The Ascent Centre organises popular seminars to study Kabbalah, as championed by media messiah Madonna, increasingly attracting Jews and non-Jews looking for spirituality and disenchanted with the vagaries of modern life.

“Madonna happened to be a vehicle of God,” says Rabbi Mordechai Siev, who directs the English-language programme at the centre in Safed, extolling the magnetism of the Jewish Sabbath in the slightly down-market Israeli town.

“A guy in LA told me ‘my feet are here but my head is in Safed.’ Friday here, is the real Friday night fever.

“The centre is open to Jewish and non Jewish people from all over the world and they come to check out mystical experiences,” he says, adding that plunging into religious texts allows Kabbalah enthusiasts to “connect to themselves.”

For the bargain-basement price of 280 shekels (66 dollars, 48 euros), students get a discount, interested parties are treated to a four-day course with full board and lodging in the ancient centre of Jewish learning in the Galilee.

Sheree Sharan, 31, has been interested in Kabbalah for two years and came from Chicago for a four-day seminar to “get some energy” and search for the hidden meaning that she believes is lost in the materialism of the West.

“I was looking for Jewish mysticism and Safed is the headquarters for Kabbalah,” says the skinny, blonde single woman.

“Kabbalah teaches you about the power you have inside, how to control your inner instinct, how to make sense of emotions. Our generation seems to be searching for meaning, for goals and answers.”

“There’s a lot in Kabbalah that speaks to people from different backgrounds. Now technology, materialism. People have lost touch with their basic needs and desires,” she adds, in the over-powering heat of high summer.

Source URL:
http://www.thebereancall.org/node/6031
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[1] http://www.religionnewsblog.com/18840/kabbalah-2

REBUTTAL: The New Testament was sealed with the apostles’ blood.  They put their money where their mouths were.  The Greek word for “witness” –– as in the idea of witnessing to the truth about Jesus –– is “martyro,” from whence we get the word martyr.  Why?  Because so many witnesses to Jesus, e.g., the apostles, were killed for testifying about what they themselves saw.  Brown glibly ignores this history and, instead, exalts the questionable writings of second-, third-, and fourth-century Gnostic Christians, who were sexual libertines for the most part.  (Other Gnostics were strict legalists.)

ERROR: The doctrine that Jesus was divine was created by a pagan emperor in the fourth century, Constantine, for the purposes of manipulation: “It was all about power.”

REBUTTAL: After the Resurrection, Christians worshiped Jesus because He was divine.  They called Him “Kurios,” the Greek word for “Lord.”  In the Septuagint –– the Greek translation of the Old Testament that Jesus and the apostles had (translated roughly 150 B.C.) –– the word used for Yahweh is Kurios.  For a Jew to say that a human was Kurios was absolutely forbidden.
 
ERROR: No one believed, prior to the Council of Nicea in A.D. 325 that Jesus was divine.

REBUTTAL: Again, in the Gospels, written in the first century, we see that Jesus was divine.  This is why He was delivered up to be crucified.  The Jews accused Him of blasphemy, which is why they arrested Jesus and had a “trial” among themselves: Dan Brown’s view that the early Christians believed Jesus was only a mortal rests on historical quicksand.  From the very beginning, Christians worshiped Jesus as the Son of God.  “Cracking Da Vinci’s Code” authors Jim Garlow and Peter Jones have compiled a list of several Church Fathers –– all of whom wrote before the Council of Nicea in A.D. 325 –– affirming this most basic Christian doctrine that Jesus was divine.  Those Fathers include: Ignatius (writing in A.D. 105), Clement (150), Justin Martyr (160), Irenaeus (180), Tertullian (200), Origen (225), Novatian (235), Cyprian (250), Methodius (290), Lactantius (304), and Arnobius (305).  Furthermore, one of the earliest Christian creeds was “Jesus is the Lord” (Kurios) (1 Corinthians 12:3).

ERROR: Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, and the Gnostic gospels teach that.

REBUTTAL: There is the flimsiest of evidence for that.  There is one passage in the pseudo Gospel of Philip, written about A.D. 250, long after Philip the apostle had died, that claims Jesus often kissed Mary Magdalene on her________ (where he kissed her is obscure in the manuscript).  The word could have been mouth, cheek, forehead, or whatever.  Even liberal scholar Karen King of Harvard University observes that this is referring to a holy kiss that is asexual in nature.  Just like it says in the Bible, greet one another with “a holy kiss” (Romans 16:16).  Let’s also remember that this was written more than 200 years after Christ.  So even Dan Brown’s sources from antiquity don’t make his case for him.

ERROR: In “The Last Supper,” Leonardo da Vinci allegedly painted Mary Magdalene seated next to Jesus.
 
REBUTTAL: One of Dan Brown’s proofs is that John looks so feminine, but John is often portrayed in such a way in art because he was young.  Go to any cathedral and look at the stained-glass images of John.  Just as you can identify Peter because he is holding keys, and you can tell Andrew because he is holding a Cross like an X (the kind on which He was crucified), so you can tell John by his feminine looks.  But suppose it were the case that Leonardo intentionally painted Mary Magdalene next to Jesus instead of John, because Jesus and Mary were allegedly married, and Leonardo was in on the secret, then where is the “beloved disciple” John?  He is not in the picture.  Where is he?  Under the table?
 
ERROR: The Gnostic gospels uniformly teach the “sacred feminine” –– the pagan idea that sex with a woman is the route to a relationship with God.

REBUTTAL: Unlike the four Gospels, the Gnostic gospels can be actually degrading to women.  The Gospel of Thomas declares that a woman cannot be saved unless God first changes her into a man (the very last verse of Thomas, 114).

ERROR: The Priory of Sion, which looms large in the novel, was created in 1099 by the Knights Templar.

REBUTTAL: The Priory of Sion was created out of whole cloth in 1956 by a French anti-Semite con man, Pierre Plantard.  In 1975, documents were found in the Biblioteque Nationale in Paris that allegedly proved the Priory is as old as 1099, and that Leonardo da Vinci and Isaac Newton and other luminaries secretly presided over it.  These documents were proved to be fakes.

ERROR: Christianity was based on pagan religions –– such as the mystery religions.  Specifically, Dan Brown states: “Nothing in Christianity is original.  The pre-Christian God Mithras –– called the Son of God and the Light of the World –– was born on Dec. 25, died, was buried in a rock tomb, and then resurrected in three days.”

REBUTTAL: Dan Brown has it exactly the opposite.  The mystery religions more often borrowed from Christian themes –– including the ones that Brown mentions.  In ancient cultures, there was always the myth of the dying and resurrecting god –– essentially “winter” and “spring.”  However, these are never alleged to have been real history.  In contrast, on such and such a day (some scholars, including Dr. Alan Whanger, retired professor of Duke Medical Center –– believe April 7, A.D. 30) Jesus Christ was crucified and laid in a tomb in Jerusalem.  He came out alive with a resurrected body in three days (as Jews count it –– two days as we would count it).  Going further on the mystery religions, note what authors Carl Olson and Sandra Miesel write in their book, “The Da Vinci Hoax”:

“Unfortunately for Brown and the authors of “Holy Blood, Holy Grail,” there is little or no evidence that most pagan mystery religions, such as the Egyptian cult of Isis and Osiris or the cult of Mithras, existed in the forms described in their books prior to the mid-first century.  This is a significant point, for much of the existing evidence indicates that the third- and fourth-century beliefs and practices of certain pagan mystery religions are read back into the first-century beliefs of Christians –– without support for such a presumptive act …”

WAS THERE ANY FACT-CHECKING?

There are so many errors among the alleged “accurate depictions” of “The Da Vinci Code” that historian and first-rate scholar Paul Maier just has to shake his head. He notes, “Detailing all the errors, misinterpretations, deceptions, distortions, and outright falsehoods in “The Da Vinci Code” makes one wonder whether Brown’s manuscript ever underwent editorial scrutiny or fact-checking.”  Amazingly, we live in the Information Age, yet we live in an age of massive disinformation.  The Bible says Satan is the “the prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2).  The Bible also says that in the end times, “men will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears” (2 Timothy 4:3). Is that not happening in our own day?

COMMENT FROM GEORGE BARNA

Many followers of Christ fear that the movie, which will be even more accessible to the public at-large than the book, will distort people’s theological perceptions.  This fear is well-founded.  Americans already possess an unorthodox profile of religious beliefs, indiscriminately blending biblical and cultural views.  Among adults who are aligned with a Christian church, 59% do not believe that Satan exists, 42% contend that Jesus Christ committed sins during His earthly tenure, and just 11% believe that the Bible is the source of absolute moral truth.  In fact, millions of Americans are confused about the Bible.  On the one hand, six out of ten (61%) believe that “every word in the Bible is true and can be trusted.”  On the other hand, only half as many affirm that the Bible is “totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches.”  Americans admit that they are more likely to seek theological clarity from friends, family, experiences and even media input than from diving into biblical texts.

For some reason, Sharon insisted on changing the names from the real characters to new, invented ones.

Equally problematic were the flat, overwritten dialogue, the ever-shrinking budget and the fact that —— purely for tax reasons —— we were filming in Montreal when the story took place in New York , London , Beirut and Moscow .

All of this, however, paled into insignificance when, at dinner with Sharon early in the rehearsal period, I realized something that had hitherto escaped me. She was utterly unhinged.

“Honey,” she said in the middle of the first course. “Have you let your character in yet?” “What do you mean, Shaz?” I replied, slightly wearily.

I always find that when another actor wants to discuss character, it means that they want to discuss your character —— and what you need to do so that they can play their character the way they want.

“How many dead people have you played?” “Tons. I only ever play dead people,” I said, gloomily. “So you know. Have you let him in?”. She spoke quietly and looked at me with a burning intensity. She had never looked better, even if she insisted on cutting her own hair with her nail scissors. She was a great beauty and her eyes were hypnotic. I was swept in by their drama, even if I didn’t know what the hell she was talking about.

“Sort of,” I said, feeling my way. “Sure. I felt that,” Sharon replied. “Man, she came into me last night. She’s right there.” Sharon banged her chest with her fist, then opened her fingers and grabbed one of her breasts, shaking it with passion. A man at the next table nearly fell off his chair.

“You mean Mrs Philby?”. “Oh yeah! She is in such pain. I’m trying to live with her, but she’s gonna take over. I can feel it. Once they take over……” She whistled and shook her head.

I cleared my throat to deliver my next line. “No, Philby hasn’t come into me yet, thank God, and frankly I hope he doesn’t. He was a ghastly old lush, wasn’t he?”.

Casino She ignored me. “The first time was on the film Casino.” Now she was speaking so softly that I could hardly hear and had to crane forward.Always speak as quietly as possible. It draws the listener in and makes you look riveting as well as beautiful to the on looking fans.

Because, make no mistake: Sharon ’s career was a 24/7 affair. She didn’t have to be on a sound stage to be filming. The world was her camera and her alarm clock was the clapperboard.

It was legendary stuff and I adored it. “Marty left the mad scene for last,” she continued. “You remember, when my character has that total meltdown?” “How could I forget? It was brilliant,” I replied, thinking back to Martin Scorsese’s mobster film.

“Well, she came inside me while I was in the trailer before the scene.” I giggled awkwardly. Sharon gave me a withering glare. “I was, like, completely possessed. She was right there. I was her. Bobby could tell straightaway. He said to Marty, “How much film do you have?” And Marty said, “We got a full mag!”

“So just keep rolling,” Bobby told him. “Trust me.” He knew. Bobby knew. “And when Marty said “Action”, I blacked out. I have no recollection. She took over. At the end of the scene I was on the ground. I couldn’t move and Marty said: “Don’t touch her. Leave her for a few minutes.”

The thing was, if you watched Casino, Sharon ’s performance was possessed. It was on a level few actors achieve, so it was difficult to know what to think. Maybe she was invaded by the dead. Maybe Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro believed it too.

“There was a pinkish mist over me” Sharon continued. “Everyone saw it. And it’s happened again on this film. This could be the last time we speak, you and I.” This girl was stark raving mad. I was scared of her.