The Ark and the Shroud
Gen. 11:2 says that the people of the world moved
"from the east" to the
The word Ararat, comes from a Hebrew word, meaning 'creation' or
'holy land'. It is a very general description, and not the name of a specific
mountain peak. The 16th cent. translators had a problem with the word, and
picked Ararat as a likely equivalent.
The danger of relics.
The actual location of the ark is not described in Scripture, possibly
because it could have become a relic-hunter's
Jude 9 also describes an event which we are not fully informed about,
when Michael the archangel disputed with the devil over the body of Moses. Why?
Perhaps because the devil was interested in starting up relic-worship?
If, as the Bible says, the people moved "from the east" to the
land of Shinar, they must have been in the west when they started, which puts
them in modem-day Persia, where there are many suitable peaks: Ke Danar 14640
ft., Kuh-e Bul 12011 ft.., Shahr-e-Babak 6086 ft., Kuh 13352 ft.., and many
others. (Readers Digest Great World Atlas)
There have been many claims
that the ark has been sighted on present-day Ararat, but all of them have been
unconvincing in some way. For example, a Seventh-Day Adventist TV program made
many credible-sounding claims, and produced several witnesses, but one of them
admitted later that he had picked up the alleged ark wood from his garage. All
the other so-called evidence was open to question, ambiguous, or relied on a
single person's testimony. Photographs purporting to be of the ark were hazy
and ambiguous too.
A Mr. Plimer recently made many bold claims that he had discovered the
remains of the ark, but his findings are just an unusual land formation. His
site, which forms a lens-shaped, or canoe-shaped form, does not fit the Bible
description anyway, because the ark of the Bible had length, height and width.
It was square ended, like a barge. It had no need for a pointed prow because it
was not powered, and had no need to cut through the water like a jet boat.
A similar case of making a tiny amount of ‘evidence’ go a long way is
seen in the 'Shroud of Turin'. Many claims have been made that this strip of
cloth was the very sheet in which Jesus was wrapped. Tests have shown that a
man's body has been inside the cloth. Bloodstains in certain places have led
people to infer that the man was crucified. The cloth was laid along the body
as a single strip, beginning at the head, down to the feet, under and back to
the head. However, the Bible describes the burial clothes as having been
"wrapped" Gr. = entulisso = to roll in. This means that the body of
Jesus was wound up, like a corkscrew shape, or spiral, and not as a single straight
strip each way. He same word is used in Luke 23:53, and John 20:7. When the
disciples came to the tomb, they saw the grave clothes intact, like a cocoon,
and the "handkerchief" or face cloth, "that had been around his
head, not lying with the linen cloths, but folded together in a place by
itself." The Shroud is a single strip, laid flat along both sides of the
body. The actual burial clothes for Jesus were wound, like a cork-screw along
the length of his body, with a separate sheet for his head. Once again, the Bible
gives the true and accurate picture.
Many illustrated Bibles, and movies, show a rumpled mess of gravecloths,
as if Jesus had to struggle to free himself. The Bible tells the truth. The
gravecloths were not strewn about. They were basically where they had been
wrapped, and Jesus had risen through them, leaving them largely undisturbed.
It is always better to accept what the Bible says that what people
assume or imagine.