Rating: 
Summary: HEY CHRISTIANS!!!! CONTINUE YOUR EDUCATION!!!!!
Review: A delightful stop, this second one, on the express to enlightened understanding. This sequel to "Holy Blood Holy Grail" is an essential companion piece to that masterwork of historical and religious scholarship. In this book, Messrs. Baigent, Leigh and Lincoln begin where they left off in the world of the man known as Jesus the Nazorean. They further dissect elements of his life and times and go on to discuss the development of the schism between Jesus's followers lead by his family members and the group of so-called "christians" lead by Paul. The method of these historians is breathtaking in its scope and elegance.The second part of the book is much more theoretical and at first seems at odds with the rest of the work. As it melds with the third and final part of the book, there is a cohesiveness to the entire work that is satisfying enough. As an American reader, one must make certain allowances when taking in the work of these authors. Their British take on things, which is interesting in and of itself, does not always extrapolate to American understanding. Particularly, their fascination with monarchs and chivalry is quite foreign to me as it would probably be to most American readers.
Rating:
Summary: HEY CHRISTIANS!!!! CONTINUE YOUR EDUCATION!!!!!
Review: A delightful stop, this second one, on the express to enlightened understanding. This sequel to "Holy Blood Holy Grail" is an essential companion piece to that masterwork of historical and religious scholarship. In this book, Messrs. Baigent, Leigh and Lincoln begin where they left off in the world of the man known as Jesus the Nazorean. They further dissect elements of his life and times and go on to discuss the development of the schism between Jesus's followers lead by his family members and the group of so-called "christians" lead by Paul. The method of these historians is breathtaking in its scope and elegance. The second part of the book is much more theoretical and at first seems at odds with the rest of the work. As it melds with the third and final part of the book, there is a cohesiveness to the entire work that is satisfying enough. As an American reader, one must make certain allowances when taking in the work of these authors. Their British take on things, which is interesting in and of itself, does not always extrapolate to American understanding. Particularly, their fascination with monarchs and chivalry is quite foreign to me as it would probably be to most American readers.
Rating: 
Summary: Another step forward
Review: After the great success the first book of this "saga" had, Baigent Leigh and Lincoln made another step further. Saunière and his mystery is the starting point for a very interesting exploration of the hidden face of history. Using the usual British approach for history, the result is a book sometimes hard to read and not so much flowing, especially compared to Lincoln's "Key to the Sacred Patterns".
The history of a man escaping his common known fate and founding his own dinasty; the telling of obscure plot at the shadow of the church and much more can be found here.
A great companion to two other interesting books, Starbird's "The Woman With the Alabaster Jar" and Patton and Mackness "Web of Gold", the three writers deserve a very high position among those who wrote about Rennes le Château and all the things it involves.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting reading ... but a false premise
Review: As a sequel to the book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" you might expect a little something different then what you get out of this book. That is not to say this book is necessarily bad - just of a different type than its predecessor. (While being of a different type, it is of the same general theme.) The book is, in some ways, three separate books. Part One concerns itself more with the time of Jesus and the idea of apocalyptic and Messianic thinking. Part Two concerns itself more with the modern "search for meaning" and how religion plays a part in this but that this, by necessity, brings back some of the Messianic thinking of Jesus' time. Part Three centers on an alleged secret society, the Priory of Sion. Even with these differences there is a thread that runs through the parts - namely that of providing an end to the "search for meaning" by the restoration of a dynastic bloodline via the use of Jungian archetypes. It just so happens that this dynastic bloodline happens to be that of the lineal descent of Jesus. The secret society comes in because they are planning to do just this, according to the authors - restore a bloodline from the Merovingian Kings that, in turn, is claimed to have been descended from Jesus. All of it makes for interesting reading and I would say that Parts One and Two are, for the most part, very well put forth along with some social commentary that is thoughtful and well-put. (You can tell, if you have read "The Elixir and the Stone," that Bagient and Leigh's authorial hands are more in the first two parts than anywhere else.) What saddles this book, somewhat unfortunately, is Part Three which stands on much less stable ground than the material from the previous two sections. One complaint would be that while the first two sections are well written you are constantly waiting for the authors to finally make their point. You know they must have one and you can see they are groping towards it, but it is not really until Part Three that they finally just say what they want to say in any tangible fashion. Granted, all books of this nature have to have a set-up to a certain degree to posit their main point - but this one just seemed to drag on, particularly if you read "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" and pretty much knew where the ultimate destination was. The problem is that the Priory of Sion has been mainly proven to be a hoax. It really did exist and Pierre Plantard really was its "Grand Master" but the problem is that the organization was never what Plantard claimed it to be, which is where the hoax comes from. A review like this is not the appropriate forum to divulge all those facts but needless to say the relevant documents have been published (although mostly in France). I recommend reading authors like Pierre Jarnac and Jean-Luc Chaumeil for the real story of the Priory of Sion, an organization that did not exist until 1956 and was only resurrected in name by Pierre Plantard for a brief time after the false reports of Noel Corbu. Thus the final goal of the book (showing the alleged plans of the Priory of Sion) is undermined. (Of course, if you were not aware of this fact the end of the book might give you a little fright, postulating, as it does, a conspiracy theory of somewhat epic proportions.) What this book will probably show you is that Henry Lincoln (and the other two authors) fell for the stories of Pierre Plantard and a group of people that wanted to seem more important than they were - basically a bunch of myth-makers and pseudo-royalists. This is even more telling when you realize that none of the authors, after this book, ever took up this theme again. Henry Lincoln's later books (The Holy Place and Key to the Sacred Pattern) pretty much avoid giving too much mention of the Priory of Sion in any great detail. Baigent and Leigh, for their parts, separated from this line of research and did not contribute any further with Henry Lincoln. Beyond that, however, I would say the book is worth reading for the first two parts of it, which are very erudite in style. I would say that, regarding Part One, the authors do rely overly much on one particular researcher: Robert Eisenman. This is not to say that Eisenman's work is wrong or suspect - simply that you can tell they relied on him so much simply because his worked mirrored their own thoughts. One does not see a lot of dissenting views presented in the book that might cast doubt on the authors' theories as they are put forth. What is most unfortunate is that some of the well-stated ideas and concepts put forth in the beginning of the book may be marked as frivolous when one reads the latter portion of the book. My recommendation: take the good stuff at the beginning for what it is worth and be very skeptical of the conspiracy theory at the end. Do your research and you will find that the Priory of Sion really was nothing more than a few people's myth-making apparatus. In the end, I had to give the book only three stars. The third star is because the first two parts of the book are really quite good when you remove them from the context of the conspiracy theory put forth in the third part.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting reading ... but a false premise
Review: As a sequel to the book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" you might expect a little something different then what you get out of this book. That is not to say this book is necessarily bad - just of a different type than its predecessor. (While being of a different type, it is of the same general theme.) The book is, in some ways, three separate books. Part One concerns itself more with the time of Jesus and the idea of apocalyptic and Messianic thinking. Part Two concerns itself more with the modern "search for meaning" and how religion plays a part in this but that this, by necessity, brings back some of the Messianic thinking of Jesus' time. Part Three centers on an alleged secret society, the Priory of Sion. Even with these differences there is a thread that runs through the parts - namely that of providing an end to the "search for meaning" by the restoration of a dynastic bloodline via the use of Jungian archetypes. It just so happens that this dynastic bloodline happens to be that of the lineal descent of Jesus. The secret society comes in because they are planning to do just this, according to the authors - restore a bloodline from the Merovingian Kings that, in turn, is claimed to have been descended from Jesus. All of it makes for interesting reading and I would say that Parts One and Two are, for the most part, very well put forth along with some social commentary that is thoughtful and well-put. (You can tell, if you have read "The Elixir and the Stone," that Bagient and Leigh's authorial hands are more in the first two parts than anywhere else.) What saddles this book, somewhat unfortunately, is Part Three which stands on much less stable ground than the material from the previous two sections. One complaint would be that while the first two sections are well written you are constantly waiting for the authors to finally make their point. You know they must have one and you can see they are groping towards it, but it is not really until Part Three that they finally just say what they want to say in any tangible fashion. Granted, all books of this nature have to have a set-up to a certain degree to posit their main point - but this one just seemed to drag on, particularly if you read "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" and pretty much knew where the ultimate destination was. The problem is that the Priory of Sion has been mainly proven to be a hoax. It really did exist and Pierre Plantard really was its "Grand Master" but the problem is that the organization was never what Plantard claimed it to be, which is where the hoax comes from. A review like this is not the appropriate forum to divulge all those facts but needless to say the relevant documents have been published (although mostly in France). I recommend reading authors like Pierre Jarnac and Jean-Luc Chaumeil for the real story of the Priory of Sion, an organization that did not exist until 1956 and was only resurrected in name by Pierre Plantard for a brief time after the false reports of Noel Corbu. Thus the final goal of the book (showing the alleged plans of the Priory of Sion) is undermined. (Of course, if you were not aware of this fact the end of the book might give you a little fright, postulating, as it does, a conspiracy theory of somewhat epic proportions.) What this book will probably show you is that Henry Lincoln (and the other two authors) fell for the stories of Pierre Plantard and a group of people that wanted to seem more important than they were - basically a bunch of myth-makers and pseudo-royalists. This is even more telling when you realize that none of the authors, after this book, ever took up this theme again. Henry Lincoln's later books (The Holy Place and Key to the Sacred Pattern) pretty much avoid giving too much mention of the Priory of Sion in any great detail. Baigent and Leigh, for their parts, separated from this line of research and did not contribute any further with Henry Lincoln. Beyond that, however, I would say the book is worth reading for the first two parts of it, which are very erudite in style. I would say that, regarding Part One, the authors do rely overly much on one particular researcher: Robert Eisenman. This is not to say that Eisenman's work is wrong or suspect - simply that you can tell they relied on him so much simply because his worked mirrored their own thoughts. One does not see a lot of dissenting views presented in the book that might cast doubt on the authors' theories as they are put forth. What is most unfortunate is that some of the well-stated ideas and concepts put forth in the beginning of the book may be marked as frivolous when one reads the latter portion of the book. My recommendation: take the good stuff at the beginning for what it is worth and be very skeptical of the conspiracy theory at the end. Do your research and you will find that the Priory of Sion really was nothing more than a few people's myth-making apparatus. In the end, I had to give the book only three stars. The third star is because the first two parts of the book are really quite good when you remove them from the context of the conspiracy theory put forth in the third part.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting Sequel
Review: Baigent et al. open this title with a follow-up to their successful & controversial Holy Blood Holy Grail. The authors revisit ancient times further speculating upon Jesus's divinity and bloodline.
Then they go off on a lengthy tangential train of thought researching almost everything and anything in history before retying their thoughts together in the final third of the book.
Reading this I learnt much as I did reading their Holy Blood Holy Grail. However my patience did wane slightly wondering if they were ever going to cover the topics described on the back cover, or for that matter further discuss some of the societys mentioned earlier in this book or in their other title. They finally do return to topics and themes readers familiar to this effusive collaboration have grown accustomed to, and in my opinion fulfill the promises made by their potential and the hype their works have accredited. This volume I must confess I found overall less interesting, possibly because while the authors haven't become apologetic or revoked their earlier research they didn't add more controversy to their titles. Baigent and his co-author's aren't accused of towing the party line but only recovered the earlier revelations/theories without much expansion which I think was the only really hurtful factor to my enjoyment of this book.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting Sequel
Review: Baigent et al. open this title with a follow-up to their successful & controversial Holy Blood Holy Grail. The authors revisit ancient times further speculating upon Jesus's divinity and bloodline.
Then they go off on a lengthy tangential train of thought researching almost everything and anything in history before retying their thoughts together in the final third of the book.
Reading this I learnt much as I did reading their Holy Blood Holy Grail. However my patience did wane slightly wondering if they were ever going to cover the topics described on the back cover, or for that matter further discuss some of the societys mentioned earlier in this book or in their other title. They finally do return to topics and themes readers familiar to this effusive collaboration have grown accustomed to, and in my opinion fulfill the promises made by their potential and the hype their works have accredited. This volume I must confess I found overall less interesting, possibly because while the authors haven't become apologetic or revoked their earlier research they didn't add more controversy to their titles. Baigent and his co-author's aren't accused of towing the party line but only recovered the earlier revelations/theories without much expansion which I think was the only really hurtful factor to my enjoyment of this book.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable revelation!
Review: Baigent has done it again. I didn't think he could surpass "Holy Blood, Holy grail" but he did. This book takes the discussion further. Do authors collaborate? I have just read the even more astounding "THE Autobiography of Jesus of Nazareth and the Missing Years" by Richard G. Patton. Patton has produced a real page-turner that seems to verify Baigent's work. Who would have thought anyone could produce a mystery thriller about the man we know as Jesus? "THE Autobiography.." does just that! These authors should be sold as a complete package since they each enhance the other. Thank God for authors like these that don't allow our 'presumed' knowlege to become stagnent. Buy this book soon.
Rating:
Summary: The follow-up to Holy Blood and Holy Grail!!!!!!!
Review: Fantastic! If you love alternative interpretations of history, then read this! I wonder how much is true though!!
Rating:
Summary: Incoherent, but a must ot readers of HBHG
Review: Firstly, this book is much less coherent than "Holy Blood, Holy Grail." (If you did not read that book, do NOT buy this one. HBHG is a wonderful book, pseudo-history at it's best. ML assumes you know the theories laid out in HBHG). The first fourth of the book is just more "proof" of the authors' claims about Jesus. It adds the claim that Timothy was Jesus's twin and that Saint Paul distorted Christianity, but it's not all that interesting. The second fourth is devoted to vicious (and now dated) attacks against President Ronal Reagan and American fundementalists. The authors, instead of criticising Reagen on his record, choose a barage of name calling. The second half of the book is a masterpiece. It continues the Holy Blood, Holy Grail story by adding more information. Pierre Plantard figures prominently, and the Priere of Sion is made more "round." If you loved Holy Blood, Holy Grail you will almost love this book. Once you get the first half out of the way it is hard to put down. Though nothing "definitive" is reached, the conspiracy looks even better. When you finish it you wish the book was longer... parting with this book is "such sweet sorrow." And as always, more cryptic mottos: Et In Arcadia Ego... Etats Unis d'Occident 1937-1946
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