Saturday, October 19, 2024

APOLOGETIC FOR THE SHROUD OF JESUS - part two

So far, it has been established that there was a full body covering over Jesus in the tomb. God, in His wisdom, provided evidence of His three-fold existence: (1) The object, Jesus; (2) the “negative,” the Holy Ghost; and (3) the Power.

Jesus was not a mere carpenter; He was literally a highly intelligent technician (tekton in the Greek). He is the omniscient (all-knowing) God. He had knowledge of all things before any person ever thought of them.

Things often occur to me in “dreams,” not in REM sleep but somewhere between the conscious and unconscious. That stage is called the “hypnagogic state” wherein “spontaneously appearing visual, auditory and kinesthetic images; qualitatively unusual thought processes and verbal constructions; tendencies toward extreme suggestibility; symbolic representations of mental and physiological processes; and so on.” (Schacter 1976).

In scripture, many people, even heathens, had pertinent dreams. A hypnagogic state is where a person is subject to unusual thought processes. Much of my commentary occurs to me as I get caught somewhere between sleep and awake. Perhaps that is how God shares His divine Thoughts with people, especially Christians.

In the darkness in bed, the Thoughts of God occurred to me early this morning. I was receiving thoughts that were not my own. That agrees with scripture (Isa 55:8). God guides people by getting into our minds. I am content with that. However, we must test all things and hang onto what is good (1 Thes 5:1), so that process drives me toward evidence of the truth. I believe the truth is that the shroud of Turin is a “photograph” of Jesus that reveals the third “substance” of the godhead — His Power.

Luke wrote about how, “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power” (Acts 10:38). That occurred at the baptism of Jesus when the Holy Ghost came on Jesus and remained, at least until the crucifixion where the Holy Ghost left Him. Perhaps it happened again in the tomb. More on that later.

It came to me earlier in the year that when Pilate asked Jesus, “What is truth?” that God used Plato’s way — the Allegory of the Cave — wherein in a cave chained men who could only see shadows issued by the light on objects behind them were seeing a fragment of the real thing. The crucifixion was an enactment of the Allegory of the Cave that God revealed to me when half asleep.

That was “wisdom” from the Divine. To save them that believe, Paul wrote, “The Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom” (1 Cor 1:22). Many saw the “Shadow” of Jesus as real as the “Object” Jesus. Hence, the Shadow, or Holy Ghost, was a fragment of the Man.

That would satisfy Pilate who seemed to be familiar with the Platonian question. Next, how to satisfy the Jews? A sign. How about a photograph of the godhead in action? Let me explain in the next few paragraphs.

I saw the tomb as a photographic darkroom. God would be the Technician who took and developed the photograph to present to the world to satisfy the Jews. So far, neither the Jews nor the Gentiles are satisfied, even though the shroud may be the sign that they needed. It is indeed forensic evidence that a dead man was crucified during the right time (ascertained by the weave of the fabric), right place, and right manner of death. That occurred to me half asleep when I was open to suggestion, just as the Allegory of the Cave did some time ago.

But we must tackle the process; some other things require examination. Paul wrote, “Walk in love, as Christ also has loved us, and has given Himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour” (Ephes 5:2). Jesus was the sacrifice for all the sins of all time, one time. He was the one satisfactory sin offering that was a onetime event.

Would you not want a picture of that? Of course, you would be standing there with your smartphones clicking away! We all need evidence that things occur, and they were no different then. So, God perhaps provided a picture for all of us for all time. His photograph has faded, is worn and dirty, yet it remains a picture of the ultimate sacrifice, if you accept it as evidence.

Josephus called the crucifixion a “holocaust.” At one time, “holocaust” meant burning by fire. How was the death and resurrection a “holocaust” for He did not seem to be burned by fire? He was crucified but indeed His Body may have indeed been burned by fire in the tomb. More on that shortly.

The Law was this: “You shall offer every day a bullock for a sin offering for atonement: and you shall cleanse the altar, when you have made an atonement for it, and you shall anoint it, to sanctify it” (Exod 29:36).

Jesus was the substitute for the bullock, or better said, the other way around. The crucifixion was a sin offering and “it” had to be cleansed, anointed, and burned.

Calvary was the place of the crucifixion. It was the altar. The Romans prepared the altar and hopefully it was cleansed before it was used for the Law to be done.

When did the cleansing and anointing of the “Bullock” occur?

Jesus prepared Himself. Dung would not make a clean sacrifice, so the day before Jesus announced, “Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God” (Mark 14:25). Jesus did not eat the Last Supper. Supper was over and then came the last course after Jesus was anointed (see Luke’s account). The Last Supper was the last meal of Judas wherein he effectively dipped the body of Christ into the blood of Christ.

God is polite. The bowels of Jesus would be empty just as the dung of a bullock would be emptied before a sacrifice. (We don’t like to think about Jesus having biological functions but as a Man He did.)

Next came the washing. Jesus said about Mary, “She has done what she could; she is come aforehand to anoint my body to the burying” (Mark 14:8). Mary with her ointment was preparing the perfect sacrifice and as was pointed out, she went to great expense and used the finest ointment there was — spikenard. That is important! That she was preparing for His burial means that she was supplying something that would be there when He laid in the tomb. Was she supplying the chemicals for some process? Let’s see.

We are to hang onto what is good from all the information we dream. I asked myself about spikenard. It was used to perform the Law exactly; Jesus said so: “Let her alone; why trouble you her? she has wrought a good work on Me” (Mark 14:6). She had performed according to the Law, He was saying. The Law required both cleansing and anointing; spikenard did just that! 

Spikenard consists of many essential components it being an essential oil. The spike prefix comes from the inflorescence, or stem of the plant that flowers. It represents life giving power. Wikipedia Nard oil is used as a perfume, an incense, and in Ayurvedic practices. Sesquiterpenes contribute to the major portion of the volatile compounds, with the eponymous jatamansone (also known as (-)-valeranone) being dominant. Many coumarins are also present in the oil. The alkaloid actinidine has been isolated from the oil, and valerenal alongside valerenic acid (formerly called nardal and nardin respectively). Among the other phytochemical products are found in the rhizomes are: nardostachysin, a terpenoid ester; nardostachnol; nardostachnone; jatamansic acid and jatamansinone.lists the constituents of spikenard.

 

Thinking thoughts does not make me a chemist, but alkalides stuck out. Alkali metals have low ionization enthalpies and therefore, the electrons are easily ejected when exposed to light. Light upon alkalides causes ionization — that is “any process by which electrically neutral atoms or molecules are converted to electrically charged atoms or molecules (ions) through gaining or losing electrons” (Encyclopedia Britannica 1787-2024).

The ionization of alkalides is a photographic process. Such processes produce photogenic images; and what is that? “A past concept that involves the production of images (and how after-images can continue to produce affects, emotions, ideas, and wonder)” (Ulmer 2017). The Shroud of Turin is a photogenic image that produces such emotions and things.

Some of the other substances in spikenard are alcohols — cleaning agents. Spikenard is a parfume — the most powerful of the essential oils. I submit that spikenard may have been the photographic compound that Mary used for the picture of Jesus made on the shroud.

Spikenard ointment used on Jesus contains alkalides. They are used to develop pictures, changing the color on the slide. Perhaps that process was used by the Great Technician to produce an image of Jesus in His covering.

Remember, that Mary was preparing Jesus for his burial! That is significant as His burial place was a dark and never used (clean) tomb. It would be the Great Tekton’s laboratory where the greatest photograph ever taken was shot and the negative image of Jesus revealed. (Yes, the Shroud is the negative of the Image of Christ. It is in a sense, His “Shadow,” or Holy Ghost.

The Law, or the Word (pre-incarnate Jesus), had great significance: “The Law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things” (Heb 10:1). The negative Image of Jesus on the Shroud could represent the “backside” of God that Moses saw, and the Object the Face of God (Jesus) that he could not see. Hence, the Image of Jesus on the Shroud would be what Moses saw — Jesus in the negative image, or His Holy Ghost.

So, what made the crucifixion a burnt offering? The Shroud is evidence of that. The body of Jesus was burned on the linen cloth by some Divine Power.

So far, the nard met step one of the Jewish burial process. It cleansed and anointed the dead Jew. Step two was the clothing for which the soldiers gambled. Step three was the full-body covering; what we now say is His Shroud. Those have been explained.

Also, the chemicals and “dark room” have been presented. Jesus asked, “And now, O Father, glorify You Me with your own self with the glory which I had with you before the world was.” (John 7:5). The photographic process is glorification and that implies that the Image of God be exposed. What was that Image? “Selem” in the Hebrew, the “Shadow” of God, or His Phantom Presence (Strong 2006). Jesus was asking that the Holy Spirit come onto Him after His death.

The death and resurrection of Jesus was His glorification (John 7:39). Glorification explains the source of the Light that came on Jesus to make the photonic Image of the Savior.

(To be continued)



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