Tek-Gnostics Archives
Gnosticism and Buddhism in
The Matrix
- Annotated Edition
By
Frances Flannery-Dailey
and
Rachel Wagner
The Wachowski
brothers' 1999 hit release
The Matrix draws on
multiple religious traditions to establish its
complex worldview. Two of the most prominent are
Gnostic Christianity and Buddhism, which, like
the film, pose humanity's fundamental problem
and its solution in terms of ignorance and
enlightenment. Because of ignorance, people
mistake the "material" world for something real,
but they may "wake up" from this dream with help
from a guide who teaches them their true nature.
This article explores the film's pervasive
allusions to Gnosticism and Buddhism, which in
turn opens up the question of the film's
overarching message and ultimate view of
reality.
In
The Matrix,
a 1999 film by the
Wachowski brothers, a
black-clad computer hacker known as
Neo falls asleep
in front of his computer. A mysterious message
appears on the screen: "Wake up, Neo." This succinct
phrase encapsulates the plot of the film, as Neo
struggles with the problem of being imprisoned in a
"material
world" that is actually a computer
simulation program created in the distant future by
Artificial
Intelligence (A.I.) as a means of enslaving
humanity, by perpetuating ignorance in the form of
an illusory perception called "the matrix."
In part, the film crafts its ultimate view of
reality by alluding to numerous religious traditions
that advance the idea that the fundamental problem
which humanity faces is ignorance and the solution
is knowledge or awakening. Two religious traditions
on which the film draws heavily are
Gnostic
Christianity and Buddhism. Although these traditions
differ in important ways, they agree in maintaining
that the problem of ignorance can be solved through
an individual's reorientation of perspective
concerning the material realm. Gnostic Christianity
and Buddhism also both envision a
guide who helps
those still trapped in the limiting world of
illusion, a Gnostic redeemer figure or a
bodhisattva, who willingly enters that world in
order to share liberating knowledge, facilitating
escape for anyone able to understand. In the film,
this figure is Neo, whose name is also an anagram
for "the One."
Although as a "modern myth" the film
purposefully draws on numerous traditions, we
propose that an examination of Gnostic Christianity
and Buddhism well illuminates the overarching
paradigm of The Matrix, namely, the problem
of sleeping in ignorance in a dream world, solved by
waking to knowledge or enlightenment. By drawing
synchronistically on these two ancient traditions and
fusing them with a technological vision of the
future, the film constructs a new teaching that
challenges its audience to question "reality."
Christian Elements
in The Matrix
The majority of the film's audience probably
easily recognizes the presence of some Christian
elements, such as the name
Trinity or Neo's death
and Christ-like resurrection and ascension near the
end of the film. In fact, Christian and biblical
allusions abound, particularly with respect to
nomenclature: Apoc (Apocalypse), Neo's given name of
Mr. Ander/son (from the Greek andras for man,
thus producing "Son of Man"), the ship named the
Nebuchadnezzar (the Babylonian king who, in the Book
of Daniel, has puzzling symbolic dreams that must be
interpreted), and the last remaining human city,
Zion, synonymous in Judaism and Christianity with
(the heavenly) Jerusalem. Neo is overtly
constructed
as a
Jesus figure: he is "the One" who was
prophesied to return
again to the Matrix, who has
the power the change the Matrix
from within (i.e.,
to work miracles), who battles the representatives
of evil and who is killed but comes to life again.
This construction of Neo as Jesus is
reinforced in numerous ways. Within minutes of the
commencement of the movie, another hacker says to
Neo, "You're my savior, man, my own personal Jesus
Christ." This identification is also suggested by
the Nebuchadnezzar's crew, who nervously wonder if
he is "the One"
who was foretold, and who repeatedly
swear in Neo's presence by saying "Jesus" or "Jesus
Christ." In still another example, Neo enters the
Nebuchadnezzar for the first time and the camera
pans across the interior of the ship, resting on the
make: "Mark III no. 11." This seems to be another
messianic reference, since the
Gospel of Mark 3:11
reads: "Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they
fell down before him and shouted, ' You are the Son
of God!'"
Gnosticism in
The Matrix
Although the presence of individual Christian
elements within the film is clear, the overall
system of Christianity that is presented is not the
traditional, orthodox one. Rather, the Christian
elements of the film make the most sense when viewed
within a context of
Gnostic Christianity. Gnosticism
was a religious system that flourished for centuries
at the beginning of the Common Era, and in many
regions of the ancient Mediterranean world it
competed strongly with "orthodox" Christianity,
while in other areas it represented the only
interpretation of Christianity that was known. The
Gnostics possessed their own Scriptures, accessible
to us in the form of the
Nag Hammadi Library, from
which a general sketch of Gnostic beliefs may be
drawn. Although Gnostic Christianity comprises many
varieties, Gnosticism as a whole seems to have
embraced an orienting cosmogonic myth that explains
the true nature of the universe and humankind's
proper place in it. A brief retelling of this myth
illuminates numerous parallels with
The Matrix.
In the Gnostic myth, the supreme god is
completely perfect and therefore alien and
mysterious, "ineffable," "unnamable," "immeasurable
light which is pure, holy and immaculate" (Apocryphon
of John). In addition to this god there are
other, lesser divine beings in the
pleroma (akin to
heaven, a division of the universe that is not
earth), who possess some metaphorical gender of male
or female. Pairs of these beings are able to produce
offspring that are themselves divine emanations,
perfect in their own ways. A problem arises when one
"aeon" or being named
Sophia (Greek for wisdom), a
female, decides "to bring forth a likeness out of
herself without the consent of the Spirit," that is,
to produce an offspring without her consort (Apocry.
of John). The ancient view was that females
contribute the matter in reproduction, and males the
form; thus, Sophia's action produces an offspring
that is imperfect or even malformed, and she casts
it away from the other divine beings in the pleroma
into a separate region of the cosmos. This
malformed, ignorant deity, sometimes named
Yaldaboath, mistakenly believes himself to be the
only god.
Gnostics identify Yaldabaoth as the Creator
God of the Old Testament, who himself decides to
create archons (angels), the material world (earth)
and human beings. Although traditions vary,
Yaldabaoth is usually tricked into breathing the
divine spark or spirit of his mother Sophia that
formerly resided in him into the human being
(especially Apocry. of John; echoes of
Genesis 2-3). Therein lies the human dilemma. We are
pearls in the mud, a divine spirit (good) trapped in
a material body (bad) and a material realm (bad).
Heaven is our true home, but we are in exile from
the pleroma.
Luckily for the Gnostic, salvation is
available in the form of
gnosis
or knowledge
imparted by a Gnostic redeemer, who is Christ, a
figure sent from the higher God to free humankind
from the Creator God Yaldabaoth. The
gnosis involves an understanding of our true nature and
origin, the metaphysical reality hitherto unknown to
us, resulting in the Gnostic's escape (at death)
from the enslaving material prison of the world and
the body, into the upper regions of spirit. However,
in order to make this ascent, the Gnostic must pass
by the
archons, who are jealous of his/her luminousity, spirit or intelligence, and who thus
try to hinder the Gnostic's upward journey.
To a significant degree, the basic Gnostic
myth parallels the plot of The Matrix, with
respect to both the problem that humans face as well
as the solution. Like Sophia, we conceived an
offspring out of our own pride, as
Morpheus
explains: "early in the 21st century, all
of mankind was united in celebration. We marveled at
our own magnificence as we gave birth to
A.I."
This offspring of ours, however, like Yaldabaoth is
malformed (matter without spirit?). Morpheus
describes A.I. as "a singular consciousness
that spawned an entire race of machines," a fitting
parallel for the Gnostic Creator God of the archons
(angels) and the
illusory material world. A.I.
creates the matrix, a computer simulation that is "a
prison for your mind." Thus, Yaldabaoth/ A.I. traps
humankind in a material prison that does not
represent ultimate reality, as Morpheus explains to
Neo: "As long as the matrix exists, the human race
will never be free."
The film also echoes the metaphorical language
employed by Gnostics. The Nag Hammadi texts describe
the fundamental human problem in metaphorical terms
of blindness, sleep, ignorance, dreams and darkness
/ night, while the solution is stated in terms of
seeing, waking, knowledge (gnosis), waking from
dreams and light / day.
Similarly, in the film Morpheus, whose name is
taken from the Greek god of sleep and dreams,
reveals to Neo that the matrix is "a computer
generated dream world." When Neo is unplugged and
awakens for the first time on the Nebuchadnezzar in
a brightly lit white space (a cinematic code for
heaven), his eyes hurt, as Morpheus explains,
because he has never used them. Everything Neo has
"seen" up to that point was seen with the
mind's
eye, as in a dream, created through software
simulation. Like an ancient Gnostic, Morpheus
explains that the blows he deals Neo in the martial
arts training program have nothing to do with his
body or speed or strength, which are illusory.
Rather, they depend only on his mind, which is real.
The parallels between Neo and Christ sketched
earlier are further illuminated by a Gnostic
context, since Neo is "saved" through
gnosis
or
secret knowledge, which he passes on to others.
Neo learns about the true structure of reality and
about his own true identity, which allows him to
break the rules of the material world he now
perceives to be an illusion. That is, he learns that
"the mind makes it [the matrix, the material world]
real," but it is not ultimately real. In the final
scene of the film, it is this
gnosis that Neo
passes on to others in order to free them from the
prison of their minds, the matrix. He functions as a
Gnostic Redeemer, a figure from another realm who
enters the material world in order to impart saving
knowledge about humankind's true identity and the
true structure of reality, thereby setting free
anyone able to understand the message.
In fact, Neo's given name is not
only Mr. Anderson / the Son of Man, it is
Thomas Anderson, which reverberates with the most
famous Gnostic gospel, the
Gospel of Thomas.
Also, before he is actualized as Neo (the one who
will initiate something "New," since he is indeed
the "One"), he is doubting Thomas, who does not
believe in his role as the redeemer figure. In fact,
the name Thomas means "the Twin," and in ancient
Christian legend he is Jesus' twin brother. In a
sense, the role played by
Keanu Reeves has a twin
character, since he is constructed as both a
doubting Thomas and as a Gnostic Christ figure.
Not only does Neo learn and pass on secret
knowledge that saves, in good Gnostic fashion, but
the way in which he learns also evokes some
elements of Gnosticism. Imbued with images from
eastern traditions, the training programs teach Neo
the concept of "stillness," of freeing the mind and
overcoming fear, cinematically captured in "Bullet
Time" (digitally mastered montages of freeze frames
/ slow motion frames using multiple cameras).
Interestingly enough, this concept of "stillness" is
also present in Gnosticism, in that the higher aeons
are equated with "stillness" and "rest" and can only
be apprehended in such a centered and meditative
manner, as is apparent in these instructions to a
certain Allogenes:
And although it is impossible for you to
stand,
fear nothing; but if you wish to
stand, withdraw to the Existence, and you will
find it standing and at rest after the likeness
of the One who is truly at rest...And when
you becomes perfect in that place, still yourself...
(Allogenes)
The Gnostic then reveals, "There was within me
a stillness of silence, and I heard the Blessedness
whereby I knew my proper self" (Allogenes).
When Neo realizes the full extent of his "saving
gnosis," that the matrix is only a dream world, a
reflective Keanu Reeves silently and calmly
contemplates the bullets that he has stopped in
mid-air, filmed in "Bullet Time."
Yet another parallel with Gnosticism occurs in
the portrayal of the agents such as
Agent Smith, and
their opposition to the equivalent of the Gnostics -
that is, Neo and anyone else attempting to leave the
matrix. A.I. created these artificial programs to be
"the gatekeepers - they are guarding all the doors,
they are holding all the keys." These agents are
akin to the jealous archons created by Yaldabaoth
who block the ascent of the Gnostic as he/she tries
to leave the material realm and guard the gates of
the successive levels of heaven (e.g.,
Apocalypse
of Paul).
However, as Morpheus predicts, Neo is
eventually able to defeat the agents because while
they must adhere to the rules of the matrix, his
human mind
allows him to bend or break these
rules. Mind, though, is not equated in the film
merely with rational intelligence, otherwise
Artificial Intelligence would win every time.
Rather, the concept of "mind" in the film appears to
point to a uniquely human capacity for imagination,
for intuition, (circuits 5 thru
8) or, as the phrase goes, for "thinking
outside the box." Both the film and the Gnostics
assert that the "divine spark" within humans allows
a perception of gnosis
greater than that
achievable by even the chief archon / agent of
Yaldabaoth:
And the power of the mother [Sophia, in our
analogy, humankind] went out of Yaldabaoth [ A.I. ]
into the natural body which they had fashioned [the
humans grown on farms by A.I.]... And in that moment
the rest of the powers [archons / agents ] became
jealous, because he had come into being through all
of them and they had given their power to the man,
and his intelligence ["mind"] was greater than that
of those who had made him, and greater than that of
the chief archon [Agent Smith?]. And when they
recognized that he was luminous,and that he could
think better than they... they took him and
threw him into the lowest region of all matter
[simulated by the matrix]. (Apocry. of John
19-20)
It is striking that Neo overcomes Agent Smith
in the final showdown of the film precisely by
realizing fully the
illusion of the matrix,
something the agent apparently cannot do, since Neo
is subsequently able to break rules that the agent
cannot. His final defeat of Smith entails entering
Smith's body and splitting him in pieces by means of
pure luminosity, portrayed through special effects
as light shattering Smith from the inside out.
Overall, then, the system portrayed in
The
Matrix parallels Gnostic Christianity in
numerous respects, especially the delineation of
humanity's fundamental problem of existing in a
dream world that
simulates reality and the solution
of waking up from illusion. The central mythic
figures of Sophia, 
Yaldabaoth, the archons and the
Gnostic Christ redeemer also each find parallels
with key figures in the film and function in similar
ways. The language of Gnosticism and the film are
even similar: dreaming vs. waking; blindness vs.
seeing; light vs. dark.
However, given that Gnosticism presumes an
entire unseen realm of divine beings,
where is God
in the film? In other words, when Neo becomes sheer
light, is this a symbol for divinity, or for human
potential? The question becomes even more pertinent
with the identification of humankind with Sophia - a
divine being in Gnosticism. On one level, there
appears to be no God in the film. Although there are
apocalyptic motifs,
Conrad Ostwalt rightly argues
that unlike conventional Christian apocalypses, in
The Matrix both the catastrophe and its
solution are of human making - that is, the divine
is not apparent. However, on another level, the film
does open up the possibility of a God through
the figure of the Oracle, who dwells inside the
matrix and yet has access to information about the
future that even those free from the matrix do not
possess. This suggestion is even stronger in the
original screenplay, in which the Oracle's apartment
is the Holy of Holies nested within the "Temple of
Zion." Divinity may also play a role in Neo's past
incarnation and his coming again as the One. If,
however, there is some implied divinity in the film,
it remains transcendent, like the divinity of the
ineffable, invisible supreme god in Gnosticism,
except where it is immanent in the form of the
divine spark active in humans.
Buddhism in The Matrix
When asked by a
fan if Buddhist ideas
influenced them in the production of the movie, the Wachowski brothers offered an unqualified "Yes."
Indeed, Buddhist ideas pervade the film and appear
in close proximity with the equally strong Christian
imagery. Almost immediately after Neo is identified
as "my own personal Jesus Christ," this appellation
is given a distinctively Buddhist twist. The same
hacker says: "This never happened. You don't exist."
From the stupa-like pods which encase humans in the
horrific mechanistic fields to
Cypher's selfish
desire for the sensations and pleasures of the
matrix, Buddhist teachings form a foundation for
much of the film's plot and imagery.
The
Problem of Samsara. Even the title of the
film evokes the Buddhist worldview. The matrix is
described by Morpheus as "a
prison for your mind."
It is a dependent "construct" made up of the
interlocking digital projections of billions of
human beings who are unaware of the illusory nature
of the reality in which they live
and are completely
dependent on the hardware attached to their real
bodies and the elaborate software programs created
by A.I. This "construct" resembles the Buddhist idea
of
samsara, which teaches that the world in
which we live our daily lives is constructed only
from the sensory projections formulated from our own
desires. When Morpheus takes Neo into the
"construct" to teach him about the matrix, Neo
learns that the way in which he had perceived
himself in the matrix was nothing more than "the
mental projection of your digital self." The "real"
world, which we associate with what we feel, smell,
taste, and see, "is simply electrical signals
interpreted by your brain."
The world, Morpheus
explains, exists "now only as part of a neural
interactive simulation that we call the matrix." In
Buddhist terms, we could say that "because it is
empty of self or of what belongs to self, it is
therefore said: 'The world is empty.' And what is
empty of self and what belongs to self? The eye,
material shapes, visual consciousness, impression on
the eye -- all these are empty of self and of what
belongs to self." According to Buddhism and
according to The Matrix, the conviction of
reality based upon sensory experience, ignorance,
and desire keeps humans locked in illusion until
they are able to recognize the false nature of
reality and relinquish their mistaken sense of
identity.
Drawing upon the Buddhist doctrine of
Dependent Co-Origination, the film presents reality
within the matrix as a conglomerate of the illusions
of all humans caught within its snare. Similarly,
Buddhism teaches that the suffering of human beings
is dependent upon a cycle of ignorance and desire
which locks humans into a repetitive cycle of birth,
death, and rebirth. The principle is stated in a
short formula in the Samyutta-nikaya:
If this is that
comes to be;
from the arising of this that arises;
if this is not that does not come to be;
from the stopping of this that is stopped.
The idea of Dependent Co-Origination is
illustrated in the context of the film through the
illusion of the matrix. The viability of the
matrix's illusion depends upon the
belief by those
enmeshed in it that the matrix itself
is
reality. A.I.'s software program is, in and of
itself, no illusion at all. Only when humans
interact with its programs do they become
enmeshed in a corporately-created illusion, the
matrix, or samsara, which reinforces itself
through the interactions of those beings involved
within it. Thus the matrix's reality only exists
when actual human minds subjectively experience its
programs.
The problem, then, can be seen in Buddhist
terms. Humans are trapped in a cycle of illusion,
and their
ignorance of this cycle keeps them locked
in it, fully dependent upon their own interactions
with the program and the illusions of sensory
experience which these provide, and the sensory
projections of others. These projections are
strengthened by humans' enormous desire to believe
that what they perceive to be real is in fact real.
This desire is so strong that it overcomes
Cypher,
who can no longer tolerate the "desert of the real"
and asks to be reinserted into the matrix. As he
sits with Agent Smith in an upscale restaurant
smoking a cigar with a large glass of brandy, Cypher
explains his motives:
"You know, I know this steak doesn't exist. I
know that when I put it in my mouth, the matrix is
telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious.
After nine years, you know what I realize? Ignorance
is bliss."
Cypher knows that the matrix is not real and
that any pleasures he experiences there are
illusory. Yet for him, the "ignorance" of
samsara
is preferable to enlightenment. Denying the reality
that he now experiences
beyond the matrix, he uses
the double negative: "I don't want to remember
nothing. Nothing. And I want to be rich. Someone
important. Like an actor." Not only does Cypher want
to forget the "nothing" of true reality, but he also
wants to be an "actor," to add another level of
illusion to the illusion of the matrix that he is
choosing to re-enter. The draw of samsara is
so strong that not only does Cypher give in to his
cravings, but
Mouse also may be said to have been
overwhelmed by the lures of samsara, since
his death is at least in part due to distractions
brought on by his sexual fantasies about the "woman
in the red dress" which occupy him when he is
supposed to be standing alert.
Whereas Cypher and Mouse represent what
happens when one gives in to samsara, the
rest of the crew epitomize the restraint and
composure praised by the Buddha. The scene shifts
abruptly from the restaurant to the mess hall of the
Nebuchadnezzar, where instead of being offered
brandy, cigars and steak, Neo is given the "bowl of
snot" which is to be his regular meal from that
point forward. In contrast to the pleasures which
for Cypher can only be fulfilled in the matrix, Neo
and the crew must be content with the "single-celled
protein combined with synthetic aminos, vitamins,
and minerals" which Dozer claims is "everything the
body needs." Clad in threadbare clothes, subsisting
on gruel, and sleeping in bare cells, the crew is
depicted enacting the
Middle Way taught by the
Buddha, allowing neither absolute asceticism nor
indulgence to distract them from their work.
The Solution of Knowledge/Enlightenment.
This duality between the matrix and the reality
beyond it sets up the ultimate goal of the rebels,
which is to
free all minds from the matrix and allow
humans to live out their lives in the real world
beyond. In making this point, the film-makers draw
on both Theravada and Mahayana Buddhist ideas.
Alluding to the Theravada ideal of the
arhat,
the film suggests that enlightenment is achieved
through individual effort. As his initial guide,
Morpheus makes it clear that Neo cannot depend upon
him for enlightenment. Morpheus explains, "no one
can be told what the matrix is. You have to see it
for yourself." Morpheus tells Neo he must make the
final shift in perception entirely on his own. He
says: "I'm trying to free your mind, Neo. But I can
only show you the door. You're the one that has to
walk through it." For
Theravada Buddhists, "man's
emancipation depends on his own realization of the
Truth, and not on the benevolent grace of a god or
any external power as a reward for his obedient good
behavior." The
Dhammapada urges the one
seeking enlightenment to "Free thyself from the
past, free thyself from the future, free thyself
from the present. Crossing to the farther shore of
existence, with mind released everywhere, no more
shalt thou come to birth and decay." As Morpheus says to Neo, "There's a
difference between knowing the path and walking the
path." And as the Buddha taught his followers, "You
yourselves should make the effort; the Awakened Ones
are only teachers." As one already on the path to
enlightenment, Morpheus is only a guide; ultimately
Neo must recognize the truth for himself.
Yet
The Matrix also embraces ideas
found in
Mahayana Buddhism, especially in its
particular concern for liberation for all people
through the guidance of those who remain in samsara and postpone their own final
enlightenment in order to help others as
bodhisattvas. The crew members of the
Nebuchadnezzar epitomize this compassion. Rather
than remain outside of the matrix where they are
safer, they choose to re-enter it repeatedly as
ambassadors of knowledge with the ultimate goal of
freeing the minds and eventually also the bodies of
those who are trapped within the Matrix's digital
web. The film attempts to blend the Theravada ideal
of the arhat with 
the Mahayana ideal of the
bodhisattva, presenting the crew as concerned
for those still stuck in the matrix and willing to
re-enter the matrix to help them, while
simultaneously arguing that final realization is an
individual process.
Neo as the Buddha. Although the entire
crew embodies the ideals of the bodhisattva,
the filmmakers set Neo apart as unique, suggesting
that while the crew may be looked at as arhats
and bodhisattvas, Neo can be seen as a
Buddha. Neo's identity as the Buddha is reinforced
not only through the anagram of his name but also
through the myth that surrounds him. The oracle has
foretold the return of one who has the ability to
manipulate the matrix. As Morpheus explains, the
return of this man "would hail the destruction of
the matrix, end the war, bring freedom to our
people. That is why there are those of us who have
spent our entire lives searching the matrix, looking
for him." Neo, Morpheus believes, is a reincarnation
of that man and like the Buddha, he will be endowed
with
extraordinary powers to aid in the
enlightenment of all humanity.
The idea that Neo can be seen as a
reincarnation of the Buddha is reinforced by the
prevalence of birth imagery in the film directly
related to him. At least four incarnations are
perceptible in the film. The first birth took place
in the pre-history of the film, in the life and
death of the first enlightened one who was able to
control the matrix from within. The second consists
of Neo's life as
Thomas Anderson. The third begins
when Neo emerges, gasping, from the gel of the
eerily stupa-like pod in which he has been encased,
and is unplugged and dropped through a large black
tube which can easily be seen as a birth canal. He
emerges at the bottom bald, naked, and confused,
with eyes that Morpheus tells him have "never been
used" before. Having "died" to the world of the
matrix, Neo has been "reborn" into the world beyond
it. Neo's fourth life begins after he dies and is
"reborn" again in the closing scenes of the film, as
Trinity resuscitates him with a kiss. At this point,
Neo perceives not only the limitations of the
matrix, but also the limitations of the world of the
Nebuchadnezzar, since he overcomes death in both
realms. Like the Buddha, his enlightenment grants
him
omniscience and he is no longer under the power
of the matrix, nor is he subject to birth, death,
and rebirth within A.I.'s mechanical construct.
Neo, like the Buddha, seeks to be free from
the matrix and to teach others how to free
themselves from it as well, and any use of
superhuman powers are engaged to that end. As the
only human being since the first enlightened one who
is able to freely manipulate the software of the
matrix from within its confines, Neo represents the
actualization of the
Buddha-nature, one who can not
only recognize the "origin of pain in the world of
living beings," but who can also envision "the
stopping of the pain," enacting "that course which
leads to its stopping." In this sense, he is more
than his bodhisattva companions, and offers
the hope of awakening and freedom for all humans
from the ignorance that binds them.
The Problem of Nirvana.
But what
happens when the matrix's version of reality is
dissolved? Buddhism teaches that when
samsara
is transcended,
nirvana is attained. The
notion of self is completely lost, so that
conditional reality fades away, and what remains, if
anything, defies the ability of language to
describe. In his re-entry into the matrix, however,
Neo retains the "residual self-image" and the
"mental projection of [a] digital self." Upon
"enlightenment," he finds himself not in
nirvana,
or no-where, but in a different
place with an
intact, if somewhat confused, sense of self which
strongly resembles his "self" within the matrix.
Trinity may be right that the matrix "cannot tell
you who you are," but who you are seems to be at
least in some sense related to who you think you are
in the matrix. In other words, there is enough
continuity in self-identity between the world of the
matrix and "the
desert of the real" that it seems
probable that the authors are implying that full
"enlightenment" has not yet been reached and must
lie beyond the reality of the Nebuchadnezzar and the
world it inhabits. If the Buddhist paradigm is
followed to its logical conclusions, then we have to
expect at least
one more layer of "reality" beyond
the world of the crew, since even freed from the
matrix they are still subject to suffering and death
and still exhibit individual egos.
This idea is reinforced by what may be the
most problematic alteration which The Matrix
makes to traditional Buddhist teachings. The
Buddhist doctrine of
ahimsa, or non-injury to
all living beings, is overtly contradicted in the
film. It appears as if the filmmakers deliberately
chose to link
violence with salvific knowledge,
since there seems to be no way that the crew could
succeed without the help of weaponry. When
Tank asks
Neo and Trinity what they need for their rescue of Morpheus "besides a
miracle," their reply is
instantaneous: "Guns -- lots of guns." The writers
could easily have presented the "deaths" of the
agents as nothing more than the ending of that
particular part of the software program. Instead,
the Wachowski brothers have purposefully chosen to
portray humans as innocent victims of the violent
deaths of the agents. This outright violation of ahimsa stands at direct odds with the Buddhist
ideal of compassion.
But why link knowledge so directly with
violence? The filmmakers portray violence as
redemptive, and as absolutely essential to the
success of the rebels. The Matrix steers
sharply away at this point from the
shared paradigms
of Buddhism and Gnostic Christianity. The "reality"
of the matrix which requires that some humans must
die as victims of salvific violence is not the
ultimate reality to which Buddhism or Gnostic
Christianity points. Neither the "stillness" of the
pleroma nor the unchanging "nothingness" of
nirvana
are characterized by the dependence on
technology and the use of force which so
characterizes both
of the worlds of the
rebels in The Matrix.
The film's explicit association of knowledge
with violence strongly implies that Neo and his
comrades have not yet realized the ultimate reality.
According to the
worldviews of both Gnostic
Christianity and Buddhism that the film evokes, the
realization of ultimate reality involves a complete
freedom from the material realm and offers peace of
mind. The Wachowskis themselves acknowledge that it
is "ironic that Morpheus and his crew are completely
dependent upon technology and computers, the very
evils against which they are fighting." Indeed, the
film's very existence depends upon both technology's
capabilities and Hollywood's hunger for violence.
Negating itself, The Matrix teaches that
nirvana is still beyond our reach.
Concluding Remarks
Whether we view the film from a Gnostic
Christian or Buddhist perspective, the overwhelming
message seems to be, "Wake up!" The point is made
explicit in the final song of the film,
Wake Up!,
by, appropriately,
Rage Against the Machine.
Gnosticism, Buddhism and the film all agree that
ignorance enslaves us in an illusory material world
and that liberation comes through enlightenment with
the aid of a teacher or guide figure. However, when
we ask the question, "To what
do we awaken?",
the film appears to diverge sharply from Gnosticism
and Buddhism. Both of these traditions maintain that
when humans awaken, they leave behind the material
world. The Gnostic ascends at death to the pleroma,
the divine plane of spiritual, non-material
existence, and the enlightened one in Buddhism
achieves nirvana, a state which cannot be
described in language, but which is utterly
non-material. By contrast, the "desert of the real,"
is a wholly material, technological world, in which
robots grow humans for energy, Neo can learn martial
arts in seconds through a
socket inserted into the
back of his brain, and technology battles technology
(Nebuchadnezzar vs. A.I., electromagnetic pulse vs.
sentinels). Moreover, the battle against the matrix
is itself made possible through technology - cell
phones, computers, software training programs.
"Waking up" in the film is leaving behind the matrix
and awakening to a dismal cyber-world, which is the
real material world.
Or perhaps not. There are several cinematic
clues in the scene of the construct loading program
(represented by white space) that suggest that the
"desert of the real" Morpheus shows Neo may not be
the
ultimate reality. After all, Morpheus, whose
name is taken from the god of dreams, shows the
"real" world to Neo, who never directly views the
surface world himself. Rather, he sees it on a
television bearing the logo "Deep Image." Throughout
the film, reflections in mirrors and Morpheus'
glasses, as well as images on television monitors
point the viewer toward consideration of multiple
levels of illusion. As the camera zooms in to the
picture on this particular television and the viewer
"enters" the image, it "morphs" the way the
surveillance screens do early in the film,
indicating its unreality. In addition, the entire
episode takes place while they stand in a construct
loading program in which Neo is warned not to be
tricked by appearances. Although sense perception is
clearly not a reliable source for establishing
reality, Morpheus himself admits that "For a long
time I wouldn't believe it, and then I saw
the fields [of humans grown for energy] with my
own eyes... And standing there, I came to realize
the obviousness of the truth." We will have to
await the
sequel to find out whether "the desert of
the real" is itself real.
Even if the film series does not ultimately
establish a complete rejection of the material
realm, The Matrix
as it stands still asserts
the superiority of the human capacity for
imagination and realization over the limited
"intelligence" of technology. Whether stated in
terms of matter/ spirit, body/ mind, hardware/
software or illusion/ truth, the ultimate message of
The Matrix
seems to be that there may be
levels of metaphysical reality beyond what we can
ordinarily perceive, and the film urges us to open
ourselves to the possibility of awakening to them.
