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Couldjesus
HaveWorn Long Hair?
T
he image oo the shroud shows a figure
with long ftowing hair and a beard.
While acknowledging that the Romans wcre
clean-shaven-in tbe normal fashion of
the firstcentury-and that beard and long
hair were not characteristically Jewish
during New Testament times-sorne,
such as Ian Wilson in
The Turin Shroud,
have attempted to make a point for au–
theoticity of thc relic by claiming that
Julius Caesar
"most Jews had worn beards and long
hair since the time of Moses." And fur–
ther, referrlng toa fea ture ofthe shroud's
posterior image, "the victim's most Jew–
ish fea ture was a long streak of ha ir vis–
ible at the back of tbe head, falling
almost to the shoulder blades.... tbe un–
mistakable impression of an unbound
pigtail. One study hasshown lbat this was
one of the commonest fashions for thc
Jewish rnen in antiquity" (New York
Daily
News.
March 24, 1978).
What are the facts about long ha ir and
first-ccntury Jcws?
The facts are that no Jewish religious
leader who honored the Word which had
come from God would have worn long
hair. This Word included "the law and
descended to write him a prívate
letter. ...
"Of this , also, we have the evi–
dence, in a written answer, taken
from the public records of the city of
Edessa, then under the government
of the king .... "
The
PLAIN TRUTH December 1978
the prophets" which the Jew Jesus said
He bad "not come to abolish ... but lo
fulfil" (Matt. 5: 17). Specifically. note
Ezekiel 44:20: "They [priests] shall not
shave their heads or Jet their locks grow
long." l n Roman times the
Talmud
(
Ta'anith
17a) specified a priest's hair
was to be cut every 30 days, and
(Sanh.
22b) that its style was to be the "Julian,"
that is, the short hairstyle worn by Julius
Caesar (see photo).
Any Jew might have worn a beard.
Tbe Word nowhere condemns beards,
and in certain eras, at least, a beard was
considered an important sign of rnan–
hood
(n
Sam. 10:5).
The rebel, David's son Absalom, is
presented as an example of long-haired
men (11 Sam. 14:26; 18:9). Long hair
was pagan; the pagan gods were so
imagined. The ancient Assyrian kings
were long-haired. Israel was to be sepa–
rate from this way of the world.
But Nazarites- those who had a spe–
cial vow of consecration to God- had
long hair. Could Jesus, like Sarnson.
have been a Jife long Nazarite? Jf Jesus
had beco a Nazarite, He would have
appeared quite different from the aver–
age Jew. He would have stood out in a
crowd (but see Luke 4:30: John 8:59;
10:39). There would have been no need
for Him to have to be identified (Matt.
26:48: Mark 14:44).
Jesus characterized Himself as one
who drank wine (in great moderation,
of course). But in the chapter of Naza–
rite regulations, any use of wine or any
other product of the grape is prohibited
(Num. 6:3). So Jesus was not a Naza–
rite. (Do not be confused by His title of
"Nazarene,' ' which designated a man
who grew up
in
the city of Nazareth.)
"For a man to wear long hair," wrote
Paul, "is degrading to him"
(1
Cor.
11: 14). And Paul had "seen Jesus''
(1
Cor. 9:1: 15:8). Can we imagine Paul
regarded bis Lord as shameful or de–
graded? Of course not!
Could such a s tory possibly be
true? Eusebius apparently believed
the alleged archiva! documents he
copied were genuine. But few schol–
ars b elieve it today. Nor does the
New Testament give any such hin t.
Furthermore, "F. C. Burkitt in his
Early Eastern Christianity
(
1904)
showed a n anachronism in
The Doc–
trine
of
Addai
which makes it likely
that Christianity reached Edessa
only
after
150 ... "
(The
[BBC]
Lis–
tener,
May 11 , 1978, p. 617).
One must thus conclude that not
only tbe story of a letter from Jesus,
but also the story of the orígin of an
image of Christ , are mere manufac–
tured tales coin ed long after the be–
ginning of Christianity.
And whatever the date of
Edessa's first Christianity, the qual–
ity of its religion is dubious. At Ab–
gar IX's court in A.D. 180 was a
teacher called Bardesanes, a convert
later regarded
a~
a heretic because
he taught an astrological fatalism
rather than the gospel.
And there were other heretics.
Says Eusebius: "Under the same
reign. Bardesanes lived, who dwelt
in the land between the rivers,
where
heresies abounded .
.. "
(book IV,
chaptei XXX).
How Was Chrlst's
Body Really Wrapped?
The shroud theory demands that
Christ's body was covered ditfe rently
than was the custom in Jewish burial.
The usual fashion was for the body to
be wrapped cocoonwise in strips of
lineo cloth which were bound at
hands and feet.
A11
represeotations of
Christ's burial in the first four cen–
turies assumed this Egyptian-like
style. " The [Jewish] corpse was
wrapped in a shroud, and bandages
soaked with resin were wound around
the hands and feet: a cloth, the suda–
rium, was placed over the face (John
ll :44). Finally the tomb was shut"
(Bo Reicke,
The New Testament Era,
p.
187).
The account of the raising of La–
zarus illustrates the method. "The
dead man came out, his hands and
feet bound with bandages, and his
face wrapped with a cloth ." It would
appear that he was so enclosed and
tied asto bescarcely able to walk untiJ
" Jesus said to them, 'Unbind him, and
Jet him go' " (John 11 :44). Shroud of
Turin theorists postulare that Joseph
ofAri mathea, not having time to bury
Christ's body properly. simply cov–
ered it. leaving the body lying amidst
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