The Holey Grail
I don't read fictional novels very often, but because "everyone" is doing it, I decided to see what the Da Vinci Code is all about. I couldn't bring myself to buy the book, so I borrowed it from a friend last week.
The constant suspense and mystery combined with a lot of dialogue made the book a real page turner - I had no problems finishing the 400+ pages in just under 2 days. I imagine the upcoming movie will be an exciting mixture of Mission Impossible and National Treasure.
Without going into great detail, I can summarize the "secret" of the book by quoting a few passages.
The threat Mary Magdalene posed to the men of the early Church was potentially ruinous. Not only was she the woman to whom Jesus had assigned the task of founding the Church, but she also had physical proof that the Church's newly proclaimed deity had spawned a mortal bloodline. (254)
...you must understand the Church's powerful motivations to conduct such a cover-up. They could never have survived public knowledge of a bloodline. A child of Jesus would undermine the critical notion of Christ's divinity and therefore the Christian Church... (254)
...Jesus was a Father...Mary Magdalene was the womb that carried His royal lineage. The Priory of Sion, to this day, still worships Mary Magdalene as the Goddess, the Holy Grail, the Rose and the Divine Mother. (255)
This is where Dan Brown shoots himself in the foot. Assuming that all the facts are correct about Mary Magdalene's marriage to Jesus, I see 3 ways of interpreting the relationship:
1. Jesus is God > His wife might be someone to honor
2. Jesus is just another mortal prophet > His wife might be special but not because of her marriage to Jesus
3. Jesus's supposed deity is a conspiracy of the Church > His wife is Divine and worthy of worship
Either #1 or #2 might be consistent beliefs to hold (assuming their facts are true), but option 3 is silly - if the Priory of Sion knew Jesus was not Divine, why would they or anyone care about Mary Magdalene? Not only that, if Christ is only important because the Church conspired to make him divine, then Mary is only important because of the Church they are trying to discredit. By denying Jesus' divinity, Dan Brown completely destroys the meaning of the conspiracy he is suggesting.
So, even granting that all of the facts in the Da Vinci Code are true (and they are not), the main premise of the story is nonsense at best.
-Vijay Swamidass
posted by DrewDog | 10:42 PM
2 Comments:
This is a post from Vijay's blogsite, swamidasssez.blogspot.com. If you enjoyed this read, check out his blog for more good stuff!
Good comments, Aaron. Let me try to respond.
One of the last statements in the book is, "The quest for the Holy Grail is the quest to kneel before the bones of Mary Magdalene. A journey to pray at the feet of the outcast one."
To me, the book only makes an assertion of Mary Magdalene's deity, but it doesn't do anything to prove it other than to suggest a major conspiracy.
1) I offered my #3 because I know the book was suggesting that "Mary Magdalene is a goddess worthy of worship." However, I cannot find any justification for her deity in the book.
I understand how some people might be searching for the "lost sacred feminine" in a general sense, but how Mary became genuine deity is beyond me.
2) When the book says things like "Jesus assigned the task of founding the Church [to Mary]" or "Mary Magdalene was the womb that carried His royal lineage" it seems that Jesus has great power himself, and I'm left asking - Who is more important here, Jesus or Mary? Why would Mary who is the "sacred feminine," be taking assignments from a mortal peon?
So to summarize, my biggest question is this: I can understand worshiping the "sacred feminine" in a general sense (in the context of the book), but what is Mary Magdalene's specific claim to "Divine Mother," "Goddess," etc.?
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