The Da Vinci Code, a novel by Dan Brown, has generated a huge amount of interest from the reading public. About 40 million copies have been sold worldwide, and the movie was released on May 19.
Why so much fuss about a novel? The story begins with the murder of the Louvre’s curator. But this curator isn’t just interested in art; he’s also the Grand Master of a secret society called the Priory of Sion. The Priory guards a secret that, if revealed, would discredit Biblical Christianity. Before dying, the curator attempts to pass on the secret to his granddaughter Sophie, a cryptographer, and Harvard professor Robert Langdon, by leaving a number of clues he hopes will guide them to the truth.
So what’s the secret? The location and identity of the Holy Grail. Un Brown’s novel, however, the Grail is not the cup allegedly used by Christ at the Last Supper. It’s rather Mary Magdalene, the wife of Jesus, who carried on the royal bloodline of Christ by giving birth to his child! The Priory guards the secret location of Mary’s tomb and serves to protect the bloodline of Jesus that has continued to this day!
In addition, Brown’s book alleges that:
(a) After Jesus’ crucifixion, Mary Magdalene was secretly spirited out of Jerusalem, and took their daughter to the south of France, where they became the progenitors of the Merovingian kings;
(b)The Catholic church has harshly suppressed this truth because they felt it would endanger their power by proving that Jesus was “merely” human;
(c) A secret organization called the Priory of Sion, aided by the Knights Templar, guarded the truth about Mary Magdalene as well as the evidence to prove her status; and
(d)The church — abetted by its clandestine arm, the secretive society called “Opus Dei” — systematically suppressed what is called “the divine feminine” by its teaching that sexual intercourse is somehow sinful in itself, that a woman was the source of “original sin”, and that women are quite often tools of the “devil”, and even witches!
The myths promoted by Brown are presented in quite an entertaining fashion: in a fast-paced murder mystery enlivened by puzzles, enigmas, misleading clues, and clever word games. (For example, the “Holy Grail”, or “San Greal”, by a different division of letters, becomes — presto! — “Sang Real”: “the royal bloodline”!)
Those who love anagrams will enjoy the book and the movie for that reason alone. But when all is said and done, and every riddle unraveled, the fact remains: there is little or no truth to it all. To paraphrase Shakespeare, it is a book (and a movie) “full of sound and fury” but ultimately “signifying nothing”.
Does anyone take these ideas seriously? Yes, apparently they do. This is partly due to the way the story is written. The fantasies are woven over, under, around, and through a few factual bits, and recited and taught by the most educated, erudite characters in the novel — especially a British royal historian and a Harvard professor of “religious symbology”. When Dan Brown puts these decidedly biased theories in the mouths of these characters, one comes away with the impression that they are actually true. But are they?
At first glance, Christadelphians may find at least two points that predispose them toward parts (though assuredly not all) of the Da Vinci Code “theory”:
(1)Firstly, Jesus certainly was human, and needed to be in order to overcome sin and become an effective sacrifice on behalf of all humanity. The irony here is that author Dan Brown seems to think a “divine” Jesus precludes his being “human” at all — and, furthermore, that a “human” Jesus could not be either Son of God or “God the Son”! Brown, like many others, assumes Catholicism is Christianity, and therein is his problem. But for us, a knowledge of true Christian teaching keeps us from such confusion.
(2)Secondly, we might be pleased to see anything that bashes the Catholic church, and the Da Vinci Code “theory” certainly does that.
Was Jesus married?
Of course, to assert Jesus was “human” is not the same as asserting he married and fathered a child. That he was capable of this there is no doubt, but then there is no Bible proof that he did so.
The novel and the movie rely on a non-canonical book, the Gospel of Philip, to “prove” Jesus was married. But even in this text such an interpretation is quite a stretch. The text in question reads, “The companion of the Saviour is Mary Magdalene. Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her… The rest of the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval. They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ ”
Commenting on this text, the novel’s British scholar states, “As any Aramaic scholar will tell you, the word companion, in those days, literally meant spouse.”
More to the point, however, the Greek word translated “companion” here is “koinonos” — related to the word for “fellowship” in the New Testament, and quite reasonably equivalent to “companion” or “friend”. Even if the Gospel of Philip had any weight in the discussion (which it doesn’t), it “proves” no more than that Mary was a friend or associate of Jesus, and we all know that anyway!
Of course it is also true, as the novel and movie both point out, that most Jewish men were married. But, as we know, the Bible nowhere condemns the unmarried or celibate state. The apostle Paul stresses how those who are unmarried (“as I am”: 1 Cor. 7:7) may more fully and readily give attention to serving God (1 Cor. 7:25-38; Matt. 19:12). Considering the work he was sent to do, who more than Jesus might understand it was expedient to forego the comforts of married life and a family? He would have renounced marriage so as to devote himself to his unique mission. He would have known, from a very early age, that his mortal life would not be conducive to the married state. To leave behind a young widow would not be a kind thing to do. Moreover, to leave behind natural descendants would quite easily undermine the Bible teaching of the spiritual “marriage” of Christ and the ecclesia: THAT is the true marriage of Jesus, which features in the Bible — very prominently.
Was Jesus “human”?
Of course he was! For those who know the truth of the Bible, this proposition scarcely needs stating, much less proving. It is only a misguided, apostate “Christianity” that would teach otherwise (1 John 4:2). Those who know the truth know that Jesus being the Son of God did not rule out his being human; in fact, God’s plan of redemption required it. So it is no surprise, to us at least, that the early church believed in the essential humanity of their Savior, as well as his divine origin.
To those who know their church history, it is no surprise that a developing apostasy brutally undermined this scriptural teaching of the humanity of our Lord. This part, at least, Dan Brown got right…
The developing Roman Catholic apostasy
But this part of the story is told much better in other, more historical and much less speculative, works — such as:
(a) When Jesus Became God: the Struggle to Define Christianity during the Last Days of Rome, by Richard E. Rubenstein, and
(b)The Doctrine of the Trinity: Christianity’s Self-Inflicted Wound, by Anthony Buzzard and Charles Hunting.
What Dan Brown touches upon quite briefly and incompletely, the other writers develop much more fully. They explain how, after almost 300 years of persecution, Christianity made an astounding breakthrough in 324, when Constantine the Great became the emperor of Rome. But the “victory” for Christianity, over pagan Rome, became the “defeat” of those Christians who clung to the Bible teaching of a human Jesus, made “in the likeness (or identity) of man” (Rom. 8:3). The simple statement of the Apostles’ Creed — that Jesus was God’s only-begotten Son, born of the virgin Mary — gave way, at Nicea, to the official teaching that Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God, was — also, astoundingly! — “begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God… being of one substance with the Father”, and that he “came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man”, and other such atrocities.
Those among the fourth-century Church who denied these teachings — and there were many who did — were threatened, persecuted, and even killed, as a revitalized but paganized “majority” Church — enabled by the secular power of by the emperor — abandoned argument in favor of violence and bloodshed.
And, yes indeed, the concept of a human Jesus Christ began to slip out of the mainstream, as the recognized Church more and more abandoned the Bible, and aligned itself with the political powers. The virgin bride of Christ became no more than a prostitute! Those who came the closest to believing true Bible teaching on such matters were forced underground.
Conclusion
Is there any reason to fear The Da Vinci Code, either in written or projected form? Of course not. A little history, a lot of speculation, folded into a flashy, sensationalized, violent mystery — fast-moving, exciting, intellectually challenging… but finally erroneous, confused and confusing. The Da Vinci Code may shake the faith of some who are easily shaken, and some who don’t know their Bibles in the first place. It may raise questions with those who wrongly equate Christianity with the ancient Roman Catholic Church. And if it does, so much the better.
For the believers, when and if the book and movie are discussed, there ought to be opportunities to show others how true Bible teachings is in fact contrary to “church” teaching, and to show them also the sweet reasonableness of the teaching that Jesus, while truly Son of God, was also just as truly a man, “born of a woman, born under the Law… to redeem them that were under the law” (Gal. 4:4,5), and made in the identity of “sinful flesh” so as to condemn “sin in the flesh” (Rom. 8:3).
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