Christian Shepard...What the???

Please discuss what you think of him as a person, character, smoke monster, or whatever comes to mind. I think he was a very interesting character on the show and would be a bit disappointed to find out if he was the smoke monster the whole time. I think the writers left it up for interpretation. I believe that he was Christian spirits sometimes in appearance and was sometimes the smoke monster. I would like to think that Christian was trying to make amends with Jack through his spirit since he was such an A-hole during his real life. The final forgiveness was at the end of the show when they embraced on buried the hatchet.