"You're quiet," Langdon said, gazing across the Hawker's cabin at Sophie.
"Just tired," she replied. "And the poem. I don't know."Langdon was feeling the same way. The hum of the engines and the gentle rocking of the planewere hypnotic, and his head still throbbed where he'd been hit by the monk. Teabing was still in theback of the plane, and Langdon decided to take advantage of the moment alone with Sophie to tellher something that had been on his mind. "I think I know part of the reason why your grandfatherconspired to put us together. I think there's something he wanted me to explain to you.""The history of the Holy Grail and Mary Magdalene isn't enough?"Langdon felt uncertain how to proceed. "The rift between you. The reason you haven't spoken tohim in ten years. I think maybe he was hoping I could somehow make that right by explaining whatdrove you apart."Sophie squirmed in her seat. "I haven't told you what drove us apart."Langdon eyed her carefully. "You witnessed a sex rite. Didn't you?"Sophie recoiled. "How do you know that?""Sophie, you told me you witnessed something that convinced you your grandfather was in a secretsociety. And whatever you saw upset you enough that you haven't spoken to him since. I know afair amount about secret societies. It doesn't take the brains of Da Vinci to guess what you saw."Sophie stared.
"Was it in the spring?" Langdon asked. "Sometime around the equinox? Mid-March?"Sophie looked out the window. "I was on spring break from university. I came home a few daysearly.""You want to tell me about it?""I'd rather not." She turned suddenly back to Langdon, her eyes welling with emotion. "I don'tknow what I saw.""Were both men and women present?"After a beat, she nodded.
"Dressed in white and black?"She wiped her eyes and then nodded, seeming to open up a little. "The women were in whitegossamer gowns... with golden shoes. They held golden orbs. The men wore black tunics and blackshoes."Langdon strained to hide his emotion, and yet he could not believe what he was hearing. SophieNeveu had unwittingly witnessed a two-thousand-year-old sacred ceremony. "Masks?" he asked,keeping his voice calm. "Androgynous masks?""Yes. Everyone. Identical masks. White on the women. Black on the men."Langdon had read descriptions of this ceremony and understood its mystic roots. "It's called HierosGamos," he said softly. "It dates back more than two thousand years. Egyptian priests andpriestesses performed it regularly to celebrate the reproductive power of the female," He paused,leaning toward her. "And if you witnessed Hieros Gamos without being properly prepared tounderstand its meaning, I imagine it would be pretty shocking."Sophie said nothing.
"Hieros Gamos is Greek," he continued. "It means sacred marriage.""The ritual I saw was no marriage.""Marriage as in union, Sophie.""You mean as in sex.""No.""No?" she said, her olive eyes testing him.
Langdon backpedaled. "Well... yes, in a manner of speaking, but not as we understand it today."He explained that although what she saw probably looked like a sex ritual, Hieros Gamos hadnothing to do with eroticism. It was a spiritual act. Historically, intercourse was the act throughwhich male and female experienced God. The ancients believed that the male was spirituallyincomplete until he had carnal knowledge of the sacred feminine. Physical union with the femaleremained the sole means through which man could become spiritually complete and ultimatelyachieve gnosis—knowledge of the divine. Since the days of Isis, sex rites had been consideredman's only bridge from earth to heaven. "By communing with woman," Langdon said, "man couldachieve a climactic instant when his mind went totally blank and he could see God."Sophie looked skeptical. "Orgasm as prayer?"Langdon gave a noncommittal shrug, although Sophie was essentially correct. Physiologicallyspeaking, the male climax was accompanied by a split second entirely devoid of thought. A briefmental vacuum. A moment of clarity during which God could be glimpsed. Meditation gurusachieved similar states of thoughtlessness without sex and often described Nirvana as a never-ending spiritual orgasm.
"Sophie," Langdon said quietly, "it's important to remember that the ancients' view of sex wasentirely opposite from ours today. Sex begot new life—the ultimate miracle—and miracles couldbe performed only by a god. The ability of the woman to produce life from her womb made hersacred. A god. Intercourse was the revered union of the two halves of the human spirit—male andfemale—through which the male could find spiritual wholeness and communion with God. Whatyou saw was not about sex, it was about spirituality. The Hieros Gamos ritual is not a perversion.
It's a deeply sacrosanct ceremony."His words seemed to strike a nerve. Sophie had been remarkably poised all evening, but now, forthe first time, Langdon saw the aura of composure beginning to crack. Tears materialized in hereyes again, and she dabbed them away with her sleeve.
He gave her a moment. Admittedly, the concept of sex as a pathway to God was mind-boggling atfirst. Langdon's Jewish students always looked flabbergasted when he first told them that the earlyJewish tradition involved ritualistic sex. In the Temple, no less. Early Jews believed that the Holyof Holies in Solomon's Temple housed not only God but also His powerful female equal, Shekinah.
Men seeking spiritual wholeness came to the Temple to visit priestesses—or hierodules—withwhom they made love and experienced the divine through physical union. The Jewishtetragrammaton YHWH—the sacred name of God—in fact derived from Jehovah, an androgynousphysical union between the masculine Jah and the pre-Hebraic name for Eve, Havah.
"For the early Church," Langdon explained in a soft voice, "mankind's use of sex to communedirectly with God posed a serious threat to the Catholic power base. It left the Church out of theloop, undermining their self-proclaimed status as the sole conduit to God. For obvious reasons,they worked hard to demonize sex and recast it as a disgusting and sinful act. Other major religionsdid the same."Sophie was silent, but Langdon sensed she was starting to understand her grandfather better.
Ironically, Langdon had made this same point in a class lecture earlier this semester. "Is itsurprising we feel conflicted about sex?" he asked his students. "Our ancient heritage and our veryphysiologies tell us sex is natural—a cherished route to spiritual fulfillment—and yet modernreligion decries it as shameful, teaching us to fear our sexual desire as the hand of the devil."Langdon decided not to shock his students with the fact that more than a dozen secret societiesaround the world—many of them quite influential—still practiced sex rites and kept the ancienttraditions alive. Tom Cruise's character in the film Eyes Wide Shut discovered this the hard waywhen he sneaked into a private gathering of ultraelite Manhattanites only to find himself witnessingHieros Gamos. Sadly, the filmmakers had gotten most of the specifics wrong, but the basic gist wasthere—a secret society communing to celebrate the magic of sexual union.
"Professor Langdon?" A male student in back raised his hand, sounding hopeful. "Are you sayingthat instead of going to chapel, we should have more sex?"Langdon chuckled, not about to take the bait. From what he'd heard about Harvard parties, thesekids were having more than enough sex. "Gentlemen," he said, knowing he was on tender ground,"might I offer a suggestion for all of you. Without being so bold as to condone premarital sex, andwithout being so naive as to think you're all chaste angels, I will give you this bit of advice aboutyour sex lives."All the men in the audience leaned forward, listening intently.
"The next time you find yourself with a woman, look in your heart and see if you cannot approachsex as a mystical, spiritual act. Challenge yourself to find that spark of divinity that man can onlyachieve through union with the sacred feminine."The women smiled knowingly, nodding.
The men exchanged dubious giggles and off-color jokes.
Langdon sighed. College men were still boys.
Sophie's forehead felt cold as she pressed it against the plane's window and stared blankly into thevoid, trying to process what Langdon had just told her. She felt a new regret well within her. Tenyears. She pictured the stacks of unopened letters her grandfather had sent her. I will tell Roberteverything. Without turning from the window, Sophie began to speak. Quietly. Fearfully.
As she began to recount what had happened that night, she felt herself drifting back... alighting inthe woods outside her grandfather's Normandy chateau... searching the deserted house inconfusion... hearing the voices below her... and then finding the hidden door. She inched down thestone staircase, one step at a time, into that basement grotto. She could taste the earthy air. Cooland light. It was March. In the shadows of her hiding place on the staircase, she watched as thestrangers swayed and chanted by flickering orange candles.
I'm dreaming, Sophie told herself. This is a dream. What else could this be?
The women and men were staggered, black, white, black, white. The women's beautiful gossamergowns billowed as they raised in their right hands golden orbs and called out in unison, "I was withyou in the beginning, in the dawn of all that is holy, I bore you from the womb before the start ofday."The women lowered their orbs, and everyone rocked back and forth as if in a trance. They wererevering something in the center of the circle.
What are they looking at?
The voices accelerated now. Louder. Faster.
"The woman whom you behold is love!" The women called, raising their orbs again.
The men responded, "She has her dwelling in eternity!"The chanting grew steady again. Accelerating. Thundering now. Faster. The participants steppedinward and knelt.
In that instant, Sophie could finally see what they were all watching.
On a low, ornate altar in the center of the circle lay a man. He was naked, positioned on his back,and wearing a black mask. Sophie instantly recognized his body and the birthmark on his shoulder.
She almost cried out. Grand-père! This image alone would have shocked Sophie beyond belief,and yet there was more.
Straddling her grandfather was a naked woman wearing a white mask, her luxuriant silver hairflowing out behind it. Her body was plump, far from perfect, and she was gyrating in rhythm to thechanting—making love to Sophie's grandfather.
Sophie wanted to turn and run, but she couldn't. The stone walls of the grotto imprisoned her as thechanting rose to a fever pitch. The circle of participants seemed almost to be singing now, the noiserising in crescendo to a frenzy. With a sudden roar, the entire room seemed to erupt in climax.
Sophie could not breathe. She suddenly realized she was quietly sobbing. She turned and staggeredsilently up the stairs, out of the house, and drove trembling back to Paris.
“你怎么不说话呢?”兰登注视着“猎鹰者”号机舱对面的索菲说。
“太累了。还有这首诗，我怎么也看不明白。”
兰登也深有同感。引擎的轰鸣声以及飞机轻微的摇晃无疑起到了催眠的作用，而他的头部，由于遭到修道士的袭击至今仍在狂跳不停。提彬还没从飞机后舱折回来，兰登决定抓住这个与索菲单独在一起的机会，跟她说内心的想法。“我想我知道你祖父为什么要千方百计将我们拉到一块的部分原因了，有些事他想让我跟你好好解释呢。”
“难道圣杯与抹大拉的玛利亚的历史还嫌不够吗?”
兰登一时不知道该怎样说下去了。“你们之间的裂痕，还有你十年来一直都没跟他说过话。我想也许他希望通过我来给你解释，到底是什么原因导致你俩关系的不和谐，会使情况有所好转。”
索菲在座位上移动了一下：“可我还没告诉你我们不和的原因呢。”
兰登认真地注视着她：“你是不是看到什么性仪式了？”
索菲畏缩了一下：“你是怎么知道的？”
“索菲，你告诉过我，说你看到过什么，从而使你相信，你祖父是某个秘密组织的成员。不管你看到什么，那足以使你深感不安，所以从那以后你就再没跟他说过一句话了。我对秘密组织的情况总算有些了解，所以你看到啥，就算我没有达·芬奇那样聪明也能够猜到。”
索菲吃惊地睁大了双眼。
“你是在春季里看到的吧？是春分前后呢，还是三月中旬？”
索菲看着窗外：“当时正值大学春假，我提前几天回家休假。”
“你能说说接下来发生的事情吗？”
“我看还是算了吧。”她突然转过身，面对兰登，眼里充满了复杂的感情：“我都已经忘记我看到什么了。”
“你是不是看到了男人，还有女人？”
索菲仿佛被击了一下，她点点头。
“他们都穿着黑色与白色的衣服对吧？”
索菲用手擦了擦眼，然后点点头，她看来愿意说些什么了。“女人们都身披白色轻纱长袍……脚穿金色鞋子，手拿金色圆球。男人们则都裹着长长的外衣，黑色的鞋子。”
兰登伸长脖子，竭力想掩饰内心激动的情绪，然而他还是有点不相信自己的耳朵。索菲·奈芙竟然在无意中目睹了一场有着两千年历史的神圣仪式！他努力使自己的语气平静些：“他们是不是都戴了面具？戴着让人分不清性别的面具？”
“是的，他们每个人都戴着相同的面具。女人戴白色的，男人戴黑色的。”
兰登以前读过一些描述这种仪式的文章，因此了解它神秘的渊源，于是他低声说道：“这种仪式叫做‘神婚’，它的历史可追溯到两千多年前，古埃及的祭司与女祭司们定期举行这样的仪式，以此来赞美女性的生殖能力。”他停了一会，向她俯过身去：“不过，要是在你事先没做好准备，也不知道其内在涵义的情况下看到‘神婚’，我想你一定会很吃惊吧。”
索菲一言不发。
“Hieros Camos是希腊语，是‘神圣婚礼’的意思。”兰登继续说道。
“可我看到的仪式决不是什么婚礼仪式。”
“那是灵肉交融的婚礼，索菲。”
“你是说性的结合？”
“不对。”
“不对？”她以橄榄色的眼睛质问着他。
兰登向后退缩了一下。“嗯……你可以这么说，但并不像我们今天理解的那样。”他解释说，虽然她那天见到的也许很像是一场性的仪式，然而“神婚”与色情毫无关系。它只是一种精神上的行为。从历史上看，性的结合是男人与女人借以感知上帝存在的行为。古人相信，如果男人对圣洁的女性缺乏肉体上的感性认识，那么他在精神上也必定是不完整的，因此，与女人在肉体上实现结合，也就成了使男人在精神上得以完善并最终获得真知并了解神性的唯一方式。自伊希斯时代以来，性的仪式一直被世人认为是男人从尘世通向天堂的唯一桥梁。“通过与女人进行肉体上的交流，”兰登说：“男人会在瞬间达到高潮，此时，他的大脑完全一片空白，在那瞬间他就有可能感知到上帝。”
索菲将信将疑：“你是说像祷告词上描述的那种高潮？”
兰登不置可否，他耸了耸肩，尽管实际上索菲说对了。从生理学上讲，男性的性高潮往往会导致思维的短暂停滞，使大脑出现片刻的真空状态。此时此刻，朦胧之间人就可能觉得自己看到了上帝。冥思苦想的高僧们尽管没有性行为，然而同样能够达到类似的忘我状态，因而人们将涅磐比喻为在精神上达到的永无止境的高潮。
“索菲，”兰登轻声地说：“重要的是，你要记住古人对性的看法与我们现代人对性的看法是完全不同的。性行为产生了新的生命——这是最重要的奇迹——而奇迹，只有神才能创造奇迹。女人用子宫孕育新的生命，从而使自己变得神圣起来，变成了一尊神。性的结合使人类灵魂的两半——男人与女人得以融为一体，这是一种备受推祟的手段。借助性，男人使他们的灵魂得到完善，并且实现与上帝的对话。你看到的与其说是性行为，倒不如说是一种追求灵魂升华的仪式。‘神婚’决不是什么伤风败俗，而是极其神圣的仪式。”
他的话似乎拨动了索菲的心弦。整个晚上，她表现得非常镇静。然而兰登此刻第一次感到，她的镇定自若，正逐渐面临崩溃的境地。她的眼里溢出了眼泪，于是她撩起衣袖，拭去了脸上的泪水。
他给了她一些时间，好让她的情绪平静下来。必须承认，将性行为视作走近上帝的手段，这种观念一开始的确令人难以置信。过去，兰登在给他的犹太裔学生讲述早期犹太人的传统——其中就包扩一些性的仪式时，这些学生就总是听得目瞪口呆。在《圣殿》中，类似的情节也不少吧。早期的犹太人相信，在至圣所，即所罗门的圣殿里，不仅居住了上帝，而且还住了与上帝平起平坐势均力敌的女神舍金纳。追求灵魂完整的男人们跑到圣殿里，找那些女祭司或者圣仆们，跟她们性交，并通过肉体的结合感悟神性。犹太人中表示上帝的由四个字母组成的词，YHWH——这个神圣的上帝之名，其实就是脱胎于Jehovah(耶和华)，它是由代表男性的Jah与古犹太人给夏娃取的犹太名Havah构成的雌雄同体。
“对早期的基督教会而言，”兰登低声解释：“人类通过性的手段直接与上帝交流，这对天主教的权力基础构成了严重的威严，因为它把教会弃置一边，破坏了他们自封的唯一可以与上帝对话的地位。出于一些很明显的原因，他们竭力诋毁性行为，并重新将它视作令人厌恶的罪恶行为，其他重要的宗教也采取了同样的手段。”
索菲沉默了，然而兰登觉得她开始对她祖父有了更深的了解。具有讽刺意味的是，这个学期早些时候，有一次他给学生上课，也发表过同样的高见。他问学生：“我们竟然对性反感，这难道不令人感到奇怪吗?可我们老祖宗留下来的传统以及生理学知识告诉我们，性是自然的，是值得珍惜并使人灵魂得以充实的手段。然而现代宗教却对性行为大加挞伐，认为是可耻的行为，使我们把性视同于洪水猛兽。”
兰登决定就此打住，因为如果他告诉学生，说全世界大约有十来个——其中多数是很有影响的——秘密团体，至今还在举行性的仪式，并保溜了这种古老的传统的话，他担心会吓坏他们。美国好莱坞演员汤姆·克鲁斯在电影《大开眼界》中扮演的那个角色，偷偷跑去参加由曼哈顿人中间的精英分子举行的私人聚会，却意外目睹了“神婚”。令人悲哀的是，制片人将大多数细节给搞错了，不过就其根本的东西——即秘密组织通过性的交合赞美性的神奇而言——还是没有弄错。
“兰登教授，”一位坐在后排的男学生举起手，满怀希望地问道：“你是说我们不要上教堂，只要有更多的性行为就可以了吗？”
兰登轻声地笑了，并不想上他的圈套。他听过许多有关哈佛大学学生聚会的传言，知道这些家伙在性方面颇为放纵。他也明白眼下他正处于下风，于是他说道：“先生们，我可不可以给你们一点忠告，那就是，不要轻易的宽容婚前性行为，也不要天真地以为你们都是什么天使，对你们的性生活我将提出这么一些建议。”
所有的男生都向前弯着身子，聚精会神地倾听。
“下次你们跟女人在一起时，首先问问自己，看看你有没有把性当作是神秘的精神性行为，然后向自己挑战，去找寻神性的火花，而要获得这种神性，男人只有通过与圣洁的女性实现肉体上的结合。”
女生们露出会心的微笑，并不住地点头。
男生们面面相觑，半信半疑，咯咯大笑，彼此开一些下流的玩笑。
兰登叹了口气，这些大学生，到底还是群孩子啊。
索菲觉得前额一阵冰凉，她将前额紧贴着飞机舷窗，茫然地望向窗外。她拼命地想理出一个头绪来，看看兰登到底跟她说了些什么。她不禁心生几分遗憾。十年呐！她想到了祖父写给她的然而她却从未打开过的成堆的信件。我要把所有的事情都告诉罗伯特。她没有从窗前转过身子，就开始说起来，静静地，让人觉得有点恐怖。
她开始讲述那天晚上发生的事情，她觉得自己正向后面漂浮而去……她落到祖父在诺曼底乡间别墅外面的树林里……她漫无目的的找寻那座荒凉的房子……她听到声音从下面传来……然后找到了那扇隐蔽的门，便慢慢沿着石阶，一步一步朝地下室走去。她感受到了泥土的气息，清凉而轻快。时值三月，她躲在台阶投下的暗影里，注视着那些人，在闪烁不定的橘黄色的烛光下，扭来扭去，反复地吟唱。
我是在做梦吧？她自言自语地说。是在做梦。不是梦还会是什么呢？
男人们和女人们的身影在交叠，黑与白在相互转换。女人们漂亮的白纱长袍飘了起来，她们用右手将金球举起，并异口同声地唱道：“吾与汝自始即相伴兮，在万物神圣之晨曦。长夜漫漫尚未逝兮，汝已孕于吾之体。”
女人们把金球放下，每个人都忽而向前、忽而退后地扭动着身体，仿佛着了魔。他们正向圆圈中央的什么东西表达他们的敬意，
他们在看什么呢？
突然吟颂声又起，而且是越来越大，越来越快了。
“君所见之女，乃君之所求。”女人们高声叫着，再次将金球举了起来。
男人们随即回应道：“伊终觅得永恒的归宿！”
吟唱的声音又渐趋平稳，然后加速，声音是更快了，直至电闪雷鸣一般。那些人往里头走了几步，然后跪倒在地。
就在那一刻，索菲终于知道他们在注视些什么。
在这些人围起的圆圈中央，一尊低矮却装饰华丽的神坛上，躺着一名男子，他光着身子，仰面朝天，还戴着黑色的面具。索菲立刻认出了这名男子和他肩上的胎记，差点没叫出声来。怎么会是祖父！单是这番景象就足以让索菲感到震惊，难以置信了，何况还有更惊人的事情在后头等着她呢！
一位戴着白色面具的裸体女人，骑在她祖父的身上。她茂密的银色头发往脑后拂去。她体形臃肿，身材看上去远不算完美，然而此刻，她正随着吟唱的节奏扭动着身子——她在向索菲的祖父调情示爱呢。
索菲想转身跑开，然而却挪不动脚步。地下室的石墙也将她禁闭起来了，此时吟唱声已达到白热化。旁边围着的那一圈人似乎也跟着唱起来了，声音到高，逐渐热烈起来。突然，人群中爆发出一阵狂笑，整个屋子似乎进入了高潮。索菲喘不过气来，她突然发现回到了巴黎。