Religious Satire
Mike, the man from Mars, realizes that humans can be psychologically manipulated and exploited through the power of organized religion. He founds his religion upon certain Christian rites and rituals as a means of controlling large masses of people through what amounts to a hypnotic suggestibility based on myth and lies. Religion is essentially a con game used to dupe chumps. An essential component of this satire, however, is the underlying truth that shared spiritualism is also a legitimate way to stimulate feelings of brotherhood and unity.
Libertarian Politics
It is somewhat ironic that Stranger in a Strange Land is the book which catapulted science fiction squarely into mainstream. Selling millions in the 1960’s, Heinlein’s book was a member of that exclusive club which ranged from Hesse’s Steppenwolf to Heller’s Catch-22 which caught the zeitgeist of the counter-cultural revolution. The author’s politics significantly misread by the youth culture which embraced its messages of alienated outsider and free love are actually unabashedly conservative libertarian. The ironic creation of a new religion intended to condemn the unfair balance of rights and liberties given to groups over individuals was instead taken literally as a blueprint for establishment of a new church. The imposition of beliefs by authoritarian systems is really what is at the heart of the promiscuity, public nudity and unabashed rejection of conventional social mores regarding sex. This is an expression of a libertarian perspective toward personal freedom that would become an essential thematic element in most of Heinlein’s important novels.
Christian Allegory
Like many science fiction stories about advanced aliens who come into conflict with earth’s institutions of oppression, the titular stranger takes on a Christ-like aspect in this strange land. While that usually starts out pretty well for the alien—lots of attention and power—the story inscribed to reach an ending of some sort of sacrifice. Either the alien must sacrifice his followers and escape back to his planet or he must come the sacrifice himself. Alas, this Martian is phoning home.
Identity
Mike is an earthling raised by Martians sent to earth with Martian powers observe and bring back information. He truly is a stranger in a strange land where identity is more based on cultural assimilation than genetics. The portrait of the man from Mars as an outsider both at home and on earth, stuck halfway between two cultures and belonging fully to none was a theme that hit at just the right moment in history as cultural assumptions and prejudices based on genetic encoding were starting to be annihilated under the pressure of the strength of progressive issues and agenda at work in the 1960’s.
