I finished reading Dan Brown‘s The Da Vinci Code over the weekend. It was hard to put down once I got into it.

Dan Brown’s photo looked strangely familiar, so I read his biography and found that he attended and later taught English at Phillips Exeter Academy. I lived about 5 minutes walking distance from the academy and worked there for a summer. He also lived in Spain for a year and I lived there for two, so while slight, there’s a chance that at one time or another, our paths crossed.

Anyway, I became curious about the many facts raised in the book and began researching them. Here are the links that were most helpful in solidifying my understanding of the various organizations, places, pieces of art and ideas he presented.

Image gallery
Leonardo da Vinci
Last Supper debate
Mary Magdalene
The Gospel of Mary
PHI: The Divine Ratio
Fibonacci Numbers
The Pentacle
King Solomon’s seal (or the Star of David)
The Knights Templar
Priory of Sion
Opus Dei
The Little Mermaid phallus
The Lion King (still frames) (It’s a stretch)

The book has caused a great deal of controversy regarding Jesus’ marital status, his life and the early history of the Catholic church. These links discuss many of those issues.

Slate article about a documentary investigating the validity of the claims made in the book
Opus Dei’s response
Two reviews (one from an Episcopal Priest)
Eight fictions
A detailed critique
Dismantling the da Vinci code
Deconstructing da Vinci
Lectures at BYU
Article telling Christians to “throw [the book] away”
Article thanking Brown for sparking an interest in Christianity

If you haven’t read the book yet, here’s a teaser to get you hooked. It’s the type of book that you start and can’t put down until you finish. Oh, and Ron Howard is making it into a movie.