:00 +0000

Thank you, whoever helped me edit the post. If you link to the Jewish Encyclopedia citation for Chosroes II, you’ll see that the Jews of Palestine wanted him to set up a Jewish commonwealth for them. Chosroes’ Sassanid Empire included both present-day Iraq and Iran. Imagine that — Zionists asking Iraqis and Iranians to help build a Israeli State!? My, times have changed.