This is the fourth instalment of My critique of Sarzeaud, N., 2025, "Further evidence suggests Jesus was not wrapped in 'Shroud of Turin'," Scimex, 29 Aug 2025. It was originally an item of my Shroud of Turin News, but I realised it would be too long for that. My words will be in [bold square brackets] to distinguish them from those of the article's.
"Further evidence suggests Jesus was not wrapped in 'Shroud of Turin',"Scimex, 29 August 2025.
[Right (enlarge): Full-length negative image of the Shroud (Wikipedia)[STW]. Could an unknown medieval forger really have created this? Or does Naturalism's Emperor have no clothes?]
[Today (10 October 2025) I discovered the media release that all the news articles about medieval philosopher Nicole Oresme (1325-82)'s rejection of the Shroud are based on, so I will start again and respond to that.]
A newly uncovered Medieval document has added further evidence to suggest that the famous Shroud of Turin was not authentic.
[This latest "evidence ... that the Shroud ... is not authentic" is a mere footnote (see below)! Nicole Oresme, a 14th century philosopher who had never seen the Shroud (because for ~30 years from 1359 to 1389, following the widowed Jeanne de Vergy (c.1332–1428)'s marriage to Aymon IV of Geneva, the Shroud had been taken to Anthon in High Savoy[13Apr18] and even Bishop d'Arcis did not know where it was[27Dec14] until after Oresme had died in 1382), in a footnote wrote:
"I do not need to believe those who say: 'So-and-so performed this or that miracle for me,' because in this way many clerics deceive others, inducing them to bring offerings to their churches. This is clear from the example of the church in Champagne, where it was said that it was the Shroud of the Lord Jesus Christ, and from the seemingly endless number of others who have invented this or that"[PA25].That's it! In the above footnote, Oresme does not dispute that the Shroud exhibited at "the church in Champagne" was "the Shroud of the Lord Jesus Christ." His topic is not the Shroud but the claim by "clerics" that their relics worked miracles, deceiving their followers and "inducing them to bring offerings to their churches." Oresme's example of "the church in Champagne" is evidently based on the rumour ("it is said"), later made explicit by the Bishop of Troyes, Pierre d'Arcis (r. 1377-95) in his 1389 Memorandum, about the Shroud's 1356 exposition, that because "from all parts people came together to view" the Shroud, the de Charny's and/or the Lirey church canons must have made a lot of money from it:
"This story was put about not only in the kingdom of France, but, so to speak, through out the world, so that from all parts people came together to view it. And further to attract the multitude so that money might cunningly be wrung from them, pretended miracles were worked, certain men being hired to represent themselves as healed at the moment of the exhibition of the shroud, which all believed to be the shroud of our Lord"[WI79, 267].But as I pointed out in my post of 16Dec24:
• The evidence is overwhelming that the Shroud is "the shroud of our Lord." So it is possible that there were real miracles of healing associated with that first undisputed exposition of the Shroud. • Neither Geoffroy I de Charny's widow, Jeanne de Vergy, nor the Lirey church, were wealthy after the c. 1355 exposition. Following her husband's 1356 death, Jeanne had to appeal to the young future king Charles V (r. 1364-80) for her infant son Geoffroy II (1352-98) to be granted the two houses in Paris that Charles' captured father, King John II (r. 1350-64) had promised Geoffroy I (c. 1306-56) ... • And the small wooden Lirey church fell into disrepair ... until it was replaced in stone over 170 years later in 1526 ... [which d'Arcis knew up to 1395, when he ceased being the Bishop of Troyes, because Lirey is only ~12 miles (~20 km) from Troyes[13Apr18].]. • Yet according to d'Arcis ... Jeanne de Vergy, and/or the Lirey church, would have been fabulously wealthy from all that "money" they allegedly had "cunningly ... wrung from" the "multitude"! • I could have added that "Simony ... the act of selling church offices and roles or sacred things" was a major crime in the Middle Ages and d'Arcis or his predecessor Henri de Poitiers (r. 1354–70), would have prosecuted Jeanne de Vergy and/or the Lirey church canons if they had made a lot of money from exhibiting the Shroud. • This is ... evidence that d'Arcis was not simply mistaken, but was actually lying in his memorandum!
The linen cloth, which many believe was used to wrap the crucified body of Jesus, is called into question in this new document, which is described as the first-ever written, ‘official’ and highly respected rejection of the Shroud presented to-date. [It is laughable that Sarzeaud thinks that the overwhelming evidence that the Shroud is Jesus' burial sheet could be "called into question" by a mere footnote (see above), by Oreseme, a 14th century philosopher, who had never seen the Shroud (see above), and who in his footnote did not dispute that the Shroud exhibited at the church in Champagne was the Shroud of the Lord Jesus Christ (see above). And it is not a "document" but a footnote (see above)! And while it is "the first-ever written ... rejection of the Shroud" by a named Shroud sceptic that has survived, it is hardly "‘official’ and highly respected," since, as Sarzeaud says in in this media release (see future below), it was only recently discovered by "historians Alain Boureau [1946-] and Béatrice Delaurenti [1972-]."
Also, in 1978, ~47 years ago, Ian Wilson (1941-) published an English translation of the 1389 Memorandum of Bishop Pierre d'Arcis, in which d'Arcis stated:
"For many theologians and other wise persons declared that this could not be the real shroud of our Lord having the Saviour's likeness thus imprinted upon it, since the holy Gospel made no mention of any such imprint, while, if it had been true, it was quite unlikely that the holy Evangelists would have omitted to record it, or that the fact should have remained hidden until the present time"[WI78, 230].So there were many Shroud sceptics in d'Arcis' and Oresme's day. That is understandable because it was not until Secondo Pia (1855-1941) photographed the Shroud in 1898[05Jun21], more than 500 years after Oresme's footnote, and discovered that the Shroudman's image was a photographic negative (see above)[22Dec16; 05Jun21], that scientists and the general public began to take the Shroud seriously as possibly Jesus' burial sheet.]
The statement was written by Norman theologian Nicole Oresme, who later became the Bishop of Lisieux in France. [Oresme was not a "theologian." Wikipedia says he was "a French philosopher of the later Middle Ages ... [who] wrote influential works on economics, mathematics, physics, astrology, astronomy, philosophy, and theology"[ONW]. Nicolas Sarzeaud (1992-) boosts Oresme, such that it is more about what Sarzeaud thinks about the Shroud than what Oresme thought about it! It reminds me of the joke about the lawyer's courtroom note which said, "argument weak here - shout"!]
His opinion is particularly useful, according to the researchers, because he was well known for working to provide rational explanations for unexplained phenomena (rather than interpreting them as divine or demonic), and he was not personally involved in the dispute – so had no interest in supporting his own position. [See above that Oresme did not express an opinion on the Shroud. And if he had, it would have been worthless, since, as we saw above, Orasme had never seen the Shroud. And as for it being "useful ... to provide rational explanations for unexplained phenomena (rather than interpreting them as divine ...)," that would only be true, in the case of the Shroud, if Naturalism, the philosophy that nature is all there is, there is no supernatural, including God, were true. But the Shroud is scientific evidence that Jesus was raised supernaturally from death by the power of God (1Cor 6:14; Col 2:12) (see 03Aug24), and therefore that Naturalism is not true!]
[...]
Was Jesus’ crucified body wrapped in the Shroud of Turin? A newly discovered Medieval document is the earliest written evidence to suggest not.[Again, see above that it was not a "document" but a mere footnote. And in that footnote, Oresme, who had never seen the Shroud (see above). does not dispute that the Shroud exhibited at "the church in Champagne" was "the Shroud of the Lord Jesus Christ." (see above).]
To be continued in the fifth instalment of this post.
Notes:
1. This post is copyright. I grant permission to extract or quote from any part of it (but not the whole post), provided the extract or quote includes a reference citing my name, its title, its date, and a hyperlink back to this page. [return]
Bibliography
ONW. "Nicole Oresme," Wikipedia, 8 October 2025.
PA25. Piana, A., 2025, "Shroud, A Rumor in a Medieval Document Peddled as Proof," UCCR, 29 Aug 2025.
RTB. Reference(s) to be provided.
STW. "Shroud of Turin," Wikipedia, 8 October 2025.
WI78. Wilson, I., 1978, "The Turin Shroud," Book Club Associates: London.
WI79. Wilson, I., 1979, "The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?," [1978], Image Books: New York NY, Revised edition.
Posted 10 October 2025. Updated 14 October 2025.