The Da Vinci Code: Feminine Leadership in Religion

Name: Gausvami Surbhi A.

Assignment Topic: The Da Vinci Code: Feminine Leadership in Religion

Paper no. 13, The New Literature 

Roll No. : 22

Submitted to: Dr.Dilip Barad, M.A. Department of English

MK Bhavnagar University.

Email id: gausvamisurbhi17@gmail.com

Batch Year: 2016-18

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The Da Vinci Code: Feminine Leadership in Religion

Introduction:

The Da Vinci Code is a 2003 mystery thriller novel by Dan Brown. It follows "symbologist" Robert Langdon and cryptologist Sophie Neveu after a murder in the Louvre Museum in Paris causes them to become involved in a battle between the Priory of Sion and Opus Dei over the possibility of Jesus Christ having been a companion to Mary Magdalene.

Public memory plays a vital role to construct, Deconstruct and reconstruct the memory. The needs and interests of a particular community dictate narrative frameworks that structure memory-making into the collective memories that define that community, such as the Church. Exposing how representations of historical women like Magdalene are constructed and maintained in public memory offers a rich site of inquiry. Furthermore, drawing on Michel Foucault's (1969) theories about the power/knowledge relationship, powerful people created the memory of Magdalene as prostitute. Magdalene as an historical and biblical figure has captured the imagination of people throughout history, from New Testament Gospels and Gnostic sources to Christian storytellers, medieval legends, and popular culture.

Dan Brown Remembers Mary Magdalene as Wife and Mother

Mary Magdalene is the perfect example of drastic difference in history, public memory and gender ideology. Most notably Magdalene is portrayed as prostitute and outcast. Particularly in Martin Scorsese's controversial 1988 film “The Last Temptation of Christ”. But she has been revered as wife and mother in Brown’s The Da Vinci Code.

The central argument in Brown's plot is the claim that Jesus and Magdalene were married. Pregnant at the Crucifixion, Magdalene later escaped to France, known then as Gaul, in order to bear his child. Thus, Mary Magdalene is Holy Grail because she carried the royal bloodline. According to Brown's thesis, the Catholic Church has spent the last 2,000 years trying to cover up these facts in order to diminish the role of women in the early Church—"the lost sacred feminine"—and to deny that the bloodline still exists in France today. Brown tried to prove that Jesus was Devine as well as human being. , Brown also obliterates one of the most prominent images of Magdalene in public memory—that of the repentant whore. As one character says in the 2006 movie version of the novel, "What if the world discovers that the greatest story ever told is actually a lie?"  

 Brown paints the new and pure image of Mary Magdalene. That generates debate and discussion among the readers. However book is labeled as ‘Fiction’ but he included real characters and events. it raised the question about history itself, as Brown himself told that : “How historically accurate is history itself?”

Dan Brown has challenged the Christian ideas of feminism by fevering Pagan ides. Before Christianity there was existence of ‘Paganism’. Followers of paganism believed in equality thus they worshiped both God and Goddesses. Sometimes they revered feminine leadership too. Therefore Brown attempted to restore that ‘Sacred Feminism’ in his novel. Dan Brown gave the example to prove feminine leadership;

In The Da Vinci Code, Brown quotes the Gospels repeatedly. One such quote from the Gospel of Phillip says:

“…and the companion of the saviour is Mary Magdalene. Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on her mouth. The rest of the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval. They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more that all of us?’”

It shows that Jesus was more close to Mary Magdalene and wanted her to be the leader of Christianity. But, some followers were against this idea because they believed that women are lower and impure. Novel ‘The Da Vinci Code’ celebrates feminine sacredness. Writer tried to restore feminine leadership in religion. Novel shows that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and they had child named ‘Sarah’. It also indicates that Sophie Neveu is in the same bloodline; therefore she is Granddaughter of Jesus and Mary. As a reader we feel  that divine power in Sophie’s character as story moves.

The name ‘Sophia’ has the symbolic meaning. It means ‘Wisdom’. Sophia is the Goddess of wisdom in Christian religion. Novel presents Sophia as highly intellectual being. The way she saved Robert Langdon, the way she explained Cryptex  to Langdon, the way she drives the car, all this aspects shows feminine leadership.

What makes this book so controversial is that Brown weaves a story about a museum curator with a secret life, a historian and how the church has been on a bloody rampage for several years trying to cover up the “truth” about Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene. Much like other mystery novels before its time, Along with Mary Magdalene’s untimely historical death, Brown also incorporates the “homicide” of the concept of feminine divinity. Brown ties all these concepts together, much like a detective would, and likens these two separate, but similar, murders to one killer: the Church. Although Mary Magdalene’s role in the known Bible is relatively short compared to other characters, Mary Magdalene plays a critical role in the book The Da Vinci Code.

Dan Brown shows how Mary Magdalene’s role in the Bible was deliberately downplayed and cast in a negative light. Brown also uses the written history of Mary Magdalene to represent the feminine leadership that was lost after Christianity.

In The Da Vinci Code, Brown uses the Gnostic Gospels to suggest that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. The Gnostic Gospels reveal many controversial ideas and this also adds to the animosity that Christians have had towards the Gospels, making it exceedingly difficult for them to accept text as complete or legitimate.

Brown is trying to prove that Mary Magdalene was the favorite of all the disciples. What Brown is trying to prove is obviously very profound, and his use of ancient texts makes his argument very convincing. There are other things that he says about Mary Magdalene, “the Priory of Scion, to this day, still worships Mary Magdalene as the Goddess, the Holy Grail, The Rose and the Divine Mother”. Brown also writes that Mary Magdalene traveled to France after Jesus Christ’s resurrection and bore his child, Sarah.   

Christianity spreads rumor that Mary Magdalene was prostitute. But Brown proves that Mary was not prostitute her family was very healthy so there was no need to be prostitute for her. InThe Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown commonly attributes Mary Magdalene to be a symbol of the lost goddess tradition before Christianity took over. Although Brown never refutes the history of Mary Magdalene as a disciple of Jesus, making her a devotee to the faith, he merely suggests that the way that the Church spread horrible rumors about Mary Magdalene and removing texts from the Bible that portrayed her in a favorable light is interestingly similar to how the Church eradicated the Pagan tradition which incorporated both genders into its worship and emphasized the equality of both and sometimes revered feminine leadership and divinity. Because of this analogy, Brown ties the two ideas together, suggesting that Mary Magdalene was intended to be the founder of Jesus’ church instead of Peter, placing the Church as a potentially female-led institution, much like ancient Paganism.

To undermine the appeal to Mary of Magdala as a warrant for women’s leadership. So it is clear to see that Mary Magdalene’s role was deliberately downplayed and cast in a negative light for the purpose of eradicating any female leadership in the male Christian Church. Since the find at Nag Hammadi, the Gnostic Gospels have revealed that Mary Magdalene was intended to be the leader of the Christian movement, and suddenly people are faced with “one tradition where Peter plays a role of tremendous significance and Mary is on the margins, while in another tradition, Mary is the significant figure and Peter is the suspect”. It is the tradition that emphasizes Peter also known as orthodox Christianity, which people are most accustomed today. It is unfortunate that Mary Magdalene’s reputation suffered so greatly over so many centuries. Although having Mary Magdalene as a part of fictional and non-fictional literature is not relatively new, Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code most certainly shows how Mary Magdalene’s role in the Bible was deliberately downplayed and cast in a negative light by limiting the mention of her name in the Biblical Canon as opposed to the exclusivity that she plays in the Gnostic Gospels. Brown also uses the written history of Mary Magdalene to represent the feminine leadership that was lost after Christianity took over the masses by showing how the Gnostic and Coptic texts hold Mary Magdalene in a high regard compared to the orthodox texts. Mary Magdalene has not been completely exonerated of the accusations that she has weathered throughout the ages, though on a large scale, many people have set the rumor to rest in their hearts and minds, and have accepted Mary Magdalene as “apostle to the apostles. 

Works Cited

A.Reyes, Crysti. "Mary magdalene and The Da Vinci Code: How Brown interprets feminine Leadership in Religion." (n.d.).

Giannini, John. "The Sacred Secret: The Real Mystery in The Da Vinci Code." Jung Journal: Culture & Psych 2 (2008): 63-84 .

Kennedy, Tammie M. "Mary Magdalene and the Politics of Public Memory: Interrogating "The Da Vinci Code"." Feminist Formations 24 (n.d.): 120-139.