Posted on 05/19/2006 6:28:58 PM PDT by rhema
The Da Vinci Code -- which opens in the U.S. on May 19 -- might be subtitled "Religion for Morons" or "Gnosticism Meets The New Age."
It's fantasy posing as reality. The Sony Pictures film is blasphemous, defames the Catholic Church, and promotes neo-pagan Goddess worship.
I find it offensive, and I'm not even a Christian.
Director Ron Howard (who specializes in visual candy) assures us that Opie's opus will be true to the novel -- a pretentious, overwritten piece of trash that makes Bridget Jones's Diary look like one of the 100 Greatest Books Ever Written.
The plot of Dan Brown's mega-best seller (45 million copies sold) goes like this: Jesus married Mary Magdalene, who bore his children, who became the Merovingian monarchs of France, whose descendants are running around Europe today -- being chased by Opus Dei or Mormon missionaries or Martians or someone.
Again, according to The Code, The Catholic Church has for centuries concealed the truth about Jesus to maintain its power. Mary Magdalene represents the "sacred feminine" -- which supposedly predates monotheism -- and which wicked patriarchalists have spent millennia trying to suppress, the better to deny man's sexual nature and subjugate women.
The book (and presumably the film) even has a ritualistic orgy, where communicants dance with orbs and the grand master of the book's mysterious order gets frisky with a plump, middle-aged lady. The scene is described on page 311: "'The woman you behold is love!' The women called, raising their orbs again. The men responded, 'She has her dwelling place in eternity.'" (All I want is lovin' you, and music, music, music?)
Brown may have achieved the impossible -- devised a type of mumbo-jumbo that makes "healing" crystals seem serious.
Orthodox Christians are rightly offended by The Code's plot, denying as it does the divinity of Jesus and his mission.
People are free to believe, or not believe, in Jesus. Jews and Christians have been debating the identity of the Messiah, what God requires of us and how salvation may be achieved for almost 2,000 years. But to turn the life of a man almost a billion people on this planet worship into a soap opera beggars the term insensitive.
At least Christians can take comfort in the fact that their's isn't the only faith maligned and misrepresented by Brown's book.
On page 309, Brown writes of his protagonist: "Langdon's Jewish students always looked flabbergasted when he first told them that the early Jewish tradition involved ritualistic sex. In the Temple, no less. Early Jews believed that the Holy of Holies in Solomon's Temple housed not only God but also His powerful female equal, Shekinah. Men seeking spiritual wholeness came to the Temple to visit priestesses -- or hierodules -- with whom they made love and experienced the divine through physical union."
This would be amusing, were it not so disgusting. Jews daily pray for the rebuilding of the Holy Temple. For what -- so men can "experience the divine" by getting a little nookie?
In Judaism, "Shekinah" refers to the Divine presence, at one time said to reside at the Temple. Because the Hebrew word is feminine, in Brown’s fevered imagining, it has morphed into a female deity.
There were no "priestesses" in the Temple. The Torah condemns the ritual prostitution practiced by the Canaanites as "an abomination" -- its most severe censure.
It was Judaism that first related sexuality to morality. (Christian sexual ethics come from the Jewish Bible.) Where did Brown get his understanding of ancient Judaism -- from that noted Kabbalist, Madonna? Did he discover Jewish polytheism among the documents hidden away in the Templars’ secret crypt, along with Jesus’ marriage license?
In an article on nationalreview.com, David Klinghoffer argues that Jews also should be concerned about The Da Vinci Code because of its disturbing parallels to "The Protocols of The Elders of Zion."
"The Protocols," a forged document, postulates a conspiracy of Jewish leaders to conceal the truth about their alleged control of humanity through various political movements. The Da Vinci Code claims the Catholic Church is involved in a massive cover-up to hide the real history of Jesus, in order to maintain its control of the faithful. In both cases, the public is invited to scorn the sinister conspirators -- Jews or Catholics.
As a Goddess-worshipping, neo-pagan, Brown seeks to reverse the Bible's process of taming man's erotic nature (by channeling it to fidelity and family), once again divorcing the sexual from the spiritual -- freeing man's hedonistic urges from Judeo-Christian constraints. That Brown has so many admirers among Hollywood libertines is unsurprising.
But why all the fuss? After all, it’s only a movie, right?
The novelist/philosopher Ayn Rand was once asked why she primarily wrote fiction, instead of works of philosophy. Rand explained that it's far easier to convey ideas through fiction than non-fiction -- witness Dante's The Divine Comedy, witness Uncle Tom's Cabin, witness Ben-Hur, The Screwtape Letters and To Kill a Mockingbird.
Novels and films aren't footnoted. The author or screenwriter can create a thoroughly convincing universe that powerfully projects his message. From The Birth of a Nation and Triumph of The Will to Thelma and Louise and Brokeback Mountain, films have told us how to think about the world around us.
Most movies present the world according to Hollywood (and the word became flesh -- lots of flesh) -- that the sex act is good in and of itself, that people should follow their feelings (which invariably will lead them to right conduct and happiness), that prayer is like throwing a penny in a wishing well, that God is within us, that God is love, that God makes no demands of us and that the followers of traditional religion are a bunch of uptight, puritanical, hypocritical killjoys.
Debunking Christianity -- which is The Da Vinci Code's mission -- advances this worldview.
All too many people read novels or see films and think they're experiencing reality. Their understanding of the complicated history of settlers and Indians comes from Dances With Wolves. They are informed about the crusades by Kingdom of Heaven. Their understanding of the theory of global warming comes from The Day After Tomorrow.
According to a Barna Group survey, 24% of those who read The Da Vinci Code said it aided their "personal spiritual growth and understanding." In other words, one in four of its readers believe the book’s thesis (as opposed to its storyline) is true. Our "personal spiritual growth" isn't aided by what we believe to be a lie.
The best response to The Da Vinci Code -- besides derisive laughter -- is a boycott. Resist the urge to determine just how bad it is by buying a ticket. You'll only be rewarding the perpetrators -- perhaps encouraging The Da Vinci Code: Part II, wherein Dan Brown reveals that Jesus was really married to Lazarus.
Well, somebody's got to stop the bleeding. Reviewers are elbowing each other out of line to bury this offal.
Haven't read the book. Don't want to read the book.
Won't see the movie. Don't want to see the movie.
My choice of course, and I'm pretty darn happy with that choice.
Your choice is different, I'm glad your happy with that choice.
Well, to the members of the First Existential Church of the Warm Fuzzy who've posted on this thread, no.
Good, been a while, huh? Do you keep in touch with anyone from the old group?
I read you. The aesthete, the effete snob and the dilettante in me all agree. Nevertheless, I was surprised, if not shocked, (and continue to be annoyed) by the "It's FICTION, people" posts (the word 'FICTION' usually capitalized for some odd reason. An ancient conspiracy of the murderous Church of Popular Culture?), until I recalled Umberto Eco's lectures collected in Six Walks in Fictional Woods, where he describes the inner workings, as it were, of fiction (bad characterization, but Google will direct you to better ones.)
It turns out, I see, that the understanding of the rules of fiction that I, you perhaps, take for granted is not universal. Because to me Philip Roth's recent fiction The Plot Against America, which is history that never happened, but what if it had happened, is A-OK, while Brown's history that might have happened but is likely kept a secret by the evil Catholic Church, is a blasphemy against religion and against good taste, to say the least. There are other examples I have used such as Gore Vidal's Lincoln or Steve Martin's (!) Picasso at the Lapin Agile of history as a takeoff for ideas and meditations. D'uh Vinci Code is little more that a third rate thriller by a third rate writer. I hear the porno scenes are good in it!
A reviewer I chanced upon last week expressed some guilt about her snobbery (her sister, she said, read romance novels one after the other), but finally broke down, went slumming and read this awful book. She said she now felt "connected". At the same time she was kind enough to recommend a literary novel Gilead by Marilynne Robinson (WHO?!) going as far as offering to refund any readers money if they didn't like it. I'm reading it now.
Hehehe, good for you.
The book to me is garbage, fiction or whatever it is passed as, there is no redeeming value the story can bring me. It won't make me wiser, it won't make me smarter, there are no revelations or epiphanies, I believe there is no increase in quality this story will bring to my life.
And for the movie, if I want to view garbage I'll go take a peek inside the garbage can.
You know cat, you keep bringing up these "Rules of Fiction" as if it's commonly accepted and known. You state these rules as fact. So much so, you seem to imply that anyone who isn't aware of these Laws as ignorant heathens
However, after following quite a few of these threads, I'm baffled, who governs these rules? Who came up with them? And lastly, what would you have people do to the heretics that violate your rules?
Ah, but there's a big difference! I, too, read HBHG when it came out, '83, I think. As a student of world history, it helped explain a lot, particularly how secret societies in Europe sustained a legend that helped make and depose kings, explain 'Divine Right', and allowed a handful of 'somebodies' to play puppet-masters down through the centuries -- all the while remaining somewhat on the outs with ecclesial authority. The mysterious themes by Poussin, et. al., concerning the partial phrase, "Et en Arcadie, ego...", the skull and bones of Magdalene -- all these seem reminiscent of conspiracy theorists' musings of today, along the lines of Skull and Bones Society, Trilateral Commission and Council on Foreign Relations.
I said all that to say this: Baigent and Leigh simply put two-and-two together to detail a long-standing conspiracy by king-makers, mover-shakers, without commenting on the veracity of the central Jesus/Magdalene legend. In fact, I found them looking at the premise with a jaundiced eye. They theorized, rather, that the legend was a pretext for power and control. The incorporation of important, wealthy people into the secret orders was a way of augmenting sustaining that power and control.
The monumental difference with Dan Brown's piece is that it proffers the legend as fact. And WHAT a difference that is! If true, it renders Jesus, the Church's One Foundation, the very Son of God, God Himself, a liar and a charlatan, not just ordinary, but despicable. If that's the real Jesus, then He would not even be worth talking about!!!! Not at this late date. It would be like continuing to be in awe of the Wizard of Oz after paying close attention to the man behind the curtain.
Read the book and found it entertaining, among many fictional novels I have read this month.
Might see the movie tomorrow because wifey wants to go, because she didn't read the book, but will try to stay home and stack firewood.
This is fiction, and pretend, and I am not worried about being traduced by a book or a movie. The caterwalling about it is free advertising. In two months the movie will be forgotten and the next big "scandel" will come along.
The theory that Christ had a woman? So what, pretending is not sacrelige. Its just that today so many people would LIKE to think he had a woman , who influenced his spirituality, just as they often do today. Yesterday everyone wanted him to be chaste, single and pure and today they see sacredness in union.
Maybe seeing sacredness in union might just help save the institution of marriage, look at the upside!
I suppose that offends many, but not me.
Oh, Lord. Rules of fiction? Again: Philip Roth starts out with a fantastic premise that Lindbergh wins the election in 1940 against FDR and proceeds from there with history that never happened. Dan Brown starts with a premise that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and proceeds to distort known recorded history. (Actually, he starts from the end, in the 21st century, but let's never mind that.) You see no problem with that? If you read historical fiction, the literary kind, you'd see and acknowledge that certain rules of, let's call it, decency are being followed, even if they are unwritten. The author is free to build plots around known historical events, respecting the foundations of known history. Paranoid conspiracy theories, revisionist history, such as this book, are by and for the unlearned, unread fools, me thinks. In the end, when writing historical fiction literary authors (as opposed to hacks)have generally respected what's known and invented around that, meditated around that and mused around that. No one, to my knowledge has written down these rules, but unless you are writing fantasy or a dystopia, your readers expect you to follow them. Makes sense? No? It's FICTION, people!
Well. Maybe you are right. My wife and I are taking our kids and their fiends to the movie. Because we are parents and their superiors, they don't have much choice. But our kids all loved the book. And they want to see the movie. If I didn't take them, then they would just see it at a sleep over at their friend's house. I believe that there are only two kinds of books, movies and music. Good and bad. Before I decide which camp they fall in to, I must read, watch or listen. Then I decide. That's what I am teaching my children. They must learn to decide for themselves. The Amish got that down a couple hundred years ago.
Final bus stop for this movie: the Lake of Fire.
I don't want to flame you, or insult you, m'Lord, but this is close to a flame, isn't it?! But to answer your question, if I were an editor, I wouldn't publish them. But in publishing and cultural matters nowadays, economics trump aesthetics, don't they. It's the lowest common denominator that wins. Garth Brooks vs Kieran Kane. Dan Brown vs Alexander Hemon. Sell and sell more, the crowd calls out for more, as the song goes. It's just too bad that we no longer care to recognize that there are levels of cultural products and that we sniff at anyone who disses popular culture. We measure quality by quantity. *5% of everything is crap says Sturgeon's Law, and ifit'spopular there is something wrong with it said wisely one of cat's relatives.
I thought this forum was a place to reflect on these things and not just follow the basest emotions and keep declaring that Eddie Van Halen, say, is this century's Mozart.
85% percent of everything is crap, says Sturgeon's law.
Good article bump.
As I said on another thread...I rememember my elementary school class going to the library to learn all about the Dewey System, what fiction and nonfiction means etc.
Somewhere along the way I learned that +A Novel+ on the cover means it is fiction. Maybe all the folks losing their minds over this book and movie were sick the day their school covered all that.
It doesn't sound like it's very entertaining fiction, from most of the reviews. Most reviewers give it only two out of four stars:
We read the book and plan to see the movie too. We are Christians and we recognize the book is fiction. People have gotten their panties in a wad over the suggestion that Jesus and Mary Magdalen were married and had a child. I don't find that thought so distressing but I was very upset a few years ago when someone was peddling the idea that Jesus and his Disciples were gay.
Lord Baltar, what did you think of those two pieces of "fiction"? Michael Moore tried to present them as both factual documentaries, (as I recall), when he was challenged on some bogus edited quotes, he recanted and stated they were fictional accounts.
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