On personal power, becoming, and Graytown as clues to the mysteries of LOST by j-dog

I finally decided to post my own theory of LOST on DarkUFO, for good or for ill - I'll let you guys be the judge. Let me first say that I just started the whole online theory reading thing the last couple months and I've really enjoyed reading all of your comments and theories; there are some very imaginative and brilliant people on this site!

I fall into the "loved the finale" camp, but not just because I enjoyed the overall resolution of the characters. I also loved the finale because, as with the rest of season six, the mysteries were not answered in a compiled, easy to understand format ala the recent Sherlock Holmes movie. Unfortunately, this choice by the writers begs THE QUESTION - "Was there ever any real intent and implication contained within what we were shown every week on LOST? Are the writers using a hidden yet KNOWN motus operandi to produce a veneer of observable fact, or is it all a bunch of hot air (not light) at the source?"

How you answer THE QUESTION is absolutely crucial, because if you don't really believe the writers had any intent or implication associated with the Hurley-bird or the sickness or the nature of the island itself, then there is not now nor was there ever a reason to joyfully theorize and extrapolate. We were all shamelessly long-conned and would, I believe, have every right to take a huge D on the show and try to forget all the hours wasted watching LOST, however beautiful and emotional the character resolutions were.

I happen to answer THE QUESTION, though, with a resounding "YES!!! Of course there was always very specific and arduously conceived reasons for everything we witnessed on LOST!" I actually think the scarcity of clues left for us is not a spit in our eye, but an act of faith on the part of Lindelof and Cuse - faith in our ability as fans to decipher all this stuff with a minimal amount of data. Maybe I'm a little too Locke-ian in my willingness to believe this (after all, I don't care what you say, the data is pretty thin in some places) but that is that. Now, on with what is sure to be a way-off theory...

The title of my theory declaims what I believe are the three distinct yet overlapping and reaffirming elements at work beneath most if not all of the creative decisions Lindelof and Cuse made throughout the show's history. For each one I'll try to briefly explain what I mean by it and then go on to show how this casts considerable light on the seemingly unresolved conundrums in LOST. I should also point out that these three concepts are of a religious bent, a very Christian bent actually, because from what I can tell Lindelof and Cuse are Jewish and Catholic, respectively (although based on a couple interviews, Lindelof may at some point have become Catholic in his beliefs.) That overlap concedes a lot of Biblically heavy ideas and classic Christian commentary, both from which these three theory elements stem.

"Personal power," for lack of any good definition (although I'm sure it's out there in some philosophical or theological essay) is the activation of God's power by God's will or man's will for a specific purpose (hence the description of "personal.") Within the cliche "faith that moves mountains" personal power is the thing that actually moves the mountain - faith merely activates it. It does not require close physical proximity to activate it, but in the LOST universe it seems to help and may be necessary in some cases.

The best example I can think of off-hand is when Jesus, moseying along through a crowd, suddenly "feels the power go out of him" when someone touches him. Having felt this power go out of him he exclaims that someone just touched him. One of his disciples retorts "of course someone touched you - you're walking through a crowd, man." The distinction in this case though is that a woman touched Jesus' robe with INTENTION, believing that if she only touched him, she would be healed of her sickness. She is healed and Jesus confirms that her faith has healed her (again, it was really this intangible "Jesus power" that healed her, but it took her faith and a robe-touch to activate it. This activation method of both faith and physical touch is crucial to solving some of the LOST mysteries; more on that later, though.)

So, with that in mind, what is the mysterious electromagnetic light at the heart of the island? It is personal power. More specifically, it is God's direct deposit of personal power within the physical realm of the universe. This is the power that created and now sustains the physical universe, that imbues every human with free will and hence makes them so called "spiritual beings," and that healed John Locke's paralysis on the day of Oceanic 815's demise. The light at the heart of the island is not God himself - that would render Lindelof and Cuse's God a bit too New Age and impersonal, I think. Rather the light is a poured foundation of concrete upon which the house of physical existence rests. After all, in the beginning there was God and nothing else. It stands to reason that everything created by God is predicated on the pre-existing power of God.

Alright, off and running. How does this personal power evince itself in the physical world? As incalculably strong electromagnetism, which is one of the four forces upon which the universe is able to exist and operate, the others being gravity and strong and weak nuclear force. No coincidence there, I think. That personal power exhibits any form of physical presence at all was simply a way for the writers to say "Yep, it's there. And yes, there are very dire consequences (i.e. the end of existence) if this light get tampered with."

To go even further, without actually calling the island the garden of Eden, I'm going to say that...f*** it, the island is, at the very least, an allegorical garden of Eden. The Adam and Eve story is situated at about 4,000 B.C. in the timeline and the cave of light in LOST has Mesopotamian inscriptions on it, also dating to around 4,000 B.C. Of course in LOST, evidence like that could be entirely circumstantial and in no way connected to some crazy conjecture that "the island is the real Garden of Eden," but hey, I'll mention it because undoubtedly this ENTIRE theory is outlandish to begin with anyway!

The personal power at the heart of the island is the source from which those two famous trees grew - the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (read first couple chapters of Genesis to get the specifics.) The tree of life was given to Adam and Eve from which they were encouraged to freely partake, but the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was off-limits. So of course Adam and Eve decide to eat from the off-limits one, in effect earning them an eternal ban from BOTH trees and the rest of the garden. An angel is set guard over the garden to keep mankind from ever accessing these trees again, although mankind now has aspects of both trees within himself, one of which God seemingly never intended. The whole story is a mythic-level tale whose real life and present day manifestation is... the island.

So, if you're still hanging in there with this rambling explanation and if you can accept "personal power" as the identity of the light and the island as the real life Garden of Eden, then we've already knocked out a good portion of LOST's crypticism (I know that's a made up word, but I like it) and in a manner, I think, that fits the facts quite nicely. The angel guarding the garden is now (or maybe always was) a human protector endowed with a measure of supernatural ability from the light. The "light in every man" as Jacob and MiB's mother calls it is a tiny vestige of God's power in each human being, in man from the beginning or possibly in man as a result of eating from the super-trees. Of course, as Jacob says, it's in man's very nature to sin (to want to be like God) and why Adam and Eve ate from the trees to begin with and why man will always want more of this light, this "personal power."

Whew! The two main obstacles I have with this "the light is the power of God" theory (although I'm sure there are MANY obstacles I'm woefully ignorant of which I'm expecting you guys to dutifully inform me) is the need for water around the light with the addition of a provisional cork to keep it at bay and the second, seemingly paradoxical to the aforementioned "cork," Jacob's statement regarding the island as a cork to keep the DARKNESS, not the electromagnetic goodness, from spreading. Huh? Here's my blatantly weak rationalization for both of those theory obstacles.

First, the water and the cork. I remember very little from high school chemistry, but one thing that does stand out in my memory is being taught, both verbally and experientially, that water is the quintessential solvent... for everything. Got some highly reactive, unstable element or compound? Put that thing in water (do what I oughter and add acid to water) and everything will be okay. Not only that but water acts as a great absorber for heat as well as a wonderful conductor of electricity (R.I.P. shark in Jaws 2.) All three of these qualities make water ideal as a solvent/buffer/distributor of sorts for this supernatural personal power in relation to the natural world. So you get the temple healing pool, the drinking of the water to become an island protector, etc.

Now it gets a little more dicey - why the friggin cork? I refuse to cop out and call the cork some kind of metaphorical barrier between man and the power of God. Instead, it's a very real and much needed barrier between man and the power God. In other words, don't f*** with the full-on power of God, you'll get burned and much worse (just read half the Old Testament.) It's a precarious balance because, as I theorized earlier, physical reality RESTS UPON this personal power as a means to exist and operate, however this power also needs to remain SEPARATE from physical reality, because quite frankly the universe cannot handle it (except maybe Desmond, but even he couldn't for more than a minute or two.) It's like putting an ant next to a bonfire - the ant definitely needs the warmth, but direct contact is deadly. I know, what a godawful analogy, but I do what I can.

The second major obstacle to my "personal power" part of the theory is Jacob describing the island as a proverbial cork for darkness, malevolence, hell... NOT a cork for light, goodness, heaven, which is what I'm roundabout referring the electromagnetic goodness is.

And, damn, I have to go to work now. I'll try to finish up this mess after I get back or tomorrow. Hope you enjoyed reading and would love to hear feedback on this (don't be too harsh on this newbie, although this theory probably deserves it.)