This is a particularly inventive piece of desperation, since it relies on saying the Shroud of Turin is genuine, while claiming the Resurrection was a hallucination:
“Theory: While Cambridge academic Thomas de Wesselow believes the shroud is real, he claims the image of Christ fooled the apostles into believing he had risen from the dead”
Mkay. Mr. de Wesselow explains:
‘Back then images had a psychological presence, they were seen as part of a separate plain of existence, as having a life of their own.’
Ah! “Back then”. You know, back when people were 2000 years dumber than today.
So when an negative image of the crucified Jesus miraculously appeared on a piece of cloth in which he had been buried, they mistook that image for the Risen Jesus. After that, apparently, the Mass Hysteria juggernaut took over and they just thought they had grabbed Jesus’ feet, talked with him on the Emmaus Road, seen him eat fish, not recognized him on three occasions, and poked their finger in his wounds.
Natural enough mistake. Happens all the time to 500 people and a Pharisee bent on persecuting Christians. Who *wouldn’t* think a piece of cloth is a living glorified Man God who can appear and disappear at will? I can’t even begin to count how many times mass hysteria has caused this in history (because the number of times is 0 and “mass hysteria” is only trotted out as the “explanation” for the resurrection–and by nutjobs who claim that no planes hit the WTC)
Me: I have this notion that if you are going to accept the authenticity of the Shroud (which I do) you should probably consider the possibility that the image is there BECAUSE JESUS ROSE FROM THE DEAD. Accepting that, you then have an explanation both for the Shroud and for the stories of eyewitnesses who could swear that they met Jesus, not a piece of cloth.
HT: Jon Sorenson.