Glad you asked that - a ‘Da Vinci Code’ primer

Not everyone has read The Da Vinci Code — though it may seem that way, if you pick up a newspaper or magazine these days, watch TV or surf the Internet.

Dan Brown’s novel has sold 46 million copies in 40 countries. (By comparison, the fifth Harry Potter book, published the same year, has sold 14 million.) The movie, starring Tom Hanks, opens Friday.

In case you’ve been tuning out until now — or if you just arrived from another planet — we present some “frequently asked questions” about this publishing and pop culture phenomenon.

What is the story about?

It’s basically a murder mystery. The curator of the Louvre is found murdered under bizarre circumstances. The investigation pulls in a Harvard professor who is an expert in religious symbols and the murdered man’s granddaughter, a French police cryptologist. They discover that the murder is tied to an ancient conspiracy: Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a child. A secret society protects their descendants to this day.

What does Leonardo Da Vinci have to do with this?

In the novel, he once led the secret society, and he hid clues about the mystery in his paintings.

Is any of this true?

It’s fiction. Mr. Brown, however, has tried to have it both ways, claiming the fiction is grounded in fact — or might be. As he says on his Web site:

“While the book’s characters and their actions are obviously not real, the artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals depicted in this novel all exist. … These real elements are interpreted and debated by fictional characters. 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.”

Is that all he’s said on the subject?

Charles Gibson, host of ABC-TV’s Good Morning America, pressed the author on the point in 2003:

“If you were writing it as a non-fiction book,” Mr. Gibson asked, “how would it have been different?

“I don’t think it would have,” Mr. Brown answered. “I began the research for The Da Vinci Code as a skeptic…[A]fter numerous trips to Europe, about two years of research, I really became a believer…”

How have religion scholars reacted?

Like they would to a gob of spit aimed at the Mona Lisa. The Vatican and the archbishop of Canterbury have condemned The Da Vinci Code. So have many liberal, conservative and agnostic academicians.

Can I learn about art, history or theology by reading the book?

Most experts say that’s like trying to learn science from watching Star Trek.

As the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts.” And Mr. Brown gets plenty of facts wrong.

For instance?

The Priory of Sion is the novel’s secret society. Mr. Brown says it’s a real organization founded in 1099. Last month, 60 Minutes stacked up the evidence that the Priory was a hoax invented in the 1950s by an anti-Semitic Frenchman.

Mr. Brown’s characters say Leonardo’s Last Supper includes Mary Magdalene. If so, Leonardo left out one apostle. Most art historians say the beardless, long-haired, youthful figure to Jesus’ right is not Mary Magdalene, but the apostle John — who shows up in Last Supper paintings by other artists, before and after Leonardo, as … a beardless, long-haired youth.

Art historians also snicker at Mr. Brown’s repeated references to “Da Vinci.” That would be like referring to “Fred from New York” as “from New York.” Leonardo had no last name, as we now think of it.

Mr. Brown’s characters refer to the Dead Sea Scrolls as among the earliest Christian writings. The Dead Sea Scrolls were written by Jews and do not mention Jesus.

The book’s characters claim that the Council of Nicea, in 325, was called to vote on the divinity of Jesus, and that before the meeting, Jesus was considered only “a mortal prophet.” But all surviving documents say the council’s quandary was reconciling how a Jesus could be both truly divine and human.

Who is Dan Brown?

He’s 46, a native of New Hampshire and the author of several less successful novels. His Web site says he’s the son of a math professor and a sacred musician and that he “grew up surrounded by the paradoxical philosophies of science and religion.” Time recently named him one of the World’s 100 Most Influential People.

According to biographer Lisa Rogak, Mr. Brown is a failed pop musician whose first published book was 187 Men To Avoid: A Survival Guide For The Romantically Frustrated Woman, written under the pseudonym Danielle Brown.

Christmas, Ms. Rogak writes, was a bit different in the Brown household. “Most children find brightly wrapped presents under their tree, but Dan and his brother and sister were given poems with codes, devised by his father, that led them from room to room. Eventually they would find the gifts.” Mr. Brown employs this device in The Da Vinci Code.

Is he religious?

On Web site, he claims to be a Christian, but adds: “I consider myself a student of many religions.”

How much money has he made from The Da Vinci Code?

A lot. Forbes estimates his earnings from June 2004 through June 2005 at more than $76 million, and he’s sold another 20 million copies of The Da Vinci Code since then. (It came out in paperback last month.) Authors generally make a buck or two from each book sold. Figure in the increased sales of his earlier novels, plus the screen rights and other deals he’s struck, and it’s a sizeable fortune.

The book has an Opus Dei monk as one of its villains. Opus Dei is real, isn’t it?

Yes. Opus Dei was started in Spain in 1928 by the Rev. Josemari’a Escriva’, who was canonized under Pope John Paul II.

Opus Dei, Latin for “work of God,” is an organization of conservative Catholic laity dedicated to “help people live by the Gospel in their daily activities and make Christ present in every endeavor.” There is no such thing as an “Opus Dei monk.”

Do Opus Dei members beat and torture themselves as penance?

In The Da Vinci Code, the “monk” wears a spiked chain, called a cilice, that digs into his leg, and he whips his own back as “discipline.” According to the Opus Dei Web site: “[A]s recommended by the Catholic Church, members practice small physical mortifications occasionally, such as giving up certain items of food or drink. Within this spirit, numeraries and associates (celibate members) sometimes practice traditional Catholic penances such as using the cilice and discipline….[But] it is simply not possible to injure oneself with them as the book and film depict.”

Why do the experts care about the mistakes in The Da Vinci Code?

Because they fear that people who don’t know much about Christian history will assume Mr. Brown got it right.

The Rev. Robin Griffith-Jones is the master of Temple Church in London and author of The Da Vinci Code and the Secrets of the Temple. His church is one of the places the novel’s protagonists visit on their quest for truth.

“I have recently seen Syriana and The Constant Gardner . I have never known anything about the oil or pharmaceutical industries, and probably never will,” he said. “But those films, which I know were of course fictional, were so vivid that they have given me a template into which I will from now on fit everything I read/hear about the oil/chemical business. Ditto with The Da Vinci Code, for a large number of people who will from now on see priests, monks, the church, Christian faith and churches-and-women in the light cast by the novel and film.”

Isn’t he right when he claims that Christianity has oppressed women and played down feminine spirituality?

Certainly, the institutional bosses of almost every kind of Christianity are men. And Christians speak of God the father, not mother. But Christianity is hardly unique in its male-centric theology. Zeus, Jupiter, Odin and Krishna are all guys, and all predate Christianity. Women have played a few key roles in Christian history. Mary Magdalene, for instance, is cited in the New Testament as being the first person to discover that Christ had risen. And a Mary whom Mr. Brown mostly ignores, Jesus’ mother, is incredibly important.

Did the church, as the book claims, smear Mary Magdalene by wrongly branding her a prostitute?

Yes. “Mary from Magdala” is one of seven Marys in the New Testament. Pope Gregory the Great apparently conflated “Mary” stories in 591, confusing her with Mary of Bethany, who is described in the Gospels as a sinner, though not necessarily a prostitute. Modern church scholars acknowledge the mixup. The official position of the Catholic Church today, as explained by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, is that Pope Gregory was not trying to smear Mary Magdalene but was creating a more dramatic, and therefore more theologically useful, story of sin and redemption.

Why is The Da Vinci Code so popular?

That, of course, is a matter of opinion. It touches on themes that resonate with readers: The role of women and spirituality, the power of conspiracies, suspicion about the Catholic Church (especially in the wake of the pedophilia scandals), the idea that hidden truths could change the world for the better. There’s a bit of salacious ritual sex, enough violence for a PG-13 rating, and some word puzzles that an attentive reader can solve at least as quickly as the characters in the book. Plus it’s a page-turner with tangled plotlines, cliffhangers at the end of many chapters, and dramatic feats of derring-do.

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