The Lost Secret

The Lost Secret

The subversive message of master painters down the centuries.

THE SECRET

The Judas secret, which turns Christianity upside down, or right side up, has been known down the centuries.

It is the secret suppressed by the Church, found by the Templars, forgotten by the freemasons, rediscovered by French priests in 1891 but confused in our time by popular books and documentaries. It was known to Leonardo. 15th century Florence was a city of secrets. The Artists Guild guarded its members’ trade secrets and the Achilles heel of their major patrons, the Church.

In The Da Vinci Code, the precious parchment is a “documented genealogy.” Recording the royal line of David, it is housed in a portable, secure document carrier. Dan Brown says this device was invented by Leonardo but there is no trace of it in his drawings or journals.

The phrase documented genealogy and the coded cylindrical object featured in Moonlit Messiah, a novel from 1998 in the context of a similar premise and plot [click here for details].

In both books the wife of Jesus “secret” is pure fiction, fatally flawed by lack of historical evidence and by the real secret.

So what is the real secret?

In 180CE the leader of the Latin Church, Bishop Irenaeus, wrote that, “the thing known to Judas alone … plunged heaven and Earth into confusion.” (Against Heresies, seven volumes).

And in October 2006, Benedikt XVI stated that, “the betrayal by Judas remains a mystery,” but he said no more. (Homily delivered at St Peter’s Square).

Simply stated, Judas did not betray the Jews; he deceived the Romans.

Jesus crumples a page of the Holy Bible (Rogier van Der Weyden, Madonna and Child)

The line of kings descended through Joseph and his son James who lived in the Temple’s Inner Sanctum for protection. Whatever her background and status, the son of Mary was not anointed or “messianic.” Jesus died to save his [half] brother, James the Just, legitimate king whose survival exposed the Herods as Roman collaborators.

That the wrong man died on the cross is not new and is asserted by solid sources including the Talmud, Koran, letters of Church founders, Roman chronicles, the Gnostic Gospels, the genealogies and infancy stories of Matthew and Luke, and by the Letter of James.

The four gospels selected and amended by the Church artfully air brush James out of history. But in 1st century Judea everyone knew who he was; he was more famous than Jesus. The Romans wanted him dead.

Down the centuries religious paintings have expressed the secret and reinstated James. 15th century Florence was a city of secrets in which Botticelli and Leonardo belonged to a circle of freethinkers. The Artists Guild of Florence guarded trade secrets of its members and the fatal flaw in logic of their major patron, the Latin Church.

The three wise men ignore Jesus and pay homage to a hidden king. (Boticelli, The Adoration of the Magi).

Observe the gold crown under the settee. The artist at bottom right of his painting addresses the viewers.

A knowing angel points the viewer to James. (Leonardo da Vinci, The Madonna of the Rocks, 1486).

The original painting, now in the Louvre, identifies the half-brother by a scallop shell formed by the leaves of an Alpine palm just above the hand of Mary. The scallop shell in Catholic iconography is the symbol of James. In a revised version complying with orthodox teaching, the second infant is John the Baptist.
Credit: Kelly Grovier, BBC Art; 19 February 2019

The golden key withheld from Peter: James and Jesus are juxtaposed in tellingly identical postures (Poussin, Ordination, 1647)

Astonishingly blatant and anomalous, this huge canvas hangs in Scotland’s National Gallery. Iconography: (1) the messiah is dressed in white; (2) the tomb of James is substituted for Castel S. Angelo, Rome. (3 etc) the geometry and the symbolism unravel quickly revealing Mary Magdalene and the Church, E=Ecclesia.

“Cocteau’s depiction of Mary at the foot of the cross is remarkable. Most elements of the Crucifixion are in the mural – except for Our Lord.”

The man who dies on the cross is unidentified (Jean Cocteau, Mural, 1960, Notre Dame de France, near Leicester Square, London.) The work is clearly esoteric with symbols of the black sun and the rosy cross; and the cameo of the artist.

Speaking truth to power…

The symbols and clues that identify James the Just, brother of the Lord, in famous paintings are set out in my book, The Painter and the Carpenter, which unravels the message of The Last Supper. In the Milan mural Mary is reinstated by an androgenous figure which is composite, James is depicted in the posture of crucifixion, and Judas is being stabbed in the back.

The Bible asserts the divine and eternal rule of the Davids but the Church is in denial and divisions. The aim of Cryptex Publishing is to re-establish the spiritual faith of James and Jesus which is displaced by the secular creed of Constantine.

The power struggle between Rome and Jerusalem, since Pompey invaded Judea in 63BCE, is today largely academic and secret; but it is documented in the Vatican Secret Archive and in the Hebrew University.

Explanation

In my research to interpret The Last Supper I discovered 15th century Florence was a city of secrets and Leonardo belonged to a circle of freethinkers. Closed fraternities possessed forbidden knowledge. Under the rule of the Medicis, books banned in Europe were smuggled from the Islamic Middle East. The Artists Guild of Florence guarded trade secrets of its members and the deep secret of their major patron, the Latin Church.

The identity of the disciple whom Jesus loved. The plain and practical reason Jesus died.

Despite the so-called Da Vinci Code as fiction The Last Supper does depict two denounced disciples in a new light. It seems that Leonardo was right.

Identifying “the good news” as faked history, the lost gospels called “Gnostic” or knowing have reinstated Mary Magdalene as a woman who was worthy of discipleship, a moral and loyal companion to Jesus. And yet she was condemned for centuries as a sinner by the men who seized power in the myth of Peter and their elected popes.

Reading the gospels carefully, it is telling how many of the family and the disciples of Jesus are put down.

My task is to reinstate Judas Iscariot from the same agenda. When the truth about Judas is grasped, his reason for handing over Jesus, the secret emerges and it turns Christianity upside down; or right side up. As stated,

In 180CE the leader of the Latin Church, Bishop Irenaeus, wrote that “the thing known to Judas alone … plunged heaven and Earth into confusion.” (Against Heresies).

In October 2006, Benedikt XVI stated that, “the betrayal by Judas remains a mystery,” but he said no more. (Homily, delivered at St Peter’s Square).

The secret has been passed down many generations of artists and explains the “mystery of the betrayal of Judas” as a falsified history, condemning Jews for 2,000 years as the enemies of Christ.

Judas did not betray the Jews; he deceived the Romans. This is the secret. The facts of the case confused me for many years. The framing of Judas is so “axiomatic,” an article of faith, but in 2013, I learned that Leonardo was refuting it and painting James in the posture of crucifixion.

The enigma appears in paintings down the centuries, nowhere more blatant than in the painting of 1647 by Nicolas Poussin. James and Jesus are switched and Peter is offered the leaden key to hell, not the golden key to heaven.

Simply stated, Jesus switched places; he died in the place of James, his half-brother and legitimate king. Whatever her status and background, Mary could not pass succession in a line of kings. James was the eldest son and heir of Joseph in the line and House of David. James was the anointed “messiah,” the last king of the Jews, and the head of the Mother Church of Jerusalem. Read Luke’s Acts of the Apostles.

And in all for gospels the Jews tells Pilate that Jesus is not their king and Jesus simply asks Pilate who told him otherwise? But soon Jesus was deemed to be martyr, god, king, and saviour. James was erased from history. After the Roman destruction of the city in the year 70CE Paul’s gentile cult multiplied. Peter was interpolated two centuries later to depose the surviving Davids whom the popes dismissed with contempt.

The distorted doctrine of James’ enemy, Paul, was adopted by Constantine. The faith of James and Jesus was forgotten.

It was, and remains, a colonial power struggle between Rome and Jerusalem.