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The DaVinci Code

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Dan Brown’s The DaVinci Code has become an international best-selling novel and been produced into a successful movie directed by Ron Howard.  I found to the book to be a very suspenseful, action packed work of fiction.

However, the author did not present his book at work of history.  The author tells the audience right at the beginning of the book that “All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.”  Unfortunately, many people who have read the book or seen the movie believe this historical events depicted to be true. 

I will briefly summarize some of Mr. Brown’s historical embellishments with the known facts. The reference section of the web site will refer you to more detailed analysis if you care to delve further into the subject.

The Facts of History according to The DaVinci Code

In the novel, Dan Brown claims that almost everything we know of Jesus Christ is false, that during his lifetime, Jesus never claimed to be the Son of God, that he was married to Mary Magdalene, had a child by her, and wanted her to lead the church after his death.  Her authority was overthrown by Peter and other apostles in an coup.  They proclaimed her to be a prostitute and they filled the first Gospels of the New Testament with lies, making a masculine grab of power to control the church.  According to the story the early church did everything possible to prevent the intended role of women in the church from ever being known.  Then in the Third Century, the Roman Emperor Constantine is suppose to have been responsible for turning Jesus into God for his own political gains during the Council of Nicea.  The Knights Templar was an military/religious organization that knew the secrets of Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and the early church and were charged with protecting the secret knowledge.  After nearly all the Knights were killed, a secret organization called the Priory of Scion was founded by Jesus descendants in 1099.  Many famous people are supposed to have been members of the Priory of Scion including Sir Isaac Newton and Leonardo DaVinci.  Some of DaVinci’s most famous paintings are suppose to have clues for the Priory in them.

Priory of Scion

A lot of the story line is based on the book Holy Blood, Holy Grail.  Pierre Plantard supplied the authors with supposedly uncovered secret historical documents found at the National French Library.   As it turned out, the documents were forged by Plantard and he was convicted and spent jail time for fraud in 1953.  The Priory of Scion was not founded in 1099, but instead in 1956 by Plantard and a group of his friends.  Obviously DaVinci and Sir Isaac Newton could not have been members of the Priory.  For the next two decades, the priory membership created documents showing the entire bloodline of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, which includes French royalty and of course Mr. Plantard himself!  In 1993 Mr. Plantard admitted under oath that the made the entire story up. 

Roman Emperor Constantine character assignation
Brown story states the Roman Emperor Constantine pagan who only converted to Christianity in the final days of his life and was responsible for deciding which books went in to the New Testament.  Constantine is supposedly personally responsible for deifying Jesus.   The book claims that there were over 80 competing gospels and Constantine did away with the ones related that suggested Jesus was just a man.

To tackle the most obvious falsehood first, all the early church history records clearly state the Jesus was worshiped as Divine.  The twenty-seven books which make up the New Testament  had been received by the early churches and were firmly established by the end of the first century, over 170 years before Constantine was born, so he had nothing to do with deciding which books made up the New Testament. 

[[[Please refer to the upcoming section on the New Testament History was founded.]]]

Council of Nicea

Constantine did call for the The Counsel of Nicea to determine how to understand Jesus divinity.  The meeting was called not to determine if Jesus was divine, but how was he divine.  Arius, a leading teacher of that time period argued that Jesus was first created by God, that he was Divine because he was created by God, but that there was a time period when Jesus did not exist.  The council took up the issue of whether he was created or co-eternal with God the Father.  They decided that Jesus was in fact co-eternal and not a creation of God.  Dan Brown story indicated this was a close vote but only two out of 250 to 300 delegates voted against Jesus being co-eternal.

Calling Constantine a pagan who only converted to Christianity on his death-bed simply ignores all the known history we have on the Emperor.  Constantine announced the Edict of Milan in 313 which gave toleration for the Christian faith. It did not make Christianity the Religion of Rom as stated in the movie but it did stop the persecution of Christians for their beliefs.  Constantine built Christian churches all over the region including the Church of the Nativity (Bethlehem) and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (Jerusalem).  He reimbursed the church for damages done through persecution.  He died in 326.

Jesus supposed marriage to Mary Magdalene

The character Robert Langdon states that it would have been highly unusual for a Jewish man not be married because they were always married.  This statement is simply false.  There were many Jewish men from the first century who did not marry and remained celibate.  This includes the community of Jewish men that wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls that were founded in Judea in 1947.  This entire community of men was single and celibate. 

Paul the Apostle indicated in 1 Corinthians that he was single and celibate.  When he taught on the subject of marriage he defended his right to have a wife in 1 Corinthians 9:5 as did Peter and the other apostles as well as Jesus brothers.  The fact the Paul did not mention anything of Jesus being married as the prime example to support his argument clearly indicated that Jesus was not married.

There is not one shred of evidence to be found from the ancient times to indicate that Jesus was ever married including the Gnostic gospels of the 2nd and 3rd centuries. 

Dead Sea Scrolls / Nag Hammadi Codex

Brown’s book contends that there has been a cover-up regarding Dead Sea Scrolls and that many of the lost gospels of Jesus were in the Dead Sea Scrolls.  That is totally false.  There is no mention of Jesus whatsoever in any of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 

The scrolls are important and show what life for Jewish men was like in the first century.  The group of men who wrote the scrolls had an apocalyptic worldview, must like Jesus viewpoints as taught in The Gospels.

The Nag Hammadi Codex is also mentioned in the book.  These documents were found in Egypt or year or so before the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered.  The documents are Christian Gnostic documents.  They were written in the 2nd and 3rd centuries by unknown authors who would not have ever met or heard Jesus directly.

[[[Please refer to upcoming sections on New Testament History and the Christian Gnostic movement for more details.]]]

DaVinci’s Last Supper – John or Mary Magedeline

The book claims that the DaVinci masterpiece “shouts at the viewer that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were a pair.”  But this isn’t the case.  John was the youngest of the apostles and was usually drawn as slightly feminine looking.  John is found no where else in the picture.  The final nail in the coffin for this argument is that Leonardo DaVinci’s own notes and early sketches still exist and state that the figure in question is John the apostle. 

The Gospel of Mary Magdalene  / The Gospel of Phillip

The story line uses the Gnostic novels of Phillip and Mary Magdeline erroneously in its plot analysis.  It should be first noted that these stories were written in the late 2nd or early 3rd century and do not have any historical credibility.  Even these stories which Brown depends have no mention mention of Jesus every being married.  Generally Gnostic writings saw sexual activity as something vile and inherently evil.  They would have been repulsed at the marriage. 

The Gospel of Mary is also inaccurately represented in the story.  No where in that book does it say Jesus entrusted the church to Mary.  Instead, Mary is given a revelation after Jesus’s resurrection Then the disciples debate about whether Jesus would have done given this message to a woman. 

In the story, when Sir Leigh Teabing is trying to convince Sophie Neveu that Jesus and Mary were married, he claims that in the Gospel of Phillip the term used the word “companion” to describe Mary Magdeline relationship to Jesus really means “spouse”  in Aramaic.   However, the Gospel of Phillip is not written in Aramaic, but in Coptic, and the word at the center of the translation argument means “companion”.    He further goes on to state that the book says Jesus frequently kisses her on the lips.  However, there is a whole in the original manuscript and no-one knows what it is suppose to have said.

There are many other historical errors ranging from comical to absurd in novel. See the reference section for references additional resources.

Final Analysis

Unfortunately many people believe whatever the see in a movie or read. It has long been considered ok for fiction writers to write there story against historical backdrops. Authors are free to do whatever they choose with their fictional characters; however, it has been considered taboo to falsely change the known history to meet the storys ends.

Dan Brown has taken this step and unfortunately many people will beleive him.

One good point that may come of all this is that it is actually bringing a new study of the early history of the chuch into the public's eye. Hopefully this will give rise to stronger belief in those who study the scripture and its history. As Jesus said in Matthew 7:7-8 "Ask and it will be given to you; knock and the door will be opend to you. For everyone who ask receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."

I pray you will seek the truth.---- and find it.