Roger Ebert hears from the Code-philes.

Q. Why did you refer to the novel The Da Vinci Code as a "preposterous" work of fiction, yet fail to label the Bible as such? Do you honestly believe the Bible is a work of non-fiction? Aren’t parts of the Bible "preposterous"? If your devotion to institutionalized religion colors your ability to write logically, perhaps you should recuse yourself from reviewing films that require an unbiased view.

Fred Schultz, Dallas

A. The job of a critic is to express an opinion. If critics recused themselves from reviewing anything on which they held an opinion, there would be no criticism. The purpose of my review of "The Da Vinci Code" was not to review the Bible but to review the film adaptation of a novel.

Even doing that made some readers unhappy. Here is Lara Coates of Kennewick, Wash.: "Maybe you should stick to reviewing the movie instead of reviewing and insulting people who might entertain the ideas that Dan Brown suggests. Although Brown’s suggestions may be preposterous, as you suggest, there is no way for anyone to know exactly what happened during Jesus’ time. I guarantee you that I am of ‘sound mind’ even though I question the validity of the Bible."

Ebert again: Some of the material on which Brown’s book is based did not originate in the time of Jesus, but is a French forgery from the 1950s. "60 Minutes" did a segment about that.

Thanks to my son, David, for passing that along.

This, "the Bible is just as preposterous as DVC" is pretty frequently voiced and not just by Ian McKellan. You’ve probably heard it as often as I have. Early on, I got this note from Laura Miller of Salon, a response to something I had sent her:

Personally, I can’t understand why some people’s faith seems to be so
shaken by this sort of thing; if you’re willing to believe Jesus
raised Lazarus from the dead, why is it so hard to believe that he
never got married or had sex, even though most Jewish guys his age
did? It seems quixotic to bring reason and evidentiary methods into
the matter at so late a stage.

(Miller, is of course, the author of the excellent "Da Vinci Crock" piece to which I’ve linked early and often – invaluable for passing on to folks who won’t dialogue with you about DVC because you, of course, are "blinded by faith." But let’s just say I’d disagree with her on this one. It would be hard to figure out where to start.