The last supper

THE PAINTER AND THE CARPENTER

Leonardo’s Life-Sized Portrait of Jesus

Leonardo da Vinci and Jesus of Nazareth; born outside of marriage to a young woman in a patriarchal community. Both grew up to be nonconformists who saw beyond their ages and conventions. Both lived under the rule of the Roman Empire: Jesus between the conquest of Pompey in 63BCE and the failed Judean revolt of 70CE. Leonardo lived as the Papal States captured the Italian peninsula under the ruthless army of Cesare Borgia, eventually threatening Florence with invasion.

Leonardo and Jesus had pity for the oppressed people and both challenged their leaders’ lip service to piety. Both said they awoke to find everyone around them asleep. One urged those who have ears to hear. He spoke in parables. The other spoke of those who looked but did not see. He painted in symbols. Jesus said we should look beyond appearance to make better judgement (John 7:24); it might be Leonardo’s motto and what you will take from this biography.

The first biographer of Leonardo described him as “more a philosopher than a Christian.” Today he is known as an unbeliever – but did he believe in nothing? And what did Jesus believe? It is easy to forget that Jesus was a monotheist who lived before Paul “reverse-engineered” Christianity and coined the term. And as we shall see, clearly, Leonardo painted a Last Supper that is pre-Christian and anti-Church.

Christians claim the faith was started by Jesus. But was Christianity initiated at the last supper? We may never know. But Leonardo was said to know more than anyone else. And he did not paint Jesus instructing the disciples or initiating the Eucharist. We “see” it in our mind’s eye, but it is not there.

In recent years “Da Vinci” has been linked to an unspeakable secret knowledge, as yet unspecified and unproven. A torrent of speculation has discredited the subject. But as we shall see, Leonardo did belong to a circle of speculative freethinkers. They accessed books banned in Europe but taken into Florence from the Islamic Middle East by Cosimo de’ Medici. By unravelling the scenes in the Last Supper this book shows that the painter knew more about Jesus than the pastors.

Three editions have been planned:

Seeing the Last Supper for the First Time
The author’s pocket book introduction to The Painter and the Carpenter. For the reader in a hurry, a two-hour read which outlines the argument of the book.

The Painter and the Carpenter
Exposes the secret societies of Florence in the 15th century and the hidden lives of Leonardo. Unravels the hidden message of the Last Supper into 12 scenes depicting the drift of the Church from the teaching of Jesus. Provides proof that the religious authorities erased heresy by irrigating the wall, scraping offending images, and repainting others.

The Painter and the Carpenter – Illustrated Edition
Expanded book with sources and photographic plates. Presented in the context of the convictions of anti-clerical painters and stone masons down the centuries who expressed the deep secret suppressed by the Church. From Boticelli to Jean Cocteau, they believed in James, not Jesus, as the son of Joseph in the line of the Davidic kings.

And a sequel is at an advanced stage:

The Last King of the Jews
The gospel genealogies, infancy stories, the Koran, Talmud, Roman Chronicles and writings of the Church founders from Irenaeus onwards all identify James, not Jesus, as the eldest son and heir of Joseph in the line and House of Davidic kings. For this reason, James is painted in Leonardo’s Last Supper in the posture of the crucifixion. His bound feet were erased in 1652.

The Painter and the Carpenter is a book of immense impact and global success. Based on target readership, sales estimates exceed ten million copies in a five-year plan.

SEEING THE LAST SUPPER FOR THE FIRST TIME

It is said that The Last Supper expresses the New Testament account of events in which Jesus blames Judas, announces his fate, orders commemoration of his body and blood by bread and wine; John leans on his breast, the disciples react in shock and are ordered to preach the good news of salvation.

But none of this is painted by Leonardo.

Judas is reinstated with his companions and is being stabbed in the back. Jesus is silent and completely detached from his disciples. Only the first group of three react in shock; groups two to four display a different agenda by facial expression and body language we should actively interpret. John leans away from Jesus.

This is only the beginning of the revelation by looking at what is painted, not what we expected.

After the 20-year repair and report of 1999 no one – including experts and tourists – has seen beyond what the chief conservator called the myth and mystifying beliefs arising from the work’s universal appeal.

The painting contains 12 dramatic scenes with 19 characters, 6 of whom are concealed. It charts the drift of the Church from the teaching of Jesus. The key to Leonardo’s Last Supper is the Gnostic Gospels. Leonardo has expressed the content of Thomas and Philip, not Matthew and John. The Last Supper is pre-Christian and anti-Church; historical rather than hagiographic.

Leonardo was known as a heretic and as a man who knew more than anyone else. This book publishes for the first time his sources of the forbidden knowledge and his secret lives, personal and professional. He was protected by people in high places and frequently fled jurisdictions to avoid prosecution.

This book reveals Leonardo’s dangerous life as a diplomat and military engineer engaged in Italy’s unstable and warring states. Painting was a minor pursuit but this one was life threatening in an age of heresy!

Chapter Seven discloses the early restorations as altering the artist’s intentions and later repairs revealing the deliberate destruction by irrigation of the wall. The Last Supper did not deteriorate by accident and we have identified the motives, methods, and dates of the damage.

1979 Deteriorated and defaced by “restorers” who introduced changes including blackening Judas. A door installed in 1652 obliterated the feet of Jesus, concealing the painting’s shocking secret.

1999 After 21 years of restoration, the mural was back on view in 1999. Judas appears shocked not evil. The door is retained rather than Leonardo’s image.

An oil on canvas copy made around 1520 by Leonardo’s student Giampietrino. The bound foot of James is deliberately hidden.

Nicolas Poussin read Leonardo’s secret journals. In 1640 he made this copy of Leonardo’s Last Supper. Observe the crossed feet of James, with outstretched arms: why is he in crucifixion pose? Why does Poussin introduce the jug?

A modern artist conjectures the vibrancy of Leonardo’s original colors. The feet of James are bound together.

Giovanni Rapiti, a modern Italian artist, recreated Leonardo’s vibrant colours expressing detailed facial and body language.