Da Vinci Code: Deciphering Da Vinci (Part 1) Series

Why am I doing a four week study on the Da Vinci Code? Let me open simply with these quotes and letters:

"Honestly, [reading the book] shook my whole faith. I realize that the book is fiction, but much of what he wrote about seemed like it was based on historical facts aside from the characters…”1

"Yes, I think Dan Brown makes a lot of sense, especially the part about Jesus just being a mortal. I’d always kind of thought that way, but the facts in the book back it up."2

“…It was an interesting book until I got to the part where he’s talking about how Christianity began, how it’s all false, and that Christianity is basically a lie and stolen from pagan religions. … Is it all true? … Is the last 25+ years I’ve been a Christian all a lie? … Is everything I was raised to believe just made up for the sake of money? I have to know. I don’t know where else to turn. Now I am doubting if there is a heaven, a God, and Jesus. Please, help me! Please, in God’s name, help me. I’m brokenhearted, confused, and still crying.”3

The Impact

In 2005, the National Geographic Channel commissioned a Canadian survey, finding that 32% of all Canadians who have read the Da Vinci Code believe that the theories outlined in it are true.4 1/3 of Canadians believe that Jesus’ descendants are walking among us.5

Nearly 100 million Americans have read the novel, keeping it on The New York Times Best Sellers for 148 weeks straight. 6 In fact 53% of Americans say this book has had a significant impact on their faith and understanding.7

The Da Vinci Code has sold over 40 million copies worldwide and that number is growing fast. So fast in fact that in 2005 Time magazine named Dan Brown one the world’s 100 most influential people8, among the likes of President George W. Bush and the Dalai Lama. 9

The Opportunity:

The da Vinci code provides “an instant conversation piece with non believers.”10 Thanks to Dan Brown it has become easy to bridge the divide between talking about the weather to talking about Jesus Christ. Now instead of the awkward jump we can just ask the question, “Have you seen/read the Da Vinci Code?” And then spearhead the conversation with the truth.

Don’t run and hide, invite the spiritual conversation and encourage vigorous debate. It’s not at all frightening, because we literally do have the truth on our side.

May 19th it will be released as a major motion picture. Look for it to top the charts. Do I suggest you go see it for fun? No.

However, if you have some unsaved friends going to see it; you might want to consider going with them and using the after movie ice-cream event as the perfect time to talk about the truth. Watch how you carry yourself. Don’t get angry. Be prepared, and know the truth before you go. To that end, let’s jump right in with the plotline.

The Plotline

I’m about to tell you the story and I have no problem spoiling it for you since our goal is the truth rather than the story.

The movie is about the search for and the ultimate discovery of the Holy Grail. Central to the story: Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. She herself was the Holy Grail. The Grail not being a mystical cup of legend but instead a symbolic name to identify not just Mary Magdalene as the wife of Jesus but also their Child “Sarah” whom she carried. In terms of Medieval understanding then, Mary Magdalene was carrying the blood of Christ in her womb. They fled to Gaul (France) in order to be kept safe, she was assisted by Joseph of Aramathea.

Jesus and Mary’s descendants became the Merovingian line of French kings. The secret was handed on through a secret society named the Priory of Sion which has purportedly included members like Leonardo da Vinci among other famous figures of history.

Leonardo, he continues has hidden clues in his art to this secret. Thus the name “The Da Vinci Code”. Clues which the stories main Characters are braving death and danger to uncover in a breathless page turner of a story. In the end of course the main character does discover the bones of Mary Magdalene as well as discovering, surprise upon surprise, that the main heroine of the book/movie is in fact a descendant of Jesus Christ thus she is, in a sense, the grail.

Dan Brown’s theology overriding the story is that god is male and female. However the great conspiracy is that for the last 2000 years the male dominated church has suppressed “divine feminine” in an effort to keep the power. True worship, he believes is worship that includes worshipping the divine feminine.