The Priory of Sion

DaVinci Code: Fiction and Fact

(following Paul Maier’s explanations in "The DaVinci Code: Fact or Fiction")

“Why is The Passion excoriated and The DaVinci Code extolled? Why are Gibson’s motives denounced and Brown’s dignified? Why is Christ’s passion referred to as a “repulsive, masochistic fantasy” and his supposed marriage to Mary Magdalene touted as a researched material fact? The answer may surprise you. It is not just that in our increasingly secularist culture it has become politically correct to cast aspersions on Christ and the church he founded. It is because of a great reversal of values. Fiction – such as the notion that Christianity was concocted to subjugate women – is being cleverly peddled as fact, while fact – such as the deity of Christ – is being capriciously passed off as fiction.”[1]

(There is nothing new under the sun...see Isaiah 5:13, 20)

So, let’s take a look at the fiction and facts of this story: The DaVinci Code (as understood from historian Dr. Paul Maier's book: "The Da Vinci Code: fact or fiction?")

Fiction #1

The Priory of Sion: supposedly a secret European society founded in Jerusalem in 1099 by a crusading French king named Godefroi de Bouillon. It’s purpose, according to Brown, was to preserve a great secret that had been handed down from generation to generation of Godefroi’s ancestors since the time of Christ. Hidden documents buried beneath the ruins of the Temple in Jerusalem allegedly corroborated this secret. What was the secret? Jesus’ marriage to Mary Magdalene, which resulted in a daughter named Sarah. Jesus’ bloodline supposedly continued through the Merovingian dynasty of French kings and survives even today. They exist to keep a watchful eye over the descendants of Jesus and Mary and wait for the perfect moment to reveal the secret to the world.

FACT

The “Priory of Sion” was actually registered in France in 1956 (google “Priory of Sion” and see site for “Priory of Sion Hoax” for more in depth info). The “Priory’s” first objective is to position itself in the mind of an unknowing public as the supreme Western esoteric organization. It dreams of utilizing that constituency in a synarchy-like fashion to promote its hybrid agenda of right-wing politics and turn-of-the-century esoteric teachings. It does not represent the real teachings of any positive esoteric order. It is materialistic, obsessed with attaining influence, and has fabricated documents without regard for any ethical considerations. It’s program is to manipulate people through lies in order to promote itself. The Priory’s role in this novel is supposedly “proven” by a cache of documents that were discovered in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. These documents really do exist, but they were planted there by a person named Peirre Plantard. In fact, one of Plantard’s henchmen admitted to assisting him in the fabrication of these materials, including the genealogical tables and lists of the Priory’s grand masters – all trumpeted as truth in The DaVinci Code. Plantard’s hoax was actually exposed in a series of French books and a BBC documentary in 1996, but this news – fortunately for Dan Brown – is reaching our shores only at glacial speed. Plantard turned out to be an anti-Semite with a criminal record for fraud, while the real Priory of Sion is a little splinter social group founded half a century ago. The most important strand in the central plot of The DaVinci Code, then, is a total hoax. So much for the “Fact” Brown claims on his first page!

[1] Hanegraaff and Maier, The DaVinci Code: Fact or Fiction?, viii.