The following data appears as it does on the CBN website:
The Davinci Code: A Biblical Response
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
Jesus is a great man or
prophet in the earliest
historical sources but
was later proclaimed
divine at the Council of
Nicaea.
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The Bible Says...
Jesus is called “God” (theos) 7 times in the New
Testament. He is called “Lord” (kyrios) in the divine
sense numerous times. No serious historian argues
that these texts postdate the Council of Nicaea.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
The Dead Sea Scrolls
along with the Nag
Hammadi documents are
the earliest Christian
records.
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History Says...
The Dead Sea Scrolls are purely Jewish documents;
there is nothing Christian about them. There is also no
evidence any of the Nag Hammadi documents existed
before the late second century A.D., with the possible
exception of the Gospel of Thomas.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
“One particularly
troubling theme kept
recurring in the [Gnostic]
gospels. Mary Magdalene.
. . More specifically, her
marriage to Jesus Christ"
(p. 244).
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History Says...
The Gnostic Gospels, a collection of anonymous
writings that blended pseudo-Christian ideas with
esoteric spirituality, say nothing about Mary and Jesus
being married.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
“The Bible, as we know it
today, was collated by
the pagan Roman
Emperor Constantine” (p.
231).
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History Says...
The Bible was not collated by Constantine, who died in
337 A.D. The Old Testament existed prior to even
Jesus’s day. And the New Testament, although it
started coming together by the end of the first century
(about 90-100 A.D.), was not formalized until about 393-
397 A.D. (after Constantine’s death).
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
“The royal bloodline of
Jesus Christ has been
chronicled in exhaustive
detail by scores of
historians” (p. 253).
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The Facts Say...
Following this comment about “historians,” Dan Brown
lists four books written by various authors: Margaret
Starbird, Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, Henry
Lincoln, Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince. But none of
them are historians. Starbird has an M.A. in
comparative literature and German. Baigent holds an
undergraduate degree in psychology and is pursuing
an M.A. in mysticism. Leigh is a novelist and short
story writer. Lincoln gained notoriety as a BBC
television personality and scriptwriter. And Picknett,
along with Prince, is involved in occultism, the
paranormal, and UFO studies.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
Leonardo Da Vinci made
the following comments
about the New
Testament: 1) “Many
have made a trade of
delusions and false
miracles, deceiving the
stupid multitude”; and 2)
“Blinding ignorance does
misled us. O! Wretched
mortals, open your eyes”
(p. 231).
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History Says...
These remarks have nothing to do with Leonardo’s
views on scripture. His first comment, in context, is
about alchemists who claimed that they could change
lead into gold. His second comment, in context, refers
to the foolishness of what he called men’s “own
opinions,” “lascivious joys,” and “[v]ain splenour.”
Brown completely misrepresented Leonardo’s writings
to make it seem as if the great artist detested the
Bible.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
“The Jewish
Tetragrammaton YHWH—
the sacred name for God—
in fact derived from
Jehovah, an androgynous
physical union between
the masculine Jah and
the pre-Hebraic name for
Eve, Havah (p. 309).
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History Says...
YHWH was not derived from “JEHOVAH.” The term
actually predates “JEHOVAH” by thousands of years.
Brown, in fact, has it backwards—i.e., “JEHOVAH” was
derived from YHWH. It is merely the sixteenth century
Latinized form of YHWH with “a,” “o” and “a” (the
vowels from adonai, “my Lord”) inserted between each
consonant (Latinizing the word changed the “Y” and
“W” to “J” and “V.”). As for the word Havah, there is
nothing “pre-Hebraic” about it. This is simply “Eve” in
Hebrew and it appears in the Old Testament.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
Constantine
“commissioned and
financed a new Bible,
which omitted those
gospels that spoke of
Christ’s human traits and
embellished those
gospels that made him
godlike. The earlier
gospels were outlawed,
gathered up and burned”
(p. 234).
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History Says...
First, there was no “new” Bible commissioned by
Constantine. The emperor simply requested that
Eusebius (the Bishop of Carthage) make fifty copies of
the already existing and widely accepted scriptures.
Second, no evidence suggests that Constantine or
anyone else “embellished” Matthew, Mark, Luke, or
John. Third, there were no gospels burned by
Constantine. Although some texts written by Arius
were burned, none of them were gospels. Fourth, there
were no gospels “earlier” than Matthew, Mark, Luke or
John. Finally, as previusly noted, the gospels in our
Bible clearly depict Christ’s “human traits,” which is
consistent with the Christian teaching that Jesus was
100% deity as well as 100% human.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
Sexual union between
man and woman through
which each became
spiritually whole had
been recast as a
shameful act by the
Church to 'reeducate' the
pagan and
feminine-worshipping
religions.
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The Bible Says...
The marriage bed is treasured and honored as pure
(Heb. 13:4). Sexual activities and pleasure are normal,
expected, and encouraged within a marriage. Sexual
union is a divine moment for a husband and a wife -- a
representation of the image of God that defines us.
God established boundaries around sex to protect it
and maximize its joy.
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
“[A]ny gospels that
described earthly
aspects of Jesus’ life had
to be omitted from the
Bible” (p. 244).
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The Bible Says...
The gospels in our New Testament present many
“earthly aspects” of Christ’s life such as his physical
frailties (hunger, fatigue, death); emotions (anguish,
outrage, love); and relational interactions (with his
mother, friends, and followers)
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The Da Vinci Code
says...
Leonardo’s worship of the
goddess and the feminine
can be seen in his Mona
Lisa painting. That name
comes from two Egyptian
deities: the god Amon
and the goddess Isis,
whose “ancient
pictogram was once
called L’ISA. The title
Mona Lisa, then, is really
“an anagram of the divine
union of male and female
(p. 121).
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History Says...
Leonardao Da Vinci did not even name this particular
painting. None of his works, in fact, were titled by him.
The Mona Lisa was catalogud by author Giorgio Vasari
in his book Lives of the Artists (1550). It was he who
first called it the Monna Lisa, which in English was
shortened to Mona Lisa. It simply means Madame Lisa,
and refers to the likely subject: Lisa Gherardini del
Giocondo, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo.
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