[alexamenos]

So is the line as clearly drawn in the sand as it seems right now? Is this really coming down to a good versus evil, Team MIB vs Team Jacob FTW party? Is that what it's always been about? Feuding Gods? I think we have enough information, but it's hard to say.

I'm cool with "Fueding Gods", but I don't think it's nearly so black and white as "Good v. Evil"....or out of respect to the inverted logo I should say that it's not nearly so white and black.

Maybe Jacob is a genuine good guy, but I'm not at all convinced that is the case. About the only seemingly good thing that Jacob has done (that I can think of, anyway) is giving Hurley an ankh in a guitar case so that he coudl save Sayid....but this may well be an act of pure self-interest if indeed Jacob is Sayid (a thought that didn't occur to me last night, because I'm a little slow)....come to think of it, the inexplicably murkey waters of the spring prevented the newest set of Others from rescuing Sayid, and if Jacob muddied the waters than we can put to rest the question of whether Jacob was up to Good in bringing Sayid to that temple

Moreover, the new-Others look like the motley sort of group one might find on a 1800's era slave-trading ship, such as the Black Rock (was the Black Rock definitely slave trading?). Hence, Jacob is consorting with a group of renegrade slave traders that he invited to the island in the first place, a group about which Esau-MIB observed:

"They come. They fight. They destroy. They corrupt. It always ends the same."

Seems to me to be a plausible statement about the immutability of human nature. NewLocke plainly isn't a fool and I don't think he'll become the personification of evil, even though he is literally the personification of a smoke monster.

anyhoo...I'm not sure where I'm going with this....I kind of see a progressive/ enlightenment/ liberal v. reactionary / cynical/ conservative battle rather than a good versus bad.

NewLocke represents the reactionary forces that want to maintain the old ways and Jacob is trying to mix things. Kind of like a replay of the french revolution with Esau/Locke representing the dark and dismal Church and Jacob representing...ummm....the Jacobins!