([A]n article by RBC Ministries President Mart De
Haan)
The Da Vinci Code has been on the New York Times
Bestseller List since its release in April 2003. In
less than 2 years it has become a bestseller in 150
countries and one of the most widely read books of
our time.
Author Dan Brown has done what many authors only
dream of doing. He has written a book “everyone” is
talking about. All over the world people are
discussing his upscale murder mystery that teases
readers with provocative theories about history,
religion, and the arts.
This novel, however, is more than a page--turning
murder mystery. The Da Vinci Code is a conspiracy
theory that leaves many readers wondering whether
everything they have believed about Christ and the
Bible is wrong.
A reviewer from Booksense says, “This is one of
those rare books that comes along and makes you
question everything you thought you knew about
religion, art, and what you were taught in school.
It’s fast--paced, enthralling, and simply impossible
to put down.”
The Da Vinci Code begins with a lengthy list of
acknowledgments and then a “fact page” designed to
leave the impression that the novel is based on
careful research of little--known facts.
One of the book’s main characters is Robert Langdon,
a fictional Harvard professor of religious
symbology. Claiming years of research, the professor
maintains that for 1,700 years, the church has been
covering up the real truth about Jesus. His views
are later echoed by a fictional British royal
historian referred to as Sir Leigh Teabing who says
things like, “almost everything our fathers taught
us about Christ is false” (The Da Vinci Code,
p.235).
The title of the book comes from the claim that
Leonardo Da Vinci--along with other notables like
Sir Isaac Newton and Victor Hugo--was a member of a
secret society entrusted with the truth about Jesus.
The secret of this group (The Priory of Sion) is
that Jesus had a daughter by Mary Magdalene. Mary,
according to the Priory, was the true Holy Grail who
bore the royal bloodline of Jesus on earth. This,
according to the professor, is a fact the church
will kill to suppress.
What many readers fail to keep in mind is that The
Da Vinci Code is fiction. Worse yet, the story rests
not on careful research, but on a documented fraud
passed off as truth. The idea that Leonardo was a
member of The Priory of Sion is based on a document
proven by a French court of law to be a forgery and
a hoax (The Truth Behind the Da Vinci Code by
Richard Abanes, Harvest House Publishers,
pp.48--57).
The Da Vinci Code’s “alternative view of history”
also falsely states that Jesus was not regarded as a
God until the fourth century when the Roman emperor
Constantine decided it was in his own political
interests to unite the empire by giving Jesus “an
impenetrable cloak of divinity” (The Da Vinci Code,
p.233).
To make the claim plausible, fictional historian
Teabing says, “The most profound moment in Christian
history” occurred when “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” (The
Da Vinci Code, p.234).
The Da Vinci Code claims that some of the documents
Constantine tried to destroy managed to survive in
scrolls in 1945 at Nag Hammadi, Egypt. These scrolls
allegedly “highlight glaring historical
discrepancies and fabrications, clearly confirming
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” (The Da
Vinci Code, p.234).
The ancient texts found at Nag Hammadi, however,
were not “lost books of the Bible,” as Teabing
claims. They were the writings of a mystery
religion known as Gnosticism. Gnostics viewed spirit
as good and matter as evil. They denied the physical
body and crucifixion of Jesus and emphasized a
secret knowledge received only by those initiated
into the religion. The early church rejected their
teachings long before Constantine.
But even if The Da Vinci Code doesn’t stand up under
scrutiny, is it possible that the Bible has been
altered through thousands of years of countless
copies and versions?
[Note here: We have God's word, the Bible, to us in the English lanugage.
The King James Version; perfect inerrant, the word of God.
See these two sources/links for more information:
This is the kind of question
that is best answered by those who have applied the
principles of science to manuscript evidence.
Scholars spend lifetimes examining all available
manuscripts and fragments of manuscripts. They note
and map any variations of spelling or wording that
show up in families of manuscripts that have been
copied from a common source. In addition they
analyze the writings of second and third century
church fathers who left extensive quotes of the
Scriptures they were reading and studying.
On the basis of such research, scholars assure us
that our Bible is a highly reliable representation
of the original manuscripts. In The New Testament
Documents: Are They Reliable, F. F. Bruce writes,
“To sum up, we may quote the verdict of the late Sir
Frederic Kenyon, a scholar whose authority to make
pronouncements on ancient MSS was second to none:
‘The interval then between the data of original
composition and the earliest extant evidence become
so small to be in fact negligible, and the last
foundation for any doubt that the Scripture have
come down to us substantially as they were written
has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the
general integrity of the books of the New Testament
may be regarded as finally established’ ”
(http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/ffbruce/ntdocrli/ntdocont.htm)
The Bible and Archaeology, New York and London:
Harper, 1940).
Backed by such evidence, the Bible also remains the
all--time bestselling and most widely read book in
the world. Challengers come and go. What remain are
the words of those who were willing to die for their
claim that they personally witnessed the miraculous
life, death, and resurrection of the Son of God. One
of those witnesses wrote, “For we did not follow
cunningly devised fables when we made known to you
the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but
were eyewitnesses of His majesty” (2 Peter 1:16).
Note: For additional answers to questions like,
Could the Gnostic gospels be lost books of the
Bible? and Did Constantine burn ancient books that
portray a different view of Christ? please visit our
Web site at www.rbcdavincicode.org
(http://www.rbcdavincicode.org) or write for the
Discovery Series booklet The Da Vinci Code:
Separating Fact From Fiction.
Share your thoughts on Mart’s article. We value your feedback.
Feel free to pass along this newsletter to your
family and friends.
Copyright 2005 RBC Ministries
This message was sent by: RBC Ministries, 3000 Kraft
Ave., Grand Rapids, MI 49512
