The Da Vinci Code (Jesus & Mary Magdelene)

I'm going through a brief philisophical phase so I've been thinking about this question according to allegations by Dan Brown in the Book, "The Da Vinci Code", which is supposedly partially based on fact.

I haven't read the book so the information I'm getting comes from the TV programme presented by Tony Robinson, "The Real da Vinci Code". The allegation is as follows: According to Leonardo da Vinci, Jesus was in an intimate relationship with Mary Magdelene. This was then covered up by the Christian church authorities, presumably so as not to spoil Jesus' image of purity. In fact if you look at the painting, "The Last Supper", you'll see that there is a woman sitting beside Jesus, and the shape made between their shoulders and their elbows is a "V" or triangle shape, which at the time was the symbol of fertility. Furthermore the shape made by Jesus & "Mary"'s bodies is an M whch could stand for Mary.

This has been much the subject of pub discussion, so let me address the question - did the church cover up the fact that Jesus had a relationship with Mary Magdelene?
The answer is an almost definite...
No.

The mere allegation is its own undoing. It's not a question of beliefs - I'm not a staunch Christian - it's a question of simple logic.

The only document which records the events is the Bible. Now the only thing holding the Bible with any iota of possibility of truth is the belief that when scholars are writing the Bible, it's such a holy book that God Himself intervenes to ensure that it gets written correctly. This makes it impossible to lie in the Bible. That is why the word "Gospel" is often used as a synonym for the absolute truth. The Bible - according to this idea - must be absolutely true, we have God Himself on the job making sure. For the church to attempt to cover some of it up would be inherently impossible.

But perhaps that belief is wrong. Maybe God doesn't ensure that the Bible is absolutely true. If this is the case, then surely, I hear you say, it must be possible. I'm afraid not. If God isn't ensuring the Bible is the truth, then no one is. In which case, the whole thing could be true or false, it's just a bunch of 2000-year old stories - we'll never know whether *any* of them are true, whether there was a Jesus and if so, whether He had any relationship with God - if there is or ever was a God. Arguing over whether the church covered up one detail is pointless when faced with the possibility that they could have made up the whole Bible. It makes about as much sense of accusing the Irish government of covering up an illicit affair between Cúchullain and Queen Maedbh. Indeed, there may have been a guy called Jesus Christ born in Bethlehem, who later went on to meet a woman called Mary Magdelene, but without the guarrantee that the Bible is true to make them important, who cares - other than Fair City viewers - whether they had an affair or not? I'd be more worried about the fact that the church have been conning millions of people for centuries by falsifying the entire Bible.

Either the Bible is completely true, or it is almost all false. It would be a great miracle indeed to have a 2000-year old non-divinely-guarded document to be only missing that one detail.

No I'm afraid all Leonardo da Vinci was doing with his V & M was predicting the rise to fame of Van Morrison.