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de-Coding Da Vinci: The Facts Behind the Fiction of the Da Vinci Code

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I greatly enjoyed Dan Brown's *Da Vinci Code* but I have to admit that Amy Welborn's book was even more fun. With a delightful style and large doses of irony she analyzes Brown's claims:

--That Constantine selected the books of the New Testament and invented the divinity of Christ.

--That the early Church covered up Jesus' marriage to Mary Magdalene.

--That Jesus originally designated her as the leader of his movement and that she in fact is the Holy Grail.

While these claims seem quite exciting, Amy shows that the truth is even more startling. The controversy over *The Da Vinci Code* provides an opportunity to learn the facts about Christian origins. Skepticism is good both for Christians and non-Christians. Amy's book will help any honest inquirer. Read it and decide for yourself.

Unless my aging memory deceives me, I recall a story from Catholic school days about an ancient Christian teacher who suffered a peculiarly painful martyr's death: he was pierced hundreds of times by the styluses or pens of his hostile pagan students. In this work we get the martyr's revenge: from an articulate, scholarly, and dismayed author who administers a death by a thousand cuts to the premises and biases of the best selling "Da Vinci Code."

There are many ways this antidote to DVC could have been mishandled: the author could have written an ad hoc attack upon Dan Brown, or a cosmic wail against the anti-Catholic bias of the work, or a "preaching to the choir" methodology of uncritical defense of those areas of Catholic life and history that Brown played upon so well. The author successfully avoided these pitfalls, for the most part, with a terse but thorough dismantling of the major historical and theological flaws. Welborn, who did her graduate history studies at Vanderbilt University, clearly holds the upper hand.

The author addresses about a dozen topics that DVC manhandles with distressing consistency: the identity of Mary Magdalene, the determination of the canon or texts of the New Testament, the Roman Emperor Constantine, the Holy Grail, Leonardo Da Vinci, feminism in the Church, mystery religions, and Opus Dei. Each separate critique is deadly to a novel which depends upon an intricately developed puzzle. It would require only a few threads to unravel before the plot line becomes irrational. Welborn works with a tailor's shears. To cite just one area of critique, Welborn devotes a chapter to Brown's depiction of Da Vinci himself, and discovers that the moniker "Da Vinci" is not the artist's name. He was known then, and to experts today, as Leonardo. For those familiar with the story line of DVC, such a corrective makes quite a mess out of the intricate maze of word clues that Sophie Neveu seems to revel in.

I cannot find the exact word to describe the author's literary style, but it is distinctive. At this point in her career I get the sense that her avocation is the communication of "Catholic common sense." It does help the reader to know that Welborn is the author of a successful series of religious works for Catholic high school students, traditionally a notoriously difficult audience; and her blog site, "Open Book," is a daily watering hole for Catholics across the country that rivals Chris Matthews for hardball repartee. Welborn's avowed literary inspiration has long been the take-no-prisoners Flannery O'Connor, who would probably have weighed in herself on DVC, were she alive today.

At times I felt the author was almost annoyed that she had to do this book, disconcerted that basic tenets of Catholic history were unknown to so many readers of her faith, or that a best seller with such historical and theological flaws could go unchallenged. But in the final analysis, Welborn wrote this work because, in her own words, "culture matters," [p. 20] and she is correct. To pretend that music, art, literature, and film do not have agendas and influence is naive. Recently it has come to light that much of the technology employed by investigators on the popular television series CSI [Las Vegas and Miami, presumably] does not exist in real crime labs. Real life prosecutors are having difficulty making cases because juries expect levels of technical evidence they have come to expect on television. And I trusted Gil Grissom and Horatio Cane. Mon Dieu!

Very readable book that should appeal to believers and agnostics alike - anyone honestly interested in the truth. Early church history is something most know little about, and the author (who has a BA in honors history and MA in Church History) has done an excellent job helping to fill that vacuum. She explores the sources of information Dan Brown used for his book and seeks to unravel fact from fiction in an fair-minded way.

Yes. I know. It's Just A Novel. But that does not appear to be how the the author indended it to be viewed. It is also not how many of its readers have understood it. The author seems to think that it is based on Factual Information and Hidden Truths that the Powers That Be dont want you to know about and were previously only accessible by the Cognoscenti.

The amateur historian in me wishes to point out a couple things. First of all, the magnitude of his claims about Christian history and theology are breathtaking. Second, claims of that magnitude had better have bulletproof documentation to back them up.

Amy Welborn's book does an excellent job of finding holes in the allegedly sound historical basis for the novel in question. Welborn's book is breezily written, which can be an aid in understanding the book's points. It also provides review questions and recommendations for further study.

It is a good introduction to the controversy raised by The DaVinci Code. For those who want more detail, there are many others. For example, there is The DaVinci Hoax, also available here.

Amy Welborn does a fine job of dealing with the issues raised in the Da Vinci Code, but I must say, I found it less thorough than another book on the subject, "Fact and Fiction in The Da Vinci Code" (0971812861).

Welborn, for instance, doesn't spend much time on the way anti-Semitic strains in 19th century German philosophy and theology influences a lot of the "theology" in Dan Brown's book. She also doesn't spend as much time on the modern origins of Wicca as one might hope. Kellmeyer's argument from Scripture debunking the assertions about marriage between Mary Magdelene and Jesus are very compelling; Welborn's arguments are good, but she misses the points he makes.

Overall, the two books overlap on some points, but they complement each other well. If you buy this book, you'll need "Fact and Fiction in the Da Vinci Code" to finish fleshing out the answers.

After reading The DaVinci Code, I had many questions. This book helped to answer most of them. It is well written, in an almost conversational style. Easy reading, but not lightweight.
This book will help to answer your questions about The DaVinci Code, but could also be read to help someone learn about some aspects of the early church. I found the information about Constantine to be really interesting as well as the explanation of how the bible came to be and what the gnostic gospels are all about. I highly recommend this book.

The Da Vinci Code: The facts behind the fiction AMY WELBORN

Amy Welborn points out some of the many errors about religion, history, and art contained in The Da Vinci Code in this short pamphlet.

What is The Da Vinci Code?
The Da Vinci Code is a novel by Dan Brown that has held one of the top two or three places on best-seller lists since early summer. More than 3 million copies are in print.

In Brown's novel, the "Da Vinci code" refers to cryptic messages supposedly incorporated by Leonardo Da Vinci into his artwork. According to the novel, Leonardo was a member of an ancient secret society called the "Priory of Sion" dedicated to preserving the "truths" that Jesus designated Mary Magdalene as His successor, that His message was about the celebration of the "sacred feminine," that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had children and that the Holy Grail of legend and lore is really Mary Magdalene, the "sacred feminine," the vessel who carried Jesus' children.

Sounds like an intriguing bit of lost history. Is it? Long story short: No.

Is the Holy Grail really the "sacred feminine?"

The legend of the Holy Grail has taken many forms throughout history, but it has always identified the Grail as the cup Jesus used at the Last Supper. The idea of identifying it as the "sacred feminine" and tying it into a supposed bloodline emanating from a union of Jesus and Mary Magdalene is lifted whole cloth from the 1981 classic of inventive esoteric wackiness, Holy Blood, Holy Grail.

Is the "Priory of Sion" a real group?

No. Brown begins his book with a statement, under the title "Fact," that there are documents supporting the existence of the Priory in the Bibliotheque Nationale. These documents have long been understood to be forgeries, placed in the archives by an anti-Semitic supporter of the Vichy government named Pierre Plantard.

Does Da Vinci's The Last Supper really contain a code?
No. First, the idea that Da Vinci used any kind of code pertaining to any issue Dan Brown raises is unsupported by art historians.

Brown says that in this painting Da Vinci is telling us that the figure always identified as John the Evangelist is really Mary Magdalene, and that these two figures together form an "M," and that, because there is no grail in the picture, Da Vinci is telling us the "grail" is the sacred feminine of Mary Magdalene.

Unfortunately for Brown, art historians tell us that the effeminate-looking John is quite a typical representation for the time, as is a Last Supper portrayal emphasizing betrayal rather than the institution of the Eucharist. In addition, the Last Supper is a dramatization of a scene from the Gospel of John, in which the institution narrative is not even described. No chalice? No problem. In context, it makes sense.

Who was Mary Magdalene according to the Scriptures?

St. Mary Magdalene is mentioned 12 times in the Gospels. She was healed of demon possession by Jesus (Luke 8:2), was present at the Crucifixion and the tomb and was sent by the Risen Jesus to the apostles to announce the Good News. Her feast day is celebrated July 22.

Who was Mary Magdalene according to Dan Brown?

Brown says Mary Magdalene was of royal blood, of the tribe of Benjamin, and Jesus' wife. According to Brown, after the crucifixion, Mary, pregnant with Jesus' child, moved to France and became the root of the Merovingian royal family.

He also says Jesus intended for Mary to be the head of his Church (celebrating the sacred feminine, remember) but that Peter wrested power from her, suppressed evidence of Jesus' real intentions and set into motion a 2,000-year conspiracy to demonize Mary Magdalene.

But Mary Magdalene is honored as a saint in the Catholic Church. How is that "demonizing?"

Don't ask me. What is true is that in the sixth century, Pope Gregory the Great conflated the figures of Mary Magdalene, the penitent woman in Luke 7, and Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, saying that before her conversion, Mary had been a prostitute or adulteress. This has always been a disputed identification, however. Church Fathers from St. Ambrose to St. Thomas Aquinas have been undecided on the issue, and in the Eastern Church, the three are seen as distinct figures. This question has never been pushed underground, either, as Dan Brown claims.

So, who is Dan Brown? ?????????????????

He is a former English teacher who began full-time writing in 1996. His second novel, Angels and Demons, featured the Illuminati, a vial of anti-matter and a papal conclave. He holds no advanced degrees in religion.

What's the basis for Brown's views on Mary Magdalene and her competition with Peter?

All that Holy Blood, Holy Grail stuff, of course, but then there are also the Gnostic Gospels.

Gnosticism was a dualistic, esoteric mode of thinking that was widespread during the early Christian era, although its influence was not confined to Christianity. The Gnostic Gospels are works reflecting the Gnostic take on Christianity. Some have been known for centuries, but previously unknown works - in the Nag Hammadi scrolls - were discovered in Egypt in 1945.

Some modern scholars and religious writers have seized upon various passages from the Gnostic Gospels as indicative of a competing, woman-centered element of early Christianity, especially a passage from The Gospel of Mary in which Jesus kisses Mary and the apostles express envy of His love for her. Brown works this thinking into his novel, but, like many others, ignores a deeply anti-woman passage from another Gnostic gospel, the Gospel of Thomas, in which Jesus says, "For every woman who will make herself male will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven."

Gnosticism was rejected by Christianity, but not because of gender issues. Its claims (two gods, a belief that the created world was evil) were simply inconsistent with the rule of faith, as it was called, handed down from the apostles.

The canonical Gospels all date from the middle to late first century. The Gnostic gospels cannot be placed any earlier than the mid-second century. It is ironic, as historian James Hitchcock has pointed out, that elements of a profession that have for years derided the Gospels as unreliable history have now seized on later documents as reliable guides to Jesus' intentions.

Were Jesus and Mary Magdalene married?

Dan Brown has one of his fictional scholars say it's a "matter of historical record." No nonfictional scholars would claim this. The "historical record" to which Brown refers are those 20th-century conspiracy books, not early Christian historical records.

Are Mary Magdalene's bones buried within the glass pyramid structure at the Louvre, as Brown presents it at the end of his novel?

No. Many things may have been buried with the pyramid, including good taste, but Mary Magdalene's bones are not among them.

Dan Brown claims that the idea of Jesus' divinity was dreamed up by the Council of Nicaea. Is this true?

No. When you read the Gospels and the letters of Paul, all of which date from the first century, you see a clear affirmation of Jesus as Lord.

The Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325 was a response to the threat of the Arian heresy, which claimed that Jesus was a semi-divine creature, not of the same being as God. This was quickly becoming a popular belief and threatening the unity of Christianity.

The Emperor Constantine, aware that disunity in Christianity threatened the empire, convened the Council. Traditional faith was re-articulated in the more precise, philosophical terms that the heresy demanded and was accepted as the most faithful reading of the evidence about Jesus given to us in the Gospels.

Brown indicates that the Gnostic Gospels were widely accepted in early Christianity and that Constantine ordered them destroyed. Is this true?

No. The process of discerning the authentic Gospels was a lengthy one, but it had already begun in the early second century. Some communities used various other Gospels, but second-century Church Fathers frequently cited the four Gospels as authoritative. Their criteria were apostolic origins and fidelity to the rule of faith, not gender issues. Brown's conspiracy theory is a fabrication. Moreover, the final determinations about what constituted the Christian canon of Scripture were made by councils held after Constantine's time.

So, the whole "Mary vs. Peter" thing isn't true?

The historical evidence simply doesn't support it. It's based on speculation and a dramatic over-reading of a couple of passages from second-century fringe writings.

It's also illogical. Brown's argument rests on the assumption that the early apostles were concerned with suppressing the scandalous and radical. If that were so, why would they have the founder of their faith executed in manner reserved for the most shameful criminals?

It also is dependent on the assumption that Peter and his "party" were all about power. For what purpose, we have to ask? Did they get rich from their "version" of Christianity? Were they celebrated in their culture? No, they all died as despised martyrs. Some power trip.

This whole thing should fade pretty quickly, shouldn't it?

Probably not. The movie rights to The Da Vinci Code have been bought by Columbia, and Ron Howard is set to direct the film, probably to be released in 2005.

Oops!

Besides being logically and historically flawed, The Da Vinci Code is filled with more minor, but no less risible, errors. Here are a few:

One of Brown's scholars says, "As the prophesied Messiah, Jesus toppled kings, inspired millions and founded new philosophies." We'd like to meet those toppled kings.

The Emperor Constantine did not make Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire in A.D. 325. It happened under Theodosius 50 years later.

Gothic architecture was not "masterminded" by the Knights Templar, a medieval military order that had nothing to do with the construction of Gothic cathedrals.

The Church did not burn 5 million witches during the Middle Ages. During the period 1400-1800, an estimated 30,000-50,000 people accused of witchcraft (20 percent of whom were men) were executed by Catholic and Protestant institutions and governments.
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The Da Vinci Code: The facts behind the fiction of the bestselling novel: http://catalog.osv.com/Catalog.aspx?ProductCode=P162

Dan Brown's book is a mismash of nonsense, bad writing, and anti-Catholic bigotry (and no, I'm not Catholic ;-)

Amy's book is a straightforward look at the nonsense: pointing out interesting facts, such as Brown's not citing any part of the New Testament when making up his "life" of Jesus, or his faulty history when dealing secular matters. (Other folks have been talking about the bad -- even awful -- writing.) The bottom line is, Brown's book doesn't really count as historical fiction, 'cause there's really no history involved -- it's pure fantasy. But it's fantasy with a purpose. So it's no surprise that a few folks are responding to his "argument."

I'll agree at least in part with the reviewer who said, "it's for believers." But there's enough nonsense debunked that even someone not terribly familiar with the Christian faith can figure out that Dan Brown has disfigured it mightily. As for Opus Dei, defending them is not a point of Amy's book, but let's face it, Brown's novel could be re-entitled "Protocols of the Elders of Opus Dei." Could you imagine a novel making the best-seller list today if the target were Jews and not Catholics?

Amy's book is short and to the point. And the point is, all but the most wacko scholars today won't go so far as Brown has in "re-imagining" Christianity; nearly all responsible scholars, Catholic or Protestant, would reject his ideas as nonsense.

Be sure to check out her blog: http://amywelborn.typepad.com/openbook/

Suppose Dan Brown had written a "fictional thriller" entitled "The Hassidic Code". In this fictional novel, suppose Dan Brown wrote about the biggest secret in all history: the "fact" that the Holocaust was faked. Suppose Dan Brown wrote about how rich and powerful Jews actually fabricated the entire Holocaust (phony newsreel footage and all) in order to garner global sympathy, and thereby inoculate themselves from criticism as they systematically took over the financial institutions of the world. Just suppose he had written that "fictional thriller".

How do you think the liberal press would react to that book? Do you think Ron Howard would have been vying for the rights to make the movie version? Do you think Tom Hanks would have gone for the leading role? Do you think Dan Brown would have been invited as honored guest onto the talk show circuit? Do you think that folks like the negative reviewers here would have been insisting that Jews have no right to be offended by such a book?

Get real. Anti-Catholicism is obviously the last socially acceptable form of bigotry in America. The proof is that these anti Catholic bigots don't even know they're bigots.

Excellent book! Welborn takes on the issues that are raised by readers of Dan Brown's book and tackles them head on--and the reader is left with a clear head--which is the main difference between this book and some others that are out there that raise even more issues than they clear up.

The book presents the facts clearly without an agenda. Clearly the best book out there on the topic!