topics: |  fiction | usa | christianity

The impermanence of religious text

As with the Koran in Rushdie's Satanic Verses, Da Vinci code casts into
sharp focus the ambiguity and uncertainty regarding the version of Bible
that most people consider as "Gospel truth" today.  It turns out that what
was to be in the Bible, and what was not, was not decided until three
centuries after Christ, at a council called by Emperor Constantine.
Similarly with the Koran, which was compiled by comparing various sources
by Uthman ibn Affan.  The SV deals with a blasphemic statement
made by Mohammed in his early years, where he accepts some Goddesses other
than Allah.   The DVC does not address a central question, but deals with
some artifacts related to the Gnostic Gospels in general.

But what sets this book apart is the breathlessness with which the narrative
deals with a murder / adventure story.  I went racing till the very last
pages, but at that point the edifice that Dan Brown was building up could not
sustain its own momentum and it all crumbled in what I felt was a terrible
let-down.

The NYT gushed over "this riddle-filled, code-breaking,
exhilaratingly brainy thriller":
    The author is Dan Brown (a name you will want to remember). In this
    gleefully erudite suspense novel, Mr. Brown takes the format he has
    been developing through three earlier novels and fine-tunes it to
    blockbuster perfection. Not since the advent of Harry Potter has an
    author so flagrantly delighted in leading readers on a breathless chase
    and coaxing them through hoops.
and quite justifiably so!!

Excerpts

-- p. 246: gargoyle: from Fr gargariser - "sound of water gurgling
through their throats"]

How the Bible was constructed

p.252: bible - eighty gospels about Jesus were available but only a handful
  were chosen for the NT.  The selection was done by Emperor Constantine, who
  was a "lifelong pagan who was baptized on his deathbed, too weak to
  protest.  [To avoid the increasing Christian-Pagan conflicts in the Roman
  empire] he decided to unify Rome under a single religion, Christianity."
  (because he wanted to back the winner).  "By fusing pagan symbols, dates,
  and rituals into the growing Christian tradition, he created a kind of
  hybrid religion that was acceptable to both parties." Egyptian sun disks
  --> halos of Catholic saints, Isis nurturing miraculously conceived son
  Horus --> images of Virgin Mary nursing Baby Jesus.  Miter / altar /
  doxology / communion, the act of 'God-eating' - all from earlier pagan
  mystery religions.

Council of Nicaea, called by Constantine, voted on many aspects - date
of Easter, role of bishops, administration of sacraments, and of
course, the divinity of Jesus.  Until this time, Jesus was viewed as a
mortal prophet; he became the "son of God" after Nicaea.  The word
heretic referred to those who did not accept these gospels as the
"only" gospel - the word heretic comes from this time and all such
gospels were outlawed and burnt.  [etym: heretic (c.1330)
... from Gk. hairesis "a taking or choosing," from haireisthai "take,
seize," middle voice of hairein "to choose," of unknown origin. ]

p.257: The symbols of man and woman - arrow in NE and + in S of circle
- are not shield and spar / mirror for beauty; they derive from
ancient astronomical symbols for Mars and Venus.

p.263: person to the right of christ is a woman (flowing red hair,
delicately folded hands, and the hint of a bosom). --> Mary Magdalene,
wife of Jesus, made into a prostitute to cover up his mortalness.

scotoma: psychology: "our preconceived notions of this scene are so
powerful that our mind blocks out the incongruity and overrides our
eyes."

p. 266: gospel of Philip from the Nag Hammadi (1945) and Dead Sea
Scrolls (1950s):

    And the companion of the Saviour is Mary Magdalene.  Christ loved
    her more than all the disciples and use to kiss her often on her
    mouth.  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?"

p. 267: The movie "The last temptation of Christ" is about Jesus
having sex with Mary Magdalene.  Was banned in France at the instance
of the Church.

Napoleon: What is hisory, but a fable agreed upon?" (by the winners)

---
blurb:
Harvard professor Robert Langdon receives an urgent late-night phone call
while on business in Paris: the elderly curator of the Louvre, Jacques
Sauniere, has been brutally murdered inside the museum. Alongside the body,
police have found a series of baffling codes. As Langdon and a gifted French
cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, begin to sort through the bizarre riddles, they
are stunned to find a trail that leads to the works of Leonardo Da Vinci -
and suggests the answer to a mystery that stretches deep into the vault of
history.Langdon suspects the late curator was involved in the Priory ofSion -
a centuries-old secret society - and has sacrificed his life to protect the
Priory's most sacred trust: the location of an important religious relic
hidden for centuries. But it appears that Opus Dei, a clandestine sect that
has long plotted to seize the Priory's secret, has now made its move. Unless
Langdon and Neveu can decipher the labyrinthine code and quickly assemble the
pieces of the puzzle, the Priory's secret - and a stunning historical truth -
will be lost for ever...