What is the real DaVinci Code?

There is so much hoop-da-la regarding Dan Brown's book The DaVinci Code that I find it amazing that a work of fiction could create books and television programs attempting to debunk his research.

In the lastest from the Discovery Channel is a program titled: The Real DaVinci Code, I viewed it yesterday and after viewing it, I am led to put my 'two cents worth' in.

First, if one were to reason it, the so-called 'experts' have a reputation at stake and naturally they are not going to change their positions. Noted historians are - from my persective and from my research - only promoting recycled ignorance. That doesn't make them dumb or unintelligent - it is only repeating an ignorance that has been perpetuated upon societies including the halls of 'higher' education for hundreds of years.

One can have a string of Ph.D's after one's name and it doesn't make one smarter than another who uses their reasoning power. I was told many years ago by a Ph.D holder that the letters mean: "Piled Higher and Deeper." Therefore to give a Ph.D holder the title of 'expert' only means that you have given your power away. I am in a position to say this because I do have a Ph.D and I am choosing not to use it because I don't think it is necessary.

I know this will step on toes and that is wonderfu! Perhaps it is time that each of us use the brains we have to expand our mind with knowledge and become our own expert.

If one studied the law of the Jews at the time of Jesus, it clearly is pointed out that in order to be called a rabbi that the man had to be married. This was not brought out in the above mentioned television program. There is no evidence of Peter ever going to Rome or that the title of bishop was used before 325 A.D. The only 'proof' or 'evidence' of Jesus comes from the New Testament which was created in 325 A.D. by Emperor Constantine who had sought the advice of a female oracle's writings of 500 years before. The oracle prophisized that the one head of the Roman Empire at this time would have to create a new religion in order to stay in power and Constantine did by converting to Christianity.

Everything else has come from the Catholic Church. In the New Testament, there is no mention of Mary Magdalen being a prostitute or a whore. This was done by a Pope Gregory about 500 years after the disappearance of Jesus. This lie was perpetuated by the Church until a few hundred years ago - give or take a hundred years or so. How many other lies are there to be brought to light and accepted by humanity? Or does humanity wants to stay dumb and ignorant?

We are already inundated with priests who have raped small boys and in Ireland there is the Order of the Magdalene nuns that kidnapped small girls and young women to make slaves out of them. And so I ask, why would anyone give credence to a church that has done nothing about these travesties for hundreds of years. Why would one give credence to a church who killed thousands of women during the Inquisition? They do have cause to worry.

I found the "investigator" of the Discovery program rather flippant and not at all shocked at the number of Cathars and women slaughtered by the Catholic Church. I found it a bit scarey to see the bobbing head of supposedly a Jesus on the dashboard of his auto and the view of the picture of Jesus on his car key ring. I was not impressed with his 'knowing' looks at times.

It's not that I am anti-religion. I am anti-hypocrisy.

This is the age to move from ignorance to enlightenment.

Mind Expansion

Since writing Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls, I have been asked a number of times if there are real scrolls and where did I get a copy of them. Before I answer that, I want to give some background.

The greatest thing we can for our mind is to gain knowledge. There are times when we do not understand what we are hearing or what we are reading, however by persevering, it begins to permeate our mind and brings understanding. Some years ago I was introduced to Religious Science, also known as Science of the Mind. Even though the words were in English, I felt like I was hearing and reading a foreign language. Within me, I knew there was something important there and I persevered. Finally a light went on in my brain and when the understanding came, it seemed so simple. It became my accepted thought.

Along the way and as I gained more knowledge, I began to realize that the brain was the carrier of information coming from the mind. The more knowledge I gained, the greater understanding came to me. I had heard of the Akashic Records and at one point it seemed to be airy fairy. I had heard there were those who seemingly were able to go into these records and access information of the past, present and future. I thought this was interesting but the realization didn't fully come to me of the importance of this until I began studying quantum physics. In quantum physics the past, present and future exist simultaneously. Timelines are not necessarily linear.

Quantum physics? Those two words seem to be frightening to most people who think only a genius or a physicist could understand it. For one who failed algebra in high school, I approached this subject with trepidation. When I was taught the basic concepts, quantum physics became easy to understand and it is accessible to anyone who desires to know.

In studying the brain and mind, I have learned that all thoughts go into a great quantum cauldron, which is called the Mind of God - or the Akashic Records. Some may call it quantum Mind. Every thought that has ever been thought is in this Great Cauldron and can be accessed by anyone who wants to know if they really want to know. All thoughts of the past, present and future exist now in the Mind of God. When we gain knowledge and experience, along with giving up limitation after limitation, the greater the ability we will have to access the greater Mind of God. We are expanding the neuronets in our brain to allow for more information to be accessed. Our brain is like a radio. It receives and sends information. It is also a powerful computer.

Now getting back to the Magdalene Scrolls and the question: are they real? Perhaps. I knew I wanted to write a book and the idea came to me of scrolls. As I began writing, the book took on its own form and I have said many times that it is as if the book was writing itself. Often I had no idea where the twists and turns would take the story. Perhaps I was tapping into knowledge that already exists in the Mind of God.

In the quantum world, all things exist simultaneously and all things are possible. It is possible and a potential that there are actual scrolls waiting to be found and I was the one to herald their existence. Maybe there is a surprise around the corner. Stay in touch and perhaps we will learn more.

The sequel to Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls began writing itself in my head this past January. Oh what a grand adventure!

The Maternal Link

© 2005 Bettye Johnson

Books and articles that place women beneath men have subjugated women for eons and are tiresome. In writing my book. Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls about Mary Magdalene, I found it a challenge to find any credible history of that era. The information available was written by men and for the most part, men who were monks. That should tell us something. Some claim to have evidence of the genealogy of the bloodline of Mary Magdalene and Jesus and that is even more interesting. Men put the so-called reputable charts together and only once in a great while was the mother named. Thus, it became that the lineage was handed down from king to king. That in itself is suspect and I wonder if these kings and men of royalty were hatched in an incubator.

Science today is indicating that this is not so. There is scientific evidence from archaeology combined with the study of the DNA and genes that it is a possibility women and men came from one woman nicknamed Eve. The primary piece of evidence is called mitochondria

An article by Rebecca Cann of the University of Hawaii, together with her two male coworkers, stunned the scientific world when it was published in the British journal Nature on January 1, 1987. The article, Mitochondrial DNA and Human Evolution, alleges that all people living on Earth now can date their ancestry back to 200,000 years ago to a particular woman living at that time. Since that article was published, there have been other scientific studies and subsequent research alleges it could have been a group of women. What does this mean for women?

It means that the hereditary maternal DNA is carried by the mitochondria, which is passed from mother to daughter. Any mitochondria in the male sperm dies and is not passed to the daughters or the sons. Therefore, if a man and woman have only sons, the woman’s mitochondria carrying the lineage dies out. When a son with no female sibling marries a woman and they have a daughter, then that woman’s mitochondria DNA is passed down. From my perspective, it would be quite onerous to trace the lineage unless one knew who the females were.

What is the mitochondrial? From the science reports I have researched, the general consensus is that it carries the power of the energy of a cell. It could also be called the power generator of the cell. The mitochondria also have other functions, but for the purpose of this article, I want to emphasize the importance it has in tracing a lineage because the mitochondria also has its own DNA.

I find it a tragedy that down through the ages and today in some cultures, it is the male child that is desired and in a few cultures the female baby is killed. Because of the attitudes of the men of history, almost all knowledge of powerful and wonderful women has been either suppressed or eradicated. In some instances such as Mary Magdalene, Lucretia Borgia, Marie Antoinette, they have been portrayed as either sinners or in unflattering terms. I chose to portray Mary Magdalene as a powerful woman in her own right and I used my research to write this story in novel form. She was the wife of Jesus and they had two children.

I find it interesting that I have three sons and therefore my mitochondria is not passed down. It stops with me, however my sister had three girls and they will carry on the line. My granddaughters now carry the maternal lineage through their mothers’ mitochondria. I primarily raised my sons alone, as their father was a career military man and away two-thirds of our married life. This arrangement gave me the opportunity to raise my sons as I wanted to and they have all grown into splendid men. They are loving, caring men and are not prejudice against women.

We, the women must take the responsibility of teaching our sons and daughters that each is an equal. It can begin in the womb. While carrying a child in the womb, the woman can speak to it and begin the teaching along with playing classical music. A fetus is aware in the womb. Now, that is another study in itself.

For further research, I recommend reading Zechariah Sitchen’s book The Lost Book of Enki. An excellent website is from a NOVA documentary, Tracing Ancestry Through MiDNA, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/neanderthals/mtdna.html ~

Questions and Answers

Q: I have been asked numerous times how it came about that I wrote about Mary Magdalene along with the question of ‘did you channel this?’
A: First, I will address why I chose to write this book about Mary Magdalene. Having once been a minister, I became so aware of the exclusion of beautiful, intelligent and powerful women in the Bible. Somehow, I couldn’t see Mary Magdalene being a prostitute. I had already become a champion of women and worked to pass the Equal Rights Amendment and fortunately today it is alive, only needing three states to ratify it. It is a travesty that women in the United States need an amendment for equal rights! In fact, it is a travesty the way women are treated all over the world.

In my quest for knowledge, I studied the lives and roles of many women in the world. What I noted was that most famous women were usually portrayed in an unflattering way. Now, I am not anti-male. I have three beautiful sons and I learned a great deal about males from them; and if we women had been smart enough to train them, we probably would not have the mindsets in society that we do today. Ignorant men have written history.

In 2000, while on a trip to Spain and the Languedoc area of France, I became intrigued with the Black Madonnas I came across. It seemed as though almost every church I visited had one and usually she was placed off to one side. From this trip, I began in earnest to research the Black Madonnas and the possible relationship to Mary Magdalene. My research evolved into the book, Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls.
Having traveled through the French side of the Pyrenees, it seemed logical to begin the story there. I wrote it as fiction because the story would be more acceptable and it was more fun for me.

The idea of having two women find the unknown cave with the scrolls came to me as a natural occurrence. And as I began writing, the story began flowing, and I had no outline. This is why I have said to many people that "the book almost wrote itself." No, I did not channel it. I became so caught up in the story that my mind was freed up and the story unfolded. I never knew where the next twist or turn would take the characters.

Q: I have been asked why I portrayed her as being black.
A: To me all the pieces of the puzzle are coming together. If one would reason it, the people of Palestine were not white. Jesus was not white and I do not believe Mary Magdalene was white either. From all my research, I came to the conclusion that she was black and my knowingness tells me I am correct.

Q: I have also been asked if I thought I had been Mary Magdalene.
A: The answer is an emphatic "NO."

Q: Am I a descendant of the lineage of Mary Magdalene and Jesus?
A: I wouldn’t want to presume that. My deceased brother did a genealogical search and I will say I do come from a long line of interesting people with roots in Scotland and England.

Q: Do I think my portrayal of Mary Magdalene is close to the truth?
A: It depends on what one calls truth. We each have our own perspective and we each might call it our truth. To answer the question, I know I have portrayed her evenly and it is my hope that this portrayal of her will be an inspiration to all women and men.

Q: Am I writing a sequel?
A: Yes. The sequel began writing itself in my head in January of this year. There is much more research to accomplish and perhaps it will be ready in 2006. The title is something I am not sharing at this time. In addition to researching, I am preparing "Secrets" for its revised second edition to be available in June 2005. My editor, Jo Stockstill, is a gem.

Q: Have I read The DaVinci Code?
A: I had never heard of Dan Brown until Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls was two-thirds completed. By then it was already breaking all records. I purchased a copy and found it exciting and refreshing. I have also read his other books and have a great respect for him as a researcher and a writer. From my perspective, my book compliments his.

I also want to thank you for the comments about the book cover. There is a grand deeper meaning to the red rose that I will leave up to you to research. My son, Kenneth D. Brown, took my idea and created this beautiful cover. He also created this website and now two great women have taken his idea and are creating even greater aspects of the site. I thank Jan and Kathleen Hazelton for their enthusiasm and expertise.
Please continue to send me questions and your comments. ~

IN ANSWER TO: A Commentary

As with most authors, it is a truism that you can please some of the people some of the time, but not all the people all the time. There is a criticism of the book I authored, Secrets of the Magdalene Scrolls that I feel warrants addressing. The criticism is about the sexual scenes I wrote as being much too explicit. I did not slough this one off and contemplated on it.

To address this issue, I will first give you a bit of my background. I grew up in an era where some women never undressed in front of their husbands and when they performed the sexual act, they took off their underwear and pulled up their nightgown. And you can guess that it was a duty performed for the most part with aversion or resignation.
There is a history of women being used for men’s sexual pleasure with no regard in most cases of it being a pleasurable act for both partners. In Africa today, young girls are mutilated by having their clitoris cut off in order that they won’t feel the pleasure of the sexual act. Supposedly this is to keep them from becoming promiscuous.

In my era of growing up, I fell into the majority group where my mother never spoke of the sexual act, having babies and she did not prepare me for the onset of menses. I learned about the sexual act from schoolmates and didn’t know what a clitoris was until I was 40. Girls were never given the proper name for their body parts and even today most little girls are given the name ‘pee-pee’ in referring to their vagina.

Therefore, I grew up ignorant about my body or the realization that it was possible for a woman to enjoy the sexual act. After a rape, two marriages, and the birthing of three sons, I still was not all that enlightened because I had never had an orgasm. I was never promiscuous.

When I married my third husband, now deceased, I experienced what I wrote about in the book. He was truly my Mr. Magic. I was fifty-one years of age when we met and married. I have had a grand experience, which evolved beyond a need to have sex all the time.

My point is, women and girls need to know that it is possible to have a loving relationship and be fulfilled with the sexual act. One has only to observe the sexual scenes in movies, television and in books to realize that neither the female nor the male truly have a clue what it is all about. From my perspective, if both sexes truly were educated in the meaning and value of the sexual act, there would be no need for Viagra and less emphasis placed on the need to repeat the experience over and over with a different partner.

I have received comments from older women who thanked me because they realize that it is possible to have fulfillment in the mature years. If I can light a candle of hope, it is worth it all.

From my perspective, Mary Magdalene and Yeshua (Jesus) would have been enlightened enough to have a fantastic sexual relationship and that relationship, after the birth of a child, would have evolved into a deeper level of love without always having to express it through the sexual act.

In the sequel, which I am now researching and writing, perhaps Peter and Ellen as well as Jill and Sebastian will evolve this way also. ~

WHAT IS LOVE?

- Originally published as “Living in Love,” ©1986 Bettye Johnson

Love is to see with the eyes of a child. To be open and receptive to new ideas and concepts and to use the imagination.

Love is to dream a dream and allow it to become.

Love is to let go of doubt, fear and guilt because these are the killers of dreams.

Love is the awareness and acceptance of one’s self-worth.

Love is the letting go of all judgments and beliefs that keep us in bondage to limitation.

Love knows that personal experience brings wisdom.

Love is letting go of expectations of others and not living someone else’s expectations.

Love is allowing. It is allowing others to be right and it is allowing others to be wrong. By allowing other people to be just as they are and the past to be, brings to fruition true forgiveness.

Love is to look beyond outer appearances and know the true reality of situations as well as other people.

Love is to be giving. To be compassionate. To be understanding of others.

Love is to be in harmony with Nature and to understand the natural laws.

Love recognizes we cannot change the world or other people. It is the recognition that we can only change ourselves. By changing our beliefs and opening the door to know knowledge, we change our world.

Love seeks to be a beneficial presence.

Love is expanding and unlimiting our mind.

Love knows no boundaries.

Love is unlimited and when we live Love, we realize an inner harmony and peace, which passes all understanding.