Gnosticism never developed a well-defined theology, but it depicts Jesus as a hero figure who saves mankind through "gnosis," or esoteric knowledge. In the Gnostic philosophy, the physical world is not part of God's creation, but a manifestation of a lower god - a nightmarish reality that imprisons mankind, say religious experts. Gnostics believed they could achieve salvation, not by overcoming evil and sin with God's grace, but by learning the "higher knowledge" about reality.

Gnostic threads are present in many religious traditions, including Sufism and Buddhism. As woven by "The Matrix," these threads tie together current concerns with an ancient knot.

"All of this stuff has been bouncing around in the human brain for centuries. When it comes into this hip new iteration in the cyberworld, it all sounds familiar," says Robert Thompson, professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University in New York.

http://search.csmonitor.com/search_c...6s01-almo.html

 

finally... I thought I was the only one that thought the Matrix had huge religious undertones. *whew* I'm not all that crazy!

 

oh, i did all along, but this site goes really far into analyzing that. i really liked this realization about the 72 secs:

Numerology: Neo's apartment number is 101, suggesting that he's "the one." Neo is shot in apartment number 303, and after 72 seconds (72 hours = 3 days), he rises again

and this:

Thomas Anderson: The Apostle Thomas was also called Didymus, which in Greek means "twin" or "double." Anderson means "son of man," one of the titles Jesus uses for himself. The twin names suggest his dual nature. As "Mr. Anderson," he is vulnerable to the powers of the evil agents. As "Neo," he has dominion over them.

oh, oh, and this:

Nebuchadnezzar: Morpheus's ship. This figure referenced in the Book of Daniel was the powerful king of ancient Babylon who suffered from troubling dreams. The name literally means "Nebo, protect the crown."

 

Isn't this kind of old info? I recall reading this when the Matrix first came out. :dunno:

 

i believe so, /. just posted it today though.

 

This reminds me of people scouring through phonebooks to prove prophecy's and suceeding.

The fact is, if you look for something hard enough you'll find it. Just like that BS with the numbers, just like the BS with the bible predicting shit, just like the BS with September 11th and prophets, just like racism, just like anything else.

Lame.

 

eh, the difference is this was actually written with an audience in mind...unlike the phone book.

 

what do you mean? phone books are also written with an audience in mind as well :chuckles:


but I know antarius point. data mining. look for something hard enough and you will find it.

 

What he's saying is that if you look hard enough... you can find some similarities in however an obscure way for almost anything. Not nessisarily meaning anything.

Example: Pick up a hand full of rocks (29 rocks) and throw them at the nearest person, lets say 3 of them happen to hit. 1st of all, your a bad shot. But does it really MEAN anything? No. Does it mean that's 3 strikes and they are out? No. Does it mean they are blessed by the holy trinity? Maybe, but not cause you threw rocks at them. Does it mean that someone named Najarhy called himself a profit and said that on May 13th 2003, the first person to get hit by 3 rocks thrown by another human... will die within 24 hour? No. But you can think whatever you want.

h: :doh:

 

i was thinking. the first guy i hit on the head happen to be a psycho killer who whips out a gun and fires 3 rounds at me. all of which miss but hits the cia agents that were following me all this time. :dunno: :chuckles: