THE FACTS AND FICTION, IN “THE DA VINCI CODE,”
ABOUT JESUS, HIS CHURCH, AND HIS WORD
(PART 1 of 2:)
(Copyright 2006 by Congregation of God, 7th. Day; used here by permission)
Unless you’ve been hiding out from the world in a cave somewhere in Montana for the past three years, or rounding up Al Quaida terrorists in the deserts of the Middle East with the U. S. Army’s Special Forces Command, like my nephew Jason (whom we just proudly welcomed home), you’ve probably heard of a book entitled, “The Da Vinci Code.” It is author Dan Brown’s highly confrontational novel that has masterfully, yet deceptively entwined historical fact, legend, and fiction about Jesus Christ, Mary Magdalene, and the Roman Catholic Church.
Since its publication in April of 2003, “The Da Vinci Code” has attained such an immense global popularity that it has now been translated into over 40 languages. It was deservedly referred to this week in the “Faith and Values” section of “The Atlanta Journal and Constitution” as: “The Book that Consumed the World.” The subsequent newspaper article asked the question: Why has “The Da Vinci Code” remained a global “cultural phenomenon” for almost three years now?” The answer is quite simple: “The Da Vinci Code has re-ignited the world’s interest in Jesus Christ and Christianity like no other book has since John Wycliff’s first translation of the Bible into English in 1380 A.D.
As of today, “The Da Vinci Code” has sold more than 40 million hard-copies in over 150 countries worldwide. It has been on the New York Times Best Seller List for 155 consecutive weeks. And next week, Anchor Books is releasing for sale more than 5 million paperback copies of the book to major book outlets across America from Wal-Mart to Barnes and Noble. It is now the biggest-selling non-series novel of all time, and has even inspired more than 50 books to be written analyzing its content, mostly by authors who dismiss the “The Da Vinci Code’s” historical claims as fallacious fantasy and fiction.
With all of the enormous literary success that the book has achieved in the past three years, it was just a matter of time before some large movie production company decided to make “The Da Vinci Code” into a movie, and cash in on some of its lucrative popularity. So, last year Sony Pictures spent $125 million to produce the movie version of “The Da Vinci Code.” Sparing no expense, Sony hired Ron Howard, a multi-award-winning director to direct the movie, and Tom Hanks, a two-time Oscar-winning actor to play the lead character. “The Da Vinci Code” movie is set to premiere in theaters across the world in the middle of May, 2006. It is expected to draw an international audience of hundreds of millions into the theaters this spring to see just what Dan Brown’s controversial “cultural phenomenon” is all about.
What Is “The Da Vinci Code” About?
The theme, storyline, and plot of this intriguing novel of historical fiction have the modern-day Christian World in an absolute, and complete uproar today. So, without any more hesitation, let’s begin our investigation to ascertain how “The Da Vinci Code,” in three short years, has managed to cast an almost supernatural spell on the entire literary world. We will try to find out why, and how it has lured people from every civilized culture on earth into believing its outlandish claims about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Christianity, even though it is nothing more than, like I said, historical fiction. Let’s continue now and discover just what the block-buster book and much-awaited movie are all about.
Prof. Bart D. Ehrman, a prominent modern-day Christian historian, wrote an excellent brief synopsis of the book in his recent work, “Truth and Fiction in ‘The Da Vinci Code’.” He summed the “Code” up this way:
“There has been a mysterious murder, in Paris, of the renowned curator of the Louvre, Jacques Sauniere. Because of bizarre religious symbols left at the scene of the crime, drawn by Sauniere himself just before his death, a mas¬ter of religious symbology, Robert Langdon, a professor at Harvard who is in Paris to deliver a lecture, is called in to investigate. He is joined by a police cryptographer, Sophie Neveu, who happens to be Sauniere's granddaughter; she and her grandfather have been estranged for ten years. What Langdon and Neveu do not realize at first, but eventually come to learn, is that Sauniere was the head of a secret religious group known throughout history as the Priory of Sion, which has always guarded the secret to the true nature and whereabouts of the Holy Grail.
A bizarre set of circumstances sets Langdon and Neveu on a search, following clues that Sauniere has left behind, with the ul¬timate goal of finding the mysterious and long-sought Grail. Also in the pursuit, however, are those responsible for Sauniere's death, who evidently have killed him while attempting to learn the where¬abouts of the Grail. These mysterious others have used members of the fanatical Catholic order Opus Dei as pawns to lead them to the place of the Grail's hiding.
In the course of their adventures, Langdon and Neveu meet up with Sir Leigh Teabing, a wealthy aristocrat and expert on the Grail, who discusses the historical background to its mys¬tery. The Grail is not the cup of Christ but the container that held his see—it is in fact a person, Mary Magdalene, who was Jesus' wife and lover, who became pregnant by him and bore him a daughter. After his crucifixion, Mary and her child fled to France, and there the divine ancestral line of Christ was contin¬ued down through the ages.
There were secret documents kept about the existence of this bloodline of Christ. These documents celebrate the feminine principle in early Christianity and include a number of early Gospels that came to be suppressed by Christianity in the fourth century, specifically by the emperor Constantine. Constantine destroyed the eighty-some Gospels that were vying for a posi¬tion in the New Testament, elevated Jesus from being a mere mortal to being the Son of God, and completely silenced the tradition about Mary and the divine feminine, demonizing the feminine in Christianity and destroying its true nature as a cel¬ebration of the feminine deity.
But the Priory of Sion has, for centuries, known the truth about Jesus and Mary and has long met in secret in order to celebrate their holy union and to worship the divine feminine. This secret society, of which Jacques Sauniere was the most re¬cent head, has kept the tomb of Mary Magdalene and the hun¬dreds of documents that told the truth of the divine feminine.
Other famous people had headed the Priory of Sion and cel¬ebrated the truth of the marriage of Jesus and Mary—including notably Leonardo da Vinci, who painted Mary Magdalene in his famous fresco ‘The Last Supper’ and gave hints of the truth of Jesus and Mary in many of his other works of art, there for those with the knowledge of the truth to see and revel in.
Langdon and Neveu, with the help of Sir Leigh Teabing, gradually unravel the mystery surrounding the Grail and the secret documents that reveal its true power as they follow an intricate maze of cryptograms that lead them from one place and puzzle to another—until they arrive at the truth of the Grail and the place of its final hiding.”
After providing his synopsis, Professor Ehrman, considered one of this country’s top experts on Early Christian History, raised and answered in his book, the following questions about “The Da Vinci Code.”
“Is there any truth in what it says about Jesus and Mary Magda¬lene? Were there really secret Gospels that told the secret of their physical union? Were they really married? Did Mary re¬ally give birth to a child, whose holy lineage has been preserved down to today? Did the emperor Constantine suppress the other Gospels and create the Christian Bible? Did he eliminate the divine feminine from Christianity, promote the masculine Jesus to the realm of divinity, and so change the tenor of Christianity for all time?”
After asking the questions about “The Da Vinci Code” that everyone, who had not read the book, wanted to know, Prof. Ehrman inadequately defended, from his own arrogant, yet poorly researched, point of view, Jesus and Christianity from the heretical accusations made by Dan Brown in his book. The main problem with Prof. Ehrman’s defense of Jesus and Christianity in his book is that he, like most other collegiate “Christian scholars” today, are not sure if the Bible should be their authority on the life and teachings of Christ and His Church, or if the newly-discovered Gnostic Gospels might be a more reliable source for true Christian History.
Actually Ehrman, along with most of his colleagues, is caught up in the modern Jesus-Seminar belief that both the Bible and the Gnostic Gospels must be consulted to discover the whole truth about Jesus and Christianity. Unfortunately Dan Brown is also caught up in that same dilemma as Ehrman. He relied heavily on the Gnostic Gospels for the basis of his information about Jesus, Mary, and God’s Church. Brown, like the highly educated Ehrman, has gullibly been taken-in by the deliberate lies about Jesus and Mary Magdalene that the Gnostics of the first four centuries concocted and wrote into their false gospels; with the whole purpose of deceiving the world, then and now, about Jesus Christ and His Apostles.
The exhaustive testimony of Irenaeus, a man chosen by Christ through Polycarp, to defend and bear witness of the true New Testament Scriptures, is basically ignored and discounted by both Brown and Ehrman because they erroneously believe that he was a follower of Catholicism, and an opponent of the Gnostics for that reason. But Irenaeus was an opponent of the Gnostics because they were lying heretics, sent by Satan, through Simon Magus, to spread “damnable lies” about Christ throughout the fledgling Christian World. (Much more about Irenaeus in Part 2.)
Before I continue, I want to say that there are several other secondary mysteries in “The Da Vinci Code” that I will not be concerned with in this study. They may be important to the storyline of the novel, but are actually irrelevant when it comes to discerning the truth about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and the Catholic Church (and that is what my sole purpose is here). I omitted any references to the book’s claims about Opus Dei, the Priory of Sion, and the Vatican’s involvement with both of them. And I only briefly mention the paint¬ings and beliefs of Leonardo Da Vinci, as they are used to help perpetuate the book’s lies about Jesus and His Apostolic Church.
Claims Of “The Da Vinci Code”: The Facts And The Fiction
First let us review the main characters of the book, through whom the author makes his controversial comments and accusations about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and the Roman Catholic Church. Comments and claims that, as the A.J.C. newspaper article proclaimed, have “Consumed the World.” Accusations that have millions already, and will have millions more after the movie debuts, actually doubting the roots of the Christian Faith, and the Biblical account of the character, divinity, and message of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.
Robert Langdon is the main character. He is a fictional Harvard Professor of religious symbology. Next character in importance is Sir Leigh Teabing, a fictional British royal historian, and professed expert on the infamous Holy Grail legends, and early Christian history. They are joined by Sophie Neveu, a police cryptographer who happens to be the granddaughter of Jacques Sauniere, the curator of the Louvre Museum.
Neveu is the innocent, uninformed young woman who Langdon and Teabing seek to educate about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and the history of the Catholic Church.
The following insinuations, allegations and comments made by Langdon, Teabing, and Neveu are what have sparked all of the recent Christian controversy and resentment toward the book and soon-to-be-released movie. To counter the many anti-Catholic claims of “The Da Vinci Code,” several Catholic and Protestant Churches around the world have established Internet Websites and Chat Rooms to try and refute the many accusations made by Dan Brown as nothing more that a pack of preposterous lies. But not all of what Brown wrote in his book are lies, some of them happen to be true.
Below, I have recorded, verbatim, what I consider the controversial allegations made in the book about Jesus, His Church, and His Word. Read my accompanying comments about each allegation to find out which assertions are true, and which are false. Many you will probably know for yourself, but you just might be surprised at what you learn, especially in Part 2. (D.V.C. = The Da Vinci Code)
The D.V.C. Lie About Who Wrote The Bible:
Teabing declared: "The Bible is a product of man, my dear. Not of God…. Man created it as a historical record of tumultuous times, and it has evolved through countless translations, additions, and revisions. History has never had a definitive version of the book."
My Comments About The Facts:
First of all, the Bible was not a product of man, but of God. The Apostle Paul, who just might know a little more about God’s Word than Dan Brown, told his disciple Timothy, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” (2 Timothy 3:16) It’s true men wrote down the words, but God told them what words to write.
Teabing makes the statement that history has never had a definitive version of the Bible. That’s not true. For over 200 years, the Old and New Testament Bible was read and studied by the Apostolic Christian Church; right up until the start of the 4th Century, when the Roman Catholic Church wrested it away from the True Church, drove them underground, and usurped the name “Christian” for their church.
It wasn’t until after the Roman Catholics seized control of the Bible in the 4th Century, that their scribes were able to cleverly retranslate, add to, and revise the original New Testament Scriptures. They deliberately made the changes to the New Testament writings for the purpose of slanting some key Scriptures in favor of their Gnostic-Christian Theology. Then I believe, as Mr. Pinkston does, the Scribes hid, as ordered, the original Greek manuscripts deep in the Vatican vaults, far away from any non-Papal access.
Last year I saw a TV interview with the bishop in charge of the Vatican Library. When asked what type of materials were stored in the massive Vatican vaults, the bishop said that he, nor anyone else other than the popes, had ever seen but about 5% of what was stored in the vaults.
From 300 A.D. right up until today, self-professing “Christian” groups have deliberately altered the New Testament Gospels so they would be more congruent with their beliefs. A good example of such a group today is the Christian Feminists at the LBI Institute. Last year, they proudly, without any attempt to be discrete, or any regard for the truth, published their New Testament Bible: “Judith Christ Of Nazareth, The Gospels Of The Bible, Corrected To Reflect That Christ Was A Woman, Extracted From The Books Of Matthew, Mark, Luke, And John.”
From the ancient Catholic Scribes to the modern Christian-Feminists, I wonder: “Don’t these people realize that Christ warned in the Old Testament (Deut. 4:2) and in the New (Rev. 22:18-19) that anyone who “added to,” or “took away from” His Word would have their names removed from the “Book of Life?” I guess they must not recognize those Scriptures, Huh.
The D.V.C. Lie About The New Testament Gospels:
Teabing announced: "More than eighty gospels were considered for the New Testament, and yet only a relative few were chosen for inclusion—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John among them.
Neveu asked: "Who chose which gospels to include?"
Teabing answered: “Aha!…..The fundamental irony of Christianity! The Bible, as we know it today, was collated by the pagan Roman emperor Constantine the Great."
My Comments About The Facts:
The Gnostic-Christian followers of Simon Magus, like Cerinthus, Menander, Basilides, Valentinus, and a few others did write many Gnostic Gospels in the first four centuries, probably more than the eighty gospels mentioned by Teabing. Irenaeus and Justin Martyr, true Christian Apologists, warned that these Gnostic disciples of Simon Magus composed their alternative lying gospels for one purpose only: to deceive the early Christian world about Jesus Christ and His Gospel Message. Seeing the totally confused state that modern Christianity is in today, I would say that the Gnostic “wolves in sheep’s clothing,” mentioned above, achieved their goal. Christianity today, from the scholar to the layman, doesn’t seem to know what to believe about Jesus anymore.
In the so-called Christian World today there are over 450 different “Christian” denominations, 99% of them adhering to what the early Gnostic-Christians taught instead of what Christ’s Apostles taught, yet they all claim to be “Christian” followers of Jesus Christ; and all descended from the True Apostolic Christian Church.
Neveu asked the question: "Who chose which gospels to include [in the New Testament]?" The answer is simple: the Apostle John. The Roman Emperor Constantine had nothing to do with collating the original Bible.
If all of the highly educated “New Testament Scholars” in the world today would simply read Revelation 1:2, with an open mind, they would know that Christ appointed His Apostle John, a close family member, to “bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.” The “word of God,” was the original books of the Old Testament; the “testimony of Jesus,” was the inspired books of the New Testament; and “all things that he saw,” were the visions and revelations that Jesus had revealed to John on the Mount of Transfiguration and the isle of Patmos.
John, like the Apostle Paul, was a chosen vessel of God who fulfilled a special mission. Jesus spared His beloved Apostle from suffering martyrdom because He had commissioned John to personally assemble and deliver the books of the New Testament to the early Christian Church. Think about it, John outlived the other Apostles by approximately 20 years; during that time he collected all of their writings into one work. Then, John personally presented the books of what we now call the New Testament to his disciples (like Polycarp), commanding them to defend it and preserve it with their lives; this they did. Then as commanded, Polycarp, the last prominent disciple of John, kept the Truth alive by passing it on down to his disciple (Irenaeus), who taught the Truth to the primitive Christian Church of the second and third centuries. Irenaeus regarded Polycarp as the most important link between Christ and himself. He knew, beyond any doubt, that Polycarp was sent by John to teach him and the Church the Gospel Truth, so they could not be led astray by the Gnostics’ “cunningly devised fables,” (the Apostle Peter’s description of the Gnostic Gospels.)
Dr. Adam Clarke, renowned Bible scholar, confirms John’s appointment by Jesus to “bear record” of the “testimony of Jesus Christ.” He wrote in his Bible Commentary: “The last of the apostles to pass away was John. His death is usually placed about 100 A.D. In his closing days he cooperated in the collection and forming of those writings we call the New Testament.” (Commentary on New Testament, Vol. 11, p. 544.)
Also, according to the most prominent early Church historian Eusebius: “While St. John lived, heresy could make no serious headway. He had hardly passed away, however, before perverse teachers [the Gnostics-Christians] infested the Christian Church….These years were times which saw the New Testament books corrupted in abundance” (Ecclesiastical History, Bk. 111, Chapter 24).
I have noticed over the years that many times the simple things of Christianity are the hardest for highly educated Christian scholars and theologians to understand. The reason is, they were all taught that Catholicism was Christianity; and all of them knew how hard Roman Catholicism was to understand.
Yet, Jesus said: “Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein.” Jesus didn’t make Christianity hard to understand, the Roman Catholic Papacy did. The most educated Catholic and Protestant theologians have always felt that only they, with their “secret knowledge,” could accurately discern the Truth of the Bible. Ironically that’s also what the ancient Gnostic-Christians believed. They even took their name from the Greek word “Gnosis,” which basically meant, “secret knowledge.”
The Apostle Paul, who was an expert on Biblical Truth, wasn’t all that impressed with the knowledge of the Gnostic-Christian gurus of the first century; in fact he called their knowledge, false knowledge. Not only did Paul teach the early Christian world that the knowledge of the Gnostics was false, but that all of their gospels were based on their “knowledge, falsely so-called” (1 Timothy 6:20.) Paul’s advice to Timothy then, is what it would be to us now, avoid the “profane and vain babblings” of the Gnostic Gospels if you want to understand True Christianity.
The D.V.C. Truth About Constantine and Christianity (Meaning Catholicism):
Neveu said: "I thought Constantine was a Christian."
Teabing answered: "Hardly…..He was a lifelong pagan who was bap¬tized on his deathbed, too weak to protest. In Constantine's day, Rome's official religion was sun worship-the cult of Sol Invictus, or the Invincible Sun-and Constantine was its head priest. Unfortu¬nately for him, a growing religious turmoil was gripping Rome. Three centuries after the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, Christ's followers had multiplied exponentially. Christians and pagans began warring, and the conflict grew to such proportions that it threatened to rend Rome in two. Constantine decided something had to be done. In 325 A.D., he decided to unify Rome under a single religion—Christianity."
Neveu said: "Why would a pagan emperor choose Chris¬tianity as the official religion?"
Teabing answered: "Constantine was a very good businessman. He could see that Christianity was on the rise, and he simply backed the winning horse. Historians still marvel at the brilliance with which Con¬stantine converted the sun-worshipping pagans to Christianity. By fusing pagan symbols, dates, and rituals into the growing Christian tra¬dition, he created a kind of hybrid religion that was acceptable to both parties."
My Comments and Corrections About The Facts:
What Teabing said here is true. Constantine was never a True Christian. As the Roman Emperor, he was the high priest of the Cult of Sol Invictus ,the Invincible Sun-god of the Roman World. (the Roman pre-Christian god Mithras, whom I will discuss later.)
In the latter days of his life, Constantine is said to have converted to Christianity, but it was not Apostolic Christianity, it was his version of “Christianity,” a fusion of Mithraism, Christianity, and a few other minor religions practiced by the different pagan cultures that made up his massive empire.
Constantine established his Roman Catholic (or “universal”) Religion as a type of “one-world religion,” which became the official state religion of the Roman World. But those who practiced True Christianity in the Roman Empire were never more than a small remnant church; they were never a threat to anybody, especially to the point of “rending Rome in two,” as Teabing said.
The religious followers of Simon Magus’ Gnostic-Christian Religion were the “Christians” that Teabing referred to as having “multiplied exponentially.” In order to amalgamate all of the religion factions of his empire into one “hybrid,” or Catholic Religion is why Constantine called for the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D. And the #1 reason that Roman Catholicism, and its daughters, Protestantism, are inundated with “pagan symbols, dates, and rituals” is because most of modern Christianity’s religious customs and rituals came straight out of Mithraism.
Constantine kept most of the beliefs of Mithraism as the main doctrines for his Catholic Religion; and there was a very good reason for that. Constantine was no dummy, he knew if he was going to remain in power of such a massive empire of diverse cultures, he needed to keep the loyalty of his powerful Roman Legions. Well, the #1 religion of the Roman Army of that time was Mithraism. Since Constantine knew that the pagan god Mithras was just a figment of men’s imagination, he chose a real life Messiah, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, to represent Mithras in his state Roman religion.
The only other people in the Roman Empire at that time who were claiming Jesus as their Messiah was the small remnant who followed True Apostolic Christianity, and the ultra-left-wing followers of the larger groups of hard-line Gnostic leaders such as Marcion and Valentinus. To get rid of his opposition, Constantine simply persecuted both groups into an underground position, and forced them into almost total obscurity.
Something people need to understand: Some of the right-wing Gnostic followers of men like Marcion and Valentinus, who were hiding out from the Romans in secluded caves in Egypt, were most likely the one’s who buried the blasphemous Gnostic Gospels at Nag Hammadi, Egypt, not the followers of Jesus Christ.
The D.V.C. Truth And Lies About Jesus’ Divinity and Christianity (Meaning Catholicism):
Teabing stated: “During this fusion of religions Constantine needed to strengthen the new Christian tradition, and held a famous ecumenical gathering known as the Council of Nicea. At this gathering many aspects of Christianity were debated and voted upon—the date of Easter, the role of the bishops, the administration of sacraments, and, of course, the divinity of Jesus."
Neveu said: "I don't follow. His divinity?"
Teabing explained: "My dear, until that moment in history, Jesus was viewed by His followers as a mortal prophet. . . a great and powerful man, but a man nonetheless. A mortal."
Neveu asked: "Not the Son of God?" Teabing answered: "Right, Jesus' establishment as 'the Son of God' was officially proposed and voted on by the Council of Nicea." Neveu asked: “Hold on. You're saying Jesus' divinity was the result of a vote?" Teabing explained: “Establishing Christ's divinity was critical to the further unification of the Ro¬man empire and to the new Vatican power base. By officially endorsing Jesus as the Son of God, Constantine turned Jesus into a deity who ex¬isted beyond the scope of the human world, an entity whose power was unchallengeable…..now the followers of Christ were able to redeem them¬selves only via the established sacred channel—the Roman Catholic Church." Neveu glanced at Langdon, and he gave her a nod of concurrence.
Teabing continued: "It was all about power. Christ as Messiah was critical to the functioning of Church and state. Many scholars claim that the early Church literally stole Jesus from His original followers, hijacking His human message, shrouding it in an impenetrable cloak of divinity, and using it to expand their own power."
Teabing added: "Jesus was indeed a great and powerful man. Constantine's underhanded political maneu¬vers don't diminish the majesty of Christ's life. Nobody is saying Christ was a fraud, or denying that He walked the earth and inspired millions to better lives. All we are saying is that Constantine took advantage of Christ's substantial influence and importance. And in doing so, he shaped the face of Christianity as we know it today."
My Comments and Corrections About The Facts:
Teabing was right; Constantine’s “new Christian religion” was a fusion of religions, mostly Mithraism & Christianity. And the Council of Nicea was called to order for the purpose of establishing the date of Easter, the role of bishops, and the administration of sacraments, among other things, but not the divinity of Jesus. Only someone like Dan Brown or his wife, who did most of the research on the D.V.C., and who is a believer in the “sacred feminine” philosophies of the ancient Gnostics, would want to demean Jesus with such an asinine, easily refutable statement.
The first sentence that the Apostle John wrote in his gospel account of the life of Jesus Christ of Nazareth was: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Then a few lines down he wrote, “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory….).” The Apostle John knew that Jesus was divine. And in 2 Peter 1:16-18, the Apostle Peter concurred, by adamantly declaring: “For we have not followed cunningly devised fables (a reference to the Gnostic Gospels), when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory (heaven), This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount (the Mount of Transfiguration).”
Irenaeus also knew and taught the early Christian Church that Jesus was divine, as evidenced by what he wrote in 180 A.D.: “Jesus is Himself in His own right, beyond all men who ever lived, God, Lord, King Eternal, and the Incarnate Word…..He is the Holy Lord, the Wonderful, the Counselor, the Beautiful in Appearance, and the Mighty God.”
John, Peter, Irenaeus, and all of the true followers of Jesus knew that he was divine, yet Teabing said: “Jesus was viewed by His followers as a mortal prophet….”
The truth is: the True Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ knew that their Savior was divine over 150 years before Constantine called the Council of Nicea to order.
The Browns, like almost everyone else in the modern-day Christian and Academic World, believe that Jesus Christ of Nazareth was the God of Roman Catholicism. But the god of Catholicism was never Jesus Christ, the Son of God, it was Mithras, the Sun god; and anyone who is not afraid to learn the historical truth about Catholicism can prove it, simply by engaging in some minor research.
What the Browns do throughout the book is use dialogue between their three main characters to expose the sordid truth about the Roman Catholic Church. Then, assuming that Jesus was the Catholic Deity, they report, as true, all of the blasphemous lies that the Gnostic-Christian heretics wrote about Jesus in their Gospels. The Brown’s reasoning appears to be: a church with such an evil and sordid history, responsible for millions of deaths during the Crusades and the Inquisition, couldn’t be telling the truth about their God, Jesus. So, they concluded, the only Christians telling the truth about Jesus must have been the Gnostic-Christians, in their Gnostic Gospels.
Another little piece of truth in the Teabing’s statement is that Constantine did steal Jesus away from His followers; His true followers, not the Gnostic-Christians heretics that Dan Brown assumes are the true Christians.
One more true statement of Teabing was that Constantine “shaped the face of Christianity as we know it today.” That is most definitely true. As evident from the information above, modern Christianity did spawn from the pagan-influenced mind of Constantine, not from the true Apostles of Jesus Christ.
The D.V.C. Lies About The Gnostic-Christians And Their Lying Gnostic Gospels:
Teabing declared: "Because Con¬stantine upgraded Jesus' status almost four centuries after Jesus' death, thousands of documents already existed chronicling His life as a mor¬tal man. To rewrite the history books, Constantine knew he would need a bold stroke. From this sprang the most profound moment in Christian history. Constantine com¬missioned and financed a new Bible, which omitted those gospels that spoke of Christ's human traits and embellished those gospels that made Him godlike. The earlier gospels were outlawed, gathered up, and burned." Langdon added. "Anyone who chose the for¬bidden gospels over Constantine's version was deemed a heretic. The word ‘heretic’ derives from that moment in history. The Latin word ‘haereticus’ means 'choice.' Those who 'chose' the original history of Christ were the world's first heretics."
Teabing continued: "Fortunately for historians some of the gospels that Constantine attempted to eradicate managed to survive. The Dead Sea Scrolls were found in the 1950s hidden in a cave near Qumran in the Judean desert. And, of course, the Coptic Scrolls in 1945 at Nag Ham¬madi. In addition to telling the true Grail story, these documents speak of Christ's ministry in very human terms. Of course, the Vatican, in keeping with their tradition of misinformation, tried very hard to sup¬press the release of these scrolls. And why wouldn't they? The scrolls highlight glaring historical discrepancies and fabrications, clearly con¬firming that the modern Bible was compiled and edited by men who possessed a political agenda-to promote the divinity of the man Jesus Christ and use His influence to solidify their own power base."
My Comments About The Facts:
First of all, let’s get it right: the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947, not the 1950’s; a minor point, but we are striving to be accurate here. Next, as for Teabing's remarks that Constantine commissioned and financed a new Bible, I have already proven that Jesus commissioned John to establish which Gospels were to be included in the Bible. And the Apostle John, not Constantine, is the one who deliberately omitted the Gnostic Gospels from being part of the Holy Scriptures. Let me elaborate more on what I explained earlier: According to my research, what Constantine did was commandeer the original Bible away from the Apostolic Christian Church, and persecuted them; driving them underground. Then the Catholic scribes retranslated the original New Testament writings, rewording, relocating, and cleverly punctuating several key Scriptures so that Constantine’s Latin version of the New Testament agreed more with Roman Catholic Theology than the original Gospels and Epistles did. (Yet, even though modern Christianity still uses the Latin Vulgate version of the Scriptures, most good study Bibles today identify the Scribes’ inaccuracies so that serious Christians, who want to know the truth, will be aware of the changes.)
After Constantine had driven the smaller conservative group of Apostolic Christians underground, he then focused on driving the larger group of liberal Gnostic extremists out of Rome, and into exile. Then, at the Council of Nicea, Constantine established his new Catholic Religion; a hybrid religion that was designed to appeal to the soldiers, politicians, and large mass of common people who populated the Roman Empire in the 4th Century. His new middle-of-the road Gnostic-Christian religion, which I like to call “Mithrianity,” was so popular with the Roman people because it already included a variety of pagan beliefs, customs, and traditions that they had practiced and revered all their lives.
I will cover the Gnostic lies about Jesus and Mary Magdalene in detail in Part 2 of this study, but for now let me just say that there was no “true Grail story” told in the Gnostic Gospels found at Nag Hammadi, as Teabing declared. Again, I’ll explain all about the so-called Holy Grail in Part 2.
Although, Teabing was right when he said that, “the Vatican, in keeping with their tradition of misinformation, tried very hard to sup¬press the release of these scrolls,” his reasoning was all wrong. The Vatican didn’t want to suppress the release of the Gnostic Gospels because they showed that Constantine compiled and edited the Bible to fake Jesus’ divinity; the Vatican suppressed the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Gnostic Gospels because they revealed just how much their Gnostic-Christian Catholic Religion had borrowed from the teachings of Simon Magus and Mithraism.
The D.V.C. Truth About Christianity (Meaning Catholicism):
Langdon declared: "The vestiges of pagan religion in Christian symbology are undeniable. Egyptian sun disks became the halos of Catholic saints. Pictograms of Isis nursing her miraculously conceived son Horus became the blueprint for our modem images of the Virgin Mary nursing Baby Jesus. And virtually all the elements of the Catholic ritual-the miter, the altar, the doxology, and commun¬ion, the act of "God-eating"-were taken directly from earlier pagan mystery religions."
Teabing added. "Nothing in Christianity is original. The pre-Christian God Mithras—called the Son of God and the Light of the World—was born on December 25, died, was buried in a rock tomb, and then resurrected in three days. By the way, December 25 is also the birthday of Osiris, Adonis, and Dionysus. The newborn Krishna was presented with gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”
My Comments About The Facts:
I won’t labor on this section, since I’m running out of space for Part 1; but what Langdon and Teabing say here is basically true, but with one simple qualification: they are referring to Constantine’s Gnostic-Christianity, not True Apostolic Christianity—the is a big difference between the two.
Now there is a little bit of overlap between the customs of how the pagans worship their gods, and how the Bible tells us to worship Jesus Christ; but the similarities were not, as Dan Brown thinks, passed on from paganism to Christianity, they were stolen centuries ago from Christianity by the pagans. Let me briefly explain: All of the early pre-Christian pagan deities originated from either ancient Egypt and Babylon. When the ancient Israelites ventured down to Egypt to escape the famine, and were enslaved by the pharaoh, after Joseph died, they brought with them their Hebrew Religion. And it included all of the miraculous prophecies and events that surrounded their future Messiah who was to come to protect and grant them salvation from evil, and the evil one. The ancient religious leaders of Egypt simply inserted into the legends of their gods some of those same events that were prophesied about the Messiah God of the Hebrews.
Then in 721 B.C. the ancient Israelites were taken captive to Assyria, and in 586 B.C., the Ancient Jews were taken captive to Babylon. While they were there the same thing happened: the ancient Assyrians and Babylonians learned of those same prophecies and events prophesied about the much-heralded Hebrew and Jewish Messiah. The too simply usurped some of the fascinating legends for their pagan gods. The legends about the Mighty Hebrew God permeated throughout the ancient world of that time. That is the simple explanation of why some of the ancient pagan cultures had customs of worshipping their gods that mimic some of our Christian customs today. Contrary to the D.V.C., the pagans stole those customs from us; we didn’t steal them from the pagans.
The D.V.C. Truth About The Christian Sabbath (Saturday not Sunday):
Langdon said: “Even Christianity's weekly holy day was stolen from the pagans. Originally…..Christianity honored the Jewish Sab¬bath of Saturday, but Constantine shifted it to coincide with the pagan's veneration day of the sun…..To this day, most churchgoers attend services on Sunday morning with no idea that they are there on account of the pagan sun god's weekly tribute—Sunday."
My Comments About The Facts:
Langdon is partially correct here. It is today’s Gnostic-Christianity whose weekly holy day, Sunday, was stolen from the pagans, who worshipped the Sun god. From the 1st Century on, the true Apostolic Christian Church of Jesus Christ has always honored, and still does today, the Seventh Day Sabbath (our Saturday). Actually the Seventh Day Sabbath has been God’s Holy Sabbath since Creation. Notice I said “God’s Holy Sabbath,” not the Jewish Sabbath, as Langdon referred to it. We know this because the Bible tells us, who established the seventh day Sabbath in Genesis 2:3: “God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” In other words, the God of the Old Testament established the seventh day as His Holy Sabbath Day 2000 years before the Jews even existed.
The Apostle John, in the first chapter of his Gospel, told us that the God of the Old Testament, created all things, became flesh and blood and dwelt on the Earth among men; and we all know that was Jesus Christ of Nazareth. So, according to the Bible, the God of the Old Testament, God the Son, wrote the Ten Commandments with His finger, gave them to Moses, and told Moses to tell His people to keep His Commandments as a sign between them and their God, forever. (Exodus 31:13)
Then in the New Testament, in John 14:15, Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.” Again, whose Commandments were they? Jesus said they were His Commandments. What does the 4th Commandment say? “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy…..the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God?” (Exodus 20:8-19) Knowing which day is the Lord’s Holy Day of Worship is so simple if people would just read the Bible, and believe what it said.
Langdon was also right when he said, “Constantine shifted it (the Sabbath Day) to coincide with the pagan's veneration day of the sun.” Remember I told you earlier that Constantine kept most of the beliefs of Mithraism as the main doctrines for his Catholic Religion. Well, he also kept, and introduced into that religion, the holy days of Mithraism—Sunday worship, Christmas, and Easter. Nothing has changed today, Sunday is still the holy day of the Sun god, not Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And as for Christmas, remember Mithras was the Roman version of the Sun god, and his birthday was December 25th. Most all “Christian scholars” know that.
Also, what do rabbits and eggs have to do with worshipping the Son of God. The answer of course, is nothing; but they have plenty to do with the worship of the pagan Sun god, and his mother, the fertility goddess, who was called Ishtar (Easter).
By the way, you can read all about this in the Encyclopedia Britannica if you want to know the truth about how much paganism has heavenly influenced Roman Catholicism. The author of the Da Vinci Code knows all this, and has now made it common knowledge through his book. Yet, most of the lay people of the modern Christian world are still unaware of the true history of the Roman Catholic Church; but they won’t be after reading the D. V. C. That’s why the Catholic Church is so upset with Dan Brown, and has fought so hard to refute his book, and keep the movie from being released. They don’t want their pagan background to become common knowledge.
The Conclusion of Part 1
Dan Brown wrote in his book, that “almost everything our fathers taught us about Jesus is wrong.” The Da Vinci Code does contain several factual revelations about Constantine and His Roman Catholic Church that the Papacy had hoped to keep secret, and hidden from the world. I have almost no problem with what the D.V.C. reveals about Constantine and the Catholic Church because most of it is true; but, what I and all who are striving to follow Jesus Christ, have against the D.V.C. is that it also contains plenty of blasphemous fiction about our Savior that Dan Brown has taken directly from the Gnostic Gospels, claiming that his research was based on facts.
Take it from me, the Gnostic Gospels are about as factual as little children’s nursery rhymes. They are not much more than nursery rhymes for adults, gullible adults. That’s why I am so amazed that highly educated men like Dan Brown, Bart D. Ehrman, and the men and women of the Jesus Seminar have been so gullibly taken in over the years by the Gnostic lies, lies which Irenaeus revealed were deliberately invented to confuse men like them and their cohorts. Do you think old Satan just might have a hand in their being so blind to the truth about Jesus and His Church?
I have some advice for all of you who will read or see “The Da Vinci Code:” understand and, keep in mind, about 95% of what the book says about Constantine and the Roman Catholic Church is true, and about 95% of what it says about Jesus is false!
Brown also asserts in his book that, “when you finish the book—like it or not—you’ve learned a ton” (He means about Jesus and Christianity). A man named Josh Billings once wrote: “The problem with Christianity is not so much what we know, but that we know so much that ain’t so.” It is this problem that Dan Brown struggles with throughout his book; because there is so much about Christianity that he knows “that ain’t so. He falsely assumes the Roman Catholic Church, with all of its evil history of the Crusades, the Inquisition and the Witch Hunts, could not be the Church of a loving, benevolent man like the Jesus Christ of the Bible, so he concludes that the Catholic Church must be the heresy church, and the alternate version of Christianity revealed in the Gnostic Gospels must be real Christianity.
“ The Da Vinci Code’s” claims that the Roman Catholic Church knew about, and deliberately covered-up the fact that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a child; and that the Holy bloodline of Jesus and Mary was the real meaning of the term “Holy Grail.” Dan Brown states that this is the greatest cover-up in the history of the world.
But that‘s not the mother of all conspiracies and cover-ups, let me tell you what is; and, unlike the unsubstantiated claims of the Da Vinci Code, you can prove this. In the second century, the Gnostic-Christian group that later evolved into the Roman Catholic Church usurped the name “Christian”, and falsely began to call itself the true Apostolic Christian Church of Jesus Christ. Consequently, since the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D., Jesus Christ and His Disciples have been credited with, and held accountable for, all of the evil sins that the Catholic Church has perpetrated against humanity for nearly 2000 years—that is the greatest conspiracy and cover-up in history, not the ridiculous plot of the Da Vinci Code.
Don’t miss Part 2 of this study, where we will discover in depth, “The Truth and Lies, in ‘The Da Vinci Code,’ About Jesus, Mary Magdalene, Joseph of Arimathea, and the Holy Grail.
