With all this talk about the book and the movie, "THE DA VINCI CODE," one wouldn't want to miss the "teaching opportunity"of writing about the real Leonardo da Vinci. He was the most fascinating figure of the Renaissance [meaning the time of a new birth of learning, a time of new and daring ideas, kk]. He was born April 15, 1452 about sixty miles from Florence, Italy. His mother was a young peasant girl who was seduced by a lawyer out on a "one night stand," or whatever they called it back about 40 years before Columbus discovered America? She was from the lowest of the farm laboring class, so there was no possibility that Leonardo's father (Piero, the lusting lawyer) would marry her. At the time, for a lawyer to marry a farm laborer, would have been a bigger disgrace than fathering a bastard boy. So, Piero married a woman of his own high class, and took the baby away from its biological mother. Leonardo da Vinci, then, was brought up by his father and stepmother in aristocratic comfort. There was to be no maternal love for him from either "mother." Poor Leonardo's spirit is still without maternal, or real womanly, love today. I find it so odd that the author of "THE DA VINCI CODE" drew so heavily on modern (rather than from centuries of actual historical scholarship) works, and cited so many "check-out counter"works and publications by so many pseudointellectual, and heavily anti-Christian women, but I'm dangerously close to getting off the subject. Just let me write this: Dan Brown's cited principal sources are mostly perfect specimens of non-historical anti-male, and mostly left-feminist, "scholarship." He apparently (judging by the gross errors in the book) ignored hundreds of years of concrete scholarship. But, we'd best move on, because this piece is about the real da Vinci, and not about the fabulously popular book and movie. Of course, one knows that the hoary hearted Hollywood herd loves outrageously invented anti-Christian "history," because they know that too many Christians like their entertainment to be occasionally "religiously naughty." The producers know that millions of us Christians will see that movie. Indeed, we did watch the movie, perhaps because we're still animal enough to be unable to resist smelling our fingers after examining our athlete's foot, we know its going to stink, but it's the animal instinct that wins out? No Christian saw that movie to reaffirm his faith, surely?

Now let's take a look at da Vinci, the great Italian painter, sculptor, architect, musician, mechanic, engineer, and natural philosopher, who lived and worked from 1452 till his death in 1519. All educated people (those who received liberal arts degrees before college courses were created to accommodate those actually a bit too slow for a real university education) in the world know the story of how the young Leonardo da Vinci painted a single angel (at the lower left) in the "Baptism of Christ," a masterpiece by the leading painter of the time, Verrocchio. Leonardo was about fifteen years old at the time and was a student of his "master" Verrocchio. The better students often painted background objects for their teacher-artists. It's said that Verrocchio was so overwhelmed by the lifelike beauty of his young student's artistry, that the teacher never painted again, instead confined himself to sculpture. And Leonardo was still a young man when he drew "The Adoration of the Magi," the Virgin in that piece was essentially the same Virgin that da Vinci painted in all his works to the end of his life. I mention this painting because the plans he drew for it were drawn on a strictly geometrical pattern of perspective, with the whole space divided into diminishing squares; the mathematician in Leonardo always competed with the artist. It was da Vinci's love and understanding of mathematics, not some occult code, that caused him to leave behind unfinished plans, heavy with geometric designs. And in his paintings, he also showed us his interest in literally everything. You can see all postures and actions of the human body, all expression of the face in young and old, all the organs and movements of animals and plants from the waving of wheat in the field to the flight of birds in the air, all the cyclical erosion and elevation of mountains, all the currents and eddies of water and wind, the moods of the weather and the changing colors of the sky. The "Adoration of the Magi" has all that, and more. In that painting there are more than fifty people gathered "hurriedly" around the crib. It was as if they had left whatever they were doing and rushed to see "The Light of the World." It is a Christian painting, by a young Christian man, da Vinci, who had no quarrel with Christ, but with, as today, some of the "church leaders" of his time. Of course, da Vinci's "The Last Supper" and "Mona Lisa" are the most famous paintings in the world. It's said that da Vinci sat for hours without painting a stroke on the wall that was to be the "Last Supper." He told his "employer,"(the Duke of Lodovico), when the Duke complained about his not starting to paint, that he (da Vinci) had two huge problems: one was how to conceive the features worthy of the Son of God, and the other how to picture a man as heartless as Judas. I can't believe that those were the problems of an unbeliever. Those were the problems of a genius too humble, when confronted with the Son of God's image in his mind, to consider himself capable of rendering the face and body of his Lord and Savior.

We leave the believing da Vinci, and now take a look at da Vinci the scientist. While he was painting, he was also feeling his way into the experimental study and observation of every branch of theoretical and experimental science known in his time. He became a pioneer in some scientific fields. For example, he amazed his fellow citizens with his architectural and engineering projects. I invite you to go to the library and read more about Leonardo's dazzling accomplishments in science. There are few figures more attractive in history than Leonardo da Vinci during his "all capable" and dazzling youth. But how did he die? That is, what were his last wishes? And, what can we learn about da Vinci's faith from those wishes?

Leonardo da Vinci's excessive pride and self-confidence faded in old age, as it does in most of us. And like us older folks today, a certain serenity of spirit fell upon him, giving rise to religious hope. He made a simple will, but asked for, and received, "all the services of the Church" before he died. That request, my friends, is the difference between the man insinuated in the fictional "THE DA VINCI CODE," and the real Leonardo da Vinci, a struggling Christian.

Kenneth Kinchen is an independent writer with a background in international business and foreign service contracting.