WELCOME TO THE PASTOR’S FORUM The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

Main Characters Robert Langdon, Professor of Religious Symbology, Harvard University Jacques Sauniere, murdered museum curator at the Louvre, Grand Master of the Priory of Sion, sworn protectors of the Holy Grail. Sophie Neveu, agent of the Department of Crypto-graphy, a branch of the French state police Sir Leigh Teabing, wealthy grail researcher, British Royal Historian affiliated with Oxford University

“All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.” (1) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MISINFORMATION The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

“During three hundred years of witch hunts, the Church burned at the stake an astounding five million women.” (125) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Langdon: “It was man, not God, who created the concept of ‘original sin,’ whereby Eve tasted of the apple and caused the downfall of the human race.” (238) “The orb from which Eve partook,” Langdon said coolly, “incurring the Holy wrath of God. Original sin.” (425) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown The Priory’s beliefs conveyed by Langdon: “. . . powerful men in the early Christian church ‘conned’ the world by propagating lies that devalued the female and tipped the scales in favor of the mas-culine. . . .Constantine and his male successors successfully converted the world from a matriarchal paganism to patriarchal Christianity by waging a campaign of propaganda that demonized the sacred feminine, obliterating the goddess from modern religion forever.” (124) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “In the battle between the pagan symbols and Christian symbols, the pagans lost.” (37) “As part of the Vatican’s campaign to eradicate pagan religions and convert the masses to Christianity, the Church launched a smear campaign against the pagan gods and goddesses, recasting their divine symbols as evil.” (37) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing: “Nothing in Christianity is original . . . . Originally Christianity honored the Jewish Sabbath 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.” (232-233) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing, regarding 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 . . . . until that mom-ent in history, Jesus was viewed by His followers as a mortal prophet . . .a great and powerful man, but a man nonetheless. A mortal . . . . The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Jesus’ establishment as ‘the Son of God’ was officially proposed and voted on by the Council of Nicaea. . . .By officially endorsing Jesus as the Son of God, Constantine turned Jesus into a deity who existed beyond the scope of the human world . . . . 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.” (233) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown From Teabing: “Jesus Christ was a historical figure of staggering influence, perhaps the most enigmatic and inspirational leader the world has ever seen. . . .More than eighty gospels were considered for the New Testament, and yet only a relative few were chosen for inclusion. . . .The fundamental irony of Christianity! The Bible, as we know it today, was collated by the pagan Roman emperor Constantine the Great.” (231) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing: “. . . any gospels that described the earthly aspects of Jesus’ life had to be omitted from the Bible.” (244) “Constantine commissioned 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.” (234) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing, responding to Sophie, who thought Constantine was a Christian: “Hardly. He was a lifelong pagan who was baptized on his deathbed, too weak to protest.” (232) “In 325 [Constantine] decided to unify Rome under a single religion. Christianity.” The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

CONSTANTINE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Sophie: “Why would a pagan emperor choose Christianity as the official religion?”   Teabing: “Constantine was a very good businessman. He could see Christianity was on the rise, and he simply backed the winning horse.” (232) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

THE GOSPELS The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

GOSPELS The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown From Teabing: “The Bible did not arrive by fax from heaven. . . . The Bible is a product of man, my dear. Not of God. . . . it has evolved through countless translations, additions, and revisions. History has never had a definitive version of the book.” (231) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

GOSPELS The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “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. . . . Constantine upgraded Jesus’ status almost four centuries after Jesus’ death.” (234) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

GOSPELS The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “Almost everything our [church] fathers taught us about Christ is false.” (235)   Langdon considers the implications of “presenting to the world thousands of ancient documents as scientific evidence that the New Testament is false testimony.” (341) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

GOSPELS The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “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 Hammadi.” (234) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown If Jesus was born around the year 1900 Jesus in Jerusalem about when the Titanic sank Death and resurrection in 1930 First NT writings at the close of WWII First NT Gospel around 1960 Last NT Gospel around 1990 Gospel of Thomas written about 2030 Gospel of Mary written about 2050 Gospel of Philip written about 2170 The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

SECRET SOCIETIES The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

SECRET SOCIETIES The Knights Templar Opus Dei Priory of Sion The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

LEONARDO DA VINCI The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

LEONARDO DA VINCI “His Mona Lisa is neither male nor female. It carries a subtle message of androgyny.” (120) [This, he claims, is why she is smiling – it was her secret (121)]

LEONARDO DA VINCI

LEONARDO DA VINCI

LEONARDO DA VINCI

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE Was she a prostitute? The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

Did the Church conspire against her? MARY MAGDALENE Was she a prostitute? Did the Church conspire against her? The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing, that Mary Magdeline was a prostitute: “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.” (244) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown  “Magdalene was recast as a whore in order to erase evidence of her powerful family ties.” (249)   “The Church . . . perpetuated her image as a whore and buried evidence of Christ’s marriage to her. . . .” (254) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing: “Sadly, Christian philosophy decided to embezzle the female’s creative power by ignoring biological truth and making man the Creator. Genesis tells us that Eve was created from Adam’s rib. Woman became an offshoot of man. And a sinful one at that. Genesis was the beginning of the end for the goddess.” (238) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

Did the Church conspire against her? MARY MAGDALENE Was she a prostitute? Did the Church conspire against her? Was she Jesus’ wife? The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE Gospel of Philip 63:33-36 And the companion of the [...] Mary Mag-dalene. He loved Mary more than [all] the disciples and used to kiss her [often] on the [mouth? Head? Cheek?]. The rest of [the disciples were offended?]. They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’” The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Gospel of Mary 17:10-18:21 When Mary had said this, she was silent, since the Savior had spoken thus far with her. But Andrew answered and said to the brethren, ‘Say what you think concerning what she said. For I do not believe that the Savior said this. For certainly these teachings are of other ideas.’ The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Gospel of Mary 17:10-18:21 Peter also opposed her in regard to these matters and asked them about the Savior. ‘Did he then speak secretly with a woman, in preference to us, and not openly? Are we to turn back and all listen to her? Did he prefer her to us?’ Then Mary grieved and said to Peter, ‘My brother Peter, what do you think? Do you think that I thought this up myself in my heart or that I am lying concerning the Savior?’ The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Gospel of John 20:17 Jesus said to [Mary], “Stop clinging to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to My brethren and say to them, ‘I ascend to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God.’” The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “These are photocopies of the Nag Hammadi and Dead Sea Scrolls, which I mentioned earlier,” Teabing said. “The earliest Christian records.” (245) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “Teabing flipped through the book and pointed out several other passages that, to Sophie’s surprise, clearly suggested Magdalene and Jesus had a romantic relationship.” (246) Teabing, referring to Philip and Magdalene: “According to these unaltered gospels . . .” The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing: “It is not I who claim she is the Grail. Christ Himself made that claim.” (242) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown Teabing: “I shan’t bore you with the countless references to Jesus and Magdalene’s union.” (247)  “It’s a matter of historical record.” (244) “The marriage of Jesus and Mary Magdalene is part of the historical record.” (245) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

MARY MAGDALENE The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown “The historical evidence supporting this is substantial.” (254)  Teabing calls it “persuasive scientific evidence.” (266) Langdon: “The iconographic evidence I’m finding to support the theory is, well, staggeringly persuasive.”  (163) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

A VERY TRUE NUGGET: “A career hazard of symbologists was a tendency to extract hidden meanings from situations that had none.” (172) The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

“Great fiction; Bad theology” A FINAL THOUGHT: “Great fiction; Bad theology” The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown

WELCOME TO THE PASTOR’S FORUM Q & A The Da Vinci Code By Dan Brown