LOST: The Final Season (Spoilers)

Despite all of the claims along the way that this was science fiction, in the end it was pretty clearly a straight up Christian allegory.

I would hardly call it Christian: the church in the end was very carefully shown to be multiply-denominational, and the spirituality shown could be a wide variety of religions. If I had to pick just one I'd call it New Thought, though it could easily fit within some versions of Buddhism or Hinduism.

And there was plenty of sci-fi, IMO.
 

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Miles noticed that Richard had a grey hair, and plucked it out for him.

Richard was surprised - when Miles asked him what was up, he said something to the effect of 'I realize I want to live' (I'm not sure it was exactly that, but close).


I thought you were referring to Jacob, not Richard.
 



I would hardly call it Christian: the church in the end was very carefully shown to be multiply-denominational, and the spirituality shown could be a wide variety of religions. If I had to pick just one I'd call it New Thought, though it could easily fit within some versions of Buddhism or Hinduism.

I concur. The ending was definitely more on the side of Buddhism or Hinduism. Very specifically, the idea of a group of souls finding each other in the afterlife is very similar to Buddhist and Hindu beliefs about the afterlife. A very reasonable interpretation of the ending would be that they all reincarnated together.
 

Well, obviously YMMV. I don't deny there was a Hindu dimension to a lot of the material (not so much Buddhist, at least not obviously), but I think that the explicit direction of the plot, and a great deal of the symbolism, was emphatically accessing Christian tropes: Battle of good vs. evil, redemption, guilt, sin, saviors, etc. Plus, again, I think that when you're being ushered into the afterlife (from a putative purgatorial state) by a guy named "Christian Shepherd" it's hard to ignore the Chrisitan subtext to the whole thing.

That said, I can see you taking an alternative, less obvious reading, where the Island represents the wheel of Samsara, and the goal of the islanders is to earn enough good karma to escape the cycle of suffering. Thus leaving the Island represents the state of Moksha, which is attained by recognizing and living according to your proper Dharma.

I'm not saying that interpretation isn't there, but recognizing it requires a lot more effort than the much more overtly Christian themes.

Also, not trying to get into Eric's Grandma territory here, so mods please let me know if this is encroaching too much on real world religions here. I'm just trying to interpret the text.
 

It may be that we're talking past each other here: I'm talking about the island being a very real, physical place on the incarnated planet Earth that has some weird properties. While characters absolutely found redemption, purpose, etc. there, only the flash-sideways part was "unreal" and purely spiritual. As such, the fact that Jack's father's name is Christian Shepherd is amusing but not indicative of anything spiritual: he was a real dude with a real body living on the real Earth whose parents had a bad sense of humor. :)
 

Also, not trying to get into Eric's Grandma territory here, so mods please let me know if this is encroaching too much on real world religions here. I'm just trying to interpret the text.

All OK at the moment, it is a level of discussion appropriate to the conclusion of LOST.

Thanks everyone.
 

I really liked the ending and thought it was fitting for such an epic show. I was a little sad to learn that "flash sideways" time was what it was and Flight 815 from Sydney never did land at LAX and that all those who were killed over the years up to the end were truly dead, but enjoyed it nevertheless.

It was a great, epic and groundbreaking show, and I will miss it.
 


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