The Da Vinci Hoax

REVIEWS inal Priory for the same reason that THE DA VINCI HOAX Masonic Lodges claim (spuriously) to be descended from the Knights Templar.1 This is like Ralph Cramden’s Raccoon Lodge claiming the ancient secrets of Robert M. Price Solomon. As for the Secret Dossier, AKA the Priory Documents, these have The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown (New York: Doubleday, 2003, ISBN 0385504209) been exposed as modern fakes perpe- 454 pp. Cloth $24.95. trated by the same political sect as part of its attempt to fabricate a venerable pedigree.2 Once these facts are known, ooks that claim to “blow the lid supplying a background of plausibility Brown’s whole house of cards collapses. off Christianity” by means of for the great secret that forms the prize The Priory of Sion hoax (of which B new discoveries, real or imag- that all his characters seek: the fanci- Dan Brown appears to be a victim, not ined, find an avid public. Many of those ful speculation that Jesus Christ and an accomplice) was made popular twen- readers might be called sophomoric Mary Magdalene married and gave rise ty years ago through a tedious pseu- skeptics: having learned proper suspi- to the Merovingian dynasty of France do-documentary tome called Holy Blood, cion toward their inherited Christian with present-day heirs. Surely the whole Holy Grail, by Michael Baigent, Richard 3 faith, they remain uncritical about the premise of the book is that this supposed Leigh, and Henry Lincoln. (Brown’s assertions of those who would substi- knowledge is a carefully guarded secret, scholarly character Lee Teabing is tute any other hypothesis, often equally in fact the secret of the ages. Yet as we a scrambled version of the names of wild. Despite their admirable curiosity, shall see, this “secret” is well known to Baigent and Leigh.) These gents argued these seekers just do not know how to scholars—if only as a hoax. Apparently that the Templar Knights were sent by it is only the definitive proof, in the form separate fact from fiction. Their imag- the ultra-secret Priory of Sion on a top-se- of first-century documents salvaged from inations have been much stirred by cret mission to retrieve the legendary the ruins of the Jerusalem Temple, that Dan Brown’s best-selling novel, The Da treasure of Solomon’s Temple. They suc- await disclosure. What exactly is the Vinci Code. It is a fictional narrative, ceeded beyond their wildest dreams, dis- secret? The truth or the proof? Brown covering also the aforementioned cache but its author claims it is based on fact. seems to shift from one foot to the other That, too, alas, is part of the fiction. of documents telling the real story of the and back again. Holy Grail, which turned out not to be a A NOVEL IDEA FALSE FACTS chalice but rather the secret of the royal The Da Vinci Code is certainly a blood line of Jesus. Fortified by these Despite its shortcomings, The Da Vinci riches and the highly volatile secret of page-turner. Its brisk narrative is span- Code is astonishingly popular. We may Jesus and his queen Mary Magdalene, the gled with sudden twists, deft turns of hope that this betokens rising public Templars and the Priory of Sion bribed phrase, sparkling metaphors, and res- suspicion that there is a deeper truth and blackmailed their way to centuries of onating observations. Yet the book has to Christian origins than what the church- grave shortcomings. es teach. If readers hunger for the inside prominence, all the while protecting the First, there is no real protagonist. story, they aren’t getting it in The Da descendants of Jesus and Mary among The ostensible hero is a Harvard profes- Vinci Code. But Brown assures them the Merovingian dynasty. In turn, the sor; no Indiana Jones, our man is mere- that they are. Right up front he promises: Merovingian heirs, notably Crusader ly a passive intra-narrative incarnation “The Priory of Sion—a European secret Godfrey de Bouillon, mindful of the mes- of the reader, figuring out occasional society founded in 1099—is a real orga- sianic destiny implied in their very DNA, puzzles simply because the narrative nization. In 1975 Paris’s Bibliotheque sought to regain their lost glory, final- requires their solution before the action Nationale discovered parchments known ly establishing the short-lived Crusader can continue. Too often, those solutions as Les Dossiers Secrets, identifying Kingdom of Jerusalem. pop into the text in italics capped by numerous members of the Priory of Sion, Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln were exclamation points, cueing the reader including Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, little encumbered by inductive histori- in the manner of a sitcom laugh track to Victor Hugo, and Leonardo da Vinci” (p. cal method. Much as their disciple Dan feel astonishment and a sense of (illuso- 1). None of this is quite true. Brown would do decades later, they ry) discovery. Here are the inconvenient facts: constructed their hypotheses in novel- Second, much of the resolution of While there was indeed a medieval istic fashion, linking odd bits of data the plot depends on a series of arbi- monastic order called the Priory of Sion from medieval chronicles by means of trary mechanical reversals, with this (Zion), it was absorbed by the Jesuits one speculation after another: “What or that character suddenly revealing in 1617. The name was revived in 1956, if A were really B?”; “What if B were unsuspected good or evil dimensions appropriated by a far-right French polit- really C?”; “It is not impossible that . .”; or hitherto-unhinted connections with ical faction led by Pierre Plantard, an “If so-and-so were the case, this would other characters. The reader is jerked anti-Semite and Vichy sympathizer who certainly explain that and that.” about by a chain of mere fiats on the fancied himself the rightful Merovingian Admittedly, had the Templars discov- part of the omnipotent author. heir to the throne of France. Plantard’s ered proof that Jesus and the Magdalene Third, Brown trips over himself in group claimed connection with the orig- were husband and wife, this might free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 54 REVIEWS account for their considerable clout. much. Throughout Holy Blood, Holy mystery religions and utopian communi- But what are the chances that this is the Grail, Baigent and company recounted ties, we cannot dismiss the possibility. explanation? their attempts to authenticate a sheaf Still, possibility is not probability, as of modern, privately printed documents, it seems to have become for upholders THE KNIGHTS WHO SAY… the Secret Dossier or Priory Doc- of the Teabing hypothesis. Conservative Who were the Templar Knights? They uments. We have seen that these were apologists and New Age paperback writ- were a monastic order, the Poor Knights the hoaxes planted by Pierre Plantard’s ers alike have a sad way of leaping from of the Temple of Solomon, founded sect. And only this false source lists da possibility to unjustified belief. “If there between 1110 and 1120. Their sworn Vinci as one of the Grand Masters of the might be space aliens, we can assume duty was to protect Christian pilgrims secret order. Thus there is no da Vinci there are.” “If the traditional view of on their way to and from Jerusalem. connection at all. Gospel authorship cannot be definitively Over the years, they acquired consid- What of Brown’s claim that Mary debunked, we can go right on assuming erable fortunes and power, laying the Magdalene appears next to Jesus in da its truth.” No, you can’t. And though groundwork for modern banking as they Vinci’s Last Supper? There is nothing Jesus might have had sex with one or used their vast funds to bail out the to it. The figure is surely intended as many women or men, the mere possibil- crowned heads of Europe. Finally, in John, son of Zebedee. In view of church ity is of no help. He might have been a 1308, Philip the Fair, King of France, traditions that imagined John penning space alien, too. Some think he was. But subjected the Templars to a ruthless his Gospel as an old man at the close historians don’t. inquisition, stripping them of their mon- of the first century, it was traditional to Second, would it be a theological eys, the real object of his covetous picture John as a callow youth among scandal if Jesus could be shown to have lust. What was the pretext of the per- the disciples of Jesus. In Renaissance mated with a woman? The Teabing secution? It is difficult to tell, as we painting, this means he winds up look- hypothesis so asserts. One of the gross can never know the degree to which historical errors in The Da Vinci Code tortured wretches eagerly signed any ing effeminate, as Jesus himself would is the claim that, in the interests of impe- crazy-sounding confession shoved in were he not sporting a beard. rial propaganda, Constantine and his front of them. The beleaguered Templar O NEGATIVE vest-pocket bishops abruptly re placed Knights “confessed” to blasphemies the hitherto-prevailing understanding including the worship of a goat-headed We have several times had to get ahead of Jesus as a simple mortal with the demon statue called “Baphomet” and of ourselves by mentioning the tan- mythic view of Jesus as a god who only kissing its anus, as well as ritual homo- talizing notion that Jesus Christ and seemed to be human.

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