Customer Reviews

Cracking the Da Vinci Code: The Unauthorized Guide to the Facts Behind Dan Brown's Bestselling Novel

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1 star:		(2)

 

 

After reading The Da Vinci Code I certainly had some questions. Brown makes a compelling argument, he sure doesn't describe the church that I went to Sunday School at. Can the things he incorporates into his story really be true? His 'facts' 'feel' correct to me. But before I went out spouting his facts as the 'gospel truth' I thought I should read some commentaries on Brown's book. There's a lot of them. The theme of The Da Vinci Code is so sensitive that readers come down hard on either side, love it..hate it, and that's the way most of the commentaries are. I found several that were written by theologians clearly writing to protect their turf. The same with the alternative history writers. Both were so deeply into their beliefs, they couldn't tell you background facts with out soaking them in politics. But dear sensitive reader...look no further! Simon Cox is your Joe Friday("Just the facts,mamam").Cox's book is composed of short essays of the obscure names, places, things that a regular reader might be unfimilar with. So if you want to know if there really is disembodied hand holding a knife in 'The last Supper' or if Opus Dei is a real thing you can read a page or two about it,have your curiousity slackened and not have to wade thru religio/politicio b.s. And the price is right!

This is an excellent book detailing the background to the details and information utilized in The Da Vinci Code (unlike the pathetic attacks on Dan Brown by the author of Breaking The Da Vinci Code and similar books). Cox does a good job researching the historical context of Dan Brown's book. He brings out interesting information concerning the names, places and things utilized by Dan Brown in his provocative novel. For those interested in delving further into this information, Cox lists recommended readings in the bibliography. This book is a must for anyone wondering about the mix of facts and fiction in The Da Vinci Code.

This is a good little reference work for people who have been exposed for the first time to the Bloodline/Grail theories found in The Da Vinci Code. Cox gives each item its own dictionary-style entry with a factual description that is anywhere from a half page in length to three pages. As Cox writes, "This book is designed in such a way as to give the reader of The Da Vinci Code a primer on many of the factual elements in the book." I found the color photos especially helpful so that I could see for myself what is being talked about. This book has been faulted for Cox's unabashed support of The Da Vinci Code, but clearly that is what inspired him to put this volume together.

I confess to having read two of Dan Brown's books , and even saw the Ron Howard's and Tom Hanks movie. I claim to be a Christian and yet Brown's writing and ideas are just so contrary to a faith based world view. This little book is quite useful for someone like me. With an alphabetical marching of topics in page after page, Cox reveals the sources for the facts and the fiction (mostly fiction) behind Brown's fictions. Since I first found out that Geoffrey Moore did not invent the the idea of "eartly adopters" , I have been a believer that ideas get recycled from story teller to story teller. Cox does us a favor by laying out just where many of the ideas came from and often from whom. If you have read the "book" then this book is quite helpful to you. I was interested in the links between DaVinci, Isaac Newton and others Cox found.

Dan Brown's bestselling novel, The Da Vinci Code, has become a global phenomenon; and introduced readers to a mysterious world where Leonardo Da Vinci encoded hidden meanings into his paintings, strange symbols are engraved in a remote Scottish chapel; and the Catholic Church and an ancient secret society are locked in a centuries-old battle to gain control of the ultimate prize: the Holy Grail.

But how much of the novel is actually true and what is fictional distortion? Cracking the Da Vinci code is the first book to cut through the confusion and disclose the amazing facts that underpin the plot. In a simple A-Z format it reveals the historical basis of the secrets contained in the book, including background information on all the key figures, reproductions of the symbols encoded in the paintings, and insider knowledge such as the riddles hidden in the characters' names.

Cracking the Da Vinci Code is an invaluable resource for the many enthusiasts of the novel and all those who want to learn more about the remarkable truth behind the legend of the Holy Grail.
--- from the book's dustjacket

I just now started reading Mr. Cox's book and therefore cannot offer a full review. However, There is a passage right at the beginning of the book that demands to be addressed. On page 10, Mr. Cox writes,

"However, what they [the books' detractors] haven't addressed with their reading of the Scriptures and Gospels is one of the central themes of this hypothesis: namely, that this information was deemed so damaging and disruptive to the early Church that it was actually suppressed by the original redactors and editors of the New Testament - being in effect written out of the original texts, to be replaced with a sanitized version that was much more appealing to the early Church Fathers"

This statement is blatantly false, as anyone who has read the other books which critique Brown's book will know. Having read nearly all of these books myself (except for those yet to be published), this statement of Cox's really surprised me. He is either dishonest or ignorant. All of these books, without exception, devote pages (some more than others) to addressing this very issue.
Interestingly, as to Cox's (common) charge that the hypothesis presented in Brown's book was suppressed by the 'original redactors and editors of the New Testament", he betrays an ignorance, not only of how the Bible came to be as it is today [there were never any 'original redactors and editors', as such], but also of the Church Fathers. This hypothesis was far from suppressed. The Fathers dealt with it (and countless other heresies) in volumes of writings (Irenaeus' 'Against Heresies', for example). Indeed, until the discovery of the [Gnostic] Nag Hadmaddi writings in 1945, the near-totality of our knowledge of 'this hypothesis' came from such church literature. Refuted and denounced, yes; suppressed, hardly.
If this is at all characteristic of Mr. Cox's book, then I will leave my rating as it stands. If not, then I will re-review the book and rate it accordingly.
(Yes, I am a Christian, but my problem is not with Mr. Cox's theology, whatever it may be. My problem is with his false statement).
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After finishing this book, I wish I could revise my review down to zero stars. 80%-90% of he content of this book is only slightly related to The Da Vinci Code. More than once, the author prefaces a section with a comment like, "Though this issue isn't found in The Da Vinci Code, it's still important to consider..." Interestingly, though he provides alot of historical minutia, his research could not uncover one of the biggest weaknesses of Brown's book; the issue of the Priory of Sion. Nearly all of the other Da Vinci Critiques delas with this issue. The fact is that Pierre Plantard, who founded the Priory was shown to be a criminal and a forger in a French Court in 1992. He admitted forging the document that alleges that Da Vinci, Victor Hugo, Isaac Newton, et al were past grand masters of the organization. This is the lynch-pin in Brown's theory (which he claims to sincerly believe). It is false, so the rest falls.

Do you know that some members of the Knights Templar, after the suppression of their order in 1307, moved to Scotland and helped Robert Bruce in his successful battle to force out the English? Well, this books says they did. It doesn't give a source, and the suggested reading at the back is heavily filled with questionable new age works. And you might wonder why an order whose main function before 1307 was international banking would care about a dynastic squabble on the periphery of Europe. But of course, such suggestions appeals to the romantic for whom tales of Clerical treachery, secret organizations and romanticized national myths all uncritically merge together.

As a book this book has little to offer, and hardly provides the facts behind "The Da Vinci Code." It contains padded discussions of the Cathars and the myths of Isis and Osiris, although these elements do not really play much a role in the book. About the dramatic claims Dan Brown makes, such as that Mary Magdalene was the wife of Jesus, or that she appears in Da Vinci's "The Last Supper," or whether there is a secret Priory of Sion with earthshattering secrets that has been led in the past by Da Vinci, Newton, Hugo, Debussy and Cocteau, the book is somewhat wishy washy. Cox doesn't exactly endorse these claims, but he certainly doesn't look at the evidence that would refute these claims. There is a certain sort of disingenousness, which gives Brown more seriousness than he deserves. At one point, for instance, Cox notes, correctly, that thousands of women were killed in the witch-hunts. This differs from Brown's claim that "millions" were killed, but Cox does not point this out. Cox also claims that these witch-hunts were done to stop a revival of Goddess worship. In fact as recent witchcraft scholarship as pointed out by Ronald Hutton has made quite clear, there is no evidence that any of the condemned witches belonged to a satantic or pre-Christian religion.

And Cox continues with other examples of shallowness and misinformation. The New Testament was not "supposedly" confirmed at the Council of Nicea. Constantine was not baptized in 326, but in 337 on his deathbed (oddly enough, this is one fact Dan Brown gets right). The Nag Hammadi material are not "undoubtedly" a product of the Coptic church. If they were, they would have been preserved by them. Arianism denies the equality of Jesus the Son with the Father; it does not deny his divinity altogether. The Christian idea of forgiveness after repentance does not come from Isis; it clearly has its roots in Jewish doctrine. At the beginning of his book Cox says that The Da Vinci Code will no doubt make a great movie, since it will supposedly star Russell Crowe and be directed by Ron Howard. I've both read the book and seen "A Beautiful Mind," and this strikes me as the perfect example of naivetee to start off this questionable book.

If you loved DaVinci Code or if you hated it, you must admit it did get a reaction from you....which in itself is one definition of a successful novel. Many readers have found themselves more interested in the information detailed in Dan Brown's books, and if so, this book is a good choice to begin to learn about the amazing history of the Christian Church.

Especially Gnosticism and the early Christian Church, and especially the creation of the New Testament Bible. For a different review....here is my review of books that build on these interests, especially the "lost" books of the New Testament Bible and the concepts of Gnosticism.

Nearly all knowledgeable Biblical scholars realize there have been a wide range of writings attributed to Jesus and his Apostles..... and that some of these were selected for compilation into the book that became known as the Bible.....and that some books have been removed from some versions of the Bible and others have been re-discovered in modern times.

The attention focused on Gnosticism by Dan Brown's DaVinci Code may be debatable, but the fact is that increased attention on academics tends to be predominately positive, so I welcome those with first-time or renewed interest. At least first-timers to Gnosticism are not pursuing the oh-so-popular legends of the Holy Grail, Bloodline of Christ, and Mary Magdalene.

This is great......I seldom quote other reviewers, but there is one reviewer of Pagels' books who confided that he had been a Jesuit candidate and had been required to study a wide range of texts but was never was told about the Nag Hamadi texts. He said:

"Now I know why. The Gospel of Thomas lays waste to the notion that Jesus was `the only begotten Son of God' and obviates the need for a formalized church when he says, `When your leaders tell you that God is in heaven, say rather, God is within you, and without you.' No wonder they suppressed this stuff! The Roman Catholic Church hasn't maintained itself as the oldest institution in the world by allowing individuals to have a clear channel to see the divinity within all of us: they need to put God in a bottle, label the bottle, put that bottle on an altar, build a church around that altar, put a sign over the door, and create rubricks and rituals to keep out the dis-believing riff-raff. Real `Us' versus `them' stuff, the polar opposite from `God is within You.' `My God is bigger than your God' the church(s)seem to say. And you can only get there through "my" door/denomination. But Jesus according to Thomas had it right: just keep it simple, and discover the indwelling Divinity `within you and without you.'"

Here are quickie reviews of what is being bought these days on the Gnostic Gospels and the lost books of the Bible in general:

The Lost Books of the Bible (0517277956) includes 26 apocryphal books from the first 400 years that were not included in the New Testament.

Marvin Meyers' The Secret Teachings of Jesus : Four Gnostic Gospels (0394744330 ) is a new translation without commentary of The Secret Book of James, The Gospel of Thomas, The Book of Thomas, and The Secret Book of John.

James M. Robinson's The Nag Hammadi Library in English : Revised Edition (0060669357) has been around 25 years now and is in 2nd edition. It has introductions to each of the 13 Nag Hammadi Codices and the Papyrus Berioinensis 8502.

The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (0140278079) by Geza Vermes has selected works....a complete work is more difficult to achieve than the publisher's marketing concept indicates. His commentary generates strong reactions.

Elaine Pagels has 2 books (The Gnostic Gospels 0679724532 and Beyond Belief : The Secret Gospel of Thomas 0375501568) that have received considerable attention lately. For many, her work is controversial in that it is written for popular consumption and there is a strong modern interpretation. She does attempt to reinterpret ancient gender relationships in the light of modern feminist thinking. While this is a useful (and entertaining) aspect of college women's studies programs, it is not as unethical as some critics claim. As hard as they may try, all historians interpret the past in the context of the present. Obviously there is value in our attempts to re-interpret the past in the light of our own time.

If you want the full scholarly work it is W. Schneemelcher's 2 volume New Testament Apocrypha.

Also, to understand the Cathars......try Barbara Tuckman's Distant Mirror for an incredible historical commentary on how the Christian Church has handled other points of view

I have enjoyed this book immensely. It is great as fast reference for the facts peppered throughout the Da Vinci Code, and also as a cover to cover read. My mother picked it up after I recommended it and has also enjoyed discovering the truth and the history behind the facts mentioned in the Dan Brown book.