Course Title: INTEGRATED PROFESSIONAL ENGLISH

Course Code: 2 2U C 11 01
ALM 1
Student Names: K.SAI KUMAR, A. YESESHWINI (Marks: 25 marks)

University ID: 2200031312,2200031255

Section: 29

Faculty: M. SURESH

The da vinci code

( SOURCE: https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna7491383)

Leonardo's activities, according to “The Da Vinci Code,” included leading a secret

brotherhood, a group entrusted with protecting the truth about Jesus, Mary and their child
-- The Priory of Sion.

Richard Leigh was among the first to evaluate the documents which were, in fact, discovered
in the library in the 1970s. The documents include a directory of leaders, called grand
masters, men whose mission, Leigh says, was to hide the secret of the bloodline, then pass it
down through the ages.

Inside the Louvre Museum, under the mysterious gaze of the Mona Lisa, a museum curator
is gunned down. In his dying moments, he leaves behind a bizarre trail of clues, some
written in his own blood. The gunman is a towering albino monk, but police suspect the
murderer is a Harvard professor of religious symbols and art.

As the professor races off into the Paris night to prove his innocence, he embarks on a
journey through ancient history, art, and the Bible, and the discovery of dangerous truths
hidden for 2,000 years -- secrets, that if revealed, could "devastate the very foundation of
Christianity."

"Fiction, as if it were fact, as if it were history, and say 'Well, this really rocks my world?
What I’ve always come to understand about Jesus and the Catholic church is suddenly
everything’s up for grabs and that shakes a lot of people up,” says NBC News analyst Father
Thomas Williams of Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University.
In the book, the monk kills the curator in a quest for the legendary Holy Grail, a mythical
vessel often thought of as the cup that Jesus drank from at the Last Supper. But in “The Da
Vinci Code,” the grail takes on an entirely new meaning. It might not be a cup at al, but a
secret, the author suggests, that would radically change our understanding of Jesus and the
life he led.

To understand that secret and to separate fact from fiction in “The Da Vinci Code,” we pieced
together a portrait of the novel's key figure, a woman who lived 2,000 years ago: Mary
Magdalene.

Mary Magdalene was born, it is believed, in the town of Magdala, a fishing village on the
western shore of the Sea of Galilee. She lives in our memory as the Biblical figure with the
flowing red hair, a fallen woman until she is forgiven by Jesus.

Even so, in a 6th century Easter sermon, Pope Gregory the Great declared that Mary was a
prostitute. Why would he do that? Many believe he simply mixed her up with another Bible
figure, an unnamed prostitute who appears just before Mary is introduced in the Book of
Luke.

But the novel's professor, who's trying to unravel the mystery of the grail, suggests
something more sinister behind the slander: a conspiracy by the church to hide the true
nature of Mary's relationship to Jesus. The fictional professor points to some tantalizing
clues, buried in the sand for almost 1,600 years, that help explain Mary's secret connection
to the grail. They're clues that are, in fact, based on something real.

In December 1945 near the Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi, a peasant smashed open an
earthenware jar and pulled out more than 50 ancient texts hidden since the 4th century.
“The Da Vinci Code” refers to them as scrolls, but they are, in fact, leather bound books, part
of a collection known as the Gnostic Gospels. These texts have never been recognized by the
church, but some scholars say they contain revealing new insights about Mary.

heir to Jesus' church and a threat to its male leaders. But many, like noted Evangelical
scholar Darrell Bock, say that's misreading the text.

Dr. Darrell Bock is research professor of New Testament Studies and professor of Spiritual
Development and Culture at Dallas Theological Seminary. .

As it is with most figures from the Bible, the portrait of Mary is incomplete. Her life is a
puzzle with some intriguing pieces; a scrap of parchment, a few lines in an ancient
manuscript. The novel says the truth about Mary and her link to the Holy Grail is
"everywhere once you open your eyes..." including some of the world's greatest works of art.
You just have to know how to read the clues.

Are the clues in a crucial image, hiding in plain sight— revealing the dangerous secret behind
“The Da Vinci Code”? The bond between Mary and Jesus may have run far deeper than
anyone imaged.

Buried deep in the pages of “The Da Vinci Code” is a secret about Mary Magdalene, one the
book says the church has suppressed for centuries. If you look carefully, there are clues
pointing to it everywhere: in the Bible, in historical documents, and in works of art by
Leonardo Da Vinci— complex codes and mysterious messages that the novel claims were
cleverly hidden by the artist. 
But are they really there?

Art historian David Nolta teaches a course on “The Da Vinci Code. He considers Leonardo a
genius whose work still evokes a deep sense of awe and mystery. His paintings, abundant
drawings, and notes, (many of which are written backwards), seem full of secrets and
fantasies. Leonardo was an architect, musician, anatomist, and engineer.

According to “The Da Vinci Code,” Leonardo offers the key to the secret of Mary Magdalene
and her relationship to Jesus in his masterpiece in Milan, the Last Supper.

The novel turns conventional wisdom on its head with this declaration that "The Last
Supper" doesn't depict 13 men, but 12 men and a woman. Could that be true? For answers,
the novel instructs us to take a closer look at the figure to Jesus' right. We asked Nolta to
help us demystify the meaning of the painting. Could it be that the beardless apostle, always
believed to be St. John, is really a woman? And if so, who is she .

If that's true, what could the painting be telling us? The book points to another clue.  The
"M" evoked by the outline of the central figures could actually be a secret code that stands for
Mary Magdalene.

Or the book says it could stand for something far more provocative, like matrimonio or
marriage. Could Mary Magdalene and Jesus have been husband and wife? “The Da Vinci
Code” claims the Last Supper practically shouts out that they were a pair. To find out if
there's any truth to this radical claim, we must travel back 2,000 years.

Mary and Jesus are thought to have come from Galilee. Mary, some believe, was from a
prosperous fishing family and Jesus was a Jewish preacher with a reputation for performing
miracles. 

The New Testament says they came together when Jesus cast out Mary's "seven demons,"
spirits once thought to represent her wayward past. But today, it is widely seen as a
metaphor for illness, perhaps epilepsy.

Soon, the Bible says that Mary was traveling the countryside with Jesus and even
contributing money to his ministry. She was with him during his final days in Jerusalem, one
of the few followers to remain by his side at his moment of death.

Before Jesus ascends to heaven, Mary reaches out to him and he tells her "do not touch me." 

Most scholars and of course the Catholic Church refute the notion that the scene in the
garden suggests anything intimate between Jesus and Mary. But Starbird says that outside of
the Bible, in those unrecognized gospels found in the Egyptian desert, there are more clues,
like phrases from the Gospel of Phillip that say Mary Magdalene "always walked with the
Lord" and is "the one who was called his companion."

Others say "companion" might simply mean a spiritual companion or fellow traveler.  But
“The Da Vinci Code” quotes another line in the same passage as proof that Jesus and marry
shared a sexual relationship.   It reads, "Christ loved her more than all the other disciples
and used to kiss her often on her mouth."

But many scholars, like Bart Ehrman author of "Truth and Fiction in the Da Vinci Code," say
that's stretching the truth.
So the picture is incomplete.  But wherever Jesus kissed Mary, other scholars add, it doesn't
tell us anything more about their relationship.

And, as for the book's claim that a married Jesus makes infinitely more sense than our view
of Jesus as a bachelor, scholarly opinion is mixed.

But one thing scholars agree on is this: nowhere in the New Testament or in any other
Christian teachings does it spell out whether or not Jesus was married. That's because it
never happened. But for others, that silence is rich with possibility.

But what if there was a reason for that silence, a truth, says “The Da Vinci Code,” that if
revealed, was far more threatening to the church than a marriage?

One set of clues brings us to a sleepy village along the Mediterranean coast of France.

There is a legend there that is said to reveal the truth about Jesus and Mary Magdalene. It is
the place where an oarless boat full of refugees from the Holy Land washed ashore not long
after Jesus was crucified.

Among those onboard was Mary Magdalene, who, the legend says, settled there and raised a
daughter named Sarah..

But in “The Da Vinci Code,” Sarah is no mere legend. She exists and her lineage is the most
astonishing revelation of the story. Sarah, the novel proclaims, is the daughter of Jesus and
Mary Magdalene. This, the book says, is the true secret of the Holy Grail: That Jesus'
marriage to Mary Magdalene produced a child, a little girl, who grew up in the South of
France. According to the legend, Sarah bore children of her own, carrying on her father's
bloodline. It flowed through generations, eventually reaching the French royal family, and
from there, the rest of the world.  

There is, of course, no birth certificate, or entry in some ancient ledger telling of Sarah's
arrival or who her parents might have been. For clues, the book once again leads us right
back to Leonardo DaVinci and the Last Supper. It is one of many renaissance depictions of
Jesus and his Apostles sharing Passover on the night before his crucifixion.

The book says the painting literally spells it out. First, there's that "M" which could stand for
"Magdalene" or "marriage." Then, there's another clue found by tracing the line formed by
the central figures -- a "V,” the shape of the missing chalice and the ancient symbol for
female fertility, conjuring the image of a mother's womb.

And so, the book concludes, Da Vinci is trying to tell us that Mary Magdalene was the "holy
vessel" who carried "the royal bloodline of Jesus Christ" by bearing his child

But why would Leonardo bury these symbols in his masterpiece?

Fill in the following columns:

S. No Topic From the article
1 Countable Nouns 1CLUES
2DOCUMENT
3PLACE
4SCHOLAR
5PAINTING
2 Uncountable Nouns 1SEARCH
2MANY
3BLOOD
4POSSIBILITY
5IMPORTANT
3 Tenses Used (Simple Present) 1SHE IS FORGIVEN BY JESUS
2MARY SHE IS SAID TO BE THE
FIRSTWITNESS TO THE RESRRECTION
3PHILIPS THINK MORE PEOPLE WILL BE
SURPRISED
4 Tenses Used (Present Continuous) 1MANY SCHOLAR LIKE BART ETRMAN
AUTHOR OF”TRUTH AND FICTION IN
THE DAVINCI CODE”,SAY THAT IS
STRETCHING TRUTH

5 Tenses Used (Simple Past) 1A WOMAN WHO LIVED 2000 YEAR AGO
MARY MAGDALENE
2WAS MANY MAGDALENE A
PROSTITUTE?
3THE FISHERMAN THOUGHT TO BE THE
FIRST HEAD OF THE CHURCH
4MARY AND JESUS ARE THOUGHT TO
HAVE COME FROM GALILEE
6 Tenses Used (Past Continuous 1MARY WAS TRAVELLING THE
COUNTRY SIDE WITH JESUS
2MARY WAS EVEN CONTRIBUTING
MONEY TO HIS MINISTRY
3MARY WAS WITH HIM DURING JESUS
FINAL DAYS IN JERUSALEN

7 Regular Verbs 1KILL

2SURROUND
3APPEAR
4SUPPRESSED
5FOLLOW
6CALL
8 Irregular Verbs 1DRANK
2FALLEN
3COME
4FORGIVE
5MISGIVE
9 Modal Verbs 1COULD
2MIGHT
3WOULD
4CAN
5WILL
10 Adjectives 1MYSTERIOUS
2GREAT
3MUSICIAN
4ANATOMIST
5FEMININE
6FAMOUS
11 Adverbs 1SUDDENLY
2ENTIRELY
3CLEVERLY
4PRACTICALLY
5FREQUENTLY
12 Phrases 1NOT THE SHE RETIRING
2EVERY WHERE ONCE YOU OPEN YOUR
EYES