THE DA VINCI CODE REVIEW
Yvonne S. Waite
The Bible For Today, Inc. *900 Park
Avenue * Collingswood, NJ 08108 USA
Phone: 856-854-4452 * Fax: 856-854-2464 *
www.BibleForToday.org
April/May 2006
As you know on my JUST
FOR WOMEN radio broadcasts, I have been giving critiques of
THE DA VINCI CODE by DAN BROWN.
WHY? This book has made a
mark in our society! It has been read by forty-two million
folks all over the world. Now with a movie, as well as the
plagiarism law-suit against the author settled in Brown's
favor, the popularity of the book has sky-rocketed once
again. To be honest with you, I did not really think that my
radio listeners understood why I was spending so much
valuable radio-time on this blasphemous book. Now I think
they, as well as you, are beginning to realize that such
warnings have merit.
Long before I read the
book for myself, I was acquainted with the volume.
I knew what the book jacket looked like. There were 454
pages between the covers of that volume and one-hundred-five
chapters therein. I'd seen many people in airports, waiting
for their planes, reading Dan Brown's masterpiece. I saw it
for sale everywhere. The truth was I did not want to waste
my time with such fiction for it lied to the world about my
Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. The book contends that Jesus
did not die for the sins of the world. It says He escaped
Calvary's cross to run away to another country in a romantic
get-a-way with a woman. It is said that woman was Mary
Magdalene, and that her womb was the vessel (or the Holy
Grail) that held the blood of Christ. WHAT BLASPHEMY!
The alleged country to which they were supposed to have fled
was France. The family name to this day is supposed to be
"Merovingian." So when a friend lent the book to me, I
was trapped. I had no excuse. I had to read it, finishing it
in about four days.
I really don't know how
to tell you about The Da Vinci Code without becoming
too verbose.
Truthfully, I do not want to spend a lot of time reviewing
it and I don't think you want to know every detail either. I
read it so fast that I find myself trying to remember what
it was all about and how in the world I can synthesize it
for you. To start with, I had a hard time getting into the
plots of the story. The chapters, which were short--an ideal
format for writers to use--keep its readers interested.
The Da Vinci Code is full of detailed characters and
different story-lines. To me it was like several different
short-stories in one book. As the writer wove the characters
and plots together, it all dovetailed into Dan Brown's
finished ending. Not being a reader of much fiction, I had
to force myself to stay with the book for several chapters.
(I had so much else to do. Here I was reading this
top-selling fanciful tale.) After awhile, I became
interested. Yet, I can truthfully say that I could have laid
down that volume at any time and not cared.
I kept trying to figure
out what the story was all about.
The supposed Mary Magdalene involvement with Jesus didn't
show up at first. It was many pages before I became aware of
it. There was much about the PRIORY OF SION, a fictional
secret society, and some information on OPUS DEI which is a
real branch of the Catholic church that has an abundance of
money. A religious group that had the approval of the late
Pope of Rome, and maybe the present one. (Maybe you remember
that I did a series of "JUST FOR WOMEN" radio
programs on OPUS DEI in connection with this book, as well
as on an OPUS DEI member named ROBERT HANSSEN, an American
who was a Russian spy. By the way Hanssen is mentioned in
this book, too)
As I read along in the
book, I was glad that previously I had read several written
exposes on this blasphemous novel.
Those critiques made me aware of the "ins & outs" of the
mysteries within Brown's imaginative mind. I do not
recommend this book, but I must admit that he is a good
writer. For me, it was a waste of time! In truth, because of
the popularity of the book, I am reading and reporting on it
for you. Brown tells us that The Da Vinci Code, is
all facts and true (which it is not!). You are probably
aware by now that a movie on this wicked plot is to be
released in May of 2006 with TOM HANKS taking the lead and
RON HOWARD as the director. Whether you want to know about
this book or not, you will be hearing every detail in the
near future. It is better to be forewarned.
Let's begin with the
main characters. As the book begins, art lover JACQUES SAUNIERE, the renowned curator of the LOUVRE MUSEUM in
Paris, France, is dying on the museum floor.
He was killed, as it
turned out, by a giant, red-eyed, albino monk named SILAS
who killed people, afterwards flagellating himself in
repentance. The dying Sauniere--a word-playing
aficionado--was able to do some astounding things as he was
expiring, leaving clues for his estranged granddaughter,
SOPHIE. She was now a mature woman who had become a
crack-police-cryptologist. Her parents and brother were
killed in some kind of mysterious way when she was a young
child. She had been told it was an automobile accident. Her
grandfather raised her and was as a father to her all her
young life. He taught her how to solve riddles and puzzles.
But it was in death that his greatest puzzle-challenge was
given. If solved, the puzzle and clues he left her, as he
lay dying on the floor of the world-famous art museum, would
reveal his murderer, the secrets of the PRIORY OF SION, and
the whereabouts of THE HOLY GRAIL.
In death, Sauniere's
body in the form and attitude of Da Vinci's "Vitruvian
Man," lay prostrate on the floor.
It was found in room five on the first floor of the of the
Louvre's Grand Gallery. The famed painting, the still
smiling MONA LISA, was watching in Room six nearby. Upon the
dead man's chest, written in his own blood by his own hand,
were veiled clues that only Sophie would understand. This
book takes us with her in her quest to solve the riddles in
order to arrest her grandfather's murderer--thus discovering
the whereabouts of THE HOLY GRAIL.
Sad to say as a young
girl, Sophie's admiration for her grandfather came to a
screeching halt when she inadvertently found him in a secret
room with a white-haired woman performing a sexual act.
Others in
white robes circled in rhythmic swaying around this couple's
ritual. It was some kind of heathen worship where it was
said that the participants became one with God during this
act. The author said it was a form of prayer-- most
unscriptural to say the least! Many years (perhaps
seven--can't remember) after witnessing that PRIORY OF SION
ritual, that had something to do with THE HOLY GRAIL
(which is said to be Mary Magdalene), the frightened and
disgusted granddaughter, never contacted her grandfather
again, not even opening his many letters to her for his
explanation and reconciliation.
As the book progressed,
Sophie accompanied by the other main character in the book,
ROBERT LANGDON a Harvard professor of religious symbology,
solved Sauniere's murder.
LANGDON was the person
whom her grandfather wanted to help Sophie solve the
puzzle-clues to his murder. These clues would lead to The
HOLY GRAIL. (By the way, the "Holy Grail" turned out to
be Mary Magdalene's womb or Magdalene herself.) In the
process of uncovering this mystery, Sophie discovered that
the white-haired woman, who was part of the sexual PRIORY OF
SION ritual/worship, that had frightened her as a young
person, was her grandmother (the best I could figure out)
and that her brother was not dead but alive. Added to those
discoveries was the fact that Grandfather Jacques Sauniere
was the head-priest-figure of the Priory of Sion--just as
Isaac Newton, Victor Hugo, and Leonardo Da Vinci had been
years ago. (All this is according to author Dan Brown's
imagination.) During all those years, to keep Sophie and her
brother safe, the grandparents had separated, seeing each
other rarely. Each raised a grandchild. If I got it, at the
end of the book, we readers learned that Sophie was a
descendent of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. (Now, I may have
this wrong as the plot was very complex and I read fast and
couldn't make notes, as the book was borrowed and didn't
want to keep it too long.)
Sophie's grandfather,
the murder-victim in this tale, had a great passion for Da
Vinci's work.
Perhaps it was because the two men (Sauniere & Da Vinci)
were bonded together by a supposed fraternal link. Both had
presided over the Priory as Grand Masters--Da Vinci
supposedly reigned between 1510 and 1519 and Grandfather
Jacques Sauniere until his recent murder. Dan Brown wrote on
page 113, of The Code as if it were a historical fact, the
following:
"The two men share a historical fraternal bond. And it all
fits perfectly with their fascination for goddess iconology,
paganism, feminine deities, and contempt for the Church. The
Priory has a well-documented history of reverence for the
sacred feminine."
I personally
think that anyone--especially a born-again Christian--should
NOT be enamored with the man Leonardo Da Vinci.
He was the illegitimate
son of a nobleman who went to Florence, Italy as an
apprentice to an older successful immoral artist. Da Vinci
took on the homosexual lifestyle of those about him and
reveled in such sin. Yes, he made a name for himself by
painting exceptional paintings and frescos, as well as
scientific studies; but, unless he repented of his sins, he
has no name written in Glory. I believe I read in Brown's
book, or some place, that "Da Vinci was a flamboyant
homosexual and worshiper of nature's divine order." Some
feel that there was almost something demonic about his aura.
There are other
characters in this complicated story. Paris' CAPTAIN BEZU
FACEH is the main detective.
Maybe he was the police
chief--I can't remember. He is mentioned throughout the
book. Sometimes the reader might think he was rather stupid
and conceited at first, but as the plot continues, we see he
was brilliant! Then we are introduced to the plush Opus Dei
World Headquarters in New York City and the money-carrying
BISHOP MANUEL ARINGAROSA, packing for a flight to Rome,
Italy at the instructions of the "Teacher" (SIR LEIGH
TEABING) who turned out to be an expert on the Holy Grail,
as well as a trusted friend of Robert Langdon. Although
Teabing was a wealthy and knowledgeable man concerning the
Holy Grail, he turned out to be a very evil, manipulative,
selfish person. In the end, he turned against Langdon and
Sophie.
In the contents of the
book, clues around the MONA LISA PAINTING (whom some feel,
according to Brown, was a self-portrait of the artist
himself) were often mentioned.
A black light was used to see blood and symbolic clues near
the painting and Sauniere's dead body. The account shows the
reader that the Priory's tradition of perpetuating goddess
worship was alluded to and often emphasized. According to
Brown's fiction, the early Christian church fooled the world
by spreading lies that devalued the "female prominence" and
pushed our thinking that masculine leadership was wrongly
favored. The thinking in The Da Vinci Code is that
Mary Magdalene was Jesus' favorite disciple, that she
carried on the blood line of Jesus by bearing his child or
children, that this blood line exists today, and that this
"truth" was pictured in code form in Da Vinci's
famous painting of THE LAST SUPPER . Of course, you and I
know that this is rank heresy without a trace of truth!
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