Today we continue our series based on Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. Last week we recognized that one of the things that The Da Vinci Code questions is whether or not the Bible, in particular the four Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke and John—can be trusted. Are they reliable? By presenting the facts related to how the Bible was put together we affirmed that both the inspiration of Scripture and the preservation of Scripture are the result of God’s working through people by the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore we have every reason to trust in Scripture as God’s revealed word to us.

While the Bible’s reliability is central to our core values and beliefs as a church, there is another issue that The Da Vinci Code raises that is less central to our faith, yet it is the key feature in the story line of the book. That issue relates to Jesus and his relationship to Mary Magdalene and in turn the whole of the relationship between the church of Jesus Christ and women.

Remember we said that the essential plot of The Da Vinci Code presents as fact that: a) Jesus was really only human and was married to Mary Magdalene with whom they had a daughter whose name was Sarah; b) Jesus’ desire was for Mary Magdalene to lead the church after his death; c) Peter, the early church and the New Testament documents engaged in a massive cover up of Jesus’ mortality and marriage in order to be certain that men only are in control of the church.

Due to the "revisionist history," it would be very easy for anyone, particularly a woman, to read The Da Vinci Code and say, " I knew it! The Christian church is anti-woman. The church is opposed to women having any influence whatsoever in culture. This just confirms what I have always believed about Christians!" This is not to say that the Christian church has never struggled with its affirmation of the values and roles of women in the church and in culture. We have failed on this one many, many times but the way The Da Vinci Code presents what it calls "historical facts" are neither historical nor facts. They are instead a deception that has fueled the suspicions of persons who may not have access to truth.

This morning I want us to talk about two things. The first is I want us to talk about how The Da Vinci Code presents a deceptive description about Mary Magdalene and Jesus. Then I want us to look at how the New Testament reveals the truth about Mary Magdalene and Jesus.

First, The Da Vinci Code presents a deceptive description about Mary Magdalene, her relationship to Jesus and the church. In one conversation in the book a supposed historian explains to a French female criminal investigator that, "The church needed to defame Mary Magdalene in order to cover up her dangerous secret…" that she was married to Jesus and was the bearer of his child (p. 244). He adds, "The church in order to defend itself against the Magdalene’s power, perpetuated her image as a whore and buried the evidence of Christ’s marriage to her, thereby defusing any potential claims that Christ had a surviving bloodline and was a mortal prophet" (p. 254). He asserts that, "the historical evidence supporting this is substantial" (p. 254).

These statements present us with three deceptions about Mary Magdalene, Jesus and the church. The first deception is that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. What do we know about Mary Magdalene from the New Testament? We know her Hebrew name was Miriam and that she was from the town of Magdala, a very tiny fishing village on the northwest corner of the Sea of Galilee. We know Jesus delivered her from seven demons and that she followed him faithfully as a result of her gratitude for her deliverance. (Luke 8:1-3). She followed Jesus all the way to the cross and the empty tomb and that Jesus made a personal resurrection appearance to her (John 20:1-3, 11-18), which resulted in her being a first witness to the resurrection. Essentially, beyond that there is nothing but legend and the accounts of Jesus’ relationship with Mary in the Gnostic Gospels of Phillip and Mary.

The Da Vinci Code says that Jesus’ marriage to Mary Magdalene "is a matter of historical record" (p. 244) and that there are "countless references to Jesus and Magdalene’s union. That has been explored ad nauseum by modern historians" (p. 247). Brown’s assertion for Jesus being married is also because, "Jesus was a Jew…and the social decorum during that time virtually forbid a Jewish man to be unmarried. According to Jewish custom, celibacy was condemned, and the obligation for a Jewish father was to find a suitable wife for his son. If Jesus were not married, at least one of the Bible’s gospels would have mentioned it and offered some explanation for His unnatural state of bachelorhood" (p. 245).

Let’s ask this question: "Was it a requirement for Jewish men to be married?" The short answer is that marriage was customary but not required. Jesus saw himself as a person uniquely dedicated to bringing into reality the Kingdom of God; therefore marriage was not something he needed. He tells the disciples in Matthew 19:10-12 that such a calling is not for everyone but was something that God called special people to do. There were others who felt the same calling: John the Baptist was single, Paul was single and Elijah was single. There is no compelling reason for Jesus to have been married just because it was expected. He chose not to be married because God had called him to a specific mission that required him to have no other attachments other than his devotion to God and his kingdom.

What is the historical evidence for Jesus being married to Mary Magdalene? The short answer is there is none, zero! Remember last time we talked about the Gnostic writings, writings that taught things very different from what the Gospels and New Testament teach. James Denison, pastor of Park Cities Baptist Church, points out that "The Gnostics made Mary Magdalene their source among Jesus’ disciples. Their Gospel of Mary depicts her as favored with insights and visions that far surpass those of Peter and the other apostles. One document calls her the ‘woman who knew the All.’ Many Gnostics claimed to have received their revelations from Jesus through Mary’s transmission.

"To bolster their claim, they posited a close and romantic relationship between Jesus and Mary. Their Gospel of Philip goes so far as to claim that Christ loved Mary ‘more than [all] the disciples and used to kiss her [often] on her [mouth; note that the text is missing here, and may not be her mouth or lips at all]. The rest of [the disciples were offended by it…] They said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Savior answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you as [I love] her?’"

"This is the ‘historical record’ of Jesus’ and Mary’s ‘marriage.’ The Gnostic text nowhere claims that they were actually married, or had a daughter. But it does continue its description of her life and legacy, in a way which is most damaging to Mr. Brown’s thesis." (The Real Painter of the Gospel: The DaVinci Code In Light of History, p. 15). The bottom line is there is not one single shred of credible evidence that Jesus was married and had a child with Mary Magdalene.

Another deception about Mary Magdalene that The Da Vinci Code presents is that it was Jesus’ desire for her to lead the church. Again, the short answer to this is that there is nothing but the writings outside of the New Testament that remotely support this. The idea of Mary being given the power of the church comes from The Gospel of Mary, which was written almost 175 years after Jesus’ death. "In that gospel Mary is given a vision—a revelation by Jesus—and it does not have to do with her being given the mission to lead the church. It has to do with finding salvation for souls." (Exploring The Da Vinci Code by Lee Stroble, p. 68). This was not a demotion for Mary in order to elevate men. It’s just that there’s nothing in the New Testament or credible historical records that teach that Mary had a different role as a follower of Jesus than any other disciple.

A final deception that The DaVinci Code proposes is that the Christian Church is anti-woman. The DaVinci Code says that Constantine and his male successors devised ways to keep the church under the rule of men and used persecution to do so (p. 124-125). It says, "The Church burned at the stake an astounding five million women." (p. 125). It proposes as well that the church has twisted the teaching of the Bible to make women the enemy of the church.

There were horrible persecutions in Europe in the Middle Ages that claimed the lives of 30,000-50,000 people, not five million. Not all were women, not all were burned, and not all were executed by the church. As to the church making women as the enemy, there have been stretches of time where women have not been given the acknowledgement to the extent that they should. Some of the failures of the church in the past and in modern history have been inexcusable. Yet, comparatively, Jesus as well as the early church and generally the church throughout history have placed women in a higher role than the culture around it. Jesus was a revolutionary in his treatment of women. The early church radically elevated the status of women above the way their culture saw them. While the church has and continues to fail in its responsibility to recognize women as co-equal in God’s kingdom, the claim that the church and the Bible waged a "campaign of propaganda" against women is false. Scripture is clear "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise." (Gal. 3:28-29) Women and men are equal in Christ.

So the deceptions of The DaVinci Code fall apart when you examine its claims: Was Jesus married to Mary Magdalene? No! Did Jesus intend for Mary to head the church? No! Has the Christian church been organized to deliberately suppress women? No!

The New Testament, however, reveals the truth about Mary Magdalene and Jesus, which provides a model of discipleship for both men and women. Anything other than the biblical record defames the character and heart of this amazing woman who served and followed Jesus! Mary is often presented as a prostitute but there is no scriptural evidence for this. As one early church writer, Hipppolytus, calls her, she was "an apostle to the apostles" because of her exemplary devotion and witness to Jesus (Bock, p. 13). So what do we know from the New Testament?

We know that Mary was a woman who was delivered from a dark past lived under Satan’s control (Luke 8:1-3). Luke says that Mary was delivered by Jesus from seven demons. The number seven was a figure for being complete or total. What Luke is saying is that Mary was a woman who was completely under the control of Satan. Nothing in the Bible tells us when or how but somewhere Mary yielded the control of her life to Satan’s power. She was a woman who had become deceived by Satan, desperate for help, disturbed within but was in a moment delivered by Jesus. As a result of her deliverance she devoted the rest of her life to serving Jesus with everything she had. What money she had she gave it. The life she had she gave it. She would follow him in service for the rest of his ministry. She would not abandon him when he suffered on the cross (John 19:25). She would follow his dead body to its tomb because there was nothing that she could ever do to repay the gift of her deliverance! (Mark 15:47).

Mary followed Jesus after his death with deep devotion (John 20:1-3, 11-15). Mary went to the tomb of Jesus early Sunday morning for one purpose: to finish the burial preparation for Jesus. She went when the disciples couldn’t face the reality of his death. She went, risking her life, when the men would not risk theirs. Even after she saw the tomb empty and was confronted by angels she would not be distracted from her devotion to the dead body of her Lord (Jn. 20:13). Even when at first presented with the Risen Christ all she could think of was the dead body of Jesus. (Jn. 20:15). All she knew was the Jesus of her deliverance and all she wanted was to continue the devotion she gave him in this life.

Mary was a woman who knew the deliverance of Jesus and devoted her life to him in both life and death. Yet it was because of such a depth of devotion she was given the task of boldly declaring the reality of her encounter with the Risen Christ. (John 20:16-17) While Mary is so distraught over the missing body of Jesus, the Risen Jesus is standing right in front of her. He speaks her name and it is at that moment that Mary sees Jesus for who he is. She does what anyone would do and reaches out for Jesus and clings to him. Understand there is nothing sexual in the relationship between Jesus and Mary. It is pure, holy devotion. What Jesus says for her to do is both physical, emotional and spiritual. He tells her to "stop clinging to me" (v. 17). This means to not just let him go physically but as has been suggested, to not hold to the Jesus of the past. That she is to go forward into the future, proclaiming that Jesus has risen and has appeared to her. (The Gospel Code by Ben Witherington, p. 74) That is exactly what she did. She was the first, according to John’s Gospel, to announce to the disciples, "I have seen the Lord" (John 20:19).

Mary was a woman delivered by Jesus from a life of cruel bondage, devoted to Jesus in both life and death and would be the first to declare the glorious news of the resurrection. Those are the truths that every one of us should model as a disciple of Jesus Christ. We are people who have been delivered from a destiny controlled by Satan (Eph. 2:1-7). We are people who are called to follow Jesus with radical unrestricted devotion in life and death (Luke 9:23). Like Mary, we are commanded to declare for the rest of our days that Jesus is alive and has changed us and can change others. (Luke 24:46-47).

I know a woman who is a Mary. Oh, her name isn’t Mary but Mary’s story is hers. She is one of the wonderful people whose story has been written through the Huntington Mission. She was delivered from her past while attending the Women’s Bible Study by the power of Jesus Christ. She has followed Jesus out of devotion and was baptized in this church. She has declared boldly her story of deliverance and devotion so powerfully that now her husband, children and members of her extended family have been to these waters. She is a woman who can say, "I have seen the Lord." That’s the power of the truth about Mary. That’s why there is something special about Mary Magdalene. She is a model for every one of us.

The tragedy of The DaVinci Code is that it diminishes and denigrates one of the greatest disciples of the Bible. Yet, regardless of its attempt, you can’t quiet Mary’s witness for it bursts from the pages of Scripture! In the same way, when you have been delivered nothing, absolutely nothing can keep you quiet!

Sunday, April 30, 2006

Dr. Bruce Tippit, Pastor

First Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR

btippit@fbcjonesboro.org

Resources:

"Jesus and The Da Vinci Code," a sermon by John Ortberg

"Recovering the Resurrection Realities," a sermon by Bruce Tippit

The Gospel Code by Ben Withenington III

Breaking the Da Vinci Code by Darrell L. Bock

Explaining the Da Vinci Code by Lee Strobel