Tuesday.
- H
E . “You actually read The Da Vinci Code?” - M
E . “I did. I wanted to see what the big deal was.” - H
E . “So what did you think? Is it true?” - M
E . “Is One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Next true?” - H
E . “No… That’s not what I meant. I know The Da Vinci Code’s fiction. I’m asking you if there’s any truth to the claims in the book.” - M
E . “You want me to confirm, or deny, what you personally believe?” - H
E . “I don’t think it’ll make any difference.” - M
E . “Then there’s no point in telling you what I think.” - H
E . “I just wanna know what you think.” - M
E . “And then you’ll completely disregard it. Unless, for some reason, it’s the same opinion you have; then you’ll think I’m the smartest guy in the world.” - H
E . “Would you just tell me…” - M
E . “Fine. First of all, I honestly don’t know if Leonardo da Vinci was a gnostic. I haven’t yet read a biography of him. Maybe at some point I will.” - H
E . “A gnostic?” - M
E . “That’s the religion that believes Jesus was married and had kids.” - H
E . “It’s an actual religion?” - M
E . “It’s actually a whole bunch of religions. Kind of like when nowadays you want to make some money, so you start a New Age cult. You borrow a few ideas from the Buddha, borrow a few from Kong Fuzi and the Bhagavad-Gita, throw in some from Moses and Jesus and Muhammad, put some space aliens in there because it’s the modern era, hit frappé, and sell your secret mystical discoveries for a healthy profit.” - H
E . “I’m talking about The Da Vinci Code.” - M
E . “So’m I. Gnostics aren’t a new bunch. There have been gnostics since the beginning of time. The only difference between gnostics now and gnostics then are the space aliens. Space aliens are more ‘today.’” - H
E . “What does this have to do…” - M
E . “You take a religion that involves a lot of ritual sex, like the Baal or Aphrodite or Artemis or one of those nature religions. Then, in order to appeal to the people who recognize Jesus Christ is an actual historical figure, you mix him in there a little. But you don’t mix him in too much; he won’t approve of the ritual sex. So you change those parts of his teachings until it’s something you can live with. And when people ask you why you don’t worship him like normal Christians, claim it was the normal Christians who changed him. You worship him the way he’s supposed to be worshipped. With lots and lots of ritual sex. That's gnosticism.” - H
E . “New Age religions don’t have ritual sex in them.” - M
E . “Okay, neo-pagan religions. New Age religions are more often about self-denial. That’s just their way of appealing to a different demographic. But they also like to mix ’n match religions until they come up with something new, and then in order to sell it they claim that it’s something old.” - H
E . “Like St. Paul does when he’s quoting the Old Testament in order to sell Christianity.” - M
E . “Paul fully admitted Christianity was something new. But it was hinted at in the Old Testament. It was planned at the beginning of time. But Jesus wasn't born until 7 BC. So it certainly wasn’t old.” - H
E . “Okay. Other than that, how do we know that Paul wasn’t one of these gnostics, trying to mix Jesus together with Judaism and come up with a new religion to sell?” - M
E . “Christianity wasn’t Paul’s idea. He had to be converted to it. By force, as I recall.” - H
E . “He claimed Jesus appeared to him.” - M
E . “He had witnesses.” - H
E . “They could’ve been faked.” - M
E . “Are you willing to apply this degree of skepticism to The Da Vinci Code, or do you only have it for Christianity? You seem to be extremely accepting of a religion as depicted in a novel, as opposed to one that’s been real and really practiced for 20 centuries.” - H
E . “I’m not saying I agree with The Da Vinci Code.” - M
E . “Ah, the easiest defense: stand for nothing.” - H
E . “I’m just saying that this all happened so long ago, Jesus and all this, and there’s no way we can really know for sure what happened way back then.” - M
E . “There's lots of ways. Fr’instance, did Octavian win the Battle of Actium?” - H
E . “The what?” - M
E . “Octavian Caesar. Antony and Cleopatra. They were fighting over the Roman Empire. Who won?” - H
E . “Octavian.” - M
E . “Are you sure?” - H
E . “No. See? That's what I’m saying. It happened all that time ago…” - M
E . “In the movie Gladiator, how did they say hello to Commodus? ‘Hail Caesar’ or ‘Hail Antony’?” - H
E . “Caesar.” - M
E . “The words ‘Kaiser’ and ‘Czar’ come from what Roman name, Caesar or Antony?” - H
E . “Okay, I get the point.” - M
E . “If Caesar didn’t win, he probably wouldn’t even have his own salad dressing.” - H
E . “Okay, but how about Jesus and Mary [Magdalene] having kids? We don’t know whether that happened.” - M
E . “Yes we do. There’s no historical record of Jesus having a wife and kids.” - H
E . “That doesn’t mean he didn’t have them.” - M
E . “How does it make Jesus any less God to have a wife and kids?” - H
E . “What do you mean?” - M
E . “In The Da Vinci Code, the argument is that the church tried to hide Jesus’s family because they wanted to say that Jesus is divine. This in a culture that worshipped Zeus, a god, who had a wife and kids, and it didn’t make him any less divine. And I don’t see how Jesus having a family would have anything to do with his divinity. He did have a mother and brothers, you remember. Marriage, Paul points out, isn’t sinful. Jesus could have been married and still been without sin.” - H
E . “I suppose.” - M
E . “So why would the church have any reason to cover that up?” - H
E . “I don’t know.” - M
E . “I don’t know either. The only reason they’d have for saying Jesus wasn’t married is that Jesus wasn’t married.” - H
E . “Wait. The book says they covered it up because after Jesus died, the disciples seized power from Mary Magdalene and her kid and started the church.” - M
E . “No. Jesus came back from the dead, took his power back, and started the church.” - H
E . “That's the Catholic version.” - M
E . “The Catholic version says that Jesus’s family was also involved in starting the church. After Jesus ascended into heaven, the disciples and Jesus’s mother and brothers gathered together to pray for 40 days. Jesus’s family was part of the church from the beginning. His brother James was bishop of Jerusalem.” - H
E . “Jesus had brothers?” - M
E . “At least four. And he had sisters. And I admit, the church has some problem recognizing they exist; there’s this doctrine that the Virgin Mary was a perpetual virgin, which Protestants don’t buy. They’re called ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ in the bible, and the only way that means ‘cousins’ is if you’re trying to explain away why your doctrine conflicts with scripture.” - H
E . “So if he had brothers and sisters, maybe he had a wife.” - M
E . “So if I have brothers and sisters, maybe I have a wife? That’s not logical.” - H
E . “No; if the church can’t admit Jesus had siblings…” - M
E . “Which is probably why people are so willing to believe this Da Vinci Code crap; because the Catholics can’t admit Jesus had siblings, and if they're willing to hide one thing, maybe they’re willing to hide other things. That’s the argument of every conspiracy theorist in the world. Proves nothing.” - H
E . “You’re not willing to entertain the idea?” - M
E . “Of course I entertained the idea; I read the bloody Da Vinci Code. I suspended disbelief long enough to read the novel. And then the novel was over and I returned to reality. And the reason there's still a stupid controversy over this novel is because thousands of readers are still suspending disbelief and asking themselves, ‘What if?’ What if? What if the Martians are going to land and invade Britain? What if a virus kills everybody and those that are left gather in Boulder and Las Vegas to have a showdown? What if a tornado sucks my Kansas farmhouse into the sky and drops me in the land of Oz? It’s only a freaking novel.” - H
E . “Then why are you getting so worked up about it?” - M
E . “Because refuting a novel is a waste of my intellect. The fact that it’s fiction should make it self-refuting. It’s not real. Why are we talking about it as if it is?” - H
E . “I don't know.” - M
E . “You don’t know? You asked me if I thought it was true!” - H
E . “Is it?” - M
E . “No.” - H
E . “Okay.” - M
E . “Plus, I hate apologetics.” - H
E . “Whatever those are.”