Secrets of the Code: The Unauthorized Guide to the Mysteries Behind the Da Vinci Code

click here for more details, find new or used items	Used from £0.01 Pages: 631 (Mass Market Paperback) Editor: David A. Shugarts ISBN: 1593153678 Pub: CDS Books Pub date: 2006-04-30 Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 407823

Reader Reviews:

A treasure chest (0/0 people found this helpful)

There are 75+ short articles, interviews and excerpts in this book all related to key topics in "The Da Vinci Code" such as Mary Magdalene, the sacred feminine, the Gnostic texts, early Christianity, secret societies, Leonardo Da Vinci, codes and symbols. It's a lot of ground to cover: Burstein has done a superb job in finding selections to do that (all in under 400 pages).

The quality of the contributors is very high, including gifted speculators such as the writers of "Holy Blood, Holy Grail", top New Testament scholars such as Deidre Good and Elaine Pagels, and even Dan Brown himself (from an interview).

This is decidedly not a refutation of "The Da Vinci Code" but some negative views of that book are included. Although the overall tone seems liberal, this doesn't appear to be a pro-Brown book either. After reading it, it left me with as many questions as when I started, although often different ones. It also left me with a list of books to go look for those answers in, books I feel I can trust after reading the corresponding excerpt here.

For me, the most impressive selections were from the New Testament scholars Elaine Pagels and Deidre Good. I was impressed that, despite all their knowledge, they both are very open and acknowledge uncertainties. Whoever Mary Magdalene may have been, and whatever role women may have played in the early Church, it is wonderful that women today like Pagels and Good are making major contributions to our religious understanding. Mary Magdalene would not have been surprised.

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