Word of the Day: Sobek (Mythology)

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Word of the Day: Sobek (Mythology)

Friday, May 15th, 2009 | A&E, Word of the Day |

So in Wednesday night’s “Lost” season finale we finally saw the four-toed statue in its entirety, revealing its crocodile face. Reading today’s DarkUFO episode recap clued me in that this was a statue of Sobek.

From Wikipedia:

Sobek (also called Sebek, Sochet, Sobk, Sobki, Soknopais, and in Greek, Suchos) was the deification of crocodiles, as crocodiles were deeply feared in the nation so dependent on the Nile River. Egyptians who worked or travelled on the Nile hoped that if they prayed to Sobek, the crocodile god, he would protect them from being attacked by crocodiles.^[1] The god Sobek, which was depicted as a crocodile or a man with the head of a crocodile was a powerful and frightening deity; in some Egyptian creation myths, it was Sobek who first came out of the waters of chaos to create the world.^[1] As a creator god, he was occasionally linked with the sun god Ra.^[1]

Sobek’s ambiguous nature led some Egyptians to believe that he was a repairer of evil that had been done, rather than a force for good in itself, for example, going to Duat to restore damage done to the dead as a result of their form of death. He was also said to call on suitable gods and goddesses required for protecting people in situation, effectively having a more distant role, nudging things along, rather than taking an active part.

That nudging things along part sounds like what we saw Jacob doing last night, or what Eloise Hawking has been doing for several seasons.

DarkUFO has a more complete wrapup here. JOpinionated has her episode reaction and thoughts on Jacob and the mystery man as embodiments of fate vs. free will.

It’s going to be a long eight months waiting for the next episode.

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Tags: Lost

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