tomten3000
03-09-2005, 01:19 PM
Okay, wild speculation here, folks. Hopefully I can support this notion with some circumstantial evidence, too.
I believe, for the time being, that our survivors have crashed in Eden. And that, as the story progresses, they will discover the fabled “garden.”
What led me to this theory? Well, a couple things that I’ve read in this forum and another. And a strange string of seemingly unconnected ideas.
First, the number 42
In all the wild calculations and mystic postulations about Hurley’s cursed line of numbers, I was most interested in the “PowerBall” number – 42. And only then for humorous reasons.
I thought it a coincidence that this number would show up, given its prominence in other works, specifically Douglas Adams’ “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” (Note, from Wikipedia: “The popularity of this book has made this number pop up in many unexpected contexts, usually inserted by fans; for instance, it is used as an identifier at the beginning of every TIFF-file. The official TIFF specification says, “this value was chosen for its deep philosophical significance.”)
In the book, the number 42 is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything. It was calculated by a great super-computer (this computer, it turns out, is the planet Earth). Problem is, no one knows what the question to life, the universe and everything is – or was.
That aside, the important note here is that 42 is directly related to “life, the universe, and everything” – which seems to be what this series is about.
Next, what Javier said
Then there’s this. Answering the question, “What’s in Sawyer’s library?” on TheFuselage.com, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, “Lost” writer and supervising producer, answered: “i'm sure that there is a surfeit of mitch albom, dan brown, john grisham and "left behind" books lying about, but maybe sawyer just has an apetite for thematically relevant stuff.”
So what have these authors written? What’s the thread that connects their work? Let’s take a look:
Mitch Albom: “The Five People You Meet in Heaven,” in which a man reviews his life after he dies through those “five people.”
Dan Brown: “The Da Vinci Code,” in which an adventurer uncovers the true meaning of the Holy Grail by following a series of clues hidden in Da Vinci’s work.
“Left Behind”: A fantasy series about a group of people left behind when the rapture occurs.
(Grisham is more difficult for me, other than his ability to create twists and turns … I don’t know what “connects” him to these other works.)
What this tells me is that there is a definite “spiritual” aspect to this island. The natural and supernatural occur. The island gives life and takes it away. So what could it be?
Eden
Why else would Adam and Eve be there? Why else would there by a "monster" that takes on different forms (like Satan taken the form of a snake) be lurking about? Could the Hatch be the "Tree of Knowledge”? Is opening the Hatch like biting from the apple?
Let’s see if our strange land fits the mold.
First, what and where is Eden?
Eden is the larger territory in which the biblical “garden” is planted. Eden is paradise, essentially. If our “Lost” creators are creating liberally (much like Dan Brown did in “The Da Vinci Code), then we can look to various theories as to its location.
Some theorize that Eden is located in Sundaland, which today is the South China Sea. The South China Sea is a marginal sea, part of the Pacific Ocean, encompassing an area from Singapore to the Strait of Taiwan. The minute South China Sea Islands, collectively an archipelago, number in the hundreds.
Others theorize that it is part of Atlantis.
And that’s certainly out in the middle of the nowhere isn’t it?
Those unlucky numbers
Want some (possible) number connections? Here are a couple.
Historians connect Eden with the island of Dilmun (now Bahrain) in the Persian Gulf (is Sayid originally from Bahrain, I wonder?). Dilmun is sometimes described as 'the place where the sun rises' and 'the Land of the Living' After its actual decline, beginning about 1500 B.C., Dilmun developed such a reputation as a long-lost garden of exotic perfections that it appears to have influenced the story of the Garden of Eden.
Please note the year of Dilmun’s decline: 1500 B.C. (tie that to our number 15).
And then there’s this:
The word "paradise" that Christians have made a synonym for the Garden of Eden is a Persian word, which describes a walled orchard garden or an enclosed hunting park (more on this in a moment).The word (or such) occurs three times in the Old Testament. In the Song of Solomon, it is clearly "garden;" in the second and third examples "park.":
In the Song of Solomon iv. 13: "Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits; camphire, with spikenard" ;
Ecclesiastes ii. 5: "I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits";
And in Nehemiah ii. 8: "And a letter unto Asaph the keeper of the king's orchard, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the palace which appertained to the house, and for the wall of the city, and for the house that I shall enter into. And the king granted me, according to the good hand of my God upon me. "
Now, let’s take one step back and look at something again.
Lewis Caroll, the number 42, and the Garden of Eden
The number 42 fascinated Lewis Caroll, author of “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” (tie this to “Lost” via the episode “White Rabbit,” a clear nod to Caroll). For example, in Carroll's book “The Hunting of the Snark,” the Baker, one of 12 adventurers hunting a legendary beast in a strange land, left 42 pieces of luggage on the pier prior to his overseas journey.
Now wait a minute. That sounds familiar. And didn’t we just say that the word "paradise," a synonym for the Garden of Eden, describes an enclosed hunting park? An island is pretty enclosed. And there is a beast lurking about.
Want to know more?
The hunt in Caroll’s book is led by the Bellman, who takes the 12 across the sea by way of his map of the Ocean--a blank sheet of paper. The hunting party arrive in a strange land. Could the 12 be our main characters (though we’ve 14)? The blank map the bad radar that sent flight 815 off course? And the strange land our strange land?
The Baker recalls that his uncle once warned him that, though catching Snarks was all well and good, you must be careful; for, if your Snark is a Boojum, then "you will softly and suddenly vanish away, and never be met with again." Hmmm, sounds like our monster is a Snark. Or is it a boojum, a dangerous snark? Or, perhaps, a frumious bandersnatch? A bandersnatch is described as moving swiftly, having a neck it can extend, and having snapping, frumious jaws, which with it tries to grab the Banker.
Our snark adventurers split up to hunt. Along the way, the Butcher and Beaver become fast friends, the Barrister falls asleep, and the Banker loses his sanity after being attacked by a frumious Bandersnatch. At the end, the Baker calls out that he has found a snark; but when the others arrive he has mysteriously disappeared. I don’t know about you, but these sound like episodes of “Lost” to me.
A long digression, but remember this: Caroll’s land is a strange one, a hunting park, a “paradise,” by its old meaning, in which characters like Hope and Care come along for the ride. Caroll wrote the story when he was 42 years old. And the dark tale has much to do with life and death.
Spiritual indeed.
I believe, for the time being, that our survivors have crashed in Eden. And that, as the story progresses, they will discover the fabled “garden.”
What led me to this theory? Well, a couple things that I’ve read in this forum and another. And a strange string of seemingly unconnected ideas.
First, the number 42
In all the wild calculations and mystic postulations about Hurley’s cursed line of numbers, I was most interested in the “PowerBall” number – 42. And only then for humorous reasons.
I thought it a coincidence that this number would show up, given its prominence in other works, specifically Douglas Adams’ “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” (Note, from Wikipedia: “The popularity of this book has made this number pop up in many unexpected contexts, usually inserted by fans; for instance, it is used as an identifier at the beginning of every TIFF-file. The official TIFF specification says, “this value was chosen for its deep philosophical significance.”)
In the book, the number 42 is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything. It was calculated by a great super-computer (this computer, it turns out, is the planet Earth). Problem is, no one knows what the question to life, the universe and everything is – or was.
That aside, the important note here is that 42 is directly related to “life, the universe, and everything” – which seems to be what this series is about.
Next, what Javier said
Then there’s this. Answering the question, “What’s in Sawyer’s library?” on TheFuselage.com, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, “Lost” writer and supervising producer, answered: “i'm sure that there is a surfeit of mitch albom, dan brown, john grisham and "left behind" books lying about, but maybe sawyer just has an apetite for thematically relevant stuff.”
So what have these authors written? What’s the thread that connects their work? Let’s take a look:
Mitch Albom: “The Five People You Meet in Heaven,” in which a man reviews his life after he dies through those “five people.”
Dan Brown: “The Da Vinci Code,” in which an adventurer uncovers the true meaning of the Holy Grail by following a series of clues hidden in Da Vinci’s work.
“Left Behind”: A fantasy series about a group of people left behind when the rapture occurs.
(Grisham is more difficult for me, other than his ability to create twists and turns … I don’t know what “connects” him to these other works.)
What this tells me is that there is a definite “spiritual” aspect to this island. The natural and supernatural occur. The island gives life and takes it away. So what could it be?
Eden
Why else would Adam and Eve be there? Why else would there by a "monster" that takes on different forms (like Satan taken the form of a snake) be lurking about? Could the Hatch be the "Tree of Knowledge”? Is opening the Hatch like biting from the apple?
Let’s see if our strange land fits the mold.
First, what and where is Eden?
Eden is the larger territory in which the biblical “garden” is planted. Eden is paradise, essentially. If our “Lost” creators are creating liberally (much like Dan Brown did in “The Da Vinci Code), then we can look to various theories as to its location.
Some theorize that Eden is located in Sundaland, which today is the South China Sea. The South China Sea is a marginal sea, part of the Pacific Ocean, encompassing an area from Singapore to the Strait of Taiwan. The minute South China Sea Islands, collectively an archipelago, number in the hundreds.
Others theorize that it is part of Atlantis.
And that’s certainly out in the middle of the nowhere isn’t it?
Those unlucky numbers
Want some (possible) number connections? Here are a couple.
Historians connect Eden with the island of Dilmun (now Bahrain) in the Persian Gulf (is Sayid originally from Bahrain, I wonder?). Dilmun is sometimes described as 'the place where the sun rises' and 'the Land of the Living' After its actual decline, beginning about 1500 B.C., Dilmun developed such a reputation as a long-lost garden of exotic perfections that it appears to have influenced the story of the Garden of Eden.
Please note the year of Dilmun’s decline: 1500 B.C. (tie that to our number 15).
And then there’s this:
The word "paradise" that Christians have made a synonym for the Garden of Eden is a Persian word, which describes a walled orchard garden or an enclosed hunting park (more on this in a moment).The word (or such) occurs three times in the Old Testament. In the Song of Solomon, it is clearly "garden;" in the second and third examples "park.":
In the Song of Solomon iv. 13: "Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits; camphire, with spikenard" ;
Ecclesiastes ii. 5: "I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits";
And in Nehemiah ii. 8: "And a letter unto Asaph the keeper of the king's orchard, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the palace which appertained to the house, and for the wall of the city, and for the house that I shall enter into. And the king granted me, according to the good hand of my God upon me. "
Now, let’s take one step back and look at something again.
Lewis Caroll, the number 42, and the Garden of Eden
The number 42 fascinated Lewis Caroll, author of “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” (tie this to “Lost” via the episode “White Rabbit,” a clear nod to Caroll). For example, in Carroll's book “The Hunting of the Snark,” the Baker, one of 12 adventurers hunting a legendary beast in a strange land, left 42 pieces of luggage on the pier prior to his overseas journey.
Now wait a minute. That sounds familiar. And didn’t we just say that the word "paradise," a synonym for the Garden of Eden, describes an enclosed hunting park? An island is pretty enclosed. And there is a beast lurking about.
Want to know more?
The hunt in Caroll’s book is led by the Bellman, who takes the 12 across the sea by way of his map of the Ocean--a blank sheet of paper. The hunting party arrive in a strange land. Could the 12 be our main characters (though we’ve 14)? The blank map the bad radar that sent flight 815 off course? And the strange land our strange land?
The Baker recalls that his uncle once warned him that, though catching Snarks was all well and good, you must be careful; for, if your Snark is a Boojum, then "you will softly and suddenly vanish away, and never be met with again." Hmmm, sounds like our monster is a Snark. Or is it a boojum, a dangerous snark? Or, perhaps, a frumious bandersnatch? A bandersnatch is described as moving swiftly, having a neck it can extend, and having snapping, frumious jaws, which with it tries to grab the Banker.
Our snark adventurers split up to hunt. Along the way, the Butcher and Beaver become fast friends, the Barrister falls asleep, and the Banker loses his sanity after being attacked by a frumious Bandersnatch. At the end, the Baker calls out that he has found a snark; but when the others arrive he has mysteriously disappeared. I don’t know about you, but these sound like episodes of “Lost” to me.
A long digression, but remember this: Caroll’s land is a strange one, a hunting park, a “paradise,” by its old meaning, in which characters like Hope and Care come along for the ride. Caroll wrote the story when he was 42 years old. And the dark tale has much to do with life and death.
Spiritual indeed.