Hawk's Nest

Friday, April 15, 2005

Lost In Thought

I've reported my fascination with Lost, the ABC TV show, over two months ago. If you aren't up to speed on it, you might want to avoid this post and any spoilers. Half the fun is figuring out what's going on and anticipating the unexpected. Once you've invested the time to digest the show, you'll find yourself thinking about the plot, the circumstances and trying to approach a plausible explanation. I don't think I'm there yet but I want to build on a theory my friends and I've played with for some time. So here come the spoilers...fair warning!
**SPOILERS BELOW**







The theory most intriguing to me has been the intersection of the show with Kabbalah, the mystical Jewish spirituality. There have been hints all along but with the episode, Numbers, we entered a whole new realm. One of my friends posted his thoughts of our resulting discussion on a forum which now resides at a domain name derived from the numbers 4 8 15 16 23 42. You need to read this to understand the starting point of how these numbers could implicate Kabbalah. Now I'd like to go further with that thought as some our discussions have brought up another compelling intersection.


The "Monster" May Be A Golem

In Kabbalah, there is a legend concerning the golem. What is a golem? Here is a salient quote from a section of the Practical Kabbalah
A golem, perhaps the best known of the Jewish legends, is an automaton, typically humanoid and typically male, created as the result of an intense, systematic, mystical meditation. The word golem means (or implies) something unformed and imperfect, or a body without a soul.
The golem could be made of clay or something else and animated in some way...mechanically or via the legend of placing the names of God on a paper and placing it in it's mouth. There are qualities of a golem which are very similar to what little we know of the "monster" including its size (golem continue to grow) and its being mute (the monster's never yelled or spoke, even when looking at Locke).


The Numbers (4 8 15 16 23 42) May Animate The Golem By Referencing The Names Of God


4 - the TETRAGRAMMATON...name of God

8 - less "famous" name of God with 8 letters

15, 16 - Psalm 139:15,16 is the only passage where golem is used in the Bible

23 - number of times abbreviated TETRAGRAMMATON appears in the Bible

42 - another important name for God with 42 letters


There Is A Series Of Comics Concerning The Golem

This is a truly fascinating angle. Marvel Comics, maker of the comic book Walt was reading, did a comic book on The Golem. Read this and draw your own conclusions but is this Golem made of "black rock"??



Footnotes
Of note,
X-files explored a golem on the episode "Kaddish"


Also, I'm not fully convinced there's a one-to-one correlation with all these elements. Some have explored a connection between golems and artifical lifeforms, especially robots. The article entitled "The Modern Golem" and this book called God In The Machine (note the episode Deus Ex Machina) make me wonder whether the writers of the series are taking a modern take on this ancient golem idea.

So, the jury's out but come season's end, we may know the answer.

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