TOPIC: - Concept Clarifications: Symbology,
Sarcophagus, Merovingian Dynasty,
Opus Dei, Priory of Sion, Constantine in ‘The Vinci
Code’
PAPER 13:- The New Literatures
STUDENT'S
NAME : - Gohil Yashpalsinh Baldevsinh
CLASS: - M.A. SEM-4
ROLL NO.:-15
YEAR: - 2014
Concept Clarifications:-
Symbology, Sarcophagus, Merovingian dynasty, Opus Dei, Priory Of Sion, Constantine.
Symbology, Sarcophagus, Merovingian dynasty, Opus Dei, Priory Of Sion, Constantine.
‘The Vinci
Code’ is a very well known book by the writer Dan Brown. It mainly speaks about
the past of Christianity and also the life of Jesus Christ. This book has been
very controversial as it deconstructs the whole idea of Christianity and also
tries to reveal some untold stories which might be hidden by the religious
people of Christianity. This book comes with some questions related to the
lives of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Whether Jesus Christ was married to Mary
Magdalena or not? It deconstructs so many things with the help of the paintings
of very famous painter ‘Leonardo Da Vinci’. Although religious scholars
sincerely doubt some of the research Dan Brown employs in The Da Vinci Code,
more than a few intriguing questions remain at the heart of The Da Vinci Code
controversy.
Although religious scholars
sincerely doubt some of the research Dan Brown employs in The Da Vinci Code,
more than a few intriguing questions remain at the heart of The Da Vinci Code
controversy.
The novel tells the story of
Harvard professor and symbologist Robert Langdon who is called to the Louvre
Museum in Paris to examine cryptic symbols found in Leonardo Da Vinci's
artwork. In decrypting these symbols, Langdon uncovers a plot by the church to
suppress the information and almost immediately becomes a hunted fugitive.
Eventually, Langdon comes up with
answers to some of the most dangerous questions posed in the novel. Was Mary
Magdalene the wife of Jesus Christ? Was she relegated to the role of
"fallen woman" by early Church fathers to conceal her real identity?
Did she give birth to a daughter, Sara, who was later protected by a secret
society known as the Priory of Sion? And what role exactly did Leonardo Da
Vinci play in the Priory of Sion during the Renaissance? In masterful
storytelling, author Dan Brown leads his readers on a journey that explains the
"real" story of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, and the final whereabouts
of the Holy Grail, with intriguing clues and symbols found in some of da
Vinci's most famous paintings.
A symbology is a protocol for arranging the bars and spaces that make up
a particular kind of bar code.
There is not just one standard bar code; instead, there are over 400
barcode symbologies that serve different uses, industries and geographic needs.
Symbologies can be designed to encode numbers, letters and special characters.
There are generally two kinds of barcode symbologies -- discrete and
continuous. In a discrete symbology, every character in the bar code can be
interpreted individually without referencing the rest of the bar code. In a
continuous symbology, individual characters in the bar code cannot be
interpreted individually.
Most barcode readers have a feature called
"auto-discrimination," which allows them to be configured to
automatically recognize and read different barcode symbologies, much the same
way a human reader can interpret and read different font types.
There are so many symbols like Vitruvian Man, Da Vinci’s Paintings,
Fibonacci Sequence; are used in ‘The Da Vinci code’.
The Last Supper:-
At the heart of Brown's novel is
the story that Da Vinci hid a major clue in his masterpiece, The Last Supper.
On reexamining the painting, it's
discovered that sitting at Jesus' right hand is Mary Magdalene, not as is
commonly believed, the apostle John.In addition, the famous cup from which
Christ drank, the Holy Grail, is conspicuously left out of the painting. Here
is where Brown cleverly weaves medieval legends with high Renaissance art to
suggest that the Holy
Grail - which became the subject of endless search by
medieval knights - was not a cup at all but Mary Magdalene herself, the human
receptacle for Jesus' blood.
Mona Lisa:-
Another clue in the novel is seen in one of Da
Vinci's Mona Lisa which Langdon states is an expression of the artist's belief in the
"sacred
feminine."
The conclusion drawn is that Mona Lisa is not any
particular person, but a cryptic reference to the Egyptian gods Amon and Isis.
"Mona" is an anagram of Amon and "Lisa" a contraction of
l'Isa, meaning Isis.
In the novel, Professor Langdon
discovers that Da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa in opposition to the Church's
suppression of Mary Magdalene's true identity.
Vitruvian Man:-
Leonardo Da Vinci's most famous
drawings is based upon the work of ancient Roman architect Vitruvius who was
a proponent of using human proportion in building.
In the novel's opening scene,
Sauniere's body is found in the Louvre naked and posed like the Vitruvian Man, with a
cryptic message written beside his body. It is the first clue that Professor
Langdon receives that prods him to delve more deeply into other works of Da
Vinci that helps solve the mystery.
Another symbol of proportion, unrelated to Leonardo da Vinci, is the
novel's use of the ancient number sequence created by 13th-century
mathematician Fibonacci.
He
suggested a sequence in which all life grows in a common progression, with each
number equaling the sum of the two preceding ones.
1 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 5 - 8 - 13 - 21
Dan Brown features the Fibonacci sequence as one of the many clues left
behind by Jacques Sauniere, the Louvre curator. The puzzle is instantly
recognized and unscrambled by his cryptologist granddaughter.
It's only later discovered that Sauniere's deposit box account number at
the Zurich bank is the Fibonacci sequence numbers, arranged in the correct
order. This way symbology becomes very important part of ‘The Da Vinci Code’.
Sarcophagus
Sarcophagus is a stone coffin. The
original term is of doubtful meaning. Pliny explains that the word denotes a
coffin of limestone from the Troad (the region around Troy) which had the
property of dissolving the body quickly (Greek sarx, “flesh,” and phagein, “to
eat”), but this explanation is questionable; religious and folkloristic ideas
may have been involved in calling a coffin a body eater. The word came into
general use as the name for a large coffin in imperial Rome and is now used as
an archaeological term.
The earliest stone coffins in use among the Egyptians of the
3rd dynasty (c. 2650–2575 bce) were designed to represent palaces of mud-brick
architecture, with an ornamental arrangement of false doors and windows.
Beginning in the 11th dynasty (c. 2081 bce), boxlike sarcophagi of wood or
limestone were in use in Egypt and on the Lebanese coast at Byblos. In the 17th
dynasty (c. 1630–1540 bce), anthropoid coffins (shaped to resemble the human
form with a carved portrait head) of pasted papyrus sheets and, later, of wood,
pottery, or stone were used. In the case of royalty, some were made of solid
gold or silver. In the 18th–20th dynasties (c. 1539–1075 bce), the upper
classes enclosed inner coffins of wood or metal in stone outer sarcophagi, a
practice that continued into the Ptolemaic period.
In the Aegean area, although not on the Greek mainland,
rectangular terra-cotta coffins (larnakes) with elaborate painted designs came
into general use in Middle Minoan times.
Sometimes these coffins resembled houses or bathtubs with
large handles. The Phoenicians developed a white marble anthropoid sarcophagus
of the Egyptian type in the 5th century bce, and in Hellenistic times they
specialized in making leaden coffins and elaborately carved marble sarcophagi.
In Italy from about 600 bce onward the Etruscans used both stone and
terra-cotta sarcophagi, and after 300 bce sculptured sarcophagi were used by
the Romans. These often had carved figures of the deceased reclining on the
couch-shaped lids.
Merovingian dynasty
Merovingian dynasty, Frankish
dynasty (ad 476–750) traditionally reckoned
as the “first race” of the kings of France.A brief treatment of the Merovingians
follows. For full treatment, see
France:
The Merovingians.
The name
Merovingian derives from that of Merovech,
of whom nothing is known except that he was the father of Childeric I,
who ruled a tribe of Salian Franks from his capital at Tournai.
Childeric was succeeded by his son Clovis I
in 481 or 482. Clovis I
extended his rule over all the Salian Franks, conquered or annexed the
territories of the Ripuarian Franks and the Alemanni, and united nearly all of Gaul except
for Burgundy and what is now Provence.
Of equal importance, he was converted to Christianity
in either 496 or 506. At Clovis I’s death in 511, his realm was divided among
his four sons, Theuderic I, Chlodomir, Childebert
I, and Chlotar I.
Despite the frequently bloody competition between the brothers, they managed
among them to extend Frankish rule over Thuringia in approximately 531 and
Burgundy in 534 and to gain sway over, if not possession of, Septimania
on the Mediterranean coast, Bavaria, and the lands of the Saxons to the north.
By 558 Chlotar
I was the last surviving son of Clovis I, and until his death in 561 the
Frankish realm was once again united.
In 561 the
realm was again divided between brothers—Charibert I, Guntram,
Sigebert, and Chilperic I—and again family strife and intrigue ensued,
particularly between Chilperic and his wife, Fredegund, in the northwest of
Gaul and Sigebert and his wife, Brunhild,
in the northeast. Dynastic struggles and increasing pressures exerted on the
realm by neighbouring peoples—Bretons and Gascons in the west, Lombards in the
southeast, Avars in the east—prompted a reorganization of the Frankish
kingdoms. Several eastern regions were merged into the kingdom of Austrasia,
with its capital at Metz; in the west Neustria emerged, with its capital first
at Soissons and later at Paris; to the south was the enlarged kingdom of
Burgundy, with its capital at Chalon-sur-Saône. Overall Frankish unity was
again achieved in 613, when Chlotar II,
son of Chilperic
I and king of Neustria, inherited the other two kingdoms as well. On the
death of Chlotar’s son Dagobert I
in 639, the realm was divided yet again, but by that time the kings of the two
regions, Neustria and Burgundy on the one hand and Austrasia on the other, had
been forced to yield much of their power to household officials known as mayors of the palace. The later Merovingian kings were
little more than puppets and were enthroned and deposed at will by powerful
mayors of the palace. The last Merovingian, Childeric
III, was deposed in 750 by Pippin III the Short, one
of a line of Austrasian mayors of the palace who finally usurped the throne itself
to establish the Carolingian dynasty.
Opus Dei
Opus Dei is a Roman Catholic organization.
Opus Dei ( Latin: “Work of God”)
in full Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei,
Roman Catholic lay and clerical organization whose members seek personal
Christian perfection and strive to implement Christian ideals and values in
their occupations and in society as a whole. Theologically conservative, Opus
Dei accepts the teaching authority of the church without question and has long
been the subject of controversy; it has been accused of secrecy, cult like
practices, and political ambitions. With separate branches for men and women,
the organization has been headed since 1982 by a prelate
elected by its members. Priests constitute only a tiny percentage of the
organization, numbering some 1,900 of the 85,000 members worldwide.
Founded in
1928 in Spain by Josemaría
Escrivá de Balaguer y Albás (canonized in 2002), a priest trained in law,
Opus Dei was formally approved by the Holy See in 1950 as a secular institute
(i.e., a new form of religious association whose members “profess the
evangelical counsels in secular life”). On Nov. 28, 1982, Pope John
Paul II, a staunch supporter of Opus Dei, established it as the first and
only personal prelature in the church, with jurisdiction over people rather
than a geographic area. The prelate can establish seminaries and promote
students to holy orders, but the organization remains subject to some oversight
by local bishops.
Opus Dei
originally required new members to take a vow of obedience and chastity. Since
the organization became a prelature, however, it has required only a
contractual commitment to receive spiritual formation, which includes weekly
classes (“circles”) and an annual religious retreat, among other activities.
New members serve a period of probation, which lasts at least five years,
before they are fully admitted. Some members of Opus Dei, called numeraries, devote much of their time to the organization.
Like priests, they are required to remain unmarried, but they live in the world
and pursue secular occupations. They commonly practice self-sacrifice and self-mortification,
which can include fasting, abstinence from certain pleasures, and the wearing
of a cilice (which often takes the form of a spiked chain worn around the upper
thigh). The majority of members, however, are the supernumeraries, who are free
to marry, contribute financially to Opus Dei, and demonstrate Christian virtue in
their daily activities. The group is assisted by cooperators,
who are not members and, by permission of the Holy See, need not even be
Christians.
Because Opus
Dei included many highly educated people, Spain’s leader Generalissimo Francisco
Franco involved several of its members in instituting economic reform in
1956, and among his ministers were members of Opus Dei. After Franco’s death in
1975, Opus Dei’s influence waned in Spain as other groups entered the political
arena.Aggressive recruiting practices, the brainwashing of new recruits, and
the isolation of members from their families are among the charges often
leveled against the organization. Pointing to its continued growth, Opus Dei
denies these accusations.
Priory of Sion
The Priory of Sion is a secret society purportedly founded in
the 11th century, its alleged purpose to preserve and protect the original
precepts of Christianity while also acting as the guardian of Jesus Christ and
Mary Magdalene’s sacred bloodline.
The Priory was initially brought to mass public awareness in
both BBC documentaries and books by writers Henry Lincoln, Michael Baigent and
Richard Leigh. From the moment of its release "The Holy Blood and the Holy
Grail" caused a great deal of controversy. In this provocative book the
authors stated “There was a secret order behind the Knights Templar, which created the Templars as its
military and administrative arm. This order, which has functioned under a
variety of names, is most frequently known as the Prieure de Sion (Priory of
Sion). The Prieure de Sion has been directed by a sequence of Grand Masters
whose names are amongst the most illustrious in Western history and culture.
Although the Knights Templar were destroyed and dissolved between 1307 and 1314
the Prieure de Sion remained unscathed.”
fleur-de-lis
Other assertions include: The Priory of Sion was founded in
1099 CE and is sworn to return the Merovingian dynasty whom they believe to be
the descendants of Jesus and Mary Magdalene to power, that its leaders or Grand
Masters have included the likes of Isaac Newton and Leonardo Da Vinci, that the
Priory is dedicated to a united Europe and new world order and that the
Catholic Church has been engaged historically in a war to destroy the
dynasty and its protectors the Cathars [1] and Knights Templar in order to
retain authority afforded it through a patriarchal line of Popes beginning with
Peter instead of the legitimate hereditary succession that began with Mary
Magdalene.
Constantine
Constantine I, byname Constantine the
Great, Latin in full Flavius Valerius Constantinus
(born February 27, after ad
280?, Naissus, Moesia [now Niš, Serbia]—died May 22,
337, Ancyrona, near Nicomedia, Bithynia [now İzmit, Turkey]), the
first Roman
emperor to profess Christianity.
He not only initiated the evolution of the empire into a Christian state but
also provided the impulse for a distinctively Christian culture that prepared
the way for the growth of Byzantine and Western medieval culture.
Constantine was born probably in the later ad 280s. A typical product of the military
governing class of the later 3rd century, he was the son of Flavius Valerius
Constantius, an army officer, and his wife (or concubine) Helena. In ad 293 his father was raised to the rank of Caesar,
or deputy emperor (as Constantius
I Chlorus), and was sent to serve under Augustus (emperor) Maximian in the West. In 289 Constantius had
separated from Helena in order to marry a stepdaughter of Maximian, and
Constantine was brought up in the Eastern Empire at the court of the senior
emperor Diocletian at Nicomedia (modern İzmit, Turkey).
Constantine was seen as a youth by his future panegyrist, Eusebius,
bishop of Caesarea, passing with Diocletian
through Palestine on the way to a war in Egypt.
Throughout his life, Constantine ascribed his success to his
conversion to Christianity and the support of the Christian God. The triumphal
arch erected in his honour at Rome after the defeat of Maxentius ascribed the
victory to the “inspiration of the Divinity” as well as to Constantine’s own
genius. A statue set up at the same time showed Constantine himself holding
aloft a cross and the legend “By this saving sign I have delivered your city
from the tyrant and restored liberty to the Senate
and people of Rome.” After his victory over Licinius in 324, Constantine wrote
that he had come from the farthest shores of Britain as God’s chosen instrument
for the suppression of impiety, and in a letter to the Persian king Shāpūr II
he proclaimed that, aided by the divine power of God, he had come to bring
peace and prosperity to all lands.
Constantine’s
adherence to Christianity was closely associated with his rise to power. He
fought the Battle of the Milvian
Bridge in the name of the Christian God, having received instructions in a
dream to paint the Christian monogram on his troops’ shields. This is
the account given by the Christian apologist Lactantius;
a somewhat different version, offered by Eusebius, tells of a vision seen by
Constantine during the campaign against Maxentius, in which the Christian sign
appeared in the sky with the legend “In this sign, conquer.” Despite the
emperor’s own authority for the account, given late in life to Eusebius, it is
in general more problematic than the other; but a religious experience on the
march from Gaul is suggested also by a pagan orator, who in a speech of 310
referred to a vision of Apollo
received by Constantine at a shrine in Gaul.
Yet to
suggest that Constantine’s conversion was “politically motivated” means little
in an age in which every Greek or Roman expected that political success
followed from religious piety. The civil war itself fostered religious
competition, each side enlisting its divine support, and it would be thought in
no way unusual that Constantine should have sought divine help for his claim
for power and divine justification for his acquisition of it. What is
remarkable is Constantine’s subsequent development of his new religious
allegiance to a strong personal commitment.
Thank You.