category: reviews - books
it's a fast paced whodunit book that offers up enough mystery that kept me interested as I read. an honest evaluation yields that for me it doesn't really hold a candle to Eco's Foucault's Pendulum (I can't help but compare since they grazed on the same topic of the Holy Grail and the Knights Templar). Maybe it presented a more controversial "revelations" and view on things but the depth of Eco's writings just wasn't there. it had some eyebrow-raising stuff of course. some "wow" moments that fascinated me for a few minutes but not the sort of intensity that Foucault's had. eco's writings made me stop every other paragraph because i just had to mull over what he wrote. some of his ideas i even pondered on for days.
But all in all da Vinci Code was pretty interesting nonetheless, a real page-turner that's hard to put down. so there I've said my piece.
now on to the next task. i warn you this is going to be a looooong discourse. i just had to contend the book's claims about the "truth" about Jesus. friends said I had to have an open mind about this as i read the book. I'd like to think I was pretty objective in this. i think my mind didn't close off any ideas but neither would it just accept something just because the author said so! so here i'm going to say my piece on the whole controversial shebang of da vinci code.
of course it doesn't feel good to be told that what you believed in for so long was a lie. but i stopped and thought, there were such moments in my life before and I survived the blow and i'd like to think I'm still intact. so if indeed there is truth at the bottom of this I'd gladly change my views and accept it. so here goes ...
on the thought that the bible is written by people and that it's not from God therefore it's not as credible as you think it is. this is an age old issue. I also agree that the bible is indeed written by people, who are even prone to some errors and personal biases. but i also believe that God (by virtue of His name) is powerful enough to destroy any lies that is committed in His name, to expose the truth and not let the lies go on for centuries. I don't think the Bible (and here i mean even its early versions, ones from before, the Old Testament which the early Israelites read, and the new testament including the gospels and the epistles) would have survived for all these years if it was nothing but an elaborate lie. I would think God would not let the truth be monopolized and be hidden by a group of people just because of power play. that goes against His program totally. He is not glorified in that, the people are, and in God's vocabulary that's a major no-no. the truth will out no matter how wisely man has hidden it, if God sees fit that it be exposed, otherwise He wouldn't even be God if man is more powerful than Him. Although I agree that there are probably many writings out there that were written by other followers of God that were not included in the Bible, there might be some nuggets of truth in there too, and probably a few errors as well. but once again, if it's a piece of writing that the whole of humanity can do without, then that was prob'ly the reason why God didn't permit it to be included. I know... bishops, men of the cloth, and other pillars of the religion had to do with what was included and what was not but ultimately it is God's work. He is powerful enough to work through people (be those people good or bad, with good intentions or otherwise) and I believe in His sovereignty, so nothing passes Him if it was not meant to be. He is on top of things always, I'd like to believe He would especially be watchful over the piece of writing that is attributed to Him.
on the premise that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, that they were lovers. If this was true I don't see any reason why such an important aspect of who Jesus was would be removed from the Bible. Honestly I don't subscribe to the thinking that Jesus would be in sin if He slept with a woman. I believe that it's another lie perpetuated by the enemy. Paul even encouraged people to marry if they have sexual urges that they can not control, that way if they have sex it would be with their wife or husband and they won't be sinning. Sex within marriage is not sin and I think God more than approves it since he created us as sexual beings anyway and commanded Adam and Eve to procreate. If Jesus had chosen to marry in His lifetime here I don't think there would have been any cause to hide it. The Bible mentioned little details of His life that attributed to His humanity, His half-brothers, His show of anger, His frustration with the disciples' difficulty in understanding some truths, He slept, He got hungry, etc. Also it was mentioned that some of the disciples had wives, Peter included, and still they were viewed as "saints", that little detail didn't disqualify any of them.
This all leads me to think. Jesus knew why He had to be here on earth, that is -> to do the will of the one who sent Him. that was His driving force and the reason behind all His actions from His childhood until He died. with that in mind, I would think, the reason behind why he did not marry was not because it would be sin for Him to join Himself with a woman, but that in marrying and having kids He would somehow undo His purpose. If He had kids His whole family line would consider themselves as Royalty. The blood of Jesus would be running in their veins and knowing the depravity of man, His line would be venerated and adored. A set of people would then be viewed as more worthy than the others, or that they would be somewhat more closer to God than others. worship of man would not be far behind. now that would skew things up, wouldn't it? there are enough lies and deceptions that man has to struggle through, I don't think Jesus would set up a situation that would aggravate that. He came here to save souls after all, not to confuse people further.
