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N.T Wright, The Da Vinci Code and Joel Osteen |
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Written by Editor
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First Response: April 2006
N. T. (Tom) Wright, Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code and Joel Osteen
By Don Williams
May 19th will be a red letter day when Sony Corp releases the film The
Da Vinci Code, directed by Ron Howard and staring Tom Hanks. Sure to be
a box-office sensation, the media has prepared us for the coming
conflagration for at least two years. While we don’t know how carefully
the film will follow the book (over 40 million copies sold and now in
paperback), no doubt its key elements will be there. Centering in the
loss of the true Jesus, its dark plot is filled with intrigue, murder,
and the obligatory extended chase following hidden, cryptic clues to
the Holy Grail. The Wall Street Journal (Friday, March 17, 2006) gives
this summary: “The contention is that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and
fathered a child with her, and that the Roman Catholic Church conspired
to cover it all up.” The evidence includes, of course, Leonardo Da
Vinci’s Last Supper where, unknown to art critics, Jesus’ wife is
pictured as one of the Twelve. Hence, the book’s title.
Last year, Bishop N. T. Wright (known in his popular writings as Tom
Wright) lectured at Seattle Pacific University on decoding The Da Vinci
Code. His subtitle is “The Challenge of Historic Christianity to
Post-Modern Fantasy.” Wright asks why this book is so popular (the
movie will propel it even further). He answers that it perfectly fits
our post-modern mindset – fully centered in the self, even the
transcendent or spiritual self, and nothing more. Wright calls us not
merely to disagree with Brown. We must “be prepared to refute – that is
to give a reasoned rebuttal of… popular misconceptions which leave
people with muddled and misguided ideas about Jesus and the nature of
the Christian faith.” In doing so, Wright makes the following points.
First, we must recognize that the post-modern mindset refuses to
separate fact from fiction. It denies that there are any facts that
stand alone. Brown steps into this haze with a set of ideas and
speculative historical reconstructions, “each of which is highly
implausible in itself,” but taken together create “an exciting if
ultra-fanciful plot” that makes us think for a moment that they might
just be true. Add to this the current scandals of the Roman Catholic
Church and we have a compelling setting for his story-line.
Second, there is a stream of speculation (going back to the Second
Century) that is convinced that while mainstream Christianity
thinks of Jesus as a divine being who sustains the church’s power, the
real truth, found in the off-beat texts of secret traditions, is that
Jesus is simply a human figure, a wisdom teacher bringing us “higher
truths” about ourselves. Wright comments that if this is true, we have
no way to explain the rise of Christianity in the first place, its
strength under persecution, and its triumph over the Roman Empire. In
fact, the “secret tradition Jesus” quickly passed away into oblivion.
Wright asks, “If Jesus’ body is buried under a hill in France, why
should anyone think he was divine in the first place? If he was a
teacher who married, had children, then got divorced and remarried,
what’s so special about him?”
Third, Wright shows that Brown’s claim at the start of his book that
“All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret
rituals in this novel are accurate,” is not itself accurate. Wright
focuses on Westminster Abby (where he was Canon Theologian before
becoming Bishop of Durham). Brown makes gaffe after gaffe in his
descriptions “which could have been corrected by 10 minutes of walking
around with his eyes open.” If he fails in these details why should we
trust him in larger claims? More devastating, Brown writes that “The
Priory of Sion – a European secret society founded in 1099 – is a real
organization. In 1975 Paris’s Bibliotheque Nationale discovered
parchments known as Les Dossiers Secrets, identifying numerous members
of the Priory of Sion, including Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, Victor
Hugo, and Leonardo da Vinci.” But, Wright notes, “The documents which
Brown, following Baigent and Leigh, cite as evidence were forgeries
cooked up by three zany Frenchmen in the 1950’s. They cheerfully
confessed to this in a devastating television program shown on British
television in February this year.”
Fourth, Brown popularizes, “albeit partial and in some ways
self-contradictory…the mainstream liberal-American ‘myth of Christian
origins’ which is widely believed, and indeed taught, in many churches
and seminaries…” These are the major points:
• There were dozens if not hundreds of ancient other
documents about Jesus – showing him to be simply a human being, not a
divine being. They give us the real truth about him.
• The Four Canonical Gospels are later products
divinizing Jesus and claiming power for the church. They were selected
at the time of Constantine (fourth century) and the earlier “gospels”
were suppressed.
• Jesus didn’t think himself to be God’s Son sent to
die for the sins of the world. He was simply a human being who gave
some wonderful moral and spiritual teaching. He may have been married
with a child on the way when he died.
• Traditional Christianity is sexist, especially
anti-woman and anti-sex. It is politically quietist and conformist.
• It is time to give up, as historically unwarranted,
theologically unjustified, and spiritually and socially damaging, the
traditional picture of Christian origins. We must return to Jesus’
original vision – spirituality based on metaphor rather than literal
truth and feeling rather than structure.
Wright concludes that the deepest irony about The Da Vinci Code is that
“it portrays itself as historically rooted, when it is a tissue of
fantasy; as going back to Jesus himself, when he would not have
recognized anything like it; as embodying the really creative new voice
of Jesus, when it is simply offering a variation on a well-known
pattern of postmodern spirituality.”
Over against Brown’s popularization of a “Christian” post-modernity, Wright makes the following points:
• The Four Canonical Gospels are all written within
the First Century. They demand that Jesus be seen in the context of
Palestinian Judaism, not a broader Hellenistic (Gnostic) spirituality.
• The other “gospels” cherished by Brown, come from
the Second Century and expound a spirituality far removed from Judaism.
• The Jesus of the Canonical Gospels is not a made-up
divine figure. He is a real flesh and blood man. At the same time, he
embraces a vocation that, according to the Old Testament, only God
himself can do and fulfill. “This represents a coming together of
divine and human which makes no sense except as an account of the real
life and mind of a first-century Jew called Jesus.”
• Jesus’ resurrection is central to early
Christianity, “though you’d never know that, either from Dan Brown or
from the many other writers who perpetrate the modern myth [of Jesus]
in its various forms. Because of his resurrection, Jesus’ death was
interpreted “from extremely early in the Christian movement, as (a) the
fulfillment of Jewish Scriptures, (b) the defeat of all rival spiritual
powers, and (c) the means of forgiveness of sins.”
• Christianity in the ancient world was not quietist;
it was revolutionary. Its central message is “Jesus is Lord” and Caesar
is not. This undermined the foundations of the Empire and released
growing systematic persecution by the State.
Listen to Wright: “Early Christianity was not primarily a movement
which showed, or taught, how one might live a better life… The early
Christian gospel, which was then written up in the four canonical
Gospels, was the good news, not that a new teaching about hidden wisdom
had appeared, enabling those who tapped into it to improve the quality
of their lives…but that something had happened through which the evil
which had infected the world had been overthrown and a new creation
launched, and that all human beings were invited to become part of that
project by becoming renewed themselves.”
This now takes us to Joel Osteen, popular TV preacher and Pastor of the
mega Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas. Osteen would never be
identified with the Jesus of The Da Vinci Code. After all, he makes a
brief appeal at the end of his broadcasts to accept Jesus as Savior.
Yet, the peril of his preaching is exactly that his focus, like the
Gnostic Jesus, is on “how to live a better life” (or, in the title of
his best-selling book, “Your Best Life Now.”). Osteen calls his
hearers to shun negativity (the Second Century Gnostics called
negativity ignorance), and develop a “prosperous mindset.” He
proclaims, “God wants you to be a winner, not a whiner.” He
markets his “gospel” as the movement from a negative to a positive
self-image where success in every area of life (including money and
things) will result. And he models his message. His first book sold
over three million copies. He negotiated his next book for a 50-50
split of the profits. His weekend services draw up to 40,000 people and
his TV show goes into 210 markets, with seven million viewers each
week. The weekend collection is about one million dollars, with another
20 million coming in yearly through the mail. And Osteen never stops
smiling. Jesus is our wisdom teacher, showing us how to live and Osteen
is his own product of unmitigated success.
So Dan Brown and Joel Osteen have something in common. They both appeal
to our self-centered spiritual interests. They both find Jesus as the
teacher and model for the good life now. They both avoid issues such as
sin, suffering and death. This is Jesus “lite.” In no way can this
Jesus stand up to the crushing power of Rome, torching his followers
and feeding them to the lions. But the real Jesus not only did that, he
still does. Everybody wants the crown. But the real gospel warns: no
cross, no crown. Take it our leave it but don’t dilute or deny it.
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First Response 
