A Messianic Bloodline?

When I began this series of three articles on the relationship of Jesus to women I had not realized that the movie Bloodline would be released half way through. I have not yet seen the film but I have researched everything available on it thoroughly and am saddened to see very strong indications that the documentation claimed to be part of the discoveries on which the movie is based appears to be fraudulent.

Twenty five years ago Donovan Joyce was the first person in modern times to postulate that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and had a child with her (The Jesus Scroll, 1973). It hadn’t been heard of in any notable way since the time of the Valentinians in the second century. Andreas Faber-Kaiser, a few years later (Jesus Died in Kashmir, 1977), said that Jesus had several children with a woman in Kashmir and was buried there. The book carried an interview with a woman who claimed descent from that couple and who was the current custodian of the famous Jesus Tomb in Srinagar.

Holy Blood, Holy Grail five years later asserted that the descendents of Jesus and Mary Magdalene eventually became the Merovingian Dynasty. Allied to this, the 2000 book Rex Deus stated that a Jesus Bloodline was part of a dynasty called “Rex Deus” or the “God King” that descended from 24 priests of the Jerusalem Temple and Jesus himself. Last year, The Lost Tomb of Jesus was produced by James Cameron of Titanic fame, and Simon Jacobovici, which said that what is known as the Talpiot Tomb near Jerusalem was the Jesus family tomb and that it contains his bones and that of Mary Magdalene.

A few weeks ago the documentary Bloodline was released which claims that a tomb discovered near Rennes-le-Chateau in the south of France may well contain the bones of Jesus and Mary Magdalene as well as a cache of Templar treasure.

So this is the seventh such site to make this a claim that I am aware of; we have a Jesus tomb in Kashmir, one in Japan, one in northern Israel at Taif; one in Jerusalem, one in Tibet and one in England.

The Bloodline movie focuses on the person of Berenger Sauniere, priest of Rennes-le-Chateau, who died in April 1917. Rennes is an ancient place steeped in history and shrouded in mystery. It is with some regret that I see its notoriety today linked with the name of its priest Sauniere, who would probably be an unknown figure were it not for the authors of Holy Blood, Holy Grail and the flock of conspiracy theories that have been spawned as a result of their work around Rennes le Chateau.

According to the makers of “Bloodline”, this movie is based on a series of discoveries made near Rennes-le-Chateau. In 1995 the English researcher Ben Hammott (The Tomb Man) accidentally dropped his camera into a hole in a cave near Rennes–le-Chateau. When he managed to recover the camera later, he discovered it had taken pictures of what seemed like a Templar Tomb. There seemed to be a body inside as well as a substantial amount of ancient treasure. He returned to the site and took some better footage.

Hammott came back to the tomb in 2007 accompanied by the American film producer Bruce Burgess (well know for his interest in the Bermuda Triangle, Bigfoot, and Area 51) and a better quality movie was made. I have not yet seen the movie but have researched any information available on it from the films extensive website and the various media reports and reviews that have appeared.

According to a press release by the filmmakers, the find was reported to the French Archeological Authority of Montpellier, Direction Regionale des Affaires Culturelle – DRAC. The person the Bloodline people spoke to was a Jean-Pierre Giraud.

The DRAC authorities say that Bruce Burgess and Ben Hammott showed them a section of film and asked if they would like to see the tomb. Seeing that that is what DRAC is there for, they readily agreed. Burgess and Hammott agreed to take them there but in the event they never returned to do so. The DRAC authorities believe the filmmakers only came to them to get a quotation for the film and no more. Apparently the French authorities are angry and convinced the whole thing is a hoax. No report of the alleged discovery has appeared in any significant French press or magazine.

In the movie Hammott claims in his searches around Rennes-le-Chateau to have discovered a series of hidden bottles with messages inside from Fr. Bernard Sauniere deposited there a century ago. Apparently he was confessing in the bottle messages to a serious crime committed to hide an even graver secret.

The first bottle contains a piece of paper that claims to have the signature of Sauniere. Sauniere was an erudite man who wrote impeccable French in an elegant hand. This alleged signature has the wrong form of accent on his family name. In French it is essential to put accents in their proper places - an incorrect or missing accent is a spelling mistake just as much as an incorrect or missing letter would be. In Sauniere’s genuine signatures the second last “e” in his family name has an accent “aigu” over it, which leans forwards. Instead that ‘e’ ought to have an accent ‘grave” which leans backwards. It is unthinkable that a cultured Frenchman would make this sort of mistake about his own family name.

It is interesting to note that the signature with the faulty accent was not shown to the British handwriting expert Emma Bache when the Bloodline team consulted her about authenticating the messages. However, the signature was shown to Antoine Captier a researcher of Rennes-le-Chateau, who condemned it as a forgery.

Three or four more bottles were discovered by Hammott with messages inside. Mistakes have been pointed out in the French phrases of those messages. One phrase reads “La route que vous suivre est pleine de danger.” Presumably the intention is to say “The route you will follow is full of danger.” But this form of the French is precisely how an English speaking person who knew only a little French would phrase the sentence. It is English using French words. No French speaker would ever phrase the sentence in this way, much less an educated person such as Sauniere. Besides “vous suivre’ should be “vous suivez,” another very elementary but serious mistake.

I have watched the program file on ABC ’s Nightline Program when the makers of the movie were interviewed. One of the parchments displayed on that program is riddled with errors in the use of the French language. For example it should read “LA resurrection” not “LE resurrection”. It should read “LA vere histoire”, not “LE vere histoire”, and of course there is no such word in French as ‘vere’ – it should be ‘vrai’ assuming the intention is to speak of a “true” history. “DES crucifixion” should be “DE LA crucifixion”, and this mistake is made twice.

This is not real French but a very amateurish attempt by an English speaking person to translate the statement that Jesus did not die on the cross, but 22 days later. Bruce Burgess is asked to translate the document but he reads an English text that is different from what is being shown on the screen.