I've been reading The Da Vinci Code....

I watched The Da Vinci Code climb to the #1 bestselling book slot and stay there for months and months. I knew a bunch of people who thought it was great. I saw the movie when it came out, and LOVED it. Still, for some reason I was fairly convinced that I wouldn't be able to follow it very well. (Modern, fast-paced books tend to do me in.) The subject came up at work the other day, and being in a position in which I was desperate for something new and gripping to read, I decided to go to the library for the first time in many months. (As a side note, I am always reading something. At the moment, I am in the middle of 3 different books. I never go to the library though. It seems like I can never pick something up off the shelf and love it. Plus I have a bad habit of holding on to library books for unreasonable lengths of time, even when I'm not reading them. Hence, the decision not to go to the library unless I already have something I'm looking for.) At any rate, I decided I wanted to read The Da Vinci Code. I really enjoyed it! Oddly enough, I think I liked the movie better, but the book has a lot of added symbology that isn't directly relevant to the story line and therefore isn't in the movie. Pretty fascinating stuff. One of the most amusing things though, is that reading this book has encouraged me to do actual research!

For those of you who may not be familiar with this story, it is about a secret dating from the time of Christ that is being fought over by the Catholic Church and a secret society called the Priory of Sion. **SPOILER ALERT** The big secret is that Jesus Christ was actually married to Mary Magdalene; that she was carrying his child at the time of the crucifixion, and that she was meant to carry on His church after His death. The Priory of Sion is a self-appointed protector of this secret, knowing that it somehow proves that Jesus Christ was human and not divine, and that the entire New Testament is based on fabrications. The plan is that the Priory will protect the secret until the time is right, at which point they will produce proof that a living bloodline of Christ exists, substantiating the whole idea of a human, rather than a divine Christ. The Catholic Church, whether they believe in the truth of this secret or not, will stop at nothing to prevent the secret from being made public, believing that the Church will crumble as a result. Where does Leonardo come into it? He apparently painted references to the relationship between Mary Magdalene and Jesus Christ in his painting 'The Last Supper', in addition to many other references which I won't get into here. The premise is that the figure on the left of Jesus Christ is actually Mary, rather than one of the twelve apostles.

(So far seems pretty convincing to me.) That, in addition to a million other things, apparently 'proves' that Jesus Christ was not the Son of God, but rather a great and gifted man. My two main questions throughout, have been (a) why would Christ having a child or children preclude him from being divine, and (b) what makes so many people think that because Leonard da Vinci painted it, it must be true?

I didn't set out to try to find out whether or not this is all true (especially not by searching the Internet), but rather to simply read more about the Priory of Sion. I found some interesting things, namely, a news article by CBS News which states in no uncertain terms that the Priory of Sion, and this so-called secret that they have been protecting, have been nothing but an elaborate and intriguing hoax.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/04/27/60minutes/main1552009.shtml

I have to say, after reading the article, I wondered how such an idea could be so self-perpetuating. Maybe it's just because the idea of a secret society protecting an idea that, if known, would throw everyone for a loop, really is intriguing. I imagine it certainly doesn't hurt to have your publicity taken care of by a NY Times Bestseller either....Anyway, read the article if you're interested - I'd love to know what you think!