The DaVinci Code – Part 5

The DaVinci Code is for you if you like a good murder mystery full of conspiracy theories and intrigue. It comes replete with hidden treasures, secret societies, and covert love. If you are spiritually inclined the fact all of this has Scripture as its backdrop may appeal.

The book having been on the best seller list for some time is now to be released as a movie. To help persons understand its basis this is part one of two parts on the subject.

If you like fiction “The DaVinci Code” is a thriller you will enjoy. If you are expecting history forget it.

If you are offended by distorted truth, misrepresentation, a refutation of history, and a mockery of Biblical fact don’t go to the movie or read the book.

The thesis of the book is fatally flawed. In summary it proves itself to be a compilation of lies. Basic to this is the deity of Christ.

Another source of the author’s materials from Gnostic sources. The Gnostics were heretics who infiltrated Christianity around 150 AD. Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, wrote of them around 180 AD: “…everyone of them generates something new, day by day, according to his ability; for no one is deemed ‘perfect’ who does not develop some mighty fiction.”

Dan Brown, author of the book on which the movie is based draws heavily form Gnostic writings. Nevertheless, he says of his work, “All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.” NOT!

In reality numerous falsehoods have a superstructure of twenty primary groups of lies. Consider the basis of a few.

#1. Constantine had the New Testament revised to represent Jesus as being “godlike.”
Long before Constantine became Emperor of Rome (306 AD) Christians readily acknowledged Christ as divine. Brown alleges a vote taken at the Council of Nicea (325 AD) was the first declaration that Jesus was divine.

In New Testament texts written nearly 275 years earlier His divinity was asserted. He was said to be our “Great God and Savior” (Titus 2:13), “the eternal blessed God” (Romans 9:5), and that in Him dwelt “all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9). He was described as “God manifest in flesh” (I Timothy 3:16). Ministers were exhorted to “shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood” (Acts 20:28). When did God shed blood? In the person of Christ on the cross. He is spoken of as “Christ, who is the image of God” (II Cor. 4:4).

Numerous secular records predating the Council of Nicea attest to the belief in Christ’s deity. An example is the writing of Ignatius around 100 A.D. in which he makes reference to “Christ the God.” Justin Martyr referred to Him as “God” in 150 A.D., Clement of Alexandria wrote of Him as being the “most manifest Deity” in 200 A.D., and Irenaeus called Him “Lord and God” in 185 A.D.

#2. By a “relatively close vote” at the Council of Nicea Jesus was declared to be God.
Out of an assembly of over 300 attending the Council only two refused to sign a statement representing Jesus as “true God from true God.” The purpose was not to propose a new concept but to support the long held belief in Christ’s deity in opposition to a then current teaching by a North African elder, Arius, who sought to humanize Christ as a created being.

#3. Jesus was “a mortal prophet, a great and powerful man, but a man nevertheless.”
In the era of the New Testament the challenge was not to establish a belief in Christ’s deity but His humanity. A sect known as Gnostics taught God could not become human. I John 4:1-6 was penned in opposition to this fallacy.

#4. Jesus married Mary Magdalene.
In “The DaVinci Code” Mary Magdalene is said to have become the bride of Christ and His choice to head His movement. Peter and other male followers of Christ were envious and brought pressure to bear on her. She escaped and moved to France where she gave birth to the Child of Jesus. Through the bloodline of this child the Merovingians were allegedly started. Historically the Merovingians sprang not from Mary but King Merovech who ruled from 447 to 557 A.D.

Mary and her followers reputedly founded Paris. Historically Paris was founded by Gauls of the Parissi tribe as a fishing village on the Ile de la Cite in the Seine River. It was originally called Lutetia.

“The DaVinci Code” represents King Dagobert II as marrying Giselle de Razes. They are reputed to have started the Priory of Sion in the Middle Ages to protect the true documents verifying the misrepresentation of Mary supposedly advocated by the church. Brown accepts those bogus documents as true and the Bible as false.

Razes in reality was not a historical character but a mythical figure created by a French charlatan, Pierre Plantard, in 1960. In an attempt to establish his lie Plantard places false documents in libraries throughout Europe to prove the group had a distinguished past including such notables as Victor Hugo, Isaac Newton and Leonardo DaVinci. These spurious works by Plantard, verified to be forgeries, form the basis of much of Brown’s thesis. It is these and other untruths that Brown declares are true (p.1).

To bolster his claim the author included a list of notable “historians” (p, 253) who “have chronicled in exhaustive detail” the bloodline of Christ. In reality not one of those listed is a historian. There is no creditable source from the period who advocated this baseless theory. “The Gospel of Mary Magdalene” is the source for this concept.

The style and content of this spurious gospel indicates it was written around 160-200 AD, long after the death of Mary even though it is ascribed to her. “The Gospel of Philip” refers to Mary as Christ’s “companion.” Brown wrote, “As any Aramaic scholar will tell you, the word companion, in those days, literally meant spouse.” The only extant copy of “The Gospel of Philip” was written in Coptic not Aramaic.

It is believed by scholars that “The Gospel of Philip” was originally written in Greek. There is no indication there ever was an Aramaic version of the bogus book. The Greek word translated “companion” (koinonos) occurs ten times in the New Testament and in neither case does it refer to marriage or a sexual relationship.

#5. The Holy Grail is a veiled reference to Mary Magdalene.
There is no reference to the “Holy Grail” in the Bible. The term first appeared in a novel by Chrestien de Troyes written around 1100 AD, entitled “Perceval.” It was first used to speak of the cup from which Christ drank and later tradition said it held Christ’s blood.

A work by the Frenchman Pierre Plantard in the 1960s and 1970’s released documents he said traced the royal bloodline from Jesus and Mary Magdalene through the kings of France to, of all people, himself. This theory of a secret society was popularized in 1982 in a book entitle “Holy Blood, Holy Grail.” Brown draws heavily from this work and its sources. Under oath in 1993, Plantard admitted his claims were unfounded and untrue.

#6. Leonardo DaVinci was aware of the secret society and the Holy Grail, therefore, he painted Mary Magdalene in his masterpiece, “The Last Supper.”
It was a signature of DaVinci that he painted many males with feminine features as in his work “St. John the Baptist,” now in the Louvre. DaVinci’s “Last Super” was painted on the Refectory wall of a convent in Milan between 1495 and 1497. His water based tempera began to erode almost immediately.

By 1726 when the first restoration was attempted it had eroded so badly the painting was barely recognizable. What DaVinci painted originally is only approximated today. What is now seen is a restoration of other restorations. The novel and movie entitled “The DaVinci Code” are fiction studded with enough truth to be confusing. Poison even in the most refreshing beverage is still poison. Bottom line. It is fiction.

Though the book is an attempt to discredit Christianity it is in general an intrinsic assault on truth comprehensively. Current facts (the glass panes in the pyramid at the Louvre number 673 not 666 as the book states) and history (the Olympic games were held on a four year cycle to honor Zeus not an eight year cycle to honor Venus) are distorted throughout to support the feigned thesis of the book. Brown says in his book, “Almost everything our fathers taught us about Christ is false” (p.235). The fact is it is his book that is false.

In one review “The DaVinci Code” is said to promote “the gleeful heretical notion that the entirety of Judeo-Christian culture is founded on a misogynist (woman-hating) lie. It is Brown’s work that is a cornucopia of lies, a classic canard. A cogent consideration of the facts leads to the conclusion the book is a delusive Christological counterfeit.