quote:Before you say that Judas has left, that would go against the Scriptures where he left after this particular event. People in DiVinci's time would catch this anomily fast.
Would those same people quickly register the anomaly that there is no cup of Christ in the painting, even though it's a painting of the Last Supper? They didn't seem to notice that for a long time.
I would remind you that you needn't prove or disprove DaVinci's beliefs in order to disagree with them. The evidence suggests that he was a part of this order and elements of several of his paintings confirm this. You can interpret the paintings differently if you wish; certainly your interpretation is the one DaVinci INTENDED to create, as the hints and clues and unorthodoxies of his paintings would have been outright heresy in his day.
We also know that DaVinci was an occultist and a homosexual, one for whom unorthodox ideas about the Church would certainly be par for the course.
Now, if you really want me to--if you really are open to the possibility--I could go into further detail about DaVinci's work to support this hypothesis. But I'm not that invested in trying to convince you that DaVinci's hidden message is really there, because it would have little bearing on whether or not you agreed with that message. If you're truly interested, however, just ask. The facts are there to support the hypothesis.
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posted
It has nothing to do with me agreeing or disagreeing with DaVinci about a married Jesus. For me, the marriage of Jesus is a question I don't find very important.
quote:You can interpret the paintings differently if you wish; certainly your interpretation is the one DaVinci INTENDED to create
This is what I am getting at. You seem to be in agreement then that he intended a particular interpretation. My argument is that there is no other interpretation MEANT beyond what he intended as you acknowledge he did have "orthodox" intentions. I just can't help seeing this as all a conspiracy theory equal to U.F.O.s and Roswell. They are great fun to investigate, but there remains more imagination than facts.
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quote:We also know that DaVinci was an occultist and a homosexual
Really? How interesting is that! Can you point me to some links (or give me book titles)? I wasn't aware of this at all.
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Notice that upon restoration the similar colors of his cloak do not match what Jesus wears. Of course, maybe the restorationists are part of the conspiracy.
It's funny that you link to a painting of John the Baptist in a typical DaVinci gesture; a gesture that is in itself a large part of these theories about his artwork.
You will also find that the Priory has some pretty strange beliefs about John the Baptist.
Anyway, if you find the topic interesting I suggest doing some independent research on it rather than just looking at the art and dismissing it as UFO-like theories. Until you see the big picture it will be easy to dismiss pretty much everything about the story, much like the creators of the "documentary" from which this thread was born. If it is true that DaVinci was putting hidden messages into his paintings, they are HIDDEN messages, and require a lot of footwork (fortunately a lot has been for us and we can just read their accounts) to uncover; you can't just look at the screenshots and judge for yourself, because you don't even know what to look for.
You may be right, of course, but to look at the painting and say that there's nothing amiss without studying the reasons for why people think that something else is going on is simply to see the painting as DaVinci intended for people ignorant of his secret to see it.
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quote: You seem to be in agreement then that he intended a particular interpretation. My argument is that there is no other interpretation MEANT beyond what he intended as you acknowledge he did have "orthodox" intentions.
Occasional
Caleb's argument seems to be that Da Vinci intended multiple interpretations of The Last Supper painting. Even straight-forward artists often put multiple interpretations into their work. Most artwork has a minimum of 3 levels of symbolic depth. Is it any surprise that one of the masterworks by one of the most respected artists in history would have multiple interpretations/meanings?
Anyway, the South of France legends concerning Mary Magdalane are more intruiging than deciphering one painting, as Caleb pointed out.
posted
Either I am not communicating myself well, or you are refusing to understand what I am saying because of your pre-occupation with your theories.
Believe all the theories about DaVinci you want I suppose. I, on the other hand, refuse to accept them as anything more than fanatical fantasies that see Communists or aliens (so to speak) in every shadow. I don't need to see the big picture because I don't believe there is any. All these HIDDEN clues are nothing more than self-delusional games of connect the dots.
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They are not "my" theories nor am I preoccupied with them, Occasional. Don't jump to conclusions, occasionally it's hard to jump back.
I do try to keep an open mind concerning things. The legends concerning Mary Magdalena are fascinating. Da Vinci's The Last Supper is just one piece of the puzzle.
But you just keep puttering around with surface observations, don't concern yourself with any symbolic meanings or analysis in depth. Just don't forget, your refusal to see the big picture is a belief too.
quote:Believe all the theories about DaVinci you want I suppose. I, on the other hand, refuse to accept them as anything more than fanatical fantasies that see Communists or aliens (so to speak) in every shadow. I don't need to see the big picture because I don't believe there is any. All these HIDDEN clues are nothing more than self-delusional games of connect the dots.
Occasional, I really hate to rain on your parade, but do you realize that you just said that anyone who doesn't agree with what you believe is stupid and delusional? Isn't that just the slightest bit arrogant?
Some people believe, others do not - in any matter that is not conclusively settled, not just the ideas under discussion in this thread. One group is not inherently smarter or better than the other. So, you know, can you dial down the rhetoric just a bit? Please? Thanks.
Now...I just finished reading "The DaVinci Code" this morning. Fun book. A bit contrived in places as far as the "whodunnit" aspect goes, but it kept me turning the pages. I loved the idea at the end that it isn't the finding of the Grail that is really the important thing, but the journey toward it and how the individual grows in the context of the search. Anyway, that's how I interpreted what Sophie's grandmother tells Landgon. And like the art talked about in the book, that is one of the coolest things about any kind of art - it is open to the interpretation of the individual.
And for those who mentioned "Focault's Pendulum" earlier - great book. It has been a few years since I read it; I think I'm going to have to go back and revisit it now.
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posted
I didn't say stupid, but I did say delusional and fanatical. Arragant? Most likely. But, those are my opinions and no amount of accusations of arrogance is going to change that fact any more than my rhetoric is going to change other people's minds on their theories (or theories built from other people's theories).
quote:(you)don't concern yourself with any symbolic meanings or analysis in depth.
Oh, but I do. However, unlike you and others I am not impressed their really are particular meanings in the symbols and deeper analysis. Its not that I don't see what you are saying. Its that I don't believe what you are seeing is really what you are saying.
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posted
Just finished listening to the audiobook version myself. A quick question: If there really is a true descendant of Christ that can be proven by historical documents, and her/his identity is revealed to the public, what do you think will happen? Will there be people flocking to her to make her the queen of the world? It seems silly, but if you are a devout Christian and you are given convincing evidence that there is a living descendant of the founder of your religion still on the planet, how does that affect your faith?
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posted
I didnt read all the responses to this, but I heard that the Davinci code was essentially stolen from another book called Michelangelos Theory or something along those lines. My friend said she read the Michelangelo book. I dunno if this is true just what I heard.
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posted
Pretty much nothing in the book is accurate OR original, I'm afraid. The people reading it are mostly chumps.
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OSC reviewed a book about Early Christianity this week. I think it would have been fun if he had compared it with Da Vinci Code. I don't plan to read it, though I may not be able to avoid it if I get it for Christmas. But I've been interested by the thread because there was a reproduction of the Last supper in our chapel and I always thought that the supposed John the Beloved looked like a girl. The way the author of the book of John refers to itself is interesting as well.
I was watching the Frontline about the early Christians, and I thought it was crap. They played an X files track whenever they said the word "Apocalyptic", which was a lot. They also jumped right past any of the text of the New Testament on several issues. Like saying it was Paul, not Peter who instituted the Baptism of Gentiles. I don't think he would have had enough influence early on to accomplish that, offerings or no. In any case, it seemed disingenuous of them to not even mention the biblical explanation, to have their panel of experts explain it away.
All text that supported their view was valid, all text that contradicted them was a "reaction" revealing the true issue. Of course, I'm sure all those scholars actually make their living disagreeing with one another.
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posted
My problem is (particularly with the documentary orgy that erupted after its release) is that few of their "biblical scholars" ...um... are.
I get irate when there are several well-known, respected scholars who could shine light on topics like these (and have, for any interested in reading non-fiction)are bypassed for what amount to the local kooks. It takes more than a degree to make a scholar.
posted
Not much at all, Beren. Though I have considerable doubts that Jesus was ever married or had children, his status was unique. I'm fairly certain that there is no literal hereditary quality involved; if there were, I think we would have heard a lot more about it.
Oh, and I think I remember reading something that indicated that two millennia later, most people should be descended from Jesus one way or another if that were true. Though I suppose perhaps population barriers might confine the genes to the Middle East, in which case we should have an awful lot of miracle-working Jews and Arabs running around if it were hereditary.
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That's a good point Maccabeus. Jesus is probably not going to pass on his hereditary qualities like a Marvel Comics mutant. Posts: 4116 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
I really think there's no reason to believe Jesus was married or had kids. The Bible explains that God created woman because "It's not good for man to be alone", plus he points out that the two become one flesh. Of course that last one isn't literal, but I consider the institute of marriage as something that helps make both participants more complete. Jesus had no need of completion, being perfect in and of himself. Not that it would have been wrong or weird for him to be married, I just don't think he was.
You'd think there would be a more obvious mention of it somewhere.
Plus, there are places in the letters to the churches where it's explained that not all men are strong enough to forego sex or marriage in order to focus more on God, but I know that Jesus was. Not that it proves he wasn't married, it just shows that the Bible considers the ability to abstain for life as a strength.
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quote:They also jumped right past any of the text of the New Testament on several issues. Like saying it was Paul, not Peter who instituted the Baptism of Gentiles
No, you did. Even if you ignore the extra-biblical records of the time, the baptism of Cornelius that you're going to argue established the doctrine of the baptism of gentiles is acknowledged in one of the Pauline letters and in Acts as a one time exception thing, not the establishment of a practice. It's kind of like people claiming that Kosher food restrictions were lifted because of Peter's dream regarding Cornelius. It only works if you ignore everything except the particular passage you're referencing.
edit: There is no controversy over who was the real "Apostle to the Gentiles". Even the Catholic Church, which has a vested interest in making Peter seem as good as possible acknowledges Paul's contribution and Peter's vacilation on the idea of incorporating Gentiles into Christianity.
posted
Finally started reading this book -- peer pressure, just about everyone else in my office has read/is reading it, and I was getting left out of literary conversations -- and my problems with the book don't stem from the subject matter or the conspiracies or the religious secrets.
Judging solely from this book, Dan Brown isn't a terribly good writer.
Granted, that's not very fair without judging it against his other works, but so far the ideas are keeping me reading despite the lousy craftmanship. I'm on Chapter 34 and perhaps three hours have elapsed. Not because so much has happened, but because every single realization, every single memory of any character at all must be spelled out, mostly in flashback form. I noticed it within the first few pages.
It was the weekend, and I had loaded the book on my Palm to begin when it struck me how no one in the book says much of anything, preferring instead to remember it. Apparently every utterance is accompanied by the characters drifting off in their own world for hours of subjective time. "This is annoying," I said to my wife Teresa, who agreed.
"I hate stories like that," she said.
It was true; for years she had despised reading and only come to it after losing a bar bet. It was only after she grew bored of the crossword puzzles that she worked by the thousands that she turned to the world of books and, to her surprise, found them to her liking. What would her English teacher think of her now, years after he mocked her for her hatred of the printed word?
Frank Allright was a stern teacher, one who ruled his class with an iron fist and brooked no interruptions or frivolity. His students would learn, by God, and woe be to him that dared pop a bubble or drop a pencil within his eyesight. He knew that the future of these children was frail and uncertain, and it was up to him to forge them into hardened critics of words in order to face the world unbowed. It was this goal that he took to bed at night, and this goal that was on his lips when he arose in the morning. Even his beloved sister came second to his destiny.
She didn't understand, his sister, and she kept trying to draw him away from the lonely scholastic life and into the bright sunlight of Paris; a tricky thing that, since they lived in central Florida. Yet she could never forget what she saw ten years ago on that fateful day when she came home early. She never forgot it. Never, not even for a little bit, it wws just that bad. Really, really bad.
She left Florida and went on to write crossword puzzles for a small publisher. Unbeknowst to anybody, Teresa amused herself with these puzzles in a bizarre connection of coincidence that makes little sense and advances the plot not a whit.
Teresa sat up and asked, "Does he do this all through the book?"
"I'm afraid so," I said. I was hoping against hope that she wouldn't remember what Mr. Allright's sister saw more than 25 years ago, since then she'd get all mopey and put her frowny pajamas on.
Jeez, guy. Don't tell me what someone thinks, show me. Don't tell me why a character responds the way he does, let their response tell me all I need to know.
So far it's more like Dan Brown read this great book called "The DaVinci Code" and now he's telling me about it. "See, he said no, but she doesn't think he's telling the truth. She used to do stuff like that with her grandfather when she was a little girl, right (seven paragraphs about childhood memories deleted), and so right away she knows what he really meant. Now she's gonna look over here and... hey, she found the clue! Isn't that cool?"
Damn. I really need to submit more stuff if this is what stays on the bestseller lists...
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quote:Approaching the door, Bishop Aringarosa would never have imagined the shocking news he was about to receive inside, or the deadly chain of events it would put into motion. It was not until an hour later, as he staggered from the meeting, that the devastating implications settled in. Six months from now! he had thought. God help us!
It might be a personal preference, but to me narration just doesn't have the immediacy or the impact as action. This reads like the announcer in a radio show filling the gaps betwen dialogue. And too much information is just given to me. Compare with this:
"An hour later a very different Bishop Aringarosa emerged. Gone was the arrogance and disdain; instead his face showed the strain of a man fighting to remain calm and composed while his carefully-constructed world falls to ashes. He staggered to the car, still shaken from the implications that he was only just beginning to understand.
"Six months, he thought. God help us all."
Not deathless prose, but I've shown that the meeting was not what he expected, that it's rocked him completely, and whatever it is it affects more than just him. I don't want to hear about deadly chains of events, I want to see them as they happen.
Seriously, read the book in a pompous and declarative voice, you'll sound just like the narrator from an Ed Wood movie.
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posted
I enjoyed the book’s puzzles (although the characters, with all their "expertise," were a bit slow on the up take, or took unnecessarily complicated paths to simple answers) and the ideas were interesting, so it was a fun read in the end, but I heartily agree Dan Brown has some writing issues.
Someone should sic the POV police on him.
Do NOT put me in somebody’s head, and have him look at a clue or puzzle, and then WITHHOLD information that that character knows just to keep the tension up. That isn’t tension, its reader frustration created by cheating the system, plain and simple. I about chucked the book at the wall over it in the beginning.
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posted
Sorry but I felt compelled to dig this thread out of the ashes, because I just finished reading Angels and Demons and The DaVinci Code both by Dan Brown this week.
I have taken a big interest in these books and a few others, namely the highly controversial works of Laurence Gardner, who has several strange titles of distinction and importance, such as:
Prior of the Celtic Church's Sacred Kindred of St Columbia Chivalric genealogist Noble Guard of the House of Stewart Chancellor of the Imperial and Royal Court of the Dragon Sovereignty, which embodies the Knights Templars of St Anthony
Make no assumptions, I view both of Dan Browns' works (Angels and Demons and Davinci Code) as fiction, and I do not profess to believe Gardners' works to be fact, but much of the content of both authors aligns very well! What is worth mentioning is that Gardner claims that his data is factual, but difficult to prove because of oppression from the Roman Catholic Church.
Things I found interesting about the works of Brown, Gardner, other works, and other popular culture:
The family names bearing the Sang Real that Brown listed in DaVinci Code is claimed to be the Stewart Royal Family of Scotland by Gardner, and this Royal House thrives today. One of them even endorses Gardner's book: The Genesis of the Grail Kings.
What Brown leaves out of his books is that Gardner, and others, notably Zecharria Sitchin, believe that the Nephalim of Genesis are "angels" but more correctly what we would call aliens that began a royal bloodline with Adam and Eve, and that Jesus and his supposed descendants all stemmed from the same lines. Worth noting is that Gardner claims that Abraham of the Old Testament, Jesus, and Modred (of Arthurian legends) were the only 3 "monastic kings" of history who united the 2 major bloodlines that branched between Cain and Abel.
If anyone has read the work of David Icke, he is more paranoid than anyone I know or have studied. He claims that Gardner and several people of prominence are in fact descendents of aliens, but of the shape-shifting kind that can turn into reptilian aliens at will, and that have a dubious distinction of feeding on human flesh. He challenges Gardner to sue him for slander in more than one of his books.
Zeccharia Sitchin, who claims to be a translator of Jewish Religious Works, is also a member of the Trilateral Committee. His books outline the arrival of the nephalim and their work on earth. He also claims that the tower of Babel was mans' attempt to recreate a rocket that the nephalim used for interstellar travel, and that the "gods" were angered and caused the tower to be destroyed...
Star Wars mentions the droid factory in Episode II to be on a planet called Geonosis, which is a blatent reference to Freemasonry.
One of my relatives that has been traced back to Europe is a De Bullion of France that bears the same name to the King de Bullion of DaVinci Code who reigned in the 11th century and began the Priory of Scion. I wonder if that name is factual or fiction? My ancestor was an offspring of French countess and a Swiss nobleman, but who fled to the US and denounced her title.
Do not get me wrong, many geneologies claim to have royal bloodlines and royal ancestors, but one of my cousins, a catholic priest, did most of confirmation of what has become family lore and published it, making the entire sum of our heritage much easier to follow.
Sadly, Father Richard passed on, but his work lives on and I have a copy of the book he put together. Strangely enough, the small little provincial Church in Lucinda is a bit of a local architectural marvel. The entire Church boasts an alaborate construction with no inner pillars of any kind. Somehow, the original designers used the design of the roof and the four walls to support all that weight, noticably without any arches or other supporting structures either.
Sorry to ramble! but I hoped you enjoyed these books of Brown as much as I did!
posted
Also worth mentioning: My cousin Richard lists his last residence in Lisle, IL. This is a monestary in Lisle that is a neat architectural treasure in itself. BannaOJ can hopefully vouch for me on this one.
If you check out the photo of St Joseph's it is no wonder why the locals called it Little Europe.
posted
I prefer to think that I'm of the bloodline of Tom Davidson from Fenton, a genuinely good man who lived a good life.
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Its been my experience that you erase any blood line, or else the cops can track you straight from the body to your spider hole/current residence of choice.
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Strangely enough, Gardner claims that Mordred and Arthur were factual figures of history. That would mean that in the lineage they were indicated to belong in, they were both descendents of Jesus. Then again, Gardner could claim just about anything.
Another interesting sidenote is that there is a british publication that reports its findings near each big election. In the last US presidential race, both Bush and Gore claimed royal bloodlines all the way back to Charlemagne. This means they are distant cousins! Rumor has it that the presidential candidate who has the more prestigious lineage has won the presidency every time.
Rumors also claim that Clinton may have been an illegitimate Rockefeller...I just wonder if Kerry or any of the other Democratic candidates have any such claims?
Thanks for reading. I agree with keeping some skeletons in the dark, but couldn't help revealing my paternal ancestors. But if you enjoyed those, you should hear about the maternal side. That side of the family is like something out of the Alvin Maker universe!
posted
I vaguely recall reading somewhere that the first mention of Mordred wasn't until a while after the Arthur tales had been around a while, and he seemed to be on the same side as Arthur in the fragment we have.
This is just vague recollection from a journal article somewhere, though. Could very well be wrong.
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