I’m thinking we’re talking about Jacob and his fraternal twin brother Esau. Esau’s name in Hebrew means “hairy”… and that dude had a bit of a beard.

The biblical Easu emerges from the womb with Jacob grasping his heel.

Easu was supposed to be in charge upon the death of their father, Isaac. However, as children Jacob tricks Easu out of his birthright. Easu comes in hungry and he trades his birthright for food. So in their first interaction on TV Jacob offers Easu some food, and Easu says he already ate. That’s some irony.

Years later, as adults their father Issac is on his deathbed and assigns Easu a task for which Issac will bless him, and confer his birthright upon him. Easu has forgotten his earlier agreement, and Jacob completes the assigned task and returns to Issac for the blessing. lsaac is by this time too old to see well, and in turn Jacob also tricks his father into getting the blessing for himself. Upon learning that his birthright (control of all things) has been legally usurped Easu threatens to kill Jacob. So this happens on TV and in the bible.

There is some disagreement of how these events should be viewed. Is Easu unjust b/c he so carelessly gives up his birthright… and for his appetites no less? Does this reveal that he is too focused on the body and thus distracted by it?

So … was Easu robbed? Or was he careless?

Also not agreed upon is the notion of the justice of Jacob. Was he just in usurping the power? Was this one of those situations where the brothers were unequal in mind… and therefore Jacob, correctly recognizing his fitness to rule… rightly steals it from Easu. But this “stealing” involved asking for it. He steals it in a very just manner… via the use of reason. He openly steals it.

The biblical Jacob is sent away into exile with followers to rule over his tribe, while Easu stays behind and has his own tribe.

On TV in the past… Jacob appears as himself… but did he always? I’m inclined to suspect that it will be shown that he always appears as himself. Lost has a lot of dead people visiting other people. And I think we may find that these dead people are themselves manifestations of Easu. In turn it may be that Easu never appear as himself.

Loke as a philosopher, always says “the island told me to”. He always appeals directly to nature. He looks to nature. So, “the island” or… perhaps “Jacob”… speaks to some people. People who are fit to listen. Men of consideration. Men of discretion and good judgment. This is what a philosopher is… and according to Maimonides that’s also the kind of dude to whom revelation is permitted. Maimonides compares revelation to the vision available momentarily in a flash of lightning. He says for some there are only a few lightening strikes in a lifetime. For others, there are periodic ones, and for still others… lightning is constantly going off, and it looks like daytime to them. They can “see” much more than others, much farther than others… or we might also say… they are being allowed to glimpse divinity… the curtain is being pulled back for them and “revelation” is provided.

So I suspect that while Locke was alive on the island, Jacob was speaking to him. Then, he died. After death, Esau was in charge of him. Or, Easu simply inhabited his body.

Dead people told Locke to leave the island. So, perhaps Easu told Locke to leave the island. It may also be that Easu was the one in the cabin and used the poor lighting to trick Locke…? In a manner that is similar to the way he was tricked.

When Locke got back to civilization, he was given a new name. He was now Bentham. Named for Jermey Bentham a political philosopher who rejected natural right.

Why did his name change? Is it b/c he had unknowingly switched sides? Was he now in Easu’s hands? Does Easu reject Natural Right? That would make sense… as he was tricked out of rulership via a “natural” claim to justice. As opposed to a conventional claim… a “legal” claim… a “formal” claim.

So the TV character Locke is slowly robbed of his close relationship with nature, aka his ability to listen to ‘the island’. Upon returning to civilization he once again finds himself crippled. Both physically and spiritually… as he no longer has the ability to lead the people. He speaks to all of them, and none will listen.

What of Ben? (In Genesis, Ben is the son of Jacob. From wiki: “Benjamin: the second (and last) son of Rachel, and the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Benjamin.”

Ben was also saved by ‘the island’. To whom does Ben listen? Is he the anti-Locke? Is he the one who leads but was then exiled? Was he tricked out of leading? And his revenge is to kill both Locke and Jacob.

It’s interesting to me also that “dead Locke” speaks openly with Ben only. He tells Ben exactly what he’s going to do. He doesn’t tell him that “Ben” will do it. En-route Locke asks why Ben does not tell Richard of Locke’s plan. Ben tells Locke that he will do anything he tells him.

Does he tell him to kill Jacob? I don’t remember, I’m going to have to watch it again. But I think he just says “You’re going to kill Jacob”, or “You’re going to do it.”… Then later I don’t recall him saying “Kill Jacob”… it seemed more like “Do what you came here to do”. Then Ben works himself up into a frenzy at Jacob essentially for being left out.

I meant that the team all went down into the temple, something happened (spoke to Lucifer?), and then they all tried to kill Rousseau (the only one that didn’t go down because she was pregnant and Jin convinced her not to).

But just to add my opinion to the theory, Jacob seems more like Jesus than God. He’s mortal, Ben’s like the Judas that killed him. We’ll see if he’s ressurected in some fashion soon.

If this ends up going all religious on us, the people will be very upset me thinks.

So I’m on board with you, sir. Though I don’t know if they will make it as stark as God/Lucifer; ambiguity is their bag.