Pagan vs Judeo-Christian ideology by ISEETHELIGHT

There is a lot of speculation about the bros names on lost. Many think it is biblical: Jacob and Esau (man in black). But their birth mom was Claudia:

Claudia was a Vestal Virgin as was thought to be Tarpeia, Tuccia, and Rhea Sylvia, who conceived Romulus and Remus. In Roman mythology Vesta pertains to a Roman goddess, the sacred fire of Vesta, and the Temple of Vesta.
Claudia, a descendant of noble Roman stock, was devoted to her father and had much love for him.

The Temple of Vesta an ancient edifice in Rome, Italy, located in the Roman Forum between the Temple of Castor and Pollux, the Temple of Caesar, the Regia and the House of the Vestal Virgins. The temple's most recognizable feature is its circular footprint, which is most likely a remnant of an ancient Latin or Etruscan shrine.

All temples to Vesta were round, and had entrances facing east to symbolize connection between Vesta’s fire and the sun as sources of life. According to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the Romans believed that the sacred fire of Vesta was closely tied to the fortunes of the city and viewed its extinction as a portent of disaster.

Although there was a fire in the temple, it did not pose a great risk to burning down since the fire was maintained in a hearth and watched closely by the Vestals.

Zosimus records how the Christian noblewoman Serena, niece of Theodosius I, entered the temple and took from the statue of the goddess a necklace and placed it on her own neck. An old woman appeared, the last of the vestal virgins, who proceeded to rebuke Serena and called down upon her all just punishment for her act of impiety. According to Zosimus, Serena was then subject to dreadful dreams predicting her own untimely death. Augustine would be inspired to write The City of God in response to murmurings that the capture of Rome and the disintegration of its empire was due to the advent of the Christian era and its intolerance of the old gods who had defended the city for over a thousand years.

It is this last part that makes me think that the premise of Lost is to show the conflict between the old – polytheist - gods (Greco-Roman) and monotheist (Judeo-Christian). This would explain why over the six seasons the show has bounced from obviously Christian themes (biblical references) to more ancient and mythological ones (temples, rituals).

And these two versions of belliefs are represented in the two versions of realities we are being shown.