Transcript The Da Vinci Code

Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Claims
Dan Brown Claims …
“All descriptions of artwork,
architecture, documents, and
secret rituals in this novel are
accurate.”
Dan Brown Claims …
But are they?
Some Reviewers Claim …
“His research is impeccable”
--New York Daily News
Some Reviewers Claim …
But is it?
The Art of Leonardo
Madonna of the Rocks
The Last Supper
Holy Grail = Holy Bloodline
Dan Brown claims …
Jesus &
Mary Magdalene
Merovingian Dynasty
A Few Secret Descendants
Merovingian Dynasty
Merovech
Clovis
Merovingian Blood
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2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Merovech
Childeric I
Clovis I
Chlothar I
Sigebert I
Childebert II
Theudebert II of Austrasia
Emma of Austrasia
Earconbert of Kent
10. Egbert I of Kent
11. Wihtred of Kent
12. Aethelbert II of Kent
13. Daughter of Kent
14. Egbert of Wessex
15. Ethelwulf of Wessex
16. Alfred the Great
17. Aefthryth of England
18. Arnulf I of Flanders
Merovingian Blood
19. Baldwin II of Flanders
20. Arnulf II of Flanders
21. Baldwin IV of Flanders
22. Baldwin V of Flanders
23. Maud of Flanders
24. Adela of Normandy
25. Stephen of Blois
26. Eustace IV of Boulogne
27. Eustachie of
Champagne
28. Beatrice of St. Pol
29. William III of Ponthieu
30. Marie of Ponthieu
31. Joan of Dammartin
32. Eleanor of Castile
33. Joan of Acre
34. Margaret de Clare
35. Amy de Gaveston
36. Alice de Driby
Merovingian Blood
37. William Mallory
38. Margaret Mallory
39. Mary Corbet
40. Richard Charlton
41. Ann Charlton
42. Elizabeth Grosvenor
43. Edward Bulkeley
44. Frances Bulkeley
45. Olive Welby
46. Joseph Farwell
47. Hannah Farwell
48. Samuel Woods
49. Hannah Woods
50. Zadock Wheeler
51. Uzziel Wheeler
52. Harriet Wheeler
53. Julius Fernando Ross
54. Anna Dutton Ross
55. Rebecca Ann Taylor
56. Robert Ernest Cork
57. William Joseph Cork
Dan Brown on Opus Dei
Albino
Monk
Assassins?
Dan Brown Claims …
“I worked very hard to create a fair and
balanced depiction of Opus Dei.”
St. Josemaria Escriva
Opus Dei
Dan Brown: “the new Opus
Dei World Headquarters … is
located at 243 Lexington
Avenue in New York City.”
Murray Hill Place, NY
Villa Tevere, Rome
Basics of Opus Dei
• A life of prayer and contemplation, with
frequent spiritual direction and confession
• Study of the Catholic faith
• Bearing the cross
• Sanctification of ordinary life
– Through excellence in your profession
– And spreading of Gospel values through the
lay apostolate
Corporal Mortification
Cilice and
Discipline
St. Josemaria on Mortification
• The world admires only spectacular sacrifice,
because it does not realize the value of sacrifice
that is hidden and silent.
• If you don't deny yourself you will never be a
soul of prayer.
• Don't say: 'That person gets on my nerves.'
Think: 'That person sanctifies me.‘
• Many who would willingly let themselves be
nailed to a Cross before the astonished gaze of
a thousand onlookers cannot bear with a
christian spirit the pinpricks of each day! Think,
then, which is the more heroic.
Others who used it …
John Allen on Opus Dei
“If you want a guiding
metaphor for Opus Dei, …
think of it as the Guinness
Extra Stout of the Catholic
Church. It’s a strong brew,
definitely an acquired taste,
and clearly not for
everyone.”
For More about Opus Dei …
http://holycrosschapel.org
http://opusdei.org
Constantine
Creator of
Christianity?
Dan Brown Claims …
“Christians and pagans began warring,
and the conflict grew to such
proportions that it threatened to rend
Rome in two.” Constantine blended
the two religions.
Fact:
Not a war between two parties, but a
bloody persecution instigated by
Emperor Diocletian. He divided the
empire, generals feuded, Constantine
triumphed—made Christianity legal.
Dan Brown Claims …
“Originally, … Christianity honored
the Jewish Sabbath of Saturday,
but Constantine shifted it to
coincide with the pagan’s
veneration day of the sun.”
Fact:
“Sunday is the day on which we all
hold our common assembly,
because it is the first day on which
God, having wrought a change in
the darkness and matter, made the
world; and Jesus Christ our Savior
on the same day rose from the
dead.”
St. Justin Martyr, ca. 150 AD.
Dan Brown Claims …
“The Bible, as we know it today,
was collated by the pagan
Roman emperor Constantine the
Great.”
Fact:
•Muratorian Canon gives
basic list of NT books, 170200 AD.
•Irenaeus, writing at the same
time: “The Gospels could not
possibly be either more or
less in number than they are
(four).” Cites in Adv. Haer. all
NT books except: Philemon,
II Peter, III John, and Jude.
Dan Brown Claims …
We should trust the Gnostic gospels that
were excluded from the canon.
As Time Goes By
From the Passion of Jesus to …
• Epistles of Paul
– 20 years
• First Gospel
– 35 years
• End of NT
– 65 years
• Gnostic Gospels
– 100 to 300 years
1986: Challenger
1972: Watergate
1941: Pearl Harbor
1906: SF Earthquake
1706: Franklin Born
Dan Brown Claims …
Before Constantine, “Jesus was viewed by His
followers as a mortal prophet. … Jesus’
establishment as ‘the Son of God’ was officially
proposed and voted on by the Council of Nicaea.”
Scripture on Jesus’ Divinity
• The eternal Word,
through whom all things
were made (John 1:1-3 )
• Jesus is Kyrios (Phil 2:11,
1 Cor 12:3)
• The eternal Son, through
whom he created the
world. The angels
worship him (Heb 1:1, 6)
• Before all things, created
all things, in him all things
hold together (Col 1:15)
• “Before Abraham was, I
AM” (John 8:58)
• “He claimed to be the
Son of God” (John 19:7)
• He shall judge the living
and the dead (2 Tim 4:1)
Dan Brown Claims …
Constantine’s new Bible “omitted those gospels
that spoke of Christ’s human traits and
embellished those gospels that made Him
godlike.”
Scripture on Jesus’ Humanity
• The Word was made
flesh (John 1:14)
• He was hungry (Matt 4:2)
• He wept (John 11:35)
• He died (Matt 27:50,
Mark 15:37, Luke 23:46,
John 19:30)
• After his resurrection he
could be touched and
could eat (Luke 24:39-43;
John 20:27)
• He emptied himself,
humbled himself to death
(Philippians 2:5-11)
• He shared our flesh and
blood, like us “in every
respect; he suffered, and
so can sympathize with
our weakness (Heb 2:1418; 4:14-16)
• Those who deny the
incarnation are antichrist
(1 John:4:1-3)
Dan Brown Claims …
We could learn a lot from Gnosticism.
What Is the Gnostic “Gospel”?
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Matter is evil, a prison
Created by a lesser deity
Jesus only appeared to be human
He was opposed to the deity who created the
world—and who inspired the Old Testament
• He taught a way to be freed from this prison
• Hidden knowledge, known only to a special few
• Spirituality: either ascetical or libertine
More Dan Brown Claims …
“the Church outlawed
speaking of the shunned
Mary Magdalene”
• 6th Century: St. Gregory the Great
preached about the Scriptural
account; Gregory of Tours says she
went to Ephesus.
• 10th Century: Feast of St. Mary
Magdalene begins to be celebrated
on July 22 in Constantinople
• 11th Century: Feast spreads through
the West
• 13th Centuy: The Golden Legend;
relics sought after.
More Dan Brown Claims …
“the Church outlawed
speaking of the shunned
Mary Magdalene”
Fresco, 1317
Titian, ca. 1530
More Dan Brown Claims …
“the Church outlawed
speaking of the shunned
Mary Magdalene”
Magdalen College, Oxford
Founded 1458
Magdalene College, Cambridge
Founded 1428
More Dan Brown Claims …
“the Church outlawed
speaking of the shunned
Mary Magdalene”
From the First Century to today,
the Scripture record bears
witness to the life and faith of
Mary Magdalene.
Dan Brown Claims …
The Catholic Church burned
5,000,000 women as witches in 300
years, including “all female scholars,”
after publication of Malleus
Maleficarum in 1486.
Fact:
Maybe one per cent of that figure
killed, through various means, by
Catholics, Protestants, and secular
authorities.
Dan Brown Claims …
“The Jewish tetragrammaton
YHWH—the sacred name of
God—in fact derived from
Jehovah, an androgynous
physical union between the
masculine Jah and the preHebraic name for Eve, Havah.”
Fact:
“Jehovah” was formed by adding
the vowel points from Adonai or
Elohim to YHWH, so that readers
who know to substitute the word
Adonai or Elohim when they came
upon YHWH.
Dan Brown Claims …
Fact:
“… the early Jewish tradition
involved ritualistic sex. In the
Temple, no less. Early Jews
believed that the Holy of Holies in
Solomon’s Temple housed not
only God but also His powerful
female equal, Shekinah.”
•Lev. 16: Only the high priest
enters the Holy of Holies, and
then only once a year.
•Deut. 5: The Lord is God, the
Lord is one.
•Isa. 45:5-6: “I am the Lord, there
is none else.”
•Shekinah appears in medieval
Judaism as a term for God’s
presence in the temple.
Dan Brown Claims …
The Church had a “new Vatican
power base” in Constantine’s day.
Fact:
Papal residence and
administration was at the Lateran
until after the Avignon “captivity.”
Brown is about 1000 years too
early.
Why Is It Popular?
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Fast-paced story
Intriguing mystery
Church is the bad guy
Church is hiding something
“You shall be as gods”
Our Response
Proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is
favorable or unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and
encourage, with the utmost patience in teaching. …
For the time is coming when people will not put up with
sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will
accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own
desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and
wander away to myths.
2 Timothy 4:2-3
Our Response
Guard what has been entrusted to you. Avoid the profane
chatter and contradictions of what is falsely called
knowledge.
1 Timothy 6:20
Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you.
1 John 2:24
Our Response
We proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and
foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called,
both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the
wisdom of God.
1 Corinthians 1:23