Thoughts On The Da Vinci Code

I'm reading now The Da Vinci Code (and strangely enough, so is my mother-in-law) and liking it a lot. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's 100%, but as fluff goes, it's not that horrible.

I find incredibly funny that so many Christians have had their feathers ruffled by this work of fiction. Of course, as much a work of fiction as it may be, there are some truths in there, and that's what has people scrambling.

I'm not naive enough to take everything presented in the book as fact: I can do my own research, thank you very much. However, I am not naive enough to think that for the last 2000 years everyone in the church has been 100% honest and telling the whole truth. Ridiculous! If you truly believe that you are either possessed of an unearthly faith (and thus should be removed from this plane of reality) or incredibly stupid.

Thing is, none of the so-called great secrets revealed in the book are new to me. I have either read them before in a variety of sources, or have come up with similar ones myself. And for the record, yes, I do believe (and have believed for more than 2 years now, before the novel was published) that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. In fact, I go so far as to say that the "Beloved Disciple" of the gospel of John is indeed Mary Magdalene. You figure it out.

Is the book biased? Of course, it is a work of fiction by a man who holds a particular set of beliefs. Is everything in the book accurate? Nope, you go look it up and find out for yourself; don't get your history from a novel (or a movie, for that matter, even if it claims to be the authoritative vision of the passion of Jesus). Are some of these theories real? Absolutely, many are documented going back centuries. Do they tell the truth? Who the hell knows. Only God knows the truth of the matter--the Truth, if you will; we humans must make due with history, what we know, and what we unearth in our constant search for an understanding of our world. But do me a favor, don't let anyone tell you what is true or not, in this book or anywhere else. Go find out for yourself.

And remember, that just as the author had a bias, so does every single book being published right now claiming to crack, explain or debunk the Da Vinci Code: notice the majority are being published by Christian writers who cannot stand even the suggestion of such an idea as Jesus' humanity and all that entails.

For now I'll keep reading. I look forward to seeing how much of it is old news to me, and feel really good about it.

-- Highmoon
Clamouring for people to think for themselves!