The process of succession, Jacob, and thoughts on pregnancy issues
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By ProfOzone
- The process of succession, Jacob, and thoughts on pregnancy issues
- Created: Jul 22, 2008
- Last updated: Aug 14, 2008
- After episode: 4.13: There’s No Place Like Home, Parts 2 & 3
- Status: Current
- Flag this theory:
Ben’s gifts were similar to those of Miles. He got information from ghosts in a similar fashion. But recall that once Miles had gotten information from a ghost, he told it that it “could go now”. Ben used Jacob for information without releasing him.
— ProfOzone
What follows are essentially old observations revisited with information from season four. Which means that much of it is stating the obvious, but the important thing is the “big picture” of it all, so please bear with me. Comments greatly appreciated.
The island is a source and attractor of paranormal power.
The island causes things to happen (or not happen) in such a manner as to make it appear to have a will of its own. More importantly, it seems to act with specific aims in mind. It seems to be looking forward to and preparing for a particular future event. There is a way to know what the specific aims of the island are, apparently, to the extent that one might know WHO is critical to those aims… to the extent that one can know that critical people will be protected by supernatural means until their usefulness to the island has expired.
In other words, someone knows just what the island wants and just who is important to the island in securing those wants. Jacob seems to be a person who has this knowledge.
“The Others” are reverent toward the island and its power.
“The Others” believe they ought to be led by individuals with paranormal power, regardless of what that power is.
Since the island healed John, they believe he is a person of paranormal power.
Since Ben could communicate with the dead, he was once thought to be a person of paranormal power.
Ben was exceptionally intelligent and skilled in manipulation, but his power was significantly enhanced by the insights he could gain from Jacob.
Ben’s gifts were similar to those of Miles. He got information from ghosts in a similar fashion. But recall that once Miles had gotten information from a ghost, he told it that it “could go now”. Ben used Jacob for information without releasing him.
Widmore is also a person of paranormal power. So he also once ruled the island. His power may be prophetic dreams. (This might also be John’s power.)
Widmore was able to somehow (through direct or indirect contact) conspire with Jacob. Jacob would con Ben while, in return, Widmore would set Jacob free.
The con worked, causing Ben to make bonehead mistakes (like letting John see where he hid the tape recorder with Juliet’s messages on it… but I’m still not sure that wasn’t deliberate) and making Ben lose his grip on the island.
John was sent to the island by Widmore. Widmore knew the plane would crash, but he also knew John would survive (he might have been interested in some of the other survivors as well) because of John’s usefulness to the island.
The first episode of Lost wasn’t titled “Pilot” simply because it was the show’s first episode. The title was supposed to point us to the pilot of the airplane. The smoke monster killed the pilot and we know now that this couldn’t have been accidental. The pilot was known to Ben to be an agent of Widmore. (Frank, perhaps, had been bumped as the pilot of flight 815 for a reason.)
The rules that Widmore changed involved the rules of succession on the island. John wasn’t ready to take over the island yet, but Widmore sent John and this forced the process of succession to begin before it might have had Widmore not interfered. Sending John was part of Widmore’s agreement with Jacob, because once John took over, Jacob would be free. In return, Jacob fed Ben false information, including information that his daughter Alex would be spared when Widmore’s soldiers invaded the island. When Alex was killed, Ben knew that he’d been had. In Ben’s last words to Jacob, he looked to the sky… to “Heaven”, if you will… because he knew Jacob had finally been released.
Christian now takes Jacob’s place.
John not being ready to lead, disaster will be a feature of his rule. Widmore bet on this because his reason for installing John prematurely was not only to unseat Ben, but also to find the island eventually himself.
One thing that “chosen” people on the island share in common is a premature birth. Ben was somehow causing the premature births on the island. This was a way for him to test each birth to see if it would be “the one”. Of course, he wanted to have early and certain knowledge of who the next “one” was so that he could control (and perhaps kill) that child. He never intended for Juliet to find a cure for the pregnancy issues. He brought her to the island because of her resemblance to Annie.
The reason the issues only afflicted women who conceived on the island was because Ben knew his people wouldn’t be as impressed by a newborn who was conceived off the island (explaining why Ben found it valuable to lie about his own off-island origins). Babies conceived on the island were automatically considered “more special”, so those where the only pregnancies Ben needed to concern himself with in his search for “the one”. (It may be that Ben believed a prophecy that referred to “the one” as being conceived on the island.)
So… that’s all I got. Again, comments are welcome.
idiot
bbs… based on some of the theories you’ve posted, you seem like an observant and articulate person. So I’m certain your criticisms can be more eloquent than that. :-)
Care to elaborate?
And we have our first troll of the LT rebirth. Congrats bbs05. We all knew it wouldn’t last for long.
bbs05; When I said I wouldn’t ban a member for being a little rude I was thinking of members that might sometimes be seen that way in their manner or maybe had a bad day one day not someone going out of their way to be obnoxious. Shape it up because you’re not going around here calling members morons and idiots so it can be your choice or mine.
Back to what is written here, i think you’ve done a good job at thinking these things over but like anything on LOST it is subject to vast amounts of false piecing together. I doubt if absolutely ALL answers will be given to us by the end of season 6 really, that’s part of the show’s fun. I just can’t help feeling you’ve slightly read too much into certain aspects, and hey they want us to. Still, enjoyable post to read.
Quality Summise and insight Prof. This was a good read, as ever. “John not being ready to lead, disaster will be a feature of his rule”. Spot on. Premature births - commonality between the ‘chosen’ is clearly true, but I also believe that ‘patience’ is very important. Unfortunately John has none, all answers need to come NOW, because he has been told he was special. Ben on the other hand was told he’d need a tremendous amount of patience (by Richard) +1
JAT: Actually, I couldn’t agree more. In fact, not only do I doubt they’ll give us “all the answers” by the end of the show, on some issues I hope they don’t! But, as you say… this is all just speculation for the fun of it.
LB: Excellent point.
Admin: Thanks for the backup. :-)
Irocz28: I still have hope, my friend. :-)
Hello ProfO nice to see you on here. I have two questions for you.
Firstly, you say the island heals John and that is why The Others are interested in him. But don’t we see Richard visiting John as a young child? How do you reconcile those two events?
Secondly can you explain what makes you think Widmore has paranormal powers?
Big up.
I agree that I dont think all the questions will be answered… I smell Big Screen movie?
ProfO: I am glad to see you posting again.
I really enjoyed the comment that the ‘Pilot’ title had further meaning. I believe that the pilot was ‘in on it’ from the onset. I dont really think that Desmonds failure to push the button was the only reason the flight ended up on the island. It makes much more sense to me that the flight was headed to the island in the first place.
I am having a difficult time reconciling the premature births are intentionally forced, I guess the line that I am thinking follows more along the idea that the time and or electromagnetic anomalies are the reason for the difficulties.
Wonderful to see you posting. +1
love this theory, just love it. +1!!!
I never thought about Ben being the one that wanted to stop the women from giving birth, maybe Ben is poisioning the women so they die, and this is why juliet can’t figure out why
Missus! How lovely to see you again…
Certainly Richard believes that John is special, but we’ve been told that for most of the Others John’s healing is what convinced them he might be something special. Also… did Richard travel back in time to visit young John AFTER flight 815 crashed (in Richard’s point of view)? It’s difficult to say at this point.
scirillo: You may be right.
tharde: My dear friend! So wonderful to hear from you. :-) Of course, you could be right. I’m just throwing some wild guesses out there as usual. I hope we’ll find out either way.
Bailey: Thanks for the kind words!
IheartJack: Yes, that’s one way Ben could be doing it. Or some psychic thing could be going on… it’s hard to say. But, alas, we’ll only know with time… if then!
What about the bunnies? :) I still think time travel is how certain people have what appears to be prophetic powers. Especially in the case of Jacob and Richard. Great post ProfO. You’ve taken the evidence and run with it to an extent … Awesome as usual!
Hi Prof Great theories as usual. One point though i am struggling to understand is the smoke monsters killing of Mr Eko. If Ben solely controls the smoke monster (which i’m unsure about) then surely with the death of Mr Eko Ben has played the largest part of all in fastracking Locke towards been the others leader. Ben always has a plan! I think he wants Locke exactly where he is now. +1
Prof….. I’ll admit that I just skimmed the post, (forgive me) but two questions…. :
and
wtf! So happy to see you, too! I guess I’m thinking that time travel will be limited to use of the Orchid by Richard, but I don’t really know for sure. And of course I’m only just guessing about Richard. The truth is we haven’t been shown the Orchid being used for time travel beyond a few minutes (note the bunnies ;-). So who knows?
jamtay: Well, many of us, since the very moment Eko was killed, suspected he’d lived past his usefulness somehow. I think you’re hitting on a big part of it. I think the biggest problem for Ben (or whoever was controlling the smoke monster… I’m with you on being unsure about how much control Ben may or may not have) was that Eko showed signs of no longer being prone to manipulation.
TT: The healing has been sold to us as something that works only for people attuned to a particular place. Rose mentioned in season 4 that the island is a place where people get better, not sick, and this seemed to be designed to tell us, the viewers, that Jack getting sick was a bad omen for him. But in three seasons we saw people die many times, sometimes quite slowly (although I’ll admit not from illness unless you count the pregnant women). So… I don’t know what to think about all of that, really. As for Widmore knowing John would survive… he knew he would survive because of his importance to the island, just like Michael survived attempts to commit suicide. But it is a very good question… if he sent the plane, why didn’t he just go himself? I’m not certain Widmore is currently under the island’s protection. (In spite of Ben saying he couldn’t kill Widmore.) Or maybe Widmore’s under the island’s protection now that Ben is no longer on it. It’s just really unclear right now.
It’s an interesting theory but I see some holes in it. I like the part about Ben really being the cause of the pregnancy-death issues, but I don’t see how Widmore is conspiring (in contact) with Jacob. If that was the case, he wouldn’t have to send Rambo in to capture Ben. And he would’ve known where the island was the entire time. He didn’t learn about where it is until that electromagnetic explosion happened.
I think that Jacob called for Locke, not Widmore, and I don’t see where his paranormal powers are. I think he’s trying to usurp the powers of the island for his own gain and that’s why Jacob has Locke and Ben move the island to conceal it from him. Why would Jacob have the island moved like that if he’s in cahoots with Widmore?
And I don’t think Christian takes Jacob’s place. He is just speaking on his behalf. He even says he’s not Jacob. If he is taking his place, then what about Claire?
Indeed, eversor, you’ve covered most of the gaps. :-) Although, again, I’m not sure if Widmore did need the EM event to find the island. Penny certainly did, but who really knows about Widmore? I can think of a number of reasons he might not have been able to go to the island himself until Ben was properly dispensed with.
Why would Jacob have the island moved if he was in cahoots with Widmore? Well… why not? This show is full-to-brimming with double-crossers. Why not Jacob? And certainly I do think Widmore is meant to represent a usurper and exploiter. But he talks about having possession of the island before and his “secondary protocols” seem to suggest more than mere cleverness. None of that is a slam dunk in implying he has paranormal abilities but… they might suggest he does.
Right… Christian spoke on Jacob’s behalf… but… why? Why does anyone need to speak for Jacob? Where is he? Why couldn’t he speak for himself? The most obvious reason would be that Jacob is just gone. But why? Where did he go? Is he coming back?
And as for Claire… I have no idea. There’s quite a bit of speculation in my theory that reaches far beyond what I’m prone to, but the weird stuff with Claire… I don’t even feel like I have a fair attempt.
Oh, and eversor, by the way… the reason I’m suggesting that Widmore manipulated John onto the plane is because one of his known associates, Abaddon, was responsible for getting John thinking about the walkabout. Now, it’s true that Abaddon could have been doing that without Widmore’s knowledge. But, then again, he could have been taking Widmore’s orders and that would suggest that Widmore somehow knew the fate of flight 815 and how it would serve him perhaps years before the flight took place.
ProfOzone, I think the reason Widmore knows about the Orchid, is that he was connected (maybe leading) to the original Dharma team somehow. Then, Ben purged all his team and took over. That’s why Widmore says that the island is his and that Ben took it away from him. That would explain Widmore’s knowledge of the island without him having paranormal powers.
I know what you’re saying about Abaddon, but I’m not sure if he really did that on Widmore’s behalf. He may have his own agenda. I suspect he will become a more major character in the next season, too. But that is a possibility, because he was in charge of the helicopter team at least, and he was trying to get answers out of Hurley. He’s a very mysterious character.
And, yeah, I guess Jacob is gone. I don’t know where. Maybe he’s appearing as another manifestaion to somebody. But I’m sure he’ll come back. He has to. Maybe Claire’s there because she’s Chirstian’s daughter? Maybe that’s why Jack has to get back, why things went wrong without him? But why is the Shepard family so important in the first place? Not sure.
:-)
I like how you think, eversor. But it looks like we BOTH have more questions than answers.
:-)
Ah well… at least we’re not alone in being “lost” eh?