[Mugen910]

Subject: LOST 5, ep. 16 "The Incident" part 1
I have a lot about this finale... I'll save the larger theories for the next emails. They mostly relate to Jacob and anti-Jacob (that's what I'll call the man in the black shirt from the beach who later takes Locke's form). The morning after the show I was sure this was a Christ/ Anti-Christ story but now I'm thinking it won't be that specific. I think the whole show is about good vs evil (personified as these 2 men) with many different religions/ philosophies being combined. I got most of this information from a DarkUFO blog and the Doc Jenson analysis... sprinkled with some message board debate and my own thoughts.
Part 1.

1. The statue is still up for debate: It's either Sobek or Taweret. See attached photos. Quick summaries... it was Sobek who first came out of the waters of chaos to create the world. Sobek also came to symbolize the produce of the Nile and the fertility that it brought to the land. He was also said to call on suitable gods and goddesses required for protecting people in situation, effectively having a more distant role, nudging things along, rather than taking an active part. He was also shown with an ankh (as seen in Paul's necklace), representing his ability to undo evil and so cure ills. Sobek was a morally ambiguous god who oversees dark waters and preys on sinful souls in the afterlife (like Smokey?). Even worse, Set, the Egyptian god of chaos and evil, was a shape shifter who often morphed into crocodiles and hippos in his clashes with archenemy Horus. Set was linked to infertility and was partial to fish and lettuce. We first see Jacob eating fish wrapped in greens.

Taweret was depicted as a composite of all the things the Egyptians feared, the major part of her being hippopotamus, with the arms and legs of a lioness, and with the back of a crocodile. On occasion, later, rather than having a crocodile back, she was seen as having a separate, small crocodile resting on her back, which was thus interpreted as Sobek, the crocodile-god, and said to be her consort. Taweret became seen, very early in Egyptian history, as a deity of protection in pregnancy and childbirth.

2. Jacob and Anti-Jacob on the beach: Jacob wants the Black Rock ship to come to the island. Anti-Jacob does not. He claims that people have always arrived bringing corruption, war, etc. Jacob has more faith in humanity and says that he chalks all that up to progress, meaning that there will be an end... eventually visitors will come and CHOOSE to do the right thing. He feels that man keeps getting it wrong but eventually will get it right.

In that beach conversation the Anti-Jacob was trying to convince Jacob that man/mankind simply wasn't worth it. However, it appears that Jacob has been bringing people to the island for a very, very long time. "They come, they fight, they destroy, they corrupt"... these are the points Anti-Jacob makes to indicate once again that Jacob will fail to prove him wrong. Anti-Jacob seems to suggest that the darker sides of human nature won't allow the circle to be broken. No matter who's on the ship, or the next ship, (or the airplane...) "It always ends the same". Jacob's response: "It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress".
The dark man is resigned to the fact that LOST's loop will never be broken. He argues that man's destructive history and propensity for war will never allow anything but corruption. And with that he wants Jacob dead... but must find a loophole to make it happen. Apparently they cannot physically kill each other.

The Biblical story states that Jacob was the younger brother of Esau. Esau was a hunter and his father's favorite, Jacob was more of a thinker. When their father was dying, Jacob tricked him into giving Jacob Esau's birthright. That could be the significance of the name Jacob. Maybe the guy we saw at the beginning hated Jacob because Jacob stole everything that was his (the island). It says in the Bible that God wanted Jacob to be the leader and receive the birthright. I don't think the Anti-Jacob is Esau but I wanted to include this story as it may have some relevance. In the Bible Jacob blesses his children by touching them and subsequently makes them leaders. As we see later, LOST's Jacob touches the 815ers in flashbacks.

3. The Tapestry: See attached. Jacob is weaving it... much like he is weaving (intricately) the Losties' lives so they will subsequently come to this island. I think he wanted to bring this group of people to the island all along... with them John Locke, who he knew would be used as a vehicle for his enemy to kill him. I think Jacob planned for this all along. More on that in another email.

Also, he left part of the tapestry in the cabin as a signal for where Ilana's crew can find him.

The phrases on the tapestry have been translated. They are from Homer's Odyssey. The top quote reads "may the gods grant thee all that thy heart desires". Another passage is woven into the middle of the tapestry. It can be only partly seen, but the passage in full reads, "may the gods grant thee happiness". It occurs twice in the Odyssey.