Hello, I have just returned from a visit to Rome which contained a guided tour of the early Christian catacombs followed by the first Christian church, St John Lateran. The original Senator doors, installed on the front of the church, are worth seeing for sure! Across the street is another church with the stairs that Jesus climbed:
“According to an ancient Christian tradition, the mother of Constantine, had the stairs transported from Pontius Pilate’s palace in Jerusalem to Rome.”
** you do not have permission to see this link **
They even claim to have drops of Jesus blood on them, which they have covered in glass. Clearly, the blood of some random preacher was not preserved 300+ years on Pontius Pilate’s stairs, and it is an amazing act of faith that people would even consider that. However, I am interested if Bart has commented on the validity of the stairs themselves. Does anybody know the authenticity among scholars of these stairs?
Thanks, Wilson Callan
I’ve never taken the authenticity of scala santa very seriously.
On the one hand, it does seem possible that Helena might have been able to identify the praetorium three hundred years later.
On the other hand, everything about Helena’s relic hunting in the holy land seriously raises my suspicions–like, really? You dug up the true cross which had been forgotten for centuries? Somebody just randomly squirreled a used cross away somewhere, and you not only stumbled on it but were able to identify it?
If there is something definitive one way or other, it would be fun to find out, but I’m not aware of it.
Somewhat tangentially, I found this fun MA thesis that discusses the archeology of the via dolorosa: ** you do not have permission to see this link **
Chapter 1 deals with locating the praetorium. I found it quite interesting, including some nice maps and on-site photographs of the ruins.
Favoring psychobabble a bit as I do, I think the need for relics is more interesting and important than the relics themselves. It shows does it not that even the deepest faith requires some contact with the physical world. A good example is the infamous Shroud of Turin. Like UFOs interest in the subject had begun to fade somewhat but the YouTube has brought it roaring back into popular consciousness. Like the poor we will now have it with us always.
The Shroud really came into my consciousness way back in 1984 when I went with my family to the World’s Fair in New Orleans. The big news of the event was the presence of the Chinese Pavilion but other than the purchase of a small ivory image of Kwan Yin I still possess I really don’t remember much about it. One of the Space Shuttles was parked there. Pretty cool. Absolutely the highlight of the experience however was going into the Vatican Pavilion. It was stuffed full of priceless artifacts and art treasures. Rodin’s John the Baptist greeted you at the entrance. Caravaggio’s ** you do not have permission to see this link **
was astounding. Afterwards my Aunt Lucille dismissed the entire exhibition because “none of it is in the Bible”. She said it so matter of factly that it still makes me laugh.
Apparently there had been talk of shipping the actual Shroud to the pavilion! But at the last minute somebody chickened out and what was there was a full-scale reproduction surrounded by extensive high-definition (for 1984) photography of the Shroud. The presentation itself was coy. Maybe it is – maybe it isn’t. The ultimate importance of faith.
The Church has always been just a bit queasy about the Shroud. It’s not hard to see why. It was denounced as a fake almost from its first mention in the 14th century. Modern scientific tests show it is from the Middle Ages. But that’s beside the point. It’s something you can see and feel. Words are not enough.
It was denounced as a fake almost from its first mention in the 14th century
Literally, the first mention (if I’m not mistaken) was a letter from the local bishop to the pope saying not only that it was a fake, produced to profit off the gullible, but that the forger had been found and had confessed not only that but how he produced it. Unfortunately, the bishop didn’t describe the process in the letter. Notably the pope, letter notwithstanding, determined to continue to allow its veneration.
The thing I find interesting is how people can see what they want. Believers will go on about the remarkable, even superhumanly perfect, anatomical accuracy of the depiction–yet anyone can confirm that it isn’t anatomically accurate (lay flat and hold your arms in the position depicted, then see if your hands cover your pudenda. Unless you have the arms of an orangutan or unless you lift your shoulders up, they wont.) People will repeat as fact whatever they hear that reinforces what they want to believe–and not just in religious affairs. Once someone makes a factual claim that supports what people want to be true, others will repeat it even if it is manifestly false.
One more observation: I find it interesting that those who defend the authenticity of the shroud (thus dismissing out of hand the investigation and testimony of the local ordinary at the time) tend to be the same crowd that will defend the authenticity of the more legendary elements of the lives of the saints on the basis that the Christians of the past knew better what happened in the past and were unlikely to lie, so we should tend to receive the stories they handed down.
It shows does it not that even the deepest faith requires some contact with the physical world.
I think it is something natural to us as embodied minds. We don’t just want to learn information about things, we want to touch them. Believing that Jesus died for you and now hears your prayers isn’t the same as standing on the very steps he stood on as he was condemned (even if they are relocated and covered over).
Or again, think of someone who lost a loved one and can’t let go of the personal effects–relics–of the person. Or think of going to a museum and viewing artifacts from some famous historical event–it isn’t just that the thing gives us information about the event and the experience of those who lived through it. If you know that what you are looking at is just a perfect replica, you won’t get the experience. It is that this, before me now, is the very thing that those people saw and handled. Somehow it makes us feel a physical connection to that event.
I remember going to Gettysburg and being told–that tree there was alive during the battle. The tree doesn’t tell me anything very much about the experience of the people at the time. It obviously looks very different now than it did then. But being in physical proximity to a thing that literally lived through the battle was somehow touching.
I think that explains the importance of Apostolic witness for the early church. It may be better to “believe without seeing” but all the writings had to be traced back to an authoritative source to be accepted. As Prof Ehrman points out, the Book of Revelation got included in the New Testament mostly because enough people thought the writer was the Apostle John.
The thing that really kills the Shroud of Turin for me is that the image of Jesus looks just how a Medieval artist would imagine he looked. He’s too tall! And he’s too European. If a Jesus movie from the 20thn century is discovered 2000 years from now and in it, he looks like Max von Sydow, then they’ll know they missed it.
BDEhrman
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