da vinci movie

Originally posted by shantyman

...This is what the DaVinci Code attacks...

This book attacks nothing. It is a work of fiction. That means it is make-believe, not real.

The hysteria over this book is, on one hand, amusing, and on the other, somewhat frightening. Catholics need to get a grip on reality.

This is the 21st century. Crack the door of your little confessional and peek out for a moment. There are more important things going on in the world than the publication of a fictional book and the production of its companion film.

"The DaVinci Code" is not murdering or raping, starving or torturing anyone. Find another dog to beat.

got back from seeing the movie, my expectations were high, then slightly lower after some reviews, but i always like to make my own mind up.

but it will be a movie i won't ever see for a 2nd time. it just had no spark. they may as well have had tom hanks standing in front of a stage reading dan brown's book...and even that may have been slightly more exciting.

as for the general theme, near the end tom hank's speech about 'believe and have faith in what you want' is basically saying it's o.k to believe jesus was the son of god...but it's also o.k that he could be married, have children and so on.

i don't see where the anti-christian was in this movie. sure it plays on the idea that the vatican have hidden the true meaning of the holy grail, jesus and so on. but it isn't saying you shouldn't believe jesus was the son of god, it's saying 'what if', what if he wasn't...

it's nothing to be afraid of.

Originally posted by Termite197

And in regards to wether the DVC is fact or fiction. WAKE UP CHRISTIANS!
No non-christians are saying it is fact! All we are saying is that it is definatley POSSIBLE that Jesus had a wife and kid. NOT that he DID have a wife and kid. Its also very possible that the church is covering something up. Look at all the other things they have manipulated and covered up throughout history.


Get real!

I figured I would repost this since you are still saying that the DVC is attacking christianity.

Actually, its author is not from out of this world. It doesnt surprise me that you would say that though. Its a common christian answer.
The FACT is: Its author is from the planet earth!

please prove to me the fact that the author is from this planet. if you want some facts proving that the author is from somewhere other than here, just read the bible, its full of all kinds of examples....or you can go to the link i provided in my earlier post and read all about the uneartly creatures that came down from the heavens(outerspace) and interacted with men. read Ezekiel chapter 1 in the old testament.
or this site will give you everything you need to find where im coming from
www.bibleufo.com...

The Lord Yhovah of the Old Testament, who became the Lord Jesus of the New Testament, is described as flying in thick clouds, swift clouds, bright clouds, dark clouds, white clouds, low clouds, great clouds, and fiery clouds. There are platforms, vessels, whirling chariots of fire, sky thrones, fiery horses, cherubims, thick darkness, great fire, whirlwinds, fiery wheels, pavilions, dark waters, storms, sky dwellings, rolls, and sanctuaries. Whether, or not, one believes these objects are actually flying vehicles that the God of the Bible lives in, appears with, travels in, and is considered the seat of his power is a matter of opinion. The fact that they do not appear without him or his ambassadors, and that, in most major appearances, he and other beings are clearly described as directly associated with these flying objects, is undeniable.

the only ones that are condemed to this planet are the fallen angles which could very well be some of those examples.

So what you are basically saying is that all the christians throughout the past that have faught holy wars for their beliefs are all the anti-christ. I think there spirits and heart would be upset with you for believing that crap. What about all the high religious figures of the past that sponsored it? What about all the heads of states, christian presidents (like Bush for instance), pastors, followers, muslims, and you name it. Are they all the anti-christ too? Are they ALL controlled by the devil.

basically yeah. any war that was brought about after the ressurection of christ had to do with baal..or lucifer. and im sure that their hearts would be upset if they knew. christ taught love and life not death and destruction. yeah definatly the high religious figures, they are the main ones. they are the ones who killed christ. heads of state. yep. presidents? oh yeah what a perfect tool for lucifer. any of them who kill in the name of god are all knowingly or unknowingly following the antichrist movement thru the centuries and are all controlled by baal himself.

If they are, then I think the Devil is winning, and GOD needs to step up his game. I guess God isnt really all that "just" is he, and must not care to much about us.

yes the devil is winning the war on this planet, but not for long. god will step up his game in due time. he even told us what it would be like here on earth when this stepping up is about to happen. he will protect his children.

any christian who says that anything that jesus did or didnt do is impossible does not know who the real christ is either that or they do know who he is and REALLY dont want anyone to know. with him all things are possible.

If you say so!

I don't think anyone, including you, know who chrsit is. Have you met, or seen him?

yeah i do say so. see thats the problem the world has with the supernatural. they dont see it so they dont belive it. thats just another tool of the antichrist. but its the other way around with the spirit world. you have to belive it to see. if you dont then you never will.

again you are right jesus was just a frickin man like you and me. that was the whole reason for him coming into existance. so he could die. if he wasnt a human like you and me, he couldnt have died. but what was on the inside didnt die. you cant compare jesus christ to any person on this planet. david blain? haha your kidding. i would like to see david blain raise himself from the dead. maybe he is the other son of god. which god? the god of this world. lucifer.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense!

I thought you said he came from the cosmos?

And yes, you can compare him to someone like david blaine. They were both pretty much just street magicians.

[edit on 26-5-2006 by Termite197]

i said the spirit that was inside of him came from the cosmos. our creator lived inside of christ. thats why the mere man could do the things he did. without the spirit of the most high he would have been just like david blaine.

sorry for getting off the subject of this thread...a really good thread to read about what we are talking (kinda sorta)about termite is here...its about the lie that was started thousands of years ago to mislead mankind. started by baal himself at babylon and is still going strong today. this includes the leaders of the religions and the kings of this world for one purpose. pretty interesting thread no doubt.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 26-5-2006 by Funkydung]

Originally posted by Funkydung
sorry for getting off the subject of this thread...a really good thread to read about what we are talking (kinda sorta)about termite is here...its about the lie that was started thousands of years ago to mislead mankind. started by baal himself at babylon and is still going strong today. this includes the leaders of the religions and the kings of this world for one purpose. pretty interesting thread no doubt.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 26-5-2006 by Funkydung]

Ok.....I took you up on reading the thread your refer to above.

well...is that what you want me to consider? His twisted view about the matrix and christ? The whole thread is full of garbage!

No disprespect to you, but your boy "sun matrix" got a few screws loose ya know?

I think I am gonna have to stop posting in the religious forums because I have come to realize that there is no point whatsoever. All the ignorance annoys me and it shouldn't.

To me...people who believe in the bible are the people stuck in the matrix. "Jesus as the massiah" is part of the big lie your boy talks about.

Cheers buddy!

No disprespect to you, but your boy "sun matrix" got a few screws loose ya know?

I think I am gonna have to stop posting in the religious forums because I have come to realize that there is no point whatsoever. All the ignorance annoys me and it shouldn't.

POT-KETTLE-BLACK?

Originally posted by Bibliophile

Originally posted by shantyman

...This is what the DaVinci Code attacks...

This book attacks nothing. It is a work of fiction. That means it is make-believe, not real.

The hysteria over this book is, on one hand, amusing, and on the other, somewhat frightening. Catholics need to get a grip on reality.

This is the 21st century. Crack the door of your little confessional and peek out for a moment. There are more important things going on in the world than the publication of a fictional book and the production of its companion film.

"The DaVinci Code" is not murdering or raping, starving or torturing anyone. Find another dog to beat.

Go to his website. There is a page 'Bizarre TRUE FACTS from the DaVinci Code'.

A quote from Mr. Brown's site
While it is my belief that some of the theories discussed by these characters may have merit, each individual reader must explore these characters' viewpoints and come to his or her own interpretations. My hope in writing this novel was that the story would serve as a catalyst and a springboard for people to discuss the important topics of faith, religion, and history.
Agenda much? He is touting a work of fiction - as you claim - to be much more than that. He wrote this book as a vehicle to inspire the vast number of religiously ambivalent readers to interpret his work of fiction in the context of valid historical and religious perspectives. In a nation that is woefully uneducated in matters of secular - let alone Church history - this is like handing an m80 and a lighter to a 4 year old. And you think that this was incidental?

I worked very hard to create a fair and balanced depiction of Opus Dei. Another quote from Mr. Brown's site. Hmm. I will not argue that the cilice and the displine have been used - and continue to be used. There are a number of sources that discuss the concept of suffering as a means to identify with the Passion of the Lord. Most practicing Catholics practice SOME degree of mortification - fasting on Holy Days of Obligation? Lent? These are milder forms of mortification, but mortification nonetheless. I have never visited Opus Dei's prelature in NY, but I have spoken to members of Opus Dei, and none of them were albino assassins. Fair and balanced? Please. I guess I should consider that as the assasssin was not an albino rapist, that's fair.

The whole Priory of Scion is a very active topic here on ATS. It is also about as true as the closet monster. Sorry, closet monster-philes. The 'gospels' of Judas and the other miscelleny? Dated two centuries after Christ's crucifixion. Minimum. But Brown taps into this as a theory worthy of discussion and consideration. The accepted volumes of the New Testament all have a lineage within one century of the Crucifixion. It is conceivable that all were written and approved by those who witnessed the events they record.

His site also fails to credit sources like "Holy Blood, Holy Grail". Not that they are great sources to begin with, but he doesn't even bother to give credit where credit is due. That's a little annoying.

When Jaws came out in 1975, this blatantly fictional movie wreaked havoc in communties that make a living off the summer beach season. People avoided beaches as if the waters were sulphuric acid. At now time did Peter Benchly or Steven Spielberg claim that this was a recreation of historical events, but they sure do enjoy the residual checks. This work of fiction entered the mass mind of American secular culture like a bomb. Common sense was sublinated by this visceral acceptance of fiction as reality. In this media-driven world, people are even less well equipped to differentiate fiction from perceptions of reality. This is my biggest problem with the book and the movie. I truly believe from reading the book and the comments Mr. Brown has made on his website and in interviews that he knew exactly what he was doing. He was cashing in on the anti-religion, anti-Catholic sentiment in this country as well as satisfying some personal grudge. And he - like Spielberg and Benchly - is laughing all the way to the bank.

The whole Priory of Scion is a very active topic here on ATS. It is also about as true as the closet monster. Sorry, closet monster-philes. The 'gospels' of Judas and the other miscelleny? Dated two centuries after Christ's crucifixion. Minimum. But Brown taps into this as a theory worthy of discussion and consideration. The accepted volumes of the New Testament all have a lineage within one century of the Crucifixion. It is conceivable that all were written and approved by those who witnessed the events they record.

There are no ( to my knowledge) extant copies of any of the cannonical gospels from
earlier than the 4th century. Everything is copies of earlier works that were mentioned
by one or another pauline church leaders.

The same is true of the Gnostic writings. Many of them are mentioned as "heretical"
by early pauline church leaders. IMO the major advantage that the Gnostic writings have is they have been untouched by church hands for + - 1500 years. they have not
been edited ,changed, and translated several times. They remain ( what is left of them) essentially as they were written.

Shantyman: from your views on this subject i get the idea that your concerns on this book is the fact that it may lead people to anti-Christ, anti-religion stuff. Well, sacred books like the New Testment or the Quran still have these days wrong interpretations and lead people to act like fools - including ending up with someones lives.

When a writer puts a book on the market he wont think if people will do everything thats written on the book, or even if people will give him credit for it. If i read a book where it says "Kill yourself, life isnt good" i will probably curse myself for spending money in such a dumb book; obviously i will not kill myself. Like you said and well, we live in a society full of information (many of it unreal and made only to sell), and its our task to filter all that useless information (if you find it that way). Now, criticizing a writer because he knew he would put people minds thinking if its actually worthy blindly follow a concept (wether its religious or not), its not really fine. If you are worried about people abandoning their christian faith because of Dan Brown book, then the book must have something of truth in it uh ? There are many many books like this..they were always around. Whats so special about Dan Brown ? Why are Christians so worried ? Why Opus Dei (even the portuguese one!) have a special section on their website regarding DVC ? To be honest, the reason for all this noise again comes from Christian institutions, they are the ones responsible for this book/movie success.

Stalkingwolf -

Raymond Brown, in his book An Introduction to the New Testament postulates the following dates for the synoptic gospels. Most scholars accept his range of dates: Mark - 60-70 AD, Matthew 70-100 AD, Luke 80-100 AD, and, last but not least, John 90-110 AD. The first complied Gospels indeed date to the 4th century, but scholars use a technique called 'higher criticism' to evaluate texts, fragments, and other written materials to determine it's likely chronological dates. The fact that the Greek-speaking world was a hotbed of 1st century Christianity helps this claim; much later than this and the originals would more likely have been Latin. Once Constantine endorses Christianity, we see more and more works in Latin. Wouldn't the early fragments of the Gospels be in Latin if the Gospels were that old?

For more information, I recommend checking out Brown's book. There is also a rich body of literature on the art (I hesitate to use the term science) of Higher Criticism.

Thanks for your attention - God Bless!

MikePhil -

My biggest concern is that that every teacher of history has - ignorance. In schools across the nation, curricula for media literacy is being implemented. Why? Because educators are realizing that Americans are suckers for the media they consume. As a nation, we are also becoming more and more ignorant of our history and less facile in the skills of critical inquiry. In short, we are ignorant of historical 'truths' (and I use the word reluctantly) AND the ability to reasonably evaluate the evidence to determine its validity.

I am also concerned - as you have noted - about an Anti-Catholic sentiment. The US does have a rich history of Catholic persecution. And I wonder if the illegal aliens - predominantly Catholic - aren't feeding the fires once again.

To claim 'it's just a book." "It's just a movie" is not being aware of the power of the media. Or in fact, the author's intent. Of course the book is fiction. So was the Divine Comedy. Dante's work of fiction satirized dozens of powerful and influential people both contemporaneously and historically. Fiction can be very powerful and very effective at influencing people. Look at the Blair Witch Project - people flooded the region looking for the Blair Witch for years after the movie came out. I had students who insisted that it was real and wanted to write their reseach papers on it. When the book came out, I was inundated by students, fellow teachers, some parents, and neighbors about the 'truth' behind the Last Supper, the Priory of Scion, Opus Dei, etc, etc, etc.

We can argue that 'its just a loaded gun. It's harmless.' It is indeed, unless it used with malicious intent. I still maintain that Dan Brown knew exactly what he was doing when he wrote it. The book came out when the Catholic church in America was already on the ropes, and the quality of the writing indicates that he rushed the job in order to maximize sales.

Thanks for reading and for helping me to dig deeper to explain my position. I hope you enjoyed it.

Raymond Brown, in his book An Introduction to the New Testament postulates the following dates for the synoptic gospels. Most scholars accept his range of dates: Mark - 60-70 AD, Matthew 70-100 AD, Luke 80-100 AD, and, last but not least, John 90-110 AD.

True and many scholars agree with those dates as the first appearance of these writings. The problem still remains that
there are no Copies available of the original texts. There are hand transcribed copies from much later.

The originals would probably been in Aramaic or greek.

"I do take umbrage at your remark about Christ being a 'street magician'. To paraphrase your own post - did you ever see him?"

Did you....

I have seen ample proof to show that "Christ was not even the real name of Jesus and that many Christs existed in that time period.

Originally posted by Bibliophile

This book attacks nothing. It is a work of fiction. That means it is make-believe, not real.

The hysteria over this book is, on one hand, amusing, and on the other, somewhat frightening. Catholics need to get a grip on reality.

This is the 21st century. Crack the door of your little confessional and peek out for a moment. There are more important things going on in the world than the publication of a fictional book and the production of its companion film.

"The DaVinci Code" is not murdering or raping, starving or torturing anyone. Find another dog to beat.

Didn't Dan Brown say that he believe what he wrote to be true, though?

I read alot of books and I watch a lot of films but it does not mean that i will believe the content within them (especially when they are specified as fiction), but i did find Da Vinci Code, the book, a jolly good read....I probably shan't bother to watch the film because usually films made from books miss an awful lot of important stuff out when they condense it down to a viewable length. And I really don't think Dan Brown is an Alien(had to laugh at that), he has wrote books on other subjects and i think he adds a 'What if' mentality to his stories(which is exactly what they are)...........

[edit on 15-6-2006 by feelingpeachytoday]

Originally posted by sambo5us
Didn't Dan Brown say that he believe what he wrote to be true, though?

If you see him in interviews, he will respond with the book being based on truth.. In his mind maybe he doesn't believe it to be fiction.. or then again it might just be an extra marketing ploy by himself to shift a few more copies.

The book remains though, in the thriller/fiction section.. So it is 'classified' as fiction.

The thing is.. technically the bible is also a work of fiction. A collective work of fictional stories passed down, and not much more. There really isn't much difference.