I’m not posting this to poke fun at Dan Brown, or take pleasure in pointing out his mistakes. Nor am I confused about the status of Brown’s books as being fiction. So responses of “IT’S ONLY A FICTION BOOK GET OVER IT” are not welcome or helpful. Although well aware that Brown’s books are fictional, many people DO believe at least parts of them are accurate. An example is my former co-worker who, upon learning I am a Christian, said something to the effect of “Oh I guess you haven’t read The Da Vinci Code, it destroys Christianity!”

Of course after he saw The Real Da Vinci Code program on TV and got the facts he changed his mind. But it illustrates the need for proper information.

One problem with the theory that the books in our New Testament were not considered Scripture in the first century is that the authors of the New Testament books specifically refer to the other author’s books as being Scripture! Take a look at 2 Peter 3:15-16:

Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.

Here Peter refers to the wisdom found in Paul’s letters. Note Peter’s wording: He says Paul’s letters contain things that are hard to understand just like the other Scriptures. Peter considered at least some of Paul’s letters to be Scripture, equal in authority to the Old Testament.

I came across another passage this week that seems to treat other New Testament books as Scripture, 1 Timothy 5:18:

For the Scripture says, “Do not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the grain,” and “The worker deserves his wages.”

The first quote is from Deuteronomy 25:4. The second is not found in the Old Testament, but it is found in the New Testament. Albert Barnes notes in his commentary that “This expression is found substantially in Matt 10:10, and Luke 10:7. It does not occur in so many words in the Old Testament, and yet the apostle adduces it evidently as a quotation from the Scriptures, and as authority in the case. It would seem probable, therefore, that he had seen the Gospel by Matthew or by Luke, and that he quoted this as a part of Scripture, and regarded the Book from which he made the quotation as of the same authority as the Old Testament. If so, then this may be regarded as an attestation of the apostle to the inspiration of the “Gospel” in which it was found.” (Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible, via e-sword)

Kinda throws cold water on the whole “Constantine put together his own collection of scriptures” myth eh? (Sorry couldn’t help referencing The Da Vinci Code again!)

There’s an interesting book that I haven’t been able to finish reading yet called The First Edition of the New Testament by Dr David Trobisch, which posits the theory that the New Testament we know today was first compiled (in a form identical to or very similar to its present form) in the early 2nd century, not in the 4th century as it is often assumed. It’s an interesting but somewhat difficult read, probably in part because it’s been translated from its original German form. It’s also expensive ($45) considering it’s only 184 pages. I’ll finish reading it next semester when I’m back at the school library.

However, I had to post this. An excellent documentary called The Real Da Vinci Code (hosted by Tony Robinson and originally broadcast a year or so ago) is now available on DVD. I highly encourage anyone who’s interested in the issues raised by the book to watch this documentary. It’s both scholarly and entertaining. Buy it from Amazon.com ($13.99US) or from your local DVD store.

The entire thing is also available to watch online for free here: The Real Da Vinci Code on Google Video (1 hour 41 minutes). Of course, since they are now (finally) selling a legit DVD version, you should really buy the DVD in addition to watching it online. Besides, it loses something watching it on the blurry Google Video box, especially when they are showing the documents, beautiful architecture, etc.

Further reading:

• TheLife.com’s Da Vinci Code site – Many useful articles.
• Criticisms of the Da Vinci Code – Some of the criticisms of the book & movie (Wikipedia entry).
• Glad you asked that: A Da Vinci Code primer – Answers to common questions.

Expert art historian Teabing Sauničre^* commented that “This novel new vision of Leonardo’s art easily equals Dan Brown’s novel in terms of historical accuracy. When you look closely at the Mona Lisa, you can clearly see a mostly dry looking, airy landscape, perfectly suited for toads. And what of Mona Lisa’s enigmatic smirk? Leonardo even mentions toads in his own notebooks! Based on this evidence, I think we can conclude that the Mona Lisa was really based on a toad.”

Further reading on The Da Vinci Code:

• TheLife.com’s Da Vinci Code site – Many useful articles
• CBN.com’s Da Vinci Code Response – Features an easy to read comparison of the novel versus reality
• Discuss Da Vinci – Blog covering many issues arising from The Da Vinci Code book & film

This kind of attitude annoys me. Where did the idea that disagreeing with someone is “hatin” come from? I don’t hate Dan Brown, he’s free to believe whatever incorrect theories he wants, but he’s still wrong. And while some may view the issues discussed in The Da Vinci Code as unimportant, I certainly don’t. So why shouldn’t I try to correct the gross errors present in the work? As stated before, tolerance is only possible when people disagree; it is, to use the dictionary definition, “capacity for or the practice of recognizing and respecting the beliefs or practices of others”. Tolerance presupposes disagreement, and stating facts, if done in a respectful manner, is not “hatin”.

Is this woman the living ‘Code’? (USAToday.com)

The gist of it is that Kathleen McGown claims she is from the ‘sacred bloodline’ as described in The Da Vinci Code. (Which in turn got its ideas from the lamentable Holy Blood, Holy Grail.) McGown is the “self-proclaimed descendant of a union between Jesus and Mary Magdalene” (emphasis mine). She’s making a big claim here; not only that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a child (for which there is absolutely no evidence) but also that McGowan herself is part of the resulting bloodline. Of course she is using the Da Vinci Code trick in her book by writing a “fictional” story about ‘Maureen Paschal’ which McGowan acknowledges is basically herself. This allows her to have all the fun of making truth claims while hiding behind the guise of fiction.

What is McGowan’s evidence for her claims? There is none. From the article:

Despite the lack of hard evidence, McGowan’s supporters include her literary agent Larry Kirshbaum … McGowan was one of his first clients and he helped her get a seven-figure, three-book deal with Simon & Schuster … Kirshbaum believes McGowan when she says she is a descendant of Mary Magdalene. “I feel she’s entirely credible,” says Kirshbaum … “She spent 20 years of her life researching this subject. You have to give her any benefit of the doubt because she’s totally rational. I believe her absolutely. She had total credibility with me from the very beginning.”

This lady spent 20 years researching and still has no evidence? That is not very convincing to me. Let’s see what a respected historian has to say about this:

“A historian simply has to look at what evidence there is,” says Bart Ehrman, chairman of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina … “You can survey anyone who is a scholar of early Christianity and they will all tell you the same thing. It’s completely bogus.” McGowan says evidence of her ancient French lineage and connections to the sacred bloodline have been passed down through many generations of her family but admits “there are certainly holes in it.” Much ancestral documentation, she says, was destroyed during the French Revolution. Ehrman is doubtful. “People didn’t keep genealogies like that in the ancient world. There are no records. We have no account of Mary Magdalene even going to France until the Middle Ages, and the legend about her going to France sprang up because there was a cult to Mary Magdalene in southern France and they used the story about her going there as a way to explain the origins of the cult.“

Ehrman is entirely correct here. And notice that Ehrman is not Christian and doesn’t believe in the resurrection, so don’t say he’s just blind to the truth or somesuch nonsense. To summarize:

1. There is no historical evidence that Jesus and Mary were married
2. There is no historical evidence that they had a child
3. Therefore there is no bloodline
4. Even if there WAS a bloodline, McGowan has no evidence (let alone proof) that she belongs to it

And people say Christians accept things based on blind faith. As per my previous article on this blog re tolerance, McGowan is free to believe this if she wants; she should even be free to try to convince others. But she is still wrong and until she can provide some evidence for her claims no one should believe her and no one should support her by buying her books.

And the companion of the Saviour is Mary Magdalene. Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used 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?

HOWEVER, the only surviving copy of the document (yes, we possess only a single copy of the Gospel of Philip) actually reads like this:

“And the companion of the […] is Mariam the Magdalene. The […] Mariam more than […] Disciples, […] kissed her often on her […]. The other […] saw his love for Mariam, they say to him: Why do thou love […] more than all of us? (Full Translation)

The portions marked with [...] above indicate portions that are missing or unreadable in the only copy of the manuscript that we possess. Brown has followed certain scholars who have filled in the missing parts, but we have no way to know what should go there.

But, for the sake of argument, let’s assume that the missing portions are filled in correctly. The text doesn’t even say anything about them being married; in fact no ancient text states or even strongly implies that they were married. Teabing claims that “As any Aramaic scholar will tell you, the word companion, in those days, literally meant spouse.” But this too is false. If this were so, why does no English translation translate the word as “spouse”? Furthermore, the Gospel of Philip was written in Coptic, not Aramaic. The Coptics borrowed the Greek word “koinonos”, which usually meant “friend, colleague” rather than “spouse.”

Clearly, even if the missing portions were filled in correctly, that would prove nothing. Even liberal scholars date when the Gospel of Philip was originally written to sometime between 180-250AD, at least 150 years after Jesus’ death, and the one copy we possess was written much later than that, sometime in the 4th century. Obviously the document was not only not written by Philip as it claims, it is also written too late after Jesus’ death to be relevant. Gnostics (the authors of this text) would be even less likely to imply Jesus was married, since they viewed matter as evil, and any further ties between Jesus and the physical world (ie through marriage) would likely be avoided.

Unlike the Gospel of Philip, which was written at least 150 years after Jesus’ death and exists in only 1 copy, the earliest biblical gospels were written about 30 years after Jesus’ death, and exist in literally thousands of copies. There is simply no comparison, and it must be noted that anyone who is even a little skeptical of the Bible should be extremely skeptical of the “Gospel” of Philip. There is simply no ancient evidence that Jesus was married, and if there is no evidence for it then we should not assume it.

Video link: See a streaming video of philosopher Michael Horner discuss the ‘evidence’ for Jesus being married here:
http://davinci.thelife.com/2006/05/12/horner-video-was-jesus-married/