- Bob Dylan And The Dylavinci Code Part 1
- Bob Dylan And The DylavincI Code (Part II)
- Bob Dylan And The DylavincI Code (Part III)
- Bob Dylan And The DylavincI Code (Part IV)
- Bob Dylan And The DylavincI Code (Part V)
- Bob Dylan And The Dylavinci Code (Part VI)
by Larry Fyffe
Yes, burlesque the ‘Dylavinci Code’ be for the most part, but, nevertheless, there’s some truth in it.
Said it can be that the so-called “code” is a rebuttal, a long footnote, to the biblical writings of Saint Jerome:
You bring it up to St. Peter You bring it up to Jerome You can bring it all the way over Bring it all the way home (My Own Version Of You)
What the singer/songwriter is bringing all the way back home is the dogma of ‘original sin’. The assertion that Adam’s guilt pervades the whole human race, and that he’s therefore responsible for the mortality of the human race, the narrator intends to kill:
Bring it to the corner where the children play You bring it to me on a silver tray I'll bring someone to life, spare no expense Do it with decency, and common sense (My Own Version Of You)
The dogma of inherited sin be anathema to most who have a background in the Jewish faith.
Jerome accepts the translation of the New Testament verse given below:
Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world And death passed upon all men And so death passed upon all men In whom all have sinned (Romans 5:12)
More accepted today is the following translation:
Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world And death passed upon all men And so death passed upon all men For that all have sinned (Romans 5:12)
Emanuel Swedenborg, for one, takes the above verse to mean that Adam, a symbol for every man, means that each individual is solely responsible for his own misbehavior, and the guilt that arises therefrom.
The religious Gnostic-like teachings of Swedenborg influence, to varying degees, poets like William Blake, Samuel Coleridge, and Robert Frost.
Saint Augustine picks up the biblical translation accepted by Jerome, and he runs with it.
Augustine rejects the religious view that holds there’s a dualistic conflict between light and dark forces.
Everyone, according to Augustine, is at the very least guilty of original sin, spread it be through Adam’s seed; the belief that Chirst, the Son of God, dies for the sins of everybody is essential for his or her salvation.
In the lyrics below, the narrator, sorrowful though he may be, can be construed as putting the personification of original sin to rest:
I dreamed I saw St. Augustine Alive with fiery breath And I dreamed that I was amongst the one That put him out to death (I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine)