Scotsman.com News - International - US publishing giants locked in holy row over religion
The religious right has gone on the attack against The Da Vinci Code, published by Doubleday, which has chipped away at fundamental beliefs with claims Christianity was founded on a cover up.
Dan Brown’s novel has caused a sensation with claims the church has conspired for centuries to hide evidence that Jesus was a mere mortal who married Mary Magdalene and had children whose descendants live in France.
This month, a number of churches and the religious right are publishing at least 10 books and pamphlets in response to the book, after surveys revealed many American readers believed it to be true.
The Rev James Garlow, co-author with Prof Peter Jones of Cracking Da Vinci’s Code and pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church in San Diego, said: "I think it [the book] is out there to win people over to an incorrect and historically inaccurate view, and it’s succeeding. People are buying into the notion that Jesus is not the son of God."
Among alleged inaccuracies cited by the critics are the book’s claims that belief in Jesus’ divinity appeared in the fourth century rather than the first; that the four New Testament Gospels became authoritative in the fourth century rather than the second and that the Dead Sea Scrolls and Gnostic writings (deemed heretical by the church) contain the earliest Christian records, though one Gnostic text does have some scholarly promoters.
News that director Ron Howard is making a movie based on the book has intensified the critics’ urgency.
Tyndale House itself came under fire from critics who say its Left Behind books, which have sold more than 60 million copies, promote dangerous and unbiblical beliefs with descriptions of an event called the Rapture, when Christ returns to Earth to take true believers to heaven.
The religious right has gone on the attack against The Da Vinci Code, published by Doubleday, which has chipped away at fundamental beliefs with claims Christianity was founded on a cover up.
Dan Brown’s novel has caused a sensation with claims the church has conspired for centuries to hide evidence that Jesus was a mere mortal who married Mary Magdalene and had children whose descendants live in France.
This month, a number of churches and the religious right are publishing at least 10 books and pamphlets in response to the book, after surveys revealed many American readers believed it to be true.
The Rev James Garlow, co-author with Prof Peter Jones of Cracking Da Vinci’s Code and pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church in San Diego, said: "I think it [the book] is out there to win people over to an incorrect and historically inaccurate view, and it’s succeeding. People are buying into the notion that Jesus is not the son of God."
Among alleged inaccuracies cited by the critics are the book’s claims that belief in Jesus’ divinity appeared in the fourth century rather than the first; that the four New Testament Gospels became authoritative in the fourth century rather than the second and that the Dead Sea Scrolls and Gnostic writings (deemed heretical by the church) contain the earliest Christian records, though one Gnostic text does have some scholarly promoters.
News that director Ron Howard is making a movie based on the book has intensified the critics’ urgency.
Tyndale House itself came under fire from critics who say its Left Behind books, which have sold more than 60 million copies, promote dangerous and unbiblical beliefs with descriptions of an event called the Rapture, when Christ returns to Earth to take true believers to heaven.
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