The Davinci Code: fact or fiction?

[Scottish_Republican]

Of course it's fiction. Have you never heard of a novel before?

[emaz]

Hi, I've read all books of Dan Brown. I like his way of writting. I don't know if The Da Vinci Code is real but... if you don't believe in it, why do you believe in the Bible? Both books are indemonstrable. I prefer to believe in scientists and intellectual people instead of believing in the church and the priests. This is my opinion.

[Peter_Martin]

Sorry if this message is long. I'm rather brain storming.

The problem is that Dan Brown's book is not an academic work! It is badly written and I stopped reading it part the way through. I've spoken to people who have decided that the bible is obviously wrong because of this book that is sold purely as a work of fiction.

One thing that the book did get me to do was to buy the Apocryphal New Testament published by the Oxford University Press. This was interesting in that it reprints various gnostic gospels that were left out the bible. A lot is made of this fact by Dan Brown and others to suggest that things about Mary Magdalen were hidden to hide the fact that Christ was not divine or that was married to Mary Magdalen. However, these theories ignore the other texts ditched presumably for the sake of convenience.

What they do not discuss is that the ditched gospels also tend to suggest that the early Christian Church was split into those that believed Christ to be a mortal preacher at one end and others that he was an absolute god. What we appear to have been left with in the 'authorised' bible is the middle of the road - he was a god with a human form. The dates of the gospels stating that Christ was totally divine are as old, if not older than the lost gospels cited by Dan Brown to support his theory. One of the theories is that the proclamation of Christ's divinity was a roman invention - this is rubbish when you consider some of the gnostic gospels.

The Gospel of Christ's Childhood according to St Thomas is interesting reading. This presents a picture of the infant Christ that would make you think twice about Nativity Plays. This presents a picture of a spiteful child with divine powers. It is full of stories as to how Christ struck down other children with death or injury, how he intimidated teachers to the point of fear and generally made everyone that came into his presence fear for their lives! I wonder how many Christians today would consider their faith to be peaceful if this gospel was part of the bible.

Another gnostic gospel deals with the childhood of the Virgin Mary and the birth of Christ. The childhood of Mary gospel written well within the 1st millenium AD effectively supports the Catholic ideas of the immaculate conception and the assumption. Two of the birth of Christ narratives go into detail how one of the women attending the birth doubted Mary's virginity and their hands withered when they examined her!

Thomas also contributed another gospel on Christ's actual adult teachings. In this he reports that the reason that Mary Magdalene was honoured is "that she had the understanding of a man and therefore would enter the Kingdom of heaven." It is interesting that Dan Brown and other writers ignore this excerpt.

The other thing about the Da Vinci Code I could not stand was the depiction of Opus Dei. They do not wonder round as mad monks in cowls bend on murder. If anything the reality is more mundane and in some ways more sinister. They dress normally and they tend only to be interested in those who are in professions. Members are supposed to take spiritual pleasure from the most mundane tasks of their work - dealing with a difficult legal problem is turned into some kind of spiritual pleasure/offering. If you were to pass an Opus Dei member in the street you would not recognise them. In that sense this makes them more sinister than the mad monk figure depicted.

In short the bible and the parts of it left on the cutting room floor can prove what you want it to.