»Neo is....«

There have been several ideas on who Neo is meant to represent.

Is he Buddha? an incarnation of Vishnu? the Anti-Christ? the Gnostic Christ, the traditional Christ, an atheistic saviour or something else entirely?

Do you think you have a case for not believing the matrix not to be based on any kind of theological view at all perhaps?

Personally I think the Neo is actually an allegory for the traditional Christ. He dies to save mankind from an evil which will doom them all (Sin/Smith).

Neo isn't just any one of those things individually.. i think what the Wachowskis have done with the trilogy which is quite remarkable.. is that they have united several elements of religion, philosophy, mathematics & science into their universal Matrix myth. the connection between all these things is they are actually all attempting to do the same things.. they are all ways in which the human mind tries to make sense of the world we perceive around us.. the way we try to make sense of our very existence, which is... of course.. one of the main themes of the movies.

so yes.. he can be viewed as the traditional christ who sacrifices himself to save mankind from sin.. but its no coincidence that he can also represent the Gnostic redeemer who saves mankind through knowledge.. nor that he is the Bodhisattva who achieves immortality through enlightenment through the path of becoming the Buddha.. but i really strongly believe its not limited to one thing..

Yeah it's cool isn't it- are there any others. I am coming up with a new theory whereby Neo is Nietzsche's "superman".

Neo definately shows existentialist ideas:

Smith is the ultimate nihilist. He literally believes in 'nothing'. He says there is no purpose for him and no purpose for life other than to end. He cries out angrily to Neo "why do you persist!". He asks this when Neo has lost everything, even Trinity.

But Neo's answer is the existentialist's answer. Why do you continue your life when you see no meaning or purpose? "Because I choose to".

In reloaded Neo is begged by the people of Zion, as if he were a God, to watch over their family members on board the various ships. He says "I'll try". This is something he has chosen to make his aim.

Shortly before that same scene he says to the kid "you saved yourself". Is he mistaken? Is he being modest? Or is it true; is there an importance in acting for yourself and recognising your own importance.

Neo is Nietzsche's idea of the "superman". He is the ultimate aim for mankind. The aim to which all people should aspire. This is particularly apt since Nietzsche claims the superman is whatever you think he should be and as we said before everyone pins their own beliefs on what Neo is.

Oh....

so much for my 'original' idea:

yeah, it would seem a likely bet that the Wachowskis would have some Nietzsche references in there! well that doesn't matter though.. it was a good idea anyway, i liked it

Nietzsche also believed in two opposing forces manifested in two different gods. One was the force of logic, order, reason and perfection. The other force is chaos, uncertainty, emotion and love. These two forces need to be in balance to maintain equilibrium. Sound familiar?

In which book does he talk about that? He doesn't believe in God I know, but I have read that he says polytheism is beneficial.

I just read that in Philosophy For Dummies.

Just Kidding, but it was some juvenile book.

I haven't seen anything where he talks about two opposing Gods. He doesn't believe in God in the traditional sense. He believes that polytheism can be beneficial to mankind, but he does not believe in particular Gods - he thinks polytheism is good because it creates Gods.

"For an individual to posit his own ideal and to derive from it his own law, joys, and rights—that may well have been considered hitherto as the most outrageous human aberration and as idolatry itself. The few who dared as much always felt the need to apologize to themselves, usually by saying: "It wasn't I! Not I! But a god through me!" The wonderful art and gift of creating gods—polytheism—was the medium through which this impulse could discharge, purifiy, perfect, and ennoble itself; for originally it was a very undistinguished impulse, related to stubbornness, disobedience and envy. Hostility against this impulse to have an ideal of one's own was formerly the central law of all morality. There was only one norm, man; and every people thought that it possessed this one ultimate norm. But above and outside, in some distant overworld, one was permitted to behold a plurality of norms; one god was not considered a denial of another god, nor blasphemy against him. It was here that the luxury of individuals was first permitted; it was here that one first honored the rights of individuals. The invention of gods, heroes, and overmen of all kinds, as well as near-men and undermen, of dwarfs, fairies, centaurs, satyrs, demons, and devils was the inestimable preliminary exercise for the justification of the egoism and sovereignty of the individual: the freedom that one conceded to a god in his relation to other gods—one eventually also granted to oneself in relation to laws, customs, and neighbors." (Anti-christ 143)