I don’t know if this has already been extolled upon in previous theory posts (I haven’t been able to keep up with the influx of theories recently), but the writers of LOST have perhaps set the island up in such a way that it will ultimately serve as the pre-historic source for all modern myths.
At first thought, this may seem a bit pretentious on their behalf, but it is also a very ingenious and original way of writing around every reference to previous works as well as any clichés they could run into.
So far on LOST, we have had references to many epic poems (Odyssey, Gilgamesh, Dante’s Commedia, Paradise Lost/Found etc), religious texts (the Bible, Koran, et. al.), popular texts (ranging from Lost Horizon, LOTR, Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz to Shakespeare to Bad Twin to god knows how many other novels), movies (Star Wars, anyone?) philosophical treatises (every single ‘State of Nature’ philosophy from Rousseau to Hume to Locke-btw, where’s a character called Hobbes?), and even straight up myths ala the Bermuda Triangle, Atlantis/Lemuria, Egyptian deities, creation stories (Adam & Eve?) etc. What we have been learning about the island is that it has the ability to jump through time… couldn’t the island have existed as it is, with all of its ‘magical’ powers, in each and every time period in which all of these myths and stories respectively came from?
What if the island is the source of every question raised in our watching of the show: Science v Faith, Fate v Free Will, Good v Bad etc. Also, what if the island is the source of our very notion of God in every sense of the word? We have gotten glimpses of the smoke monster which could leave one to believe that it is the God described both by the New and the Old Testament, as something “Beautiful” according to Locke, as well as something judgmentally vengeful to Eko. The smoke monster at least seems to have been incorporated into the Egyptian hierarchy of Gods; could it also be that some slave workers were sent to the island by their Pharaoh to work (or were exiled) and inadvertently discovered the powers of the island, ascribed a god-like status to it wrote what we now call the Old Testament based on their experiences?
What if, by the end of the show, the question as to where the island gets its ‘magic’ is not answered. The fact that the island just is magical could be a very interesting twist the writers could throw on us in the final hours of the series, and it could remain a very subtle and ambiguous nod to every reference to another work made throughout the course of the series. Regardless, this may be a topic fought about for decades to follow on internet boards such as DarkUFO by readers like us. With only a few months till next season and decades to fill after that, let’s let the debate begin!
At first thought, this may seem a bit pretentious on their behalf, but it is also a very ingenious and original way of writing around every reference to previous works as well as any clichés they could run into.
So far on LOST, we have had references to many epic poems (Odyssey, Gilgamesh, Dante’s Commedia, Paradise Lost/Found etc), religious texts (the Bible, Koran, et. al.), popular texts (ranging from Lost Horizon, LOTR, Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz to Shakespeare to Bad Twin to god knows how many other novels), movies (Star Wars, anyone?) philosophical treatises (every single ‘State of Nature’ philosophy from Rousseau to Hume to Locke-btw, where’s a character called Hobbes?), and even straight up myths ala the Bermuda Triangle, Atlantis/Lemuria, Egyptian deities, creation stories (Adam & Eve?) etc. What we have been learning about the island is that it has the ability to jump through time… couldn’t the island have existed as it is, with all of its ‘magical’ powers, in each and every time period in which all of these myths and stories respectively came from?
What if the island is the source of every question raised in our watching of the show: Science v Faith, Fate v Free Will, Good v Bad etc. Also, what if the island is the source of our very notion of God in every sense of the word? We have gotten glimpses of the smoke monster which could leave one to believe that it is the God described both by the New and the Old Testament, as something “Beautiful” according to Locke, as well as something judgmentally vengeful to Eko. The smoke monster at least seems to have been incorporated into the Egyptian hierarchy of Gods; could it also be that some slave workers were sent to the island by their Pharaoh to work (or were exiled) and inadvertently discovered the powers of the island, ascribed a god-like status to it wrote what we now call the Old Testament based on their experiences?
What if, by the end of the show, the question as to where the island gets its ‘magic’ is not answered. The fact that the island just is magical could be a very interesting twist the writers could throw on us in the final hours of the series, and it could remain a very subtle and ambiguous nod to every reference to another work made throughout the course of the series. Regardless, this may be a topic fought about for decades to follow on internet boards such as DarkUFO by readers like us. With only a few months till next season and decades to fill after that, let’s let the debate begin!
