Tuesday, April 27, 2004
Rebutting Da Vinci's code
I am not much of a fan of pulp fiction, not since the days of consuming Jeffrey Archer in my childhood anyway. That said, I did think Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code was a very interesting read. Perhaps it was the esoteric details on the history of Christianity (especially the part that seems to have been suppressed down the ages) that grabbed my attention. The book also happened to sell fantastically well. Perhaps a little too well. So much so that it has forced various fidei defensors to rise to the defence of traditional christianity. In the wake of rumours that Ron Howard may be planning a movie version of the book, the Church seems to have decided that a full-scale rebuttal of the book is necessary, according to this New York Times story.
Though for many readers the notions about Christian history in "The Da Vinci Code" seem new and startling, the novel introduces to a popular audience some of the debates that have gripped scholars of early Christian history for decades. The academic chatter grew louder after the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the 1950's and of ancient texts in Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in 1945. Among the findings were early Christian scriptures and fragments not included in the New Testament, including writings that scholars have come to call the "Gospels" of Mary, Peter, Philip, Thomas and Q.
"The Da Vinci Code" floats the notion that the fourth-century Roman emperor Constantine suppressed the earlier gospels for political reasons and imposed the doctrine of the divinity of Christ at the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325. A character in "The Da Vinci Code" points out that it is history's winners who get to write history, a refrain echoed by Mr. Brown on his Web site.
"The Da Vinci Code" taps into growing public fascination with the origins of Christianity. More scholars have been writing popular books about the relatively recent, tantalizing archaeological discoveries of Gnostic gospels and texts that offer insights into early Christians whose beliefs departed from the Gospels in the New Testament.
The plot of "The Da Vinci Code" is a twist on the ancient search for the Holy Grail. Robert Langdon, portrayed as a brilliant Harvard professor of "symbology," and Sophie Neveu, a gorgeous Parisian police cryptographer, team up to decipher a trail of clues left behind by the murdered curator at the Louvre Museum, who turns out to be Ms. Neveu's grandfather.
The pair discover that the grandfather had inherited Leonardo da Vinci's mantle as the head of a secret society. The society guards the Holy Grail, which is not a chalice, but is instead the proof of Jesus and Mary Magdalene's conjugal relationship; Langdon and Neveu must race the killer to find it. Along the way they learn that the church has suppressed 80 early gospels that denied the divinity of Jesus, elevated Mary Magdalene to a leader among the apostles and celebrated the worship of female wisdom and sexuality.
The one line that struck a chord with me is one that I have repeated ad infinitum -- that history's winners get to tell it too. You only have to look at the assumed *greatness* of the Roman empire for proof. Also oft-repeated lines like the North American continent not having any history or culture prior to the arrival of the Europeans or Copernicus being the first person to figure out heliocentricity. And I am convinced the same holds true for the "gospel truths" that survived.
Though for many readers the notions about Christian history in "The Da Vinci Code" seem new and startling, the novel introduces to a popular audience some of the debates that have gripped scholars of early Christian history for decades. The academic chatter grew louder after the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the 1950's and of ancient texts in Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in 1945. Among the findings were early Christian scriptures and fragments not included in the New Testament, including writings that scholars have come to call the "Gospels" of Mary, Peter, Philip, Thomas and Q.
"The Da Vinci Code" floats the notion that the fourth-century Roman emperor Constantine suppressed the earlier gospels for political reasons and imposed the doctrine of the divinity of Christ at the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325. A character in "The Da Vinci Code" points out that it is history's winners who get to write history, a refrain echoed by Mr. Brown on his Web site.
"The Da Vinci Code" taps into growing public fascination with the origins of Christianity. More scholars have been writing popular books about the relatively recent, tantalizing archaeological discoveries of Gnostic gospels and texts that offer insights into early Christians whose beliefs departed from the Gospels in the New Testament.
The plot of "The Da Vinci Code" is a twist on the ancient search for the Holy Grail. Robert Langdon, portrayed as a brilliant Harvard professor of "symbology," and Sophie Neveu, a gorgeous Parisian police cryptographer, team up to decipher a trail of clues left behind by the murdered curator at the Louvre Museum, who turns out to be Ms. Neveu's grandfather.
The pair discover that the grandfather had inherited Leonardo da Vinci's mantle as the head of a secret society. The society guards the Holy Grail, which is not a chalice, but is instead the proof of Jesus and Mary Magdalene's conjugal relationship; Langdon and Neveu must race the killer to find it. Along the way they learn that the church has suppressed 80 early gospels that denied the divinity of Jesus, elevated Mary Magdalene to a leader among the apostles and celebrated the worship of female wisdom and sexuality.
The one line that struck a chord with me is one that I have repeated ad infinitum -- that history's winners get to tell it too. You only have to look at the assumed *greatness* of the Roman empire for proof. Also oft-repeated lines like the North American continent not having any history or culture prior to the arrival of the Europeans or Copernicus being the first person to figure out heliocentricity. And I am convinced the same holds true for the "gospel truths" that survived.
