The Shroud

[Arpa]

I chose to post this under this subject topic rather than under History since as we will see it is a more of a fantasy and a figment of somebody's highly fertile imagination.

 

THE SHROUD

 

Everybody knows about the Shroud of Turin. How many know that as always, we are the first and that we hold the patent on the subject?

 

Yet another Hysterical History??

 

The following is from Mikael Chamich's History of Armenia. It is verbatim as a whole with slight amendments.

 

Introduction; (my comments in parantheses)

Reign of Abcar.

This prince was of muscular proportion, extremely tall, of gentle manners, and amiable disposition (Chamich has similar words for all, of our heroes). He was celebrated for his wisdom, and excelled all his eastern contemporaries in talents both natural and acquired. Many eulogiums have passed on Abcar by both Latin and Greek historians. His Armenian subjects gave him the surname of "Avag-ayr" that is; excellent in wisdom and estimable in manners". The Assyrian and Greek not being able to pronounce these words correctly, some called him Avagar, others varied it to Apacar, but the general term into which this prince's surname sunk is Abgar(there may be a method to this madness as often B converts to V and vis a versa as in Bahram/Vahram). The Assyrians designated him as Agbar (note the juxtaposition of G and B ), which signifies eminent and great. (is it "akbar" as in Allah-u-akbar"?) The author cites some other examples of corrupted names. Astvatsatur to Astoor, Mukhitar to Mukhik, Maryros to Mirto, Carapiet to Curpo, Valarsakert to Alashkert, Arkori, Akori, Manavazakert to Manazkert.

 

Fast forward...

 

In the second year of the reign Abgar, a decree was issued by the Emperor Augustus to tax all the kingdoms and states that acknowledged the Roman dominion, and also to erect statues of him in the religious temples of every nation. In the same year it pleaeed our Blessed Saviour, the uncreat image of the Eternal Father, to assume the form of man, and to be born of the Holy Virgin. About this period Herod, king of the Jews, puffed up with pride, sent statues of himself into various nations, with a command to place them intemples near to those of Augustus. Abgar refused to comply with the wishes of the haughty and van-glorious king, and thereby excisted his resentment. Herod sent his nephew Joseph with a mighty force into Armenia, but the invaders were couragiously met by Abgar and defeated; their leader was slain, with a great number of his troops. The survivors fled in terror. Soon after Herod died. (Yet another nonsense of Jewish-Armenian connection).

 

The emperor Augustus about this time began to view Abgar with an eye of suspicion, on account of some unfavourable allegations of his enemies at Rome.

 

Fast forward, fast forward.

(Abgar defies Rome relying on the Persians. He helps reinstate Artaces on the Persian throne.....)

 

After the settling of these affairs Abgar fell sick, being stricken with elephentiasis (I had heard it said to be leprosy/borot) and was obliged to return to Edessa in a haste. (Relations with Rome get even worse, icluding the new king of Judea Herod Antipas. In an attempt to repair the damage) Abgar dispatched two messengers , one being Ananey to meet and plead his case to the Roman general Marinus who was in Palestine.... (and now the shroud. I had herd many versions of this fable but never in such vivid detail) During this stay in Palestine his messengers witnessed many wonders and extraordinary powers of Christ in curing the sick . The messenges went to Jerusalem to meet Him. On witnsssing the miracles by our Lord, they were seized with wonder, and when they returnedto Armenia, they realted it to their master. Abgar became satisfied that this was the Son of God, and immediately sent his messengers back with a letter to Christ. ....beseeching him to cure him of this disease , and concluded inviting him to come to Armenia and reside with him saying; "I have heard that the Jews murmur against you, and seek to destroy you. I have a small butbeautiful city, which I offer you to partake with me. It is sufficient for both of us". He also sent a painter with them in casehe could draw a portait of Jesus which would be used as miraculous icon. (skip skip... The messengers not daring to approach Jesus in person, they seek the intevention of Philip, who in turn calls Andrew who takes them to Jesus). Jesus tetified much joy at the contents of Abgar's letter and directed Apostle Thomas to write a reply; "Whe I shall rst to my glory, I will send you one one of my disciples, who shall remove your pains...." It is related that as the painter was trying to take the fearures of our Lord, Christ took a handkerchief, and pressing it over his sacred face, miraculously impressed on it an admirable likeness of him and gave it to Ananey the courier.... Abgar on receiving the letter and portraitr worshipped the sacred semblance....

(And of course Abgar applied the portrait/shroud to his body and he was cured.)After the ascension of Christ, Thomas the Apostle, according to the desire of Jesus, sent Thaddeus.... He baptized Abgar.....

 

(And they lived happily therafter, for ever and ever, Hallelujew Amen!!

Edited September 17, 2004 by Arpa

[bellthecat]

This icon of Abgar's, which still survives, was the subject of investigation recently. Unfortunately I don't think I kept the news message (will have a look for it).

 

But they found that the frame of it was far older than the actual image of Christ, which only dated from the medieval period.

[bellthecat]

Found it!

 

 

GENOA HOSTS MYSTERIOUS MANDYLION PANEL

by Elisabetta Povoledo

 

ANSA English Media Service

June 14, 2004

 

Genoa

 

(ANSA) - Genoa, June 14 - More than a thousand years ago, in 945,

a triptych with the sacred image of Christ and the two panels that

served as doors to cover it were split up.

 

The central panel of the miraculous imprint of Christ s own face,

or Mandylion as the Byzantines called it, was taken from Edessa to

Constantinople and then on to Genoa, where it has been venerated for

more than 600 years in the church of San Bartolomeo degli Armeni. The

two doors ended up in the monastery of St. Catherine on Mount Sinai.

 

This year, panels and image have been reunited in the Ligurian capital

as the centerpiece of an intriguing exhibit that runs to July 18 at

the city s Diocesan Museum: "Mandylion, concerning the Holy Face,

from Byzantium to Genoa."

 

"It was my idea to write the mayor of Genoa about having the icon and

the panels meet," said Gerhard Wolf, director of the Kunsthistorisches

Institut in Florence, and the curator of the exhibit. The aim was

to stimulate new discussion about the icon, which has been virtually

ignored by scholarship save for a book written 30 years ago by Colette

Dufour Bozzo of the University of Genoa, who co-curated the show.

 

The bishop of the Egyptian monastery and his entourage will visit

the exhibit in July, and Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, of the Genoese

diocese, will return the courtesy call.

 

"We didn t just put objects together but persons, and it s right that

we worked to do this," Wolf said. "As art historians we can't change

the world, but we can contribute to more cross-cultural dialogue."

 

In keeping with the theme of the "voyage," which is the leitmotif

of the celebrations of Genoa as one of Europe s two capitals of

culture in 2004 (they other is Lille, France), the exhibit follows

the Mediterranean journey of the Mandylion from one Middle Eastern

capital to a Western one.

 

"In this sense the show is very topical because it touches on issues

like multicultural conflicts," said Wolf. It also underscores the

common roots of eastern and western Christianity.

 

In addition the show brazenly deconstructs, literally, one of the most

venerated icons in Christendom, separating the various elements of

the image (frame, fabrics, gold screen) to the delight of Byzantine

scholars who flocked to Genoa last month for a rare chance to see

the figure in a state of undress and probe its parts.

 

A three-day conference was held for the occasion bringing together

top-notch scholars who spoke on matters arcane and otherwise.

 

The Mandylion is an impression of the face of Christ. The story goes

that King Abgar of Edessa, who ruled the ancient titular archiepiscopal

see in what is now Sanli Urfa in South Turkey in the first decades

of the first millenium, was ill and sent a letter to Christ asking

him to come to the city.

 

Christ said he couldn t come but sent back a painted portrait that

Jesus miraculously created by washing His face and drying it with a

towel, on which the likeness appeared.

 

The icon, of which another copy is in the Vatican, is known as the

Mandylion by the Byzantine word used to describe this particular image.

 

It was venerated in Edessa - where it was a palladio, or protective

image, placed at the gates to the city - for centuries before it was

transferred to Constantinople in 944, where again it was adopted as a

protective image for the imperial city and placed in the royal chapel.

 

It came to Genoa in the late 14th century as a gift from the Byzantine

Emperor John V Palaeologus to the Captain Leonardo Montaldo, a crusader

who later became a Genoese Doge.

 

So the story of the Mandylion is closely tied to the contacts that

the crusaders had with Genoa.

 

Shortly before his death, Montaldo bequeathed the image to the

Monastery of St. Bartholomew of the Armenians, where it has been

housed and venerated since then. Until the recent show at the Museum,

and with the exception of the 2000 Jubilee, the relic had only been

shown to the public for eight days a year, in early June.

 

The two tempera doors that have been brought here from St. Catherine

s on Mount Sinai date from 945 and show King Abgar in the likeness of

Constantine VII Porphirogenitus, the emperor of Byzantium, receiving

the Mandylion. Dating and corresponding size make it a good bet that

the so-called Abgar Diptych may have originally been one with the

Mandylion, or so some scholars believe.

 

The story of the Mandylion and its voyage is illustrated in the small

gold relief panels on the frame that surrounds it. One image, showing

a wild-eyed demon being freed from a sailor s body in the presence

of the sacred icon traveling with a bishop, has been chosen for the

exhibit s logo.

 

Professor Mario Milazzo of the University of Milan carried out carbon

testing on the image. The results suggested that the image dates from

1250-1280. "We used to think it was very ancient, now there s some

doubt, clearly from the esthetic point of view it seems to have been

over painted," Wolf said. The wood frame was found to date to around

100 years later.

 

There s bound to be friction between faith and science, and the

church hasn t always enthusiastically embraced requests for scientific

testing on images or religious relics like the Turin shroud (which,

incidentally was believed to also have been in Edessa before it came

to Constantinople and then to France and Italy).

 

But Wolf said that the Barnabite Fathers who care for the icon had

been open-minded both about letting the image be tested, and then

letting it go on show in the Diocesan Museum.

 

"They were a little skeptical at first and were worried that the image

could be desecrated, but they came to understand that the exhibit

was more like a trip that offered space for reflection in which to

emerge oneself in the icon," said Wolf.

 

But the idea was not just to carry out scientific tests on the

icon. "It wasn t a question of determining what style it had been

painted in but rather to probe the theological, anthropological,

historical and politics aspects of the image," Wolf said, a task that

was amply carried out in the impressive catalogue by Skira.

 

Testing done on the cloth that was glued to the back of the icon in

1370-80, depicting a winged animal within two wheels, a reference

to the Imperial cosmology of kings, was found to date to the 10th

century when the silk industry was booming in Islam.

 

Scholars posit that this cloth may have come directly from Edessa. "We

joke that this is more authentic than the Mandylion," Wolf said during

a tour of the exhibit.

 

The exhibit also shows the precious objects found inside the case

with the Sacro Volto, like reliquaries from Byzantium and famous 11th

and 12thcentury illuminated manuscripts that illustrate the history

and legend of the image. Other works have iconographic ties with

the Mandylion.

 

The exhibit also includes a sculpted copy of the Mandylion that stood

atop of the city gates in the 16th century (there were nine gates

in all).

 

"By putting the face atop the gates, Genoa became the new Edessa,"

Wolf said.

[Arpa]

I should have searched before. There are numerous sites about Abgar. You can search using "abgar" as the keyword.

Below two sites of many.

Catholic Encyclopedia;

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01042c.htm

Assyrian;

http://cavemanart.com/osroene/

 

Mythbuster?

The following is from the Arm. Encycl. Bear in mind that it was written during cynical Soviet times.

Abgar: (Abgarios, Abgaros, Abgares). The name of all the kings of Osroene. The most famous of them is Abgar IX (179-214) who was the first to accept Christianity(207). The legend of his conversion is attributed to his scribe Labubna which was edited and embleshed at the end of the 4th c. To have Abgar IX's reign coincide with the life of Jesus and to render more authority to their religion Assyrian historians have moved the times back to the days of Abgar V who is supposed to have lived in the first century AD.

Sanatrukk, the king of Armenia has invaded Edessa during the reign of Abgar VI (71-91) conquering the kingdom and declaring himself King Of Edessa and probably assuming the Abgar name. This is where the assumption of the Armenian Abgar comes from, and the insistence that he has corresponded with Jesus. Based on this it is also assumed that Christianity was spread in Armenia during the first century.

 

You be the judge. Pay special attention to the Assyrian site above.

Edited September 17, 2004 by Arpa