The Da Vinci Ca-Ca
Though I usually produce lame attempts at humor on WTR, as an historian I feel obliged to weigh in on a serious note- The Da Vinci Code is a steaming pile of ca-ca. I confess, I read the novel and I found it diverting and I will probably catch the Ron Howard-Tom Hanks flick on DVD, but if I have to hear or read much more about how this piece of fluff has a "deep" or "controversial" message I might puke.
The central premise of the film, that a conservative conspiracy within the Church moved to conceal evidence of Jesus' marriage to Mary Magdelene and traditions of "the sacred feminine" in early Christianity is completely ahistorical. The very pairing of the words "conservative" with "early church" is so paradoxical in historical terms as to boggle the mind. We take the creed of the Roman Catholic Church today very much for granted, but in the first and second century C.E. it would have been difficult to find a message that was more radical, counterintuitive, or subversive. In a world ruled by Caesar, a figure whose authority was marked by his wealth, power, and inviolability, the notion that an impoverished convict who died on the cross was the "King of Kings" was among the wildest propositions anyone could possibly have imagined. If he had married and had children that would at least have brought him a bit closer to a conventional dynast, so there would have been nothing "conservative" about hiding the fact if it were true. As to traditions of "the sacred feminine," the early church tended to be about as patriarchal as the societies in which it took root (sometimes a bit more so, often a bit less).
Anyone interested in a readable historical account of the issues Dan Brown makes a hash of in Ca-Ca, I mean Code, should check out Elaine Pagels' The Gnostic Gospels.
The central premise of the film, that a conservative conspiracy within the Church moved to conceal evidence of Jesus' marriage to Mary Magdelene and traditions of "the sacred feminine" in early Christianity is completely ahistorical. The very pairing of the words "conservative" with "early church" is so paradoxical in historical terms as to boggle the mind. We take the creed of the Roman Catholic Church today very much for granted, but in the first and second century C.E. it would have been difficult to find a message that was more radical, counterintuitive, or subversive. In a world ruled by Caesar, a figure whose authority was marked by his wealth, power, and inviolability, the notion that an impoverished convict who died on the cross was the "King of Kings" was among the wildest propositions anyone could possibly have imagined. If he had married and had children that would at least have brought him a bit closer to a conventional dynast, so there would have been nothing "conservative" about hiding the fact if it were true. As to traditions of "the sacred feminine," the early church tended to be about as patriarchal as the societies in which it took root (sometimes a bit more so, often a bit less).
Anyone interested in a readable historical account of the issues Dan Brown makes a hash of in Ca-Ca, I mean Code, should check out Elaine Pagels' The Gnostic Gospels.
posted by Madman of Chu | 6:12 AM | Permalink
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7 comments
7 Comments:
Perhaps the Madman would be interested in these articles:
Gnostic Gospels
Inventing a Religion of Intolerance
The Summer of Mary Magdalene
This last one mentions Elaine Pagels:
"For example, Elaine Pagels, a scholar of Gnosticism, theorizes that Thomas is presented as a doubter in the New Testament in order to discredit the spurious Gospel of Thomas, a theory which is guesswork at best, not scholarship."
Dear CIV,
Hey, I didn't claim that Pagels was necessarily right about anything, just that one would be better served by reading her book than Brown's. As someone who is "in the field" but not a specialist I have a great deal of respect for Pagels. I agree with Hitchcock that the "Gnostic Gospels" are treated much too credulously as historical testimony by many scholars, but for the most part I think Pagels is clear of that sin. Hitchcock's assessment of her "Thomas" interpretation is much too harsh, calling it "guesswork" doesn't change the fact that her idea is extremely intriguing, plausible, and produces a historically interesting reading of the canonical text. She is playing much less fast-and-loose with the sources than someone like, say, John Dominic Crossan, and God knows she never strays into the territory mapped by Brown and his ilk. Historians and theologians are never going to see eye-to-eye, that being said there really shouldn't be need for hostility.
Excellent, Madman. Like you, I read and was mildly entertained by The Da Vinci Code, but I never understood it as anything other than a work of fiction. Apparently Dan Brown likes to go around claiming that it's based on historical fact. In any event, all the talk of its "controversial" message is bound to help ticket sales, and I'm sure Dan Brown and the movie-makers will take ticket sales over historical accuracy every time.
I haven't read The Gnostic Gospels, but I've read Adam, Eve, and the Serpent (also by Pagels), which I found very interesting. It gives an account, if I remember, of the revolutionary/radical nature of the early church with its emphasis on human -- male and female --moral (and sexual) autonomy and free will (that's why it was particularly compelling for women and slaves, for instance). Whether or not Pagels takes Gnosticism too seriously, I can't say (haven't read enough of her work to know). But I wasn't offended by the notion that early Christian writers and thinkers were "plugged in" to and engaged with the intellectual and theological currents of the day.
Thanks for this post, Madman.
Another pile of ca-ca in The DaVinci Code is this business with the Merovingian dynasty being descended from Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Before the conversion of Clovis to Christianity, the Merovingians were very happy to be pagans, at at least one preserved legend suggests that they believed their dynasty's eponymous founder, Merovec, to have been some combination of man and sea monster. This is basic early-medieval history; most of the sources are even available in English.
The DaVinci Code also perpetuates the misperception, common among some of my students, that there's far more to the "holy grail" stories than there really is. There are traces of Celtic myths about cauldrons and whatnot that may or may not have merged with Christian stories to become the grail of the Arthur legends, but the grail romances that survive are nothing more (or less) than trippy religious treatises.
I can't tell you guys how many nice people I've met who insist that Dan Brown's novels are historical fact. Too many of them are inclined to believe that their own ignorance of the history of Christianity is proof that someone--scholars, the Vatican, an evil cabal of Knights Templar--have been keeping secrets from them. I find it all deeply frustrating.
Thanks for that great addition to the comments, Jeff.
This discussion makes me wonder whether there's some connection between historical ignorance and a penchant for believing wacko conspiracy theories.
I blame it all on postmodernism. See, I think Derrida and Foucault and de Man got together in a darkened room in Brussels at mid-century, and ...
I think at least some of it is the deficiency of Catholic religious education and the average Catholic's poor understanding of the history of his own religion. Until I took classes in religious history and medieval philosophy at a big state university, I couldn't have told you the meaning of 70 percent of the Catholic "profession of faith," despite years of Sunday School. Many Catholics--and indeed, many members of other Christian denominations--are naturally going to be intrigued by the stories in the Gnostic gospels largely because most of them have never been informed that there were so many ancient but non-canonical gospels in the first place. Although it gets pretty nutty, conspiracy-mongering is a natural reaction to discovering something that you think your religion doesn't want you to see.
Yeah, I think you're right about that, Jeff. Daryl Ann makes fun of me and claims I just wasn't paying attention in religion class, but if they did teach me about this stuff (early Church history, apocryphal texts, the theological foundations of the Profession of Faith and the Apostle's Creed, etc.) in grade school and high school, they certainly did a poor job, because I remember very little of it -- and I wasn't a slacker student.
What bugs me is that I think some of the watered down, touchy-feely stuff we got arose from a sense among the teachers that the unwashed masses couldn't handle the great theological tradition of the Church. Or maybe some of our *teachers* couldn't handle the great theological tradition of the church. But I suppose I'm being uncharitable.
In any event, I do remember one of the books I had in high school religion was a classic touchy feel psycho-babble type thing called "Why am I afraid to tell you who I am?" -- and I think it was written by a Jesuit!
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