In Revelation 13:13 it is said: “And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men.” The first beast can be identified as emperor Nero and Domitian as his reincarnation. The time is after Jesus’ crucifixion and before John of Patmos wrote the Revelation shortly before 96 AD. The second beast are the antichrists, who are explained by the New Testament not as one person but as those, who deny Christ and pretend to be Christ. That includes the priests of the temple and magicians like Simon Magus. But what is the fire from heaven?
There are many references to bright light in the New Testament: Paul saw a bright light, there was bright light when angels moved the stone from Jesus’ grave, and so on. Bright light appears also in Gnostic writings. Gnostic Christians believed that every human has an image and they had a bright light rite that in some way connected a person with his image.
I would otherwise discard the bright light as symbolism, but the Turin Shroud seems very much like a photo and such a photo implies that there was very bright light. I have some talent in drawing and can assure that the image in the Shroud cannot possibly be a work of human hand. It is too good. It looks faint and unimpressive, but the details are far too good to be a drawing or a painting. It is a photograph, but a photograph done without a lens: light comes straight through the cloth, reflects on the body and creates an image. Obviously such light must be very bright. It is also clear that the cloth must be soaked in some photoactive substance, which was not silver-based as no silver can be found. There are several photoactive plant resins and some of animal origin (like mussles). They are no good replacement for silver, as the image is very faint. But the image in the Shroud is faint. These organic substances evaporate in 2000 years and no sign can be found.
There is another curious historical fact: the Greek fire. It was said to burn under water. Let us simply notice that nothing from crude oil and sulphur does burn under water. In order to burn under water, you need some chemical that can rob oxygen from water molecules. Such chemicals are certain metals, like aluminium, magnesium and phosphor. Of these metals only magnesium was easy enough to make in Antique times. It is really not much more difficult to make than metallic iron. You need ferrosilicon. That is a result if you heat iron with quartz sand. You also need magnesium oxide. It is a naturally occuring stone e.g. in Greece. It is magnetic, so alchemists of all times were fashinated with it. Grinding ferrosilicate and magnesium oxide to powder, enclosing it in a clay container, heanting to 1000 Celsius and cooling fast in water produces metallic magnesium, a magical substance that burns in very hight temperature with very bright light, and it also burns under water. This, I think, was the Greek fire, the secret weapon of the Byzantine empire. Constantin the Great may have got it from Christians and as a payment made Christianity the state religion of Rome. The story of Constantin’s mother Helena may be simply a replay of the true story of Queen Helene of Adiabene, who probably did find the true cross being in Jerusalem only some ten years after Jesus was crucified. I do think Helene of Adiabene converted to Christianity. It seems from the legend that she first met people from Paul’s circles, and then came Jews of James the Just, who insisted on circumcision.
An assumption that magicians of the Near East could make metallic magnesium in the times of Antique does simplify issues. It is not a preposterous assumption, since all magic was highly guarded secret and we cannot expect to know much of it. Yet, we know that the Byzantine empire had the Greek fire, but the formula is still a secret. If we assume the bright light was magnesium, then the Turin Shroud is evidence of a ritual to raise Jesus to Heavens, the resurrection ritual. Naturally, it only worked symbolically. Someone else had to impersonate resurrected Jesus, most probably Thomas, the Twin (of Jesus).
I really home I am not offending somebody’s religious feelings. The historical truth is some times rather cruel. But one has to explain what Revelation 13:13 means. The fire from heaven in that text is nothing divine. It is a magic trick by an antichrist, like the high priest. It is in Roman times, so it is something quite real and something John of Patmos knew.