The Da Vinci Code

Before I get stuck into the books I mentioned yesterday, I wanted to get something off my chest. I’ve finally read The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (I know, right up with the latest trends!) and, although it’s an OK read, I was very frustrated over various problems with it. I have no problem with a novel on this theme – it’s fiction, after all. But that is part of the problem. Dan Brown proclaims that much of it is not fiction but fact, in particular all his secret societies and their histories and rituals. And many people believe him, despite the total lack of evidence. Even worse than that, though, is that his research is often woefully weak and, where he has done his homework, he’s often failed to think about what he’s found out and ends up spouting nonsense. And the worst thing is that there was actually a good book in there crying to be let out, but it was smothered in all the ill-thought-out, poorly researched material that the author felt that he must include.

I’m not going to embark on a detailed deconstruction of the problems in the book, but I am going to make a few points that particularly irked me.

The central theme of the book is that Jesus was actually married to Mary Magdelene, and that they had a family. This much, I’m actually not going to argue with. I don’t personally think that the evidence supports such a conclusion, but there is certainly plenty of material to play with here. Jesus spent most of his life doing something – his recorded ministry only started when he was 30, which was then definitely middle-aged. Whether he married and had children or not, though, is a matter for speculation – and hence ripe for working into a novel.

Unfortunately, much of Brown’s research into pre-Christian religion is terrible. He seems to have the idea (at least, this is how the book is written) that pre-Christian religion (and, indeed, pre-Constantine Christianity) universally placed a high emphasis on feminine divinity, and that the changes wrought when Constantine made Christianity the religion of the Roman Empire deliberately suppressed this feminine divinity in favour of a purely masculine one. Now, setting aside again the question of whether Constantine had the effect on Christianity that Brown claims (because the evidence doesn’t support it – there were many changes in the church at that time, but there was no sudden change of the sort Brown claims), this picture of religion is completely unsupported by the evidence. There was no universal religion – they differed hugely in what they believed; Judaism, in particular, had been strongly male-oriented for a long time (and is important to this discussion as where Christianity started). There was no universal (or even, as I understand it, common) use of sex as a sacrament, as described by Brown. There was a time when religious beliefs seem to have been primarily female oriented (as seen from carvings of female figures) but the change to male-dominated belief patterns came tens of thousands of years ago, not less than two thousand.

Even Brown’s detailed descriptions of places and events are sometimes sadly mistaken. The worst example I spotted is one that he makes much of in the early part of the book – the church of Saint Sulpice in Paris. He describes a brass line running North—South in the church as a holdover from a temple to Isis that was allegedly on the same site before the church was built, and that this line represented a belief in a Sun God. Unfortunately, this is completely false (as is his claim that was historically known as the “Rose Line” ). These brass lines are found in many mediaeval churches across Europe, and were added to the buildings after they were built for one purpose – to help calculate the date of Easter. This date varies from year to year depending on the phase of the moon and the arrival of the spring solstice. However, the church was unable to predict the date of the solstice accurately, which often led to Easter having to be celebrate late, which was a serious embarassment. Accordingly, these devices (which are essentially large sundials) were inserted into churches to watch how the sunlight moved across them throughout the year – recording the position at which the noonday sun crossed the line each day. This led to the discovery of the cyclical nature of the date of the solstice, and a method of predicting Easter.

As I said, in a novel like this, I expect to find fiction and have no trouble with that. However, I always have trouble when people haven’t thought through what they are saying. And, sadly, part of the central thesis of this book is badly flawed. Brown writes that the Church feels threatened by the evidence for Jesus and Mary marrying and having children – this might or might not be true; I believe it to be false but this isn’t the problem. The problem is that Brown identifies the cause of the Church’s problem as the claim that Jesus is God – that is, that evidence that Jesus married and had children would somehow destroy the unique place of Jesus. But, if Jesus is God, this is precisely what insulates the Church from any serious effects of finding, for example, that Jesus had children; divinity isn’t a hereditary condition! If Jesus was God then this accords Him a unique position in history. Finding that He married and had children might change our picture of Him somewhat but wouldn’t seriously affect any aspect of Christian belief. However, many pseudo-Christian sects would have a problem with such a finding and, sadly, the sects that would have the greatest problem are precisely those sects to which Brown appeals as being complicit in hiding this secret – the Gnostics and others. The Gnostics were often dualist, holding that the material world is evil and only the spirit is good (in contrast to orthodox Christianity, which holds that God created the material world and called it good). For a dualist, God could not become human, marry, have sex and produce children because that would pollute the holiness of God’s pure Spirit. The orthodox doctrine of the Incarnation – that God became fully human and lived as one of us – is anathema to a dualist because it pollutes their pure spiritual picture of God by claiming that flesh and spirit are both good, that we are able to be holy as whole human beings, body, mind, soul, whatever. The resistance to any idea of Jesus marrying and having children that many in the church would feel comes not from the Bible or Christianity itself, but from the Greek ideas that permeated the Church in the early centuries (well before Constantine got involved). These ideas were again dualist – that the holy thing to do was withdraw from the world, to suppress emotions, to seek the spiritual truth. The Church has since always felt an internal tension between the dualists and those who defend a more holistic picture of the world, founded on the Bible and, in particular, on the teachings and actions of Jesus. And, perhaps oddly, it is precisely those defenders of a holistic Christianity, with their firm grip on the nature of the Incarnation, who would have the least problem dealing with a married Christ. Once they’d got over the shock, of course!

pax et bonum

Article posted at 11:32am on 18 February 2005
Category: Books, Musing, General

In Judaism, God is neither masculine nor feminine. That’s one of the major points in Judaism, that God is not like anything in the world, not like animals or humans, etc.

Once Christians adopted the Jewish scriptures, they, the Christians, decided that God is male. Such a view is antithetical to Judaism.

Ami () (URL)
02:30am on 19 February 2005

Ami – absolutely! I wasn’t meaning that God was seen as a man in Judaism. Rather, Judaism was (and mostly is, AIUI) male-oriented, with women not allowed the same level of participation as men (such as priestly roles) and, indeed, their very nature was seen as inferior and less clean. Indeed, Christianity doesn’t see God as a man, either; only Jesus is viewed as a man, and only then insofar as He was human. The divine has both male and female within it (and so is both or neither), as indicated in various places in the Prophets, and in the creation story itself, which talks of humanity being created in the image of God, both male and female. Both Judaism and Christianity are, however, often guilty of placing the role of man above that of woman.

[John] () (URL)
1:45pm on 19 February 2005

John,

Society has been in the past, and is to some extent today, male dominated. That has nothing to do with Judaism. Today, women in non-Orthodox Judaism can become rabbis, etc. Even within Orthodox Judaism there is some talk on the subject, but things get done notoriously slowly there.

As for “inferior and less clean”, I would have you ask you for sources. Again, women might have been seen as second class the world over, but that has nothing to do with Judaism. You will, of course, remember Deborah, who was both a Prophet and a Chieftain (“Judge”). And a woman.

pax et bonum? Not knowing Latin, I assume it means something along the lines of “peace and goodness”? Indeed, to you as well. :)

Ami () (URL)
12:46am on 27 February 2005

Ami,

First, I was talking historically, so the laudable changes in Judaism in recent decades are not really the issue here – just as, when talking about the primitive or medieval Church, we have to talk in terms of Roman or medieval society and not project our modern concerns back onto the people then.

So, when talking about Judaism around the time of Jesus, we need to look at its practices then, rather than now. So, we had a culture focused on ritual cleanliness and observing the rabbinical legal code. As a result a woman’s menstruation made her unclean for at least a week each month; childbirth also made a woman unclean (again, because of its association with bleeding). Rabbinic teaching at the time also associated women generally with the sin of Eve, and labelled women as corrupters of men. This is, of course, part and parcel of the male-dominated society!

My point wasn’t that Judaism was particularly to blame for male domination; rather I was taking an example that I knew something about to show that Brown’s contention that pre-Christian religion generally was gender-equal or female biased was simply ignorant and wrong. Judaism wasn’t any more male-biased than most religions at the time AFAIK; Orthodox Judaism is (in a Western context) male biased, but I know that wider Judaism is not.

pax et bonum
(Yes – it means “peace and goodness” :-)

)

[John] () (URL)
12:47pm on 27 February 2005

John,

First, I did not mean this as a confrontation or any type of strong disagreement. I was just jotting down some notes on a good post.

My own belief is that, at its core, Judaism is not, or is not supposed to be, biased against women.

Here are some more notes, if you don’t mind. :-)

1. Only the Pharisees, one of two major politico-religious parties, were concerned with observing the rabbinical legal code.

2. Perhaps the English word “unclean” is unfortunate. That women are ritually unclean during their period is Mosaic Law, and is not from the Rabbis. As you know, men also become ritually unclean. For example, emission of semen makes a man ritually unclean.

The reason that the English word “unclean” is unfortunate is that you probably associate it with sin, whereas ritual uncleanliness has nothing to do with sin — it is simply part of normal life.

3. As for Brown’s views, it’s always fun to reminisce about the “good old days”, but, as it turns out, the old days are often not as good as one imagines them to be.

pax et bonum

Ami () (URL)
11:25pm on 27 February 2005

Ami,
I hope we’re not having a strong disagreement, just exploring each other’s positions :-)

Re pharisees etc., I believe that the Sadducees were also somewhat concerned with observing the Law, although the Pharisees (and other groups such as the Essenes) were the ones who placed the most emphasis on it.

“Unclean” might not be ideal (translations never are!) but it does have the advantage that it doesn’t carry connotations of moral fault. The two are sometimes confused but, as I understand it, “unclean-ness” refers to a state of being unable/unworthy to take part in the religious life of the community through circumstance rather than sin. The burden of unclean-ness was perhaps biased against women because they had no choice about becoming unclean – it was simply part of being a woman, whereas there was no equivalent for a man (he could refrain from sex, for example). I don’t know the current attitudes towards cleanliness laws in Judaism, although I suspect they vary greatly!

As long as we both agree Brown was talking nonsense, I’ll be happy :-)