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THE TRUTH AND LIES IN ‘THE DA VINCI CODE’ ABOUT JESUS,
MARY MAGDALENE, JOSEPH OF ARIMATHEA, AND THE HOLY GRAIL
PART 2:
(Copyright 2006 by Congregation of God, 7th. Day; used here by permission)

Introduction

Since I wrote Part 1 of this critique of the “The Da Vinci Code” book, the movie version of Dan Brown’s world-famous novel has debuted all over the world, as the second largest worldwide release of a movie, behind only George Lucas’ sci-fi blockbuster sequel, “Star Wars III.”  Much to the delight of Sony Pictures, the movie version of the “Code” garnered some $224 million worldwide in its first weekend. The following Monday morning, Jeff Blake, vice chairman of Sony Pictures, said, “This is a fantastically great surprise for us this morning.”  He then announced that the movie’s phenomenal opening success was very good news for the studio, which had been struggling of late and was heavily counting on “The Da Vinci Code” to boost its fortunes.

Obviously Sony Pictures produced “The Da Vinci Code” to make a profit.  They didn’t care that their movie was based on a book that slandered and viciously attacked Jesus Christ, His Church, and His Word. Sony’s agenda, like most large companies in America and the world today, is one thing—make money; no matter what has to be done, or who has to be deprecated. Western Capitalist’s business ethics have greatly degenerated over the last fifty years; so much so that it is getting harder every day to distinguish the tenets of Capitalism from those of Communism. In fact, modern Capitalism’s “Board of Directors” now seems to operate under the same philosophy as the old Communist Party’s “Politburo” did—“The Ends Justify The Means.”

And in the case of “The Da Vinci Code”, it didn’t matter to Sony that they dishonored the Son of Almighty God in their movie, just as long as they made a profit doing it.  In other words, Sony’s “Ends” (showing a profit) justified their “Means” (slandering Jesus.)

Defaming Jesus for profit is nothing new in the modern literary world either. For the past 25 years, the members of the Anti-Jesus Seminar (as I refer to them) have been cashing in on their production of numerous books bashing Jesus and His Gospel Message.  Just a few of their many heretical works include: “The Five Gospels: What Did Jesus Really Say?”; “The Acts of Jesus: What Did Jesus Really Do?”; “Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography”; “The God We Never Knew”; and “Jesus: A New Vision”.  All you have to do is just read the titles of their books to recognize the theme of the Jesus Seminar’s arrogant approach to analyzing the Scriptures —“We know secrets about Jesus that you don’t,” therefore our presumptions about Jesus are justified.”

You might wonder, as I once did, where the members of the Jesus Seminar received their supposed “secret knowledge” about Jesus, and what ever prompted them write and publish so many derogatory books about Christ?  I’ll tell you.  The “secrets” about Jesus that they think they possess came from the same source that inspired Dan Brown to write “The Da Vinci Code,”—the Gnostic Gospels.

     The counterfeit Gnostic Gospels were discovered in Nag Hammadi, Egypt in 1945.  They were translated into English in 1977 by James M. Robinson.  Since then modern secular and liberal Christian scholars, who always doubted the veracity of Catholicism’s Jesus, have used the recently translated Gnostic Gospels as their authority for attacking the real Jesus and His Church.

     Today it is even in vogue to accept the alternative, heretical versions of the life and teachings of Jesus found in the Gnostic Gospels, instead of what Jesus’ true Disciples recorded for us in the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.  Not only is it fashionable today to spin the blasphemous lies of the Gnostic Gospels into books attacking Jesus and Christianity, it is also very profitable; as seen in the case of Dan Brown and “The Da Vinci Code.”

     Seeing the lucrative success that Brown achieved with his book slandering Jesus has prompted many other profit-seekers to jump on the “bash Jesus for cash” bandwagon.  Their names aren’t important because what they believe is irrelevant to the Gospel Truth about Jesus, but their books exemplify some of the lies about Christ that the Gnostics have been propagating since the Apostle John died in approximately 100 A.D. (To correct a typo-error on page 21 of Part 1: The Gnostic Gospels were written after 100 A.D., not 300 A.D.)

I mentioned above that the Gnostic Gospels were translated into English in 1977.  The scholars who translated those writings were amazed at how much of what was written about Jesus in the Gnostic Gospels was already exposed as “damnable lies” by Irenaeus in the 2nd Century, through his 5-volume work, “Against Heresies.”

What amazes me is how so many of today’s supposedly Biblically literate “Christian” scholars have been so totally duped by Satan’s Gnostic Gospels. Many of them gullibly accepted the Gnostic lies as the truth, and decided to compose books that directly reject or revise the Biblical accounts of Jesus.  But what amazes me most is they do this, even though Irenaeus (John’s disciple through Polycarp) spent his whole life preaching and writing volumes to warn them not to fall prey to such lying Gospels.  In his writings, Irenaeus told all of us what the Gnostic lies were, who wrote them, and why we should avoid them at all cost.  Yet so many “great minds of Christendom” have been completely duped into believing they hold some truth about Jesus (as Irenaeus feared they would).

     Since several of these Gnostic-inspired books, in addition to the “The Da Vinci Code, have made it to the New York Time’s best-seller list, I want to mention them, because some of them could also possibly be made into a popular anti-Jesus movie in the near future: first, “The Jesus Papers” (Jesus survived His Crucifixion); second, “The Gospel of Judas” and “The Lost Gospel” (Judas betrayal was a collaboration with Jesus); next, “The Jesus Dynasty” (John the Baptist was a twin Messiah); and last, “Misquoting Jesus” (Jesus words have been grossly misinterpreted in the Bible).

In the age of True Apostolic Christianity, men like Dan Brown and the authors of the books mentioned above, who composed lying interpretations of Jesus life and teachings, were recognized and shunned as the worst kind of heretic, by real Christians like Irenaeus.  Today they get lucrative book deals, and if Satan smiles of them, possibly a movie contract, like Dan Brown, to make them rich.

     Now let’s get back to the reason I wrote this study: To expose the lies, and reveal the truth written in the “The Da Vinci Code,” about Jesus and His Church.  But before I continue, I want to point out that there are several other secondary mysteries in “The Da Vinci Code” that I will not be concerned with at this time. 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 Christian Church. I have omitted any references to the book’s claims about Opus Dei, the Priory of Sion, and the Vatican’s involvement with 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 Church.

One such Da Vinci painting was “The Last Supper,” his second most famous, behind, “The Mona Lisa.”  Let’s resume our study where Sir Leigh Teabing is telling Sophie Neveu about this famous mural that Da Vinci painted for his patron Duke Lodovico Sforza, on the north wall of the dining hall of the Santa Maria delle Grazie Convent in Milan, Italy.

     In The Book: The “Last Supper” Reveals that Mary Magdalene is the “Holy Grail”:
Teabing declared:  “This fresco (Da Vinci’s ‘The Last Supper’) is the entire key to the Holy Grail mystery.”
Neveu asked:  “Does this fresco tell us what the Grail really is?”
Teabing continued:  “Not what it is, but rather who it is. The Holy Grail is not a thing. It is, in fact…..a person.”
Neveu remarked: "The Holy Grail is a person?"
Langdon concurred:  "A woman, in fact."
Neveu said:  “I’m lost.”
Langdon explained:  “As it turns out, the Holy Grail does indeed make an appearance in ‘The Last Supper’.  Leonardo included her prominently.”
Neveu continued:  “Hold on, you told me the Holy Grail is a woman. ‘The Last Supper’ is a painting of thirteen men.”
Teabing added, “It is? Take a closer look.”
Neveu said: “They’re all men.”
Teabing remarked: “Oh?  How about the one seated in the place of honor, at the right hand of the Lord?”
Neveu exclaimed: “That’s a woman!…..Who is she?”
The author added as an aside comment: “This is the woman who single-handedly could crumble the Church.”
Teabing replied: “That, me dear, is Mary Magdalene.”
Neveu asked:  “The prostitute?”
Teabing proclaimed:  “Magdalene was no such thing. That unfortunate misconception is the legacy of a smear campaign launched by the early Church. The Church needed to defame Mary Magdalene in order to cover up her dangerous secret—her role as the Holy Grail.”
Teabing continued:  “As I mentioned, the early Church needed to convince the world that the mortal prophet Jesus was a divine being. Therefore, any gospels that described earthly aspects of Jesus’ life had to be omitted from the Bible. Unfortunately for the early editors, one particularly troubling earthly theme kept recurring in the gospels—Mary Magdalene; more specifically, her marriage to Jesus Christ.”
Neveu remarked:  “I beg your pardon?”
Teabing added:  “It is a matter of historical record, and Da Vinci was certainly aware of that fact.”

My Rebuttal:

First of all, as we know, Leonardo Da Vinci painted the famous mural, “The Last Supper.” The painting is based on John 13:21, where Jesus announced that one of His 12 Apostles would betray Him. According to Teabing and Langdon, the fact that Da Vinci did not include a chalice in his painting, and did include a young effeminate looking character sitting on Jesus’ right side, reveals that Da Vinci was trying to tell the world, via a “secret code,” that the Holy Grail was the womb of Mary Magdalene and not the chalice, as legend states.

     Now the legend of the Holy Grail seems to have originated around 717 A.D., when a hermit supposedly had a vision that the cup, or chalice, that Jesus and His Apostles drank wine from at “The Last Supper” yielded some sort of magical power. The legend continued to grow, until several Grail romances, as they were called, came into existence between the years of 1180-1240 A.D. The most popular by far was the one where Joseph of Arimathea was supposed to have take possession of the chalice, from the Lord’s Supper, and used it to capture some of Jesus’ blood as He was taken down from the stake. Then Joseph brought the chalice with him to Glastonbury, England, when he was expelled from Jerusalem by the Pharisees.

Now, about this same time, the time of the Crusades and the Medieval Inquisition, it appears that an obscure legend was concocted by Medieval Gnostics, who worshipped the “Sacred Feminine Mystique” (Goddess Worship).  And it seems that the Gnostics figured since the Roman Catholic Church, their arch enemy, had already usurped and venerated Jesus and His mother, Mary, as their gods, they (the Gnostics) would develop their legends around John the Baptist and Mary Magdalene, and venerate them as their objects of worship. After the thirteenth century nothing new was added to the Grail legends.

It is an offshoot of this obscure Gnostic Grail legend, possibly generated by the mysterious Knights Templar, and the legends that surround Joseph of Arimethea, that seems to be behind “The Da Vinci Code’s” premise that Mary Magdalene was married to Jesus, and came to Marseilles, France to have His child, and establish the Christian Church in Europe (more detail to come).

There is one thing you have to keep in mind when viewing the works of Leonardo Da Vinci, he was not a Christian by any stretch of the imagination. In fact he seemed to loathe the priesthood and the Papacy.  He once remarked that the Catholic priests: "produce many words, receive much wealth, and promise paradise." He also believed that they commercially exploited Christians by duping them into buying “holy relics,” such as the bones of martyred saints, slivers of wood from the cross, holy dirt from Jerusalem.

     Also as a scientist, he wasn’t very fond of the Papacy either. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Popes were constantly monitoring the work and discovery of every form of science. When the Papal authorities found something in science that they thought might contradict one of their doctrines, they would excommunicate, and imprison that scientist and destroy his work. Based on his writings, the "God" that Leonardo Da Vinci embraced seems to have been a kind of glorification of the power, wonder, and beauty of nature.

     Da Vinci didn’t paint the “Last Supper” to portray to Christians an accurate picture of what the scene at the Lord’s Supper looked like; he created it to express his Gnostic-influenced mystical beliefs, which he embraced when he lost faith in the Catholic Church. It is very possible that Da Vinci deliberately painted Mary Magdalene in place of the Apostle John, in the Last Supper, and left out the chalice, to express his belief in the Gnostic Grail legends.  Although he denied it, fearing a reprisal from the Catholic Church. He always publicly maintained that the figure he painted at Jesus’ right, in the “Last Supper,” was the Apostle John.  But on the other hand, if it is not John, where is he? Under the table? Because according to the Bible, John was definitely there.  We will never know for sure what Da Vinci’s motives were in painting this mural in the manner he did. All we can do is speculate, like Dan Brown did in “The Da Vinci Code.”
As I mentioned, the Medieval Gnostics venerated Mary Magdalene as their object of Goddess Worship.  Contrary to what Teabing said above, the Catholic Church didn’t launch a smear campaign against Mary Magdalene to cover up the fact that she was married to Jesus, and that her womb contained His seed, the Holy Grail (Jesus’ Holy Bloodline). If the Catholics defamed Mary Magdalene at all, it was because they feared that she might someday replace “Mother Mary” as the Goddess figure in their “Holy Trinity” doctrine.
Next, let’s analyze, in the light of Scripture, the unsubstantiated accusation in the D.V.C. that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene.

In The Book:  The Gnostic Gospels Reveal that Jesus was Married to Mary Magdalene:

Teabing declared:  "As I said ear¬lier, the marriage of Jesus and Mary Magdalene is part of the historical record."  “He began pawing through his book collection.  Teabing located a huge book and pulled it toward him across the table…..The cover read: ‘The Gnostic Gospels.’”
Teabing then announced: "These are photocopies of the Nag Hammadi and Dead Sea scrolls, which I mentioned earlier…..The earliest Christian records. Troublingly, they do not match up with the gospels in the Bible.”  Flipping toward the middle of the book, Teabing pointed to a passage. "The Gospel of Philip is always a good place to start."
Neveu read the passage:

“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?"

Teabing continued, "I shan't bore you with the count¬less references to Jesus and Magdalene's union. That has been explored ad nauseam by modern historians. I would, however, like to point out the following." He motioned to another passage. "This is from the Gospel of Mary Magdalene."
Neveu read the text:

“And Peter said, "Did the Saviour really speak with a woman with¬out our knowledge? Are we to turn about and all listen to her? Did he prefer her to us?"
And Levi answered, "Peter, you have always been hot-tempered. Now I see you contending against the woman like an adversary. If the Saviour made her worthy, who are you indeed to reject her? Surely the Saviour knows her very well. That is why he loved her more than us."

Teabing explained, "The woman they are speaking of is Mary
Magdalene. Peter is jealous of her."
Neveu asked, "Because Jesus preferred Mary?"
Teabing answered, "Not only that. The stakes were far greater than mere affection. At this point in the gospels, Jesus suspects He will soon be captured and crucified. So He gives Mary Magdalene instructions on how to carry on His Church after He is gone. As a result, Peter expresses his discontent over playing second fiddle to a woman."
Sophie was trying to keep up. "This is Saint Peter. The rock on which
Jesus built His Church."
Teabing replied, "The same, except for one catch. According to these unaltered gospels, it was not Peter to whom Christ gave directions with which to establish the Christian Church. It was Mary Magdalene."
Sophie asked, "You're saying the Christian Church was to be carried on by a woman?"
Teabing announced, "That was the plan…. He intended for the future of His Church to be in the hands of Mary Magdalene.”

My Rebuttal:

The historical record that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married, spoken of by Teabing, was nothing more than a few obscure, incomplete statements made in two of the Gnostic Gospels, “The Gospel of Philip” and “The Gospel of Mary Magdalene.”
One of those statements is in a passage found in the pseudo “Gospel of Philip,” shown above. The sentence reads that Jesus “used to kiss her (Mary) often on her mouth.” The truth is where Jesus used to kiss her is missing from the manuscript. He could have kissed her on her mouth, cheek, forehead, or whatever, we’ll never know.  The statement probably refers to what the Bible calls, in Romans 16:16, a “holy kiss,” if it even happened at all. Even Karen King, an associate of the Jesus Seminar, and Professor at Harvard Divinity School, observes that this kiss is probably referring to a holy kiss that was asexual in nature.

The other statements mentioned were in a passage found in the “Gospel of Mary Magdalene,” which is also shown above. In it, Saint Peter asked Levi (Saint Matthew), “Are we to turn about and all listen to her (Mary)? Did he (Jesus) prefer her to us.” Then St. Matthew answered, “Surely the Saviour knows her very well. That is why he loved her more than us.”

     Even though none of the Gnostic Gospels say that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, people like Dan Brown use the two references cited above to fool people into believing that Jesus and Mary were married. That is why I mentioned them. But really they prove nothing at all.  The reason these passages from the Gnostic Gospels are useless for proving anything about Jesus is because they were written by disciples of the infamous Gnostic Teacher Valentinus, who were notorious for conjuring up, and writing lying gospels about Christ, His Apostles, and His Church.

     You might wonder how I can be so confident that the “Gospel of Philip,” and the “Gospel of Mary Magdalene” are fictitious gospels with no real merit. The answer is simple, because I know that Irenaeus was a true Christian follower of the Apostle John, who, as I mentioned earlier, wrote an extensive, 5-volume expose’ (“Against Heresies”) vehemently warning the Apostolic Christian Church what the Gnostic Valentinus and his disciples were up to. He warning was as follows:

     “But those who are from Valentinus who, being altogether reckless in putting forth their own compositions, boast that they possess more Gospels than there really are. Indeed, they have arrived at such a pitch of audacity as to entitle their comparatively recent writing,
"The Gospel of Truth, " although it finds no agreement with the Gospels of the Apostles. They in fact have no gospel which is not full of blasphemy. If what they have published is the Gospel of Truth, it is still totally unlike those, which have been handed down to us from the apostles. . . (“Against Heresies,” 3.11.9) (Emphasis Mine)

     From a lifetime of personal research and experience, Irenaeus became and expert in critiquing how and why Gnostic heretics, like Valentinus and his followers, constructed their false gospels about Jesus:
“They gather their views from other sources than the Scriptures; and, to use a common proverb, they strive to weave ropes of sand, while they endeavor to adapt with an air of probability to their own peculiar assertions the parables of the Lord, the sayings of the prophets, and the words of the apostles, in order that their scheme may not seem altogether without support. In doing so, however, they disregard the order and the connection of the Scriptures, and so far as in them lies, dismember and destroy the truth. By transferring passages, and dressing them up anew, and making one thing out of another, they succeed in deluding many through their wicked art in adapting the oracles of the Lord to their opinions.” (Against Heresies 1.8.1) (Emphasis Mine).

     These two lame passages in the Gnostic Gospels of Philip and Mary Magdalene are the “historical record” and “countless references” that Teabing referred to above; there are no others that I am aware of. The entire “Da Vinci Code” novel and movie are both predicated on the assumption that they give accurate and trustworthy accounts of Jesus life and teachings. But Irenaeus, an impeccable Christian apologist, has just warned us from the past, that the Gnostic Gospels of Philip and Mary are worthless as credible sources. Knowing that you have to ask, “What does that do to the premise and credibility of ‘The Da Vinci Code?’” The answer of course is, it destroys it.

     Jesus knew, of course, that the Gnostic attack on His Gospel Message, which began in His day with Simon Magus, would re-emerge to again deceive the whole world, here in the 21st Century.  So, through the teachings and writings of Irenaeus Jesus warns Christians today, those with “an ear to hear,” the way He warned His Apostolic Church back then.

     Jesus called the Gnostic heretics of His day “wolves in sheep’s clothing,” but He let Irenaeus and his disciples name them for us. Next to Simon Magus, Irenaeus warned that Valentinus was the most diabolical and influential Gnostic heretic.  He knew, without a doubt, that Valentinus and his followers wrote the Gnostic Gospels.  And thanks to him, we, unlike Dan Brown and his colleagues, know that their “false gospels” are packed full of lies, and are not to be trusted.

With this in mind, we can also know that the additional hoopla and rantings of Teabing above, that Jesus appointed Mary Magdalene to establish and supervise His Church, are totally inconsequential; because they too are based on the Gnostic Gospels. Also wrong is Neveu’s statement that Saint Peter was the “rock” on which Jesus built His Church. I have proven the fallacies of that statement in previous articles, and I’ll leave discussing if again for another day.

Now we know that we can’t depend on the Gnostic Gospels to tell us the truth about whether or not Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene; so lets forget them, and let’s prove from the Bible that Jesus could not have been married to Mary Magdalene, nor was He her ever her lover.

First of all, the God of the Old Testament is married to ancient Israel. In Jeremiah 3:8, Israel plays the harlot with her pagan neighbor kingdoms and God (the Son) gave her a “bill of divorce” because of her adultery. To get a divorce, you have to be married.  Then since Israel was no longer married to him, and under his protection, He allowed the ancient Assyrians to come in and carry her away into captivity, never to be a nation again.

     As we know, God the Son (Jesus) was the God of the Old Testament. He was already married to Israel many centuries before He became the human Son of God in the New Testament.  He was married to His people, or you could say, His Church, way back then.
Second, in Revelation 19:7, we read that “the marriage of the Lamb (Jesus) is come and his wife (the Church) hath made herself ready.” Jesus was betrothed throughout the New Testament to His Church.  He would not break His own 7th Commandment to commit adultery with Mary Magdalene.

T      hird, in John 20:16, after Jesus had risen from the tomb, Mary Magdalene was the first one to see him. Supposing Him to be the gardener, she asked him he had taken Jesus. Then Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She replied, “Master.” Now if Mary Magdalene had been married to Jesus, Who had just risen from the dead, don’t you think she would have responded more personally, and lunged forward to embrace Him? At the very least you would think if they were married she would have addressed him as “my husband,” or “my darling,” instead of “master”?

     Now, for absolute proof the Jesus was not married to Mary Magdalene, or any other woman, consider this.  Jesus was not only the God of the New Testament He was the God of the Old Testament too. And in Exodus 12 He established the ceremony of the Passover, where the “blood of the lamb” rescued Israel (God’s People) from the bondage of Egypt (which denotes sin in the Bible.)
You will recall in Exodus 12 that God (the Son) told Moses to command the Israelites to take the blood of a certain lamb, and “strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post” of their house, and then eat the Passover meal of lamb and bitter herbs.  After the meal they were to remain inside their house until Moses said otherwise. That special lamb that was sacrificed was to be one “without blemish” (sinless) and “a male of the first year” (a virgin).

     In John 1:29, when Jesus approached John the Baptist to be baptized, John announced to the whole world, that Jesus was,  “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” In 1 Peter 1:19, and 1 Corinthians 5:7, St. Peter and St. Paul also acknowledged that Jesus Christ of Nazareth was “the Lamb of God,” who was to be sacrificed as an atonement of sin.

     For the blood of the New Testament Lamb (Jesus) to deliver us from sin, like the blood of the Old Testament lamb delivered Israel out of Egypt, Jesus had to take the place, in every way, of the Passover lamb of Exodus 12. He had to be singled out for the Passover sacrifice on the 10th day of the first month, which he was, He had to be killed on the 14th of the first month, which he was, and His Blood had to be shed to deliver modern-day Israel (us) from Egypt (sin), as it was.

Then to complete His mission, and initiate the New Covenant, Jesus established (through St. Paul) the Lord’s Supper; where, after we are baptized, we ceremonially ingest the Body and Blood of our Savior, and perform the Foot-washing Service, to annually cleanse us from the sins of the past year. Had Jesus not been a sinless virgin, none of that would have happened; but it did, and I thank God every day that Jesus had the moral character, unlike most of us, to withstand Satan’s temptations and became that Virgin Lamb of God.  Therefore we know for sure that Jesus Christ was not the husband or lover of Mary Magdalene.

In The Book:  Some Lies and Truth About Joseph of Arimathea, Mary Magdalene, and Sarah:

Then Teabing continued, "Mary Magdalene was pregnant at the time of the crucifixion. For the safety of Christ's un¬born child, she had no choice but to flee the Holy Land. With the help of Jesus' trusted uncle, Joseph of Arimathea, Mary Magdalene secretly traveled to France, then known as Gaul. There she found safe refuge in the Jewish community. It was here in France that she gave birth to a daughter. Her name was Sarah."

Neveu glanced up. "They actually know the child's name?"
Teabing adds, "Far more than that. Magdalene's and Sarah's lives were scrutinously chronicled by their Jewish protectors. Remember that Magdalene's child belonged to the lineage of Jewish kings-David and Solomon. For this reason, the Jews in France considered Magdalene sacred royalty and revered her as the progenitor of the royal line of kings. Countless scholars of that era chronicled Mary Magdalene's days in France, in¬cluding the birth of Sarah and the subsequent family tree."

My Rebuttal:

     Okay, let me see if I can unravel the pack of lies and misinformation that Dan Brown has woven into the two paragraphs above.
First of all, we have already proven that Jesus was not married to Mary Magdalene. So if they were not married, and they were not lovers, as we also proved, then Mary Magdalene was not pregnant with Jesus’ daughter. That brings up another question: where did Dan Brown get the name of Sarah for Jesus and Mary’s daughter?  And if Mary wasn’t pregnant with Sarah, then she didn’t flee the Holy Land “for the safety of Christ’s unborn child,” like Teabing said.

     Another question arises: where did Brown get the idea that Joseph of Arimathea was Jesus’ uncle?  And why did he write that Mary Magdalene traveled to France with Joseph of Arimathea?  Also, there is no record in French history where “countless scholars of the era” chronicled “the birth of Sarah and the subsequent family tree” of Jesus, Mary, and Sarah. All of that, spoken by Teabing, is nothing but pure fabrication.

     As I said most of what is written above is a pack of lies and misinformation, but not all of it. There are a couple of things that appear to be true. Joseph of Arimathea was indeed Jesus’ uncle (mother Mary’s father’s younger brother).  And Mary Magdalene did travel to France with Joseph of Arimathea, where she did find safe refuge. But that’s it. The rest is pure fiction, intertwined with a couple of truths.
So where did those two bits of truth come from? I’ll tell you. They came from two ancient sources, one written during the Middle Ages, and the other during the Renaissance Era. Both were based on a couple of even more ancient documents; written early in the Christian era. In these two documents, there are two different scenarios surrounding Mary Magdalene after the Crucifixion.

     The two documents tend to agree on the following: Soon after the Ascension of Christ, the Sanhedrin began a great persecution of Jesus’ followers throughout Jerusalem, and the surrounding areas. In John 12:10, the Bible reports that the chief priests gathered together, and were determined to put Lazarus, and probably his whole family, to death.

     They were also planning to get rid of everyone who could, and potentially would, testify that Jesus was the Son of God.  As the story goes, the Jewish Sanhedrin gathered together all of the loyal family, friends and followers of Christ. Then they put them into a small boat, and cast them adrift on the Mediterranean Sea, off the coast of Caesarea. Without sails or oars, the small party drifted with the wind and the currents arriving unharmed at Cyrene, in northern Africa. After obtaining sails and oars, the little party of castaways left Cyrene, following the trade route of the Phoenician merchant ships, until they arrived at Marseilles, France.  Joseph of Arimathea, with Mother Mary, and eleven companions, is reported to have traveled on to Cornwall, England; where he owned tin mines in the nearby Mendip Hills. There is a lot more about Joseph in early British Christian history, but for now I want to return to Marseilles, France and who remained there.

     One of the stories as to who was in the boat with Joseph of Arimathea, is as follows: Mother Mary, Lazarus, his sisters Mary and Martha of Bethany, their handmaid Marcella, Mary Magdalene, Mary, wife of Cleopas, Mary Salome, wife of Zebedee, and their colored handmaid, Sarah, plus several of the young men that Jesus had healed during His ministry. So now you see where the name of Sarah came from. And she was not the daughter of Jesus and Mary Magdalene.

     The other scenario was the same except there was a different story concerning Mary Magdalene. In this report, she was the same Mary who was Lazarus’s sister, Mary of Bethany.  Lazarus and his sisters were very good friends of Jesus, and that’s the relationship that Jesus had with Mary, they were just very good friends.  As the story goes, Mary of Bethany got the name of Mary Magdalene because the Bethany family was fairly well-to-do; and they owned another home in the town of Magdala, on the shore of the Sea of Galilee.  Supposedly from time to time, the family would leave Bethany and spend the summers in Magdala, on the Sea of Galilee.

     Before Jesus began His ministry, Mary left the home in Bethany and went to Magdala to live, where she could be away from the dominating influence of her sister, Martha. Soon she alienated herself from God and started living a sinful life. A little while later she became known as Mary of Magdala.  She reportedly became demon-possessed until that fateful day when she met Jesus, probably at the request of Lazarus, and He set her free from her demons and she returned to her family. So according to this story, Mary of Bethany and Mary Magdalene were the same person. All of the evidence that I have seen seems to corroborate this version of the legend.
There are numerous historical stories throughout France about Bishop Lazarus and his sister disciples Mary and Martha, establishing and nurturing the early Christian churches in France.

     There are also many legends in Britain about Joseph of Arimathea, Mother Mary, and Jesus, who all reportedly lived there at different periods of the 1st Century. But we shall save that study for another time.

The Conclusion

     As soon as I discovered the Gnostic Gospels 15 years ago, I knew that Satan was going to use them to mount a successful assault on Christianity some day. I just didn't know it was going to be this big, this soon. It's almost scary the supernatural way "The Da Vinci Code" has captivated the secular and religious world in such a short period of time. It just shows what kind of power Satan really has over this world.

     Appropriately, in the 1st Century the Apostle Paul warned his student Timothy, “For the time will come when men (and women) will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead…..They will turn their ears away for the truth and turn aside to myths.”  As we have seen, by the ever-increasing popularity of the Gnostic Gospels, and the phenomenal success of “The Da Vinci Code” book and movie, that time is now!

     The producers of the D.V.C. movie claimed that their film had followed the book about 98% of the time. That 2% that the Roman Catholic Church was able to get them to cut was, in my opinion, the two most damaging true accusations against the Catholic Church in the book. They omitted the statements that Langdon made about the True Christians keeping the seventh day Sabbath holy up until the time that Emperor Constantine, when he changed the Sabbath Day from the seventh day (Saturday) to Sunday, the pagan’s veneration day of the sun-god. And they also omitted Teabing’s comment about how much modern Christianity has borrowed from the rituals and traditions associated with the pre-Christian Roman god Mithras. These two important facts have also been conveniently left out of every “Da Vinci Code” debunking book and documentary that every Catholic and Protestant critic of the book and movie has produced. For those of you who don’t recognize it, that is a prime example of a conspiracy!

     “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, let me tell you what is.  In the second century, the Gnostic-Christian followers of Simon Magus usurped the name “Christian” from the real Apostolic Christian Church. They later evolved into the Roman Catholic Church.  And in 325 A.D., when Constantine officially embraced their pseudo Christian beliefs, they deceivingly began to call themselves the true Apostolic Christian Church of Jesus Christ. Every since then, Christ and His Church has been credited with, and held accountable for, every evil act the Catholic Church has perpetrated against mankind—i.e. the Crusades, the Inquisitions, the Witch Hunts, etc.  Also, in the name of Christianity, the Papacy embraced the pagan rituals and traditions of Easter and Christmas, and caused the world to lose sight of God’s True Holy Days, which reveal His Magnificent Plan for Humanity. That, my friends, is the greatest conspiracy our world has ever known, not the ridiculous plot of “The Da Vinci Code.”

In the above study we proved, among other things, that Jesus Christ was not married to Mary Magdalene, nor did he father a daughter with her.  Knowing this simple truth we can proclaim with authority that there is no truth to “The Da Vinci Code’s” mysterious hype concerning “The Priory of Sion,” “The Les Dossiers Secrets,” “Roslyn Chapel,” “Opus Dei,” or “The Holy Grail.”  In other words, the entire premise of the Jesus-slandering “Da Vinci Code” book and movie completely crumbles under the weight of the Truth—that Jesus Christ of Nazareth was (and still is) the sinless Son of Almighty God.  And because of His impeccable character, Jesus was able to take our sins upon Himself, nailing them to the stake, so that we who obey and follow Him might not perish, but have everlasting life, with Him and our Father in Their Kingdom, on this Earth. To that I simply say, Amen. And thank You Father for sending Your Son to save us.