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THE DA VINCI CODE REVIEW
by Yvonne S. Waite
The
Bible For Today, Inc. *900 Park Avenue * Collingswood, NJ 08108 USA *
Phone: 856-854-4452 * Fax: 856-854-2464 * www.BibleForToday.org
April/May 2006
As
you know on my JUST FOR WOMEN radio broadcasts, I have been giving critiques of
THE DA VINCI CODE by DAN BROWN.
WHY? This book has made a mark in
our society! It has been read by forty-two million folks all over the world. Now
with a movie, as well as the plagiarism law-suit against the author settled in
Brown's favor, the popularity of the book has sky-rocketed once again. To be
honest with you, I did not really think that my radio listeners understood why I
was spending so much valuable radio-time on this blasphemous book. Now I think
they, as well as you, are beginning to realize that such warnings have merit.
Long
before I read the book for myself, I was acquainted with the volume.
I knew what the book jacket looked like. There were 454 pages between the covers
of that volume and one-hundred-five chapters therein. I'd seen many people in
airports, waiting for their planes, reading Dan Brown's masterpiece. I saw it
for sale everywhere. The truth was I did not want to waste my time with such
fiction for it lied to the world about my Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. The
book contends that Jesus did not die for the sins of the world. It says He
escaped Calvary's cross to run away to another country in a romantic get-a-way
with a woman. It is said that woman was Mary Magdalene, and that her womb was
the vessel (or the Holy Grail) that held the blood of Christ. WHAT
BLASPHEMY! The alleged country to which they were supposed to have fled was
France. The family name to this day is supposed to be "Merovingian." So
when a friend lent the book to me, I was trapped. I had no excuse. I had to read
it, finishing it in about four days.
I really don't know how to tell you about The Da Vinci Code without
becoming too verbose.
Truthfully, I do not want to spend a lot of time reviewing it and I don't think
you want to know every detail either. I read it so fast that I find myself
trying to remember what it was all about and how in the world I can synthesize
it for you. To start with, I had a hard time getting into the plots of the
story. The chapters, which were short--an ideal format for writers to use--keep
its readers interested. The Da Vinci Code is full of detailed characters
and different story-lines. To me it was like several different short-stories in
one book. As the writer wove the characters and plots together, it all
dovetailed into Dan Brown's finished ending. Not being a reader of much fiction,
I had to force myself to stay with the book for several chapters. (I had so much
else to do. Here I was reading this top-selling fanciful tale.) After awhile, I
became interested. Yet, I can truthfully say that I could have laid down that
volume at any time and not cared.
I kept trying to figure out what the story was all about.
The supposed Mary Magdalene involvement with Jesus didn't show up at first. It
was many pages before I became aware of it. There was much about the PRIORY OF
SION, a fictional secret society, and some information on OPUS DEI which is a
real branch of the Catholic church that has an abundance of money. A religious
group that had the approval of the late Pope of Rome, and maybe the present one.
(Maybe you remember that I did a series of "JUST FOR WOMEN" radio
programs on OPUS DEI in connection with this book, as well as on an OPUS DEI
member named ROBERT HANSSEN, an American who was a Russian spy. By the way
Hanssen is mentioned in this book, too)
As I read along in the book, I was glad that previously I had read several
written exposes on this blasphemous novel.
Those critiques made me aware of the "ins & outs" of the mysteries within
Brown's imaginative mind. I do not recommend this book, but I must admit that he
is a good writer. For me, it was a waste of time! In truth, because of the
popularity of the book, I am reading and reporting on it for you. Brown tells us
that The Da Vinci Code, is all facts and true (which it is not!). You are
probably aware by now that a movie on this wicked plot is to be released in May
of 2006 with TOM HANKS taking the lead and RON HOWARD as the director. Whether
you want to know about this book or not, you will be hearing every detail in the
near future. It is better to be forewarned.
Let's
begin with the main characters. As the book begins, art lover JACQUES SAUNIERE,
the renowned curator of the LOUVRE MUSEUM in Paris, France, is dying on the
museum floor. He was
killed, as it turned out, by a giant, red-eyed, albino monk named SILAS who
killed people, afterwards flagellating himself in repentance. The dying Sauniere--a
word-playing aficionado--was able to do some astounding things as he was
expiring, leaving clues for his estranged granddaughter, SOPHIE. She was now a
mature woman who had become a crack-police-cryptologist. Her parents and brother
were killed in some kind of mysterious way when she was a young child. She had
been told it was an automobile accident. Her grandfather raised her and was as a
father to her all her young life. He taught her how to solve riddles and
puzzles. But it was in death that his greatest puzzle-challenge was given. If
solved, the puzzle and clues he left her, as he lay dying on the floor of the
world-famous art museum, would reveal his murderer, the secrets of the PRIORY OF
SION, and the whereabouts of THE HOLY GRAIL.
In
death, Sauniere's body in the form and attitude of Da Vinci's "Vitruvian
Man," lay prostrate on the floor.
It was found in room five on the first floor of the of the Louvre's Grand
Gallery. The famed painting, the still smiling MONA LISA, was watching in Room
six nearby. Upon the dead man's chest, written in his own blood by his own hand,
were veiled clues that only Sophie would understand. This book takes us with her
in her quest to solve the riddles in order to arrest her grandfather's
murderer--thus discovering the whereabouts of THE HOLY GRAIL.
Sad to say as a young girl, Sophie's admiration for her grandfather came to a
screeching halt when she inadvertently found him in a secret room with a
white-haired woman performing a sexual act.
Others in white robes circled in
rhythmic swaying around this couple's ritual. It was some kind of heathen
worship where it was said that the participants became one with God during this
act. The author said it was a form of prayer-- most unscriptural to say the
least! Many years (perhaps seven--can't remember) after witnessing that PRIORY
OF SION ritual, that had something to do with THE HOLY GRAIL (which is
said to be Mary Magdalene), the frightened and disgusted granddaughter, never
contacted her grandfather again, not even opening his many letters to her for
his explanation and reconciliation.
As the book progressed, Sophie accompanied by the other main character in the
book, ROBERT LANGDON a Harvard professor of religious symbology, solved
Sauniere's murder.
LANGDON was the person whom her grandfather wanted to help Sophie solve the
puzzle-clues to his murder. These clues would lead to The HOLY GRAIL. (By
the way, the "Holy Grail" turned out to be Mary Magdalene's womb or Magdalene
herself.) In the process of uncovering this mystery, Sophie discovered that the
white-haired woman, who was part of the sexual PRIORY OF SION ritual/worship,
that had frightened her as a young person, was her grandmother (the best I could
figure out) and that her brother was not dead but alive. Added to those
discoveries was the fact that Grandfather Jacques Sauniere was the
head-priest-figure of the Priory of Sion--just as Isaac Newton, Victor Hugo, and
Leonardo Da Vinci had been years ago. (All this is according to author Dan
Brown's imagination.) During all those years, to keep Sophie and her brother
safe, the grandparents had separated, seeing each other rarely. Each raised a
grandchild. If I got it, at the end of the book, we readers learned that Sophie
was a descendent of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. (Now, I may have this wrong as the
plot was very complex and I read fast and couldn't make notes, as the book was
borrowed and didn't want to keep it too long.)
Sophie's grandfather, the murder-victim in this tale, had a great passion for Da
Vinci's work. Perhaps it
was because the two men (Sauniere & Da Vinci) were bonded together by a supposed
fraternal link. Both had presided over the Priory as Grand Masters--Da Vinci
supposedly reigned between 1510 and 1519 and Grandfather Jacques Sauniere until
his recent murder. Dan Brown wrote on page 113, of The Code as if it were a
historical fact, the following:
"The two men
share a historical fraternal bond. And it all fits perfectly with their
fascination for goddess iconology, paganism, feminine deities, and contempt for
the Church. The Priory has a well-documented history of reverence for the sacred
feminine."
I personally think that anyone--especially a born-again Christian--should NOT be
enamored with the man Leonardo Da Vinci.
He was the illegitimate son of a
nobleman who went to Florence, Italy as an apprentice to an older successful
immoral artist. Da Vinci took on the homosexual lifestyle of those about him and
reveled in such sin. Yes, he made a name for himself by painting exceptional
paintings and frescos, as well as scientific studies; but, unless he repented of
his sins, he has no name written in Glory. I believe I read in Brown's book, or
some place, that "Da Vinci was a flamboyant homosexual and worshiper of
nature's divine order." Some feel that there was almost something demonic
about his aura.
There are other characters in this complicated story. Paris' CAPTAIN BEZU FACEH
is the main detective.
Maybe he was the police chief--I can't remember. He is mentioned throughout the
book. Sometimes the reader might think he was rather stupid and conceited at
first, but as the plot continues, we see he was brilliant! Then we are
introduced to the plush Opus Dei World Headquarters in New York City and the
money-carrying BISHOP MANUEL ARINGAROSA, packing for a flight to Rome, Italy at
the instructions of the "Teacher" (SIR LEIGH TEABING) who turned out to
be an expert on the Holy Grail, as well as a trusted friend of Robert Langdon.
Although Teabing was a wealthy and knowledgeable man concerning the Holy Grail,
he turned out to be a very evil, manipulative, selfish person. In the end, he
turned against Langdon and Sophie.
In the contents of the book, clues around the MONA LISA PAINTING (whom some
feel, according to Brown, was a self-portrait of the artist himself) were often
mentioned. A black light
was used to see blood and symbolic clues near the painting and Sauniere's dead
body. The account shows the reader that the Priory's tradition of perpetuating
goddess worship was alluded to and often emphasized. According to Brown's
fiction, the early Christian church fooled the world by spreading lies that
devalued the "female prominence" and pushed our thinking that masculine
leadership was wrongly favored. The thinking in The Da Vinci Code is that
Mary Magdalene was Jesus' favorite disciple, that she carried on the blood line
of Jesus by bearing his child or children, that this blood line exists today,
and that this "truth" was pictured in code form in Da Vinci's famous
painting of THE LAST SUPPER . Of course, you and I know that this is rank heresy
without a trace of truth!
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