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Some people will believe anything. A number of people believe in intelligent aliens, that rich dying Nigerians want to give them millions of dollars, that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, that Bill Clinton didn’t have sexual relations with that woman, etc. The problems with these claims and others like them is that they are either directly contradicted by known evidence or are arguments from silence (no evidence). This sort of silliness was taken to a whole new level with the early 80’s novel Holy Blood, Holy Grail and by the 2003 best-seller (and now motion picture) The Da Vinci Code.
In these works, Jesus is presented as just a great man whose divinity was invented during the time of Constantine and the Council of Nicea in the early forth century. He also shacked up with Mary Magdalene and fathered a child and whose bloodline descends into French royalty. Furthermore, the Church covered these facts up, and in "selecting" which books to include in the Biblical canon, ignored the best and reliable "gospels" about the real Jesus. Therefore, for 2,000 years, ignorant dumb sheep have been duped into believing they knew Jesus when in fact they really believe a lie.
There has been much written on this subject in a number of books, but apparently many still haven’t got the message that the truth claims of The Da Vinci Code have about as much credibility as those supposedly dying or exiled Nigerian millionaires flooding your email inboxes. Quickly here are the facts:
(1) There is no evidence the extra-Biblical works cited by Da Vinci conspiracy theorists are more reliable than the actual Biblical books themselves. The Da Vinci Code makes the claim that there were actually 80 other gospels about the life of Jesus. In fact, there were 17, and the four earliest and most reliable are found in the New Testament. The other so-called "gospels" were part of a collection of works known as the "Gnostic Gospels" from a group called Gnostics that were written from the mid second century into the third century.
Usually we consider things that were written the earliest and closet to the events that are being reported to be the most reliable and accurate. Paul’s letters were written from around AD 49 to AD 63. The gospels were written starting in the mid to late 60’s (Mark) up till at the very latest the early 90’s (John). The writers of the canonical gospels had access to either the apostles themselves or those heavily connected to the apostles (in the case of Luke’s relationship to Paul). If anyone "has an agenda" it is the writers of the Gnostic gospels who deny the goodness of creation, disdain women (yes, even though The Da Vinci Code presents the Gnostic gospels as some liberating documents of equality they were in fact, extremely anti-female), and present a goofy picture of a known vs. spiritual world where all matter is corrupt and people are only saved by a "secret knowledge."
(2) There is no evidence anywhere that Jesus ever was married to anyone, including Mary Magdalene, and no evidence anywhere that He fathered children. This is completely an argument from silence. The only source for this is one sentence in a late heretical Gnostic gospel from the mid-second century that said Jesus loved Mary Magdalene and makes some indirect reference to kissing her.
First of all, as already stated these works are not credible themselves and were never considered to be credible. Second, the reference to where or what was kissed is never stated in the text since the text itself is incomplete with gaps, and even so, the more likely reference was to a friendly kiss, or kiss of greeting, referred to several times in the canonical works of Scripture.
Many ask, "Well, what’s the big deal if Jesus had a wife or children"? The big deal in my mind is that there is no evidence anywhere to support such a notion and we are dealing with extremely sloppy and irresponsible history.
(3) Neither Constantine nor the Council of Nicea had anything to do with inventing Jesus’ divinity. The Council met because of something called the Arian heresy, a belief that Jesus was not divine but was God’s first created being. The doctrine of Christ’s divinity is found itself in the first century NT documents in at least a dozen places explicitly and others implicitly. In the early second century and beyond, Church fathers began using language to try and convey the meaning of Christ’s divinity and the Godhead and so forth. The council was called only because of a doctrinal dispute that was dividing the Church and to articulate on paper what the Biblical texts were already saying. The authors assert that the victors wrote the history and from that point forward Christ was divine. This is extremely misleading and does not reflect the truth of the prior history of Christological understanding. Finally, Brown’s novel asserts that the vote at the Council was close when in fact it was not. The pro-Arian side only had several votes to the other sides’ several hundred.
There are all sorts of other historical errors in both Brown’s book and the other Holy Blood, Holy Grail. Brown’s novel makes the assertion on its first page that the historical backdrop of the fictional story is "fact." As a professor friend of mine pointed out, who himself claims to be an agnostic, "an honest magician is one who doesn't pretend to have supernatural powers and doesn't play to people's credulity, but just says, in effect ‘you can't figure it out, can you?’ Then there are the charlatans. By asserting that the background circumstances of his story are factually true, Brown puts himself in the second category."
Plenty act as if I am just a Christian crank for continuing the pile-up on Brown’s book and the new movie. But anything that further dumbs down the populace, adds to historical misunderstanding and ignorance certainly isn’t a good thing. Popular novels like this just make people less intelligent and blind people to true historical inquiry. It’s a lot more fun and easier to read some suspenseful murder mystery novel (and yes, I read the whole book) that makes fanciful historical claims rather than doing an inductive study on Scripture themselves, examining extra-canonical works, and studying the history of the early church period, the Gnostics, and the Church councils and the various controversies and sides that were taken. It’s much more fun just to nibble on pop history from sloppy novels or pseudo-scholars (in the case of Holy Blood, Holy Grail) rather than put in the time and effort to study real history.
What’s the big deal though; it’s just a fictional novel, right? Well, first, plenty of people are being swayed and influenced by the book. Polls have shown that. Second, as said, anything that further introduces misunderstanding in the public’s mind on important academic matters needs to be refuted. Does the popular culture really need to be dumbed down any further?
Also, many Christians roll their eyes every time they read one of these sorts of articles because they think it’s much ado about nothing. After all, it’s just fiction. Well, I for one would be mightily ticked off if somebody wrote a fictional story about my mother in a way that harmed her integrity or defiled her, even if it was presented in a way that was blatantly farcical. I’m sure the "Oh it’s all just fun and fiction" crowd would feel the same way. If anyone wrote a novel disgracing their mother as the central character, any such person would be outraged and want to set the record straight. Well, it’s all the more important when the issue is not mom, but one who many of us consider the Savior of the world. Or is it defending Jesus’ integrity not quite as important to these Christians?
Either way, Christian or non-Christian, there is plenty not to like about the Da Vinci phenomenon. Those interested in a more intelligent public dialogue should continue having this debate and those who gobble up the claims of Dan Brown should listen to what is being said.
May 18, 2006
Bill Barnwell [send him mail] is a pastor in Flushing, Michigan. He has completed a Master of Ministries degree and a Master of Arts in Theological Studies degree at Bethel College in Mishawaka, Indiana.
Posts: 199 | Registered: May 2006
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Well, I personally believe the story is fiction but at the same time, I also don't understand all of the hoopla either.
There's no concrete evidence that Jesus was married however there is also no evidence that he practiced celibacy either. Besides, during his time it would have been frowned upon if he did practice celibacy since Judaic customs of the time practically made marriage a requirement for Jewish men.
Posts: 72 | Registered: Apr 2006
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