It’s no secret that people of faith often feel mistreated and misrepresented by a mainstream media that oversimplifies their beliefs (GetReligion: Martinez; An-Na`im; "Christians Misrepresented"). In the midst of numerous movies and television programs is a television show where the broken find redemption, the lame walk and the dead rise. This blog will analyze the ways in which LOST educates on issues of religion. Issues of faith are mainly represented in three key characters that appear on the show: Locke, a self-proclaimed “man of faith; Jack, a self-proclaimed “man of science”; and Eko”—a drug dealer turned Catholic priest. Entertainment Weekly recently noted the Biblical connections seen in LOST (Click for an 8 minute, 15 second run-down of the show):
It is safe to say that from the outset LOST has been a rare show that allows those able to pick up on its Christian symbolism to appreciate it on a deeper level than the average viewer. Some of those symbols are writ in neon and some in postscripts (ask Christian fans about the thrill they experienced when the character Charlotte Staples Lewis—ahem, C.S. Lewis—arrived on the scene), but they are an ever-present, ever-developing feature of the story (Basham).Why do the religious care about the depictions of their faith on television? First of all, people consume a lot of media (Generation M2). Several studies have indicated that media has the power to educate. Liebes and Katz found that viewers, especially the uneducated, are likely to make strong connections with the role models on screen. Americans especially are liable to make referential statements—statements that link themselves to the media role models in question (Liebes and Katz 155, 162). Singhal and Rogers found, in their study, that “learning can occur through observing media role models and that this vicarious learning usually is more effective than direct experiential learning” (Singhal and Rogers 346). This process is typically called “identification”—viewers build a relationship with a character and then hypothesize about what they would do in a similar situation as the character (Hill 106).
And this happens easily in a show like LOST in which the story is quite polysemic. It’s likely that to be as popular as LOST, a program would need to be polysemic so that different subcultures—such as the Christian fans mentioned above—can find different meanings that correspond to their differing social relations. And while a given media signal may have a ‘preferred reading,’ a subject maybe able to resist the centralized meaning in order to take hold of an alternative reading (Fiske 391, 404-405; Hall 172). These subjects, in their distinctive subcultures, identify with characters who then can not only entertain, but educate. In a recent study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, researchers found that information in an episode that discussed the nature of mother-to-child HIV transmission translated into a correct understanding of the information for many viewers (“A New Study”). Of course, the information that comes across could just as easily be misinformation (Chambers).
And there’s some indication that what viewers see exemplified shapes their future experiences on the topic. Zillman and Brosius note that the images viewers see on television and the frequency of depictions affects how the issue depicted is perceived by viewers (Zillmann and Brosius 110).
And what is it religious viewers are seeing? One of the role models viewers see is John Locke. And his name is intrinsic to what he represents.
Locke demonstrates this connection to the philosopher John Locke with his process of explaining and understanding the world, which employs a scientific and empirical method (Biderman and Devlin 196). For example, when he goes about hunting for boar, he first searches for evidence, traces of the boar in order to estimate the size, weight and gender of the animals in question (Ibid.). It’s important to note that Locke was an abandoned foster child. He is lame in both legs when he gets on his plane to Los Angeles, but when he awakes on the island, he can walk. And he goes on to experience other miracles of New Testament proportions. But when Locke discovers his legs are healed, he isn’t concerned about how it happened, but he is concerned with why it happened (Biderman and Devlin 197; Basham).[The philosopher John Locke] “held the search for truth as the highest good for which a human could strive, and this value was intrinsically related to his Christian faith; however, he viewed his religion rationally, condemning those who believed in God but had no foundation of faith. In other words, for Locke, God was real but belief was only valid if you could explain why (Seay 74).
Seay, a Baptist pastor, sees a parallel between Locke’s story and that of Jesus Christ in the Bible. His uniqueness, his ability to discover secrets about the island and the allusions to his “destiny” are reminiscent of Jesus’s messianic role (Seay 122). But Biderman and Devlin see Locke’s way of describing the phenomena of the island as more in line with Taoism. Taoism holds that there is a special force in nature that is unnamable, intangible and a creating entity. As “unnamable,” the Tao is represented by Ying and Yang/light and dark/good and evil—two sides that are seen as interdependent and complimentary (Biderman and Devlin 198).
Locke is … someone who not only adopts the Taoist method, but also uses this method to understand that he is someone who employs both the Taoist and Lockean methods to help him answer the questions of why and how things occur the way they do. This understanding is rooted in the Taoist picture of the universe, as the Taoist and Lockean methods, like the Yin and Yang, appear to be direct opposites, but are ultimately complementary and interdependent (Biderman and Devlin 202-203).
Patterson notes that Cruse and Lindelof may be offering a sort of faith most in line with Native American spirituality or a New Age perspective—represented in Locke’s communion with nature, etc. (Patterson 215).And perhaps it’s the number of faith subcultures that see themselves in Locke that make him such a compelling and popular character (Fiske 391). Taoists, Christian, New Agers and many others can identify with at least traces of Locke’s spirituality. The closest thing to a guiding faith statement Locke makes is in his insistence that “everything happens for a reason” (Patterson 215). Locke is often put in sharp contrast to Jack Shephard, who Locke calls the “man of science.”
LOST’s writers Damon Lindelof, a Jew, and Carlton Cuse, a Catholic, admit that many of their questions and debates get written into the Locke/Shephard discussions on faith and science (Porter et al. 15)
Jack and John are, essentially, two sides of the same coin, but the coin in question here is not really leadership (where their tension often resides) but doubt…Locke, unlike Jack, wants desperately to believe in the island…in a higher being, a personal God to give meaning to the large and small tragedies of life (Seay 64).
In Jack’s worldview, everything is achievable through tangible, human ability. In a way, Jack is a man of faith, but his faith is humanistic (Seay 85). But this worldview evolves through the course of the show. If there is anyone who could be said to have “converted” during the course of the show, it’s Jack Shephard. Shephard is at first eager to leave the island. And once off the island, he finds himself rich, respected, with the love of a beautiful woman; but it doesn’t satisfy him. His life spirals downward in a breakup, drunkness, and drugs. But soon after a new Jack emerges. The new Jack has doubts, but yet speaks of “destiny” and in the end leads a return to the island (Seay 91). So eventually the “man of science” becomes a “man of faith.”
Jack’s conflict with Locke is rooted in Jack’s belief in free will…We are completely responsible for our own actions. For Jack, as for Sartre, an acceptance of individual freedom and responsibility is the cornerstone of moral integrity. Anyone who denies his or her freedom is engaging in a form of hypocrisy that Sartre calls ‘bad faith.’ A person of bad faith lies to himself and thereby refuses to accept his freedom and the responsibility that goes with it (Lee 64).
But there is perhaps a more obvious man of faith, although his stay on the show is brief. And that’s Eko. The character was raised in Nigeria, in a war-torn town. A local gang terrorizes the town and his brother Yemi is told to kill a man or be killed. Yemi can’t do it, so Eko steps in for his brother and kills the man. This story is key to understanding Eko.
The act he performed was violent and murderous, but it also spared his brother’s life. Seay notes that this story itself is educational—while the characters are fictional, situations like Eko’s are not uncommon in Nigeria (Seay 105). Seay notes that there’s a lot to learn from Eko’s story. And indeed, as noted earlier, Eko’s story could serve to educate viewers on the plight of Nigeria. But also by exemplifying Nigerians in this way, it shapes the perception of Nigeria by LOST viewers (Zillmann and Brosius 110; “A New Study”; Chambers).
Through this story, Eko eventually becomes a full-fledged member of the gang while his brother becomes the town’s priest. But after a series of incidents leads to his brother’s death, he leaves the gang and declares himself for the priesthood. Once Eko ends up on the island, one of his first acts is building a church (Seay 104-107). Eko also carves scriptural references onto his staff. And after his death on the island, the staff serves as a guide for the crash survivors (Patterson 215).
And while Eko may seem like an obvious character representation of the Catholic faith, Lee notes that his story has many elements of Jewish theology. On the island, Eko actively seeks redemption through a variety of acts of penance—a period of silence, the carvings on his staff, the knots in his beard, his plan to build a church.The Jewish theologian and philosopher Martin Buber (1878-1965) suggested that God only enters the lives of those who wish it. If one chooses to live one’s life without God, then no evidence of God’s existence will appear. But once one chooses to open oneself up to the possibility of God by initiating a genuine dialogue with Him, Buber contends that a true relationship is possible. Only allowing oneself to be completely vulnerable before God can one construct a meaningful life (Lee 71).And Eko certainly makes himself vulnerable, eventually offering his final confession before his death and asking for “no forgiveness,” which in Catholic theology is sure a road to damnation (Lee 71-72).
But here also, the name Eko is significant as it seems to refer to the Italian philosopher Umberto Eco. An Italian thinker, Eco is primarily known for extending the use of semiotics to fiction and combining various genres including literary analysis, mystery, and biblical exegesis (Liukkonen).
With all the characters in the show, there is an emphasis on their past failures, the existential questions they’re facing, a struggle for some sort of faith, a revelatory experience and a desire to find some sort of redemption. But this redemption often arises out of the community of survivors—implying that in the dominant ‘preferred faith’ of LOST, redemption is a communal activity (Hall 166-167; Patterson 216).
Many of the most notable of LOST episodes do show characters who find new realization in their new community. They have faced the existential questions; they have wrestled with faith and found reasons for it in their revelatory encounters with the island; and they have started to develop into a community where they can trust one another in their struggle to survive. Jews and Christians should see parallels to their respective concepts of redemption, and just about everyone should be able to relate to the stories of failure and the longing for second chances (Patterson 220).In conclusion, this blog has argued that people of faith have reason to be interested in LOST. Television has a proven ability to educate, inform, and, at times, misinform. On issues of faith, which many hold dear, it’s understandable select subcultures would want to see their faith represented well. And this blog showcased the depth of polysemy in the show, noting that the show can easily draw subcultures of viewers who will easily spot Judeo-Christian, Taoist, and New Age references.
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