SPECULATION Luke, Yoda and the Gray Jedi of the Old Republic!

I like the theory, but I have issues with this idea the PT Jedi where somehow completely false Jedi. First, in 800 years Yoda couldn't have figured that out. I mean Luke learns in 30 years what Yoda blindly ignored for hundreds of years?

If that's true, then Yoda and Kenobi even are vastly diminished as Jedi Knight and characters of good. It's one think to miss the evil right under your nose. That can be done because you want to see the good and both seemingly had done good things. Palpitine didn't appear evil, but that hardily says the 800 or whatever years Yoda was a Jedi master needs to be seen as one giant mistake.

I actually just posted about this, but I'm leaning towards Luke telling Rey that the enemy they face is the anti-Jedi sentimate.

--- Double Post Merged, Apr 28, 2017, Original Post Date: Apr 28, 2017 ---

I don't me to takes sides in a good debate, but something you say don't make sense. When Yoda and Kenobi went into exhike the entire republic had bee defeated. The Jedi were all presumed dead. They did all the could to make sure they'd have a future shot at turning it around. Yoda could feel the depths of their defeat.

However, we don't know when they learned of the rebellion. Both were exiled. And showing themselves too soon could be bad. For all we know they communicated. And NO, they were not cowards who sat idle. Yoda was 800+ years old. He was hiding to make sure he lived long enough to trim another. In that time he clearly started to go a little old guy like.

But before that he trained Kanan and Ezra in rebels, or helped them get training. Who knows how many ways like that he helped the rebellion. By helping Kanan and Ezra, he helped Hera, Wren, Chopper, Sabine and Zeb.

We also know Kenobi killed Maul, and kept watch over the very guy who'd eventually lead to the end of the Sith. No small feat. Definitely not cowardly.

I mean with thus with all due respect, but I think the idea that Yoda and Kenobi were doing nothing when they could be doing more is silly. Rebels shown us how trickle it was to create the rebellion.

I mean this is to deny they survived the Jedi purge and lived long enough to bring about the New Hope, something most Jedi hadn't. And we don't even know the full extent of their deeds. Revels has fleshed out some.

I imagine a Kenobi movie will flesh out more.

Personally I don't think it's a new order, I think people may be reading into it too much. But who knows. I don't think LFL is going to diminish the legacy of Yoda and Kenobi by turning them into some flawed Jedi that leads to Luke becoming the ultimate Jedi apostate.

In my opinion that is hard to justify and difficult for the average viewer to understand.

 

I agree mostly with this. The big mistake of the Jedi was cutting themselves off from the living Force. They should've all been more like Qui Gon. His advice to kenobi in those opening moments of TPM were telling:

Kenobi: But master Yoda said I should be mindful of the future
Jinn: But not at the expense of the moment. Be mindful of the living Force young padawan.

Essentially, the Jedi had not real challenge to their power and became arrogant. They became detached from the living Force, largely because they didn't need to be mindful of it - or so they thought. They hadn't realised the Sith had adapted and were patiently eroding the Republic from within - creating corruption where they could, undermining democracy. The Jedi walked right into the trap. Again, Qui Gon said it all in TPM:

Jinn: I can only protect you, I cannot fight a war for you.

Now sure, he's probably just being practical there but I think there is more behind that statement, narratively if not anything else. However, this isn't to say the Jedi themselves were not well intentioned. They truly were. They cared about the galaxy. About the Republic. If they did not, then they would've left the order (like the Lost Twenty did). But they had simply become too arrogant and cut off. Does this make them "grey Jedi"? I wouldn't go that far. Of course, that term for me is bogus anyway. If anyone is grey, it is a person who has yet to fully commit to one side of the Force and finds themselves in the middle, conflicted, vulnerable. But as much as their hearts were in the right place, it cannot be disputed that their actions did empower the Dark Side. And so it would be fair to say that the Jedi were not at this point the paradigms of light that they should be.

You need to look at the bigger picture.
Palpatine had just become Emperor. He commanded a huge army. There was no opposite. Nothing in place to take over. The Senate corrupted. The Jedi massively vulnerable. Palpatine wouldn't allow himself to be in a vulnerable position again (Yoda took him by surprise). Whether Yoda heard the Force tell him to leave or not, it was the sensible thing to do. It was the right thing to do. Yoda isn't all powerful. And by going into exile, he was able to see the rise of the Rebellion and train the offspring of the most powerful Jedi in history.

But that is the point about how they trained - they taught Luke to trust his feelings and how to reject the Dark Side. Did Yoda and Kenobi want Luke to kill Vader? Probably. They thought that was likely the only way of defeating the Sith. But they didn't train him to be a warrior. They trained him to connect to the Force through the light side - through compassion, selflessness, discipline, patience and love. This is where Yoda changed the Jedi. Before hand, he would've just trained Luke from birth, ignored what the living Force was telling him, trained a warrior etc. That was not how the Force willed it. And by doing it as the Force guided him to, we see that they were successful.

Going back to Yoda telling Luke that he must confront Vader if he is to become a Jedi - that for me is the most important line. Yoda didn't know how events would play out. He didn't know the scenario that awaited Luke on the Death Star. He probably didn't even know Luke was going to surrender himself. All he did was hope that he had trained Luke well enough so he could see when the Dark Side was taking over him and he could reject it. Yoda believed that if Luke could defeat the Dark Side, then as a Jedi he could find a way to defeat the Sith. There wasn't anything measurable in that. Unlike in the PT, he wasn't trying to control everything. He simply trusted in the Force. He taught Luke not "the basics" but the core principles of being a Jedi. But following these principles, Luke rejected the Dark Side and this action ultimately saved the galaxy.

And risk the Rebellion and his own life?

The Force cannot act alone. It needs those willing to listen to it and fulfil its will.

Huh? Had he told Luke there and then that Vader was his father, this would've shattered Luke and events wouldn't have worked out as they did. That had nothing to do with the Force and everything to do with Kenobi being a wise mentor.

And likely failed. And if he failed, then that is one less person to help Luke and fight the Sith when the Force willed it.

Luke was the last hope. His power and connection to the Force was key to defeating the Sith. Kenobi did as the Force willed. Going off and finding random Jedi wouldn't have helped. It would've been a pointless risk.

And it turns out he was right...

You say they were flawed because they were cut off from the living Force in the PT but then when they simply trust in the living Force after ROTS you say they were wrong then?

Why on Earth would the Jedi be doomed to fail? You admit you can't think why or indeed what the Jedi could become - doesn't that say something? For me the Jedi must always exist because the Dark Side always exists and there will be those that seek to use the Dark Side to take over. The Jedi represent the best of the light side. They will lose sometimes. The balance will go back and forth. It is a constant struggle. A constant fight (as Maz points out in TFA). But without the Jedi there can be no balance in the Force - those that wield the Dark Side will take over if those that represent the core principles of the light side aren't there to stop them.

I foresee Luke building a very different Jedi Order, but Jedi nevertheless. Likely a smaller group of highly trained individuals who have experienced in life the true dangers of the Dark Side and have come through the other side. Not a huge order of automatons. Not some dogmatic, rigid, arrogant order - but a group that is fully attuned to the will of the Force and is capable of doing what it requires.

 

One area that make this analysis harder is that it is mentioned that the Jedi were cut off from their ability to foresee events. They were cut off in some way from a level of insight that they were normally used to. Yoda and Mace speak of it. Now they are concerned if they share their vulnerability elements of the senate will use it to undermine their efforts. But it should be a part of any discussion of what went wrong. It wasn't only hubirs and complacency.

 

I think that again though was their connection to the cosmic rather than living Force.
The living Force connects the Jedi to everyone and everything, but the cosmic gives them this power of foresight.
"The Dark Side clouds everything, impossible to see, the future is".

And so when they had become overly reliant upon this power to see the future they were caught on the back-foot.
For centuries the Force was balanced and the Jedi could look into the future to help them in the present. But now it was all clouded.
They were blinded, partly of their own making because they were too detached from the living Force. Had they heeded Qui Gon's advice, they perhaps would've made better choices when the Sith emerged.

But this is another sign of how Yoda changed things:
"Always in motion is the future". Yoda accepted more readily that the future cannot be controlled. That things are always changing based on decisions made in the moment. This is very different to what the Jedi were like in the PT as we see them relying on their foresight and trying to control everything.

 

They no doubt made some stretegic blunder in the lead up to the purge, but it mostly revolve around the belief in Anakin. Even when Mace went to Anakin to arrest Palpitine, he believed Anakin would do the right thing, which he was trying. But Mace chose to kill Palpitine, and Anakin's emotions took over. He committed acts too dark to come back from. Although later he would.

That wasn't really Kenobi or Yoda fault as Jedi, it was their fault of misreading the prophecy.

And I don't question Yoda choice to go into exile, it eventually worked. If they took another path from a place of defeate, they could have compounded the tragedy.

What if him and Kenobi went to face Anakin and Vader at a earlier time, and failed. What if Kenobi failed to protect Luke--we don't know to what extent that job was. Maul went after Kenobi, but what if the Holicron would have shown him Luke instead, since Kenobi was killed. Maul trains Luke in thebways of the dark side and takes on Vader and gets revenge on the emperor. That doesn't serve the Jedi.

It's easy to judge actions in hindsight, but for every action is a reaction. If Yoda and Kenobi try to get the empire right away and die, all hope could be lost. The ghosts crew, Luke, Leia, and Hon could fail.

--- Double Post Merged, Apr 28, 2017, Original Post Date: Apr 28, 2017 ---

But wasn't it Qui Gon who made the original mistake of getting Anakin trained in the first place. And then getting Kenobi to act in accordance to that wish. He begun the chain of events that led to the purge.

And maybe the prophecy was misread, but Anakin was still the chosen one. He was far too powerful in the force, maybe Palpitine finds him and he creates Vader without the obvious handicaps. That's a powerful Sith.

My only real point is that Yoda and Kenobi went into exhale because it's the only option they had while holding onto the future. The Sith had just created a powerful empire and they were the FBI most wanted.

 

But that could again be because of the Jedi's detachment from the living Force - they didn't truly understand Anakin's conflict, pain and mindset. Anakin's fault of course, but still - the Jedi were blind to it.

The prophecy wasn't misread. It came true. How it came about however wasn't ever set in stone. Anakin could've brought balance sooner had he chosen but of course, he made the wrong choices.

It wasn't Qui Gon's fault that Anakin fell to the Dark Side (I know you're not saying that). Just saying it wasn't fate. Qui Gon was right about him being the chosen one. In the end, Anakin brought balance. Had Qui Gon not have died, perhaps his stewardship of Anakin would've brought about better results? But the point is that Qui Gon's take on the Jedi was right - and Yoda realised this in ROTS. But yes, it was a dangerous decision Jinn made from a certain pov but ultimately he was right.

The prophecy was just a prediction though - it has no bearing on how the prediction comes to pass. For instance, I could predict that X might die on 22 Dec 2019. The prediction is dependent on that end result - not on what happens up to that point or indeed how it happens.

Indeed. The Jedi did what was right. And the end result proved them to be right.

 

It's interesting to me how they'll handle the misreading if the prophecy. Or whatever they call it. They misread what it meant to bring balance to the force and assumed balance meant no dark side.

As for Qui Gon, it's probably his misreading more than Yoda, who warned against training him. Heck, Yoda was right. He didn't want Anakin trained and he didn't want him to be a master. In my view, Qui Gon and Kenobi kind of pushed it and hold more blame.

 

I disagree. They didn't assume that. They know the light and dark exist together. Balance is the equality of light and dark. The Sith caused imbalance by empowering dark over light and so to the Jedi they believed that in destroying the Sith that light and dark would be balanced again. They were right.

 

I am not saying Jedi are bad just that suppressing emotions may not have been the best way to train living beings to use the Force Powers they were born with. Their ability to use the force was diminished due to hidden Sith.

 

I'm not so sure. It wouldn't be balanced without dark and light, ying and yang. When Anakin refused to take the father's place on the force users planet, the fear was the son would create unbalance by killing the daughter.

When Luke asked Rey what she sees, she says light, dark, balance. She doesn't say light, no dark, balance.

To me balance in the force was always going to be equal light and dark.

How Anakin actually created balance is subjective in some sense.

 

The "paths of the darkside" are motives of greed, power, selfishness and domination. All things that prevent balanced working systems. Uncontrolled unsustainable waste and consumption jeopardizes the balance of ecosystems. Greed, consumption, unchecked materialism, monopolies, and injustice within economies destroy the balance of economies. The balance is a wheel turning in proper sustainable rhythm. The light side practice compassion, encourage sharing and recognition of symbiosis, seek justice, defend those who need to be defended. Its not a scale. Its not a 50/50 diagram. Its not a coin. Its love verses selfishness, sharing verses greed. That's why it was so clearly tied to good and evil. The darkside unchecked kills billions, blows up planets, manipulates and controls economies for their own ends, you get the idea.

 

He also once described it as yin and yang. You can't have the dark without the light and vice versa.

 

Indeed. But I didn't say balance = equal Jedi and Sith. We even used to debate this point together in a past thread.
My view on the balance is that good and evil always exist. You can't do away with evil. You can't do away with the Dark Side. People will always be greedy. There will always be people that have "evil thoughts" and do bad things. Most people commit bad things at some point.
The thing with the balance is that this is disrupted when powerful people or groups who use the Dark Side empower evil over good in the galaxy. When they spread evil everywhere. The Sith were very good at this, hence why their destruction lead to balance. Evil wasn't destroyed. But the powerful beings that were oppressing the galaxy were - and thus the equality between good and evil returned.

I think it is obvious that [Qui-Gon] was wrong in Episode I and made a dangerous decision, but ultimately this decision may be correct. The “phantom menace” refers to the force of the dark side of the universe. Anakin will be taken over by dark forces which in turn destroy the balance of the Galaxy, but the individual who kills the Emperor is Darth Vader—also Anakin. The tale meanders and both the prediction and Qui-Gon are correct—Anakin is the chosen one, and he did bring peace at last with his own sacrifice. Luke couldn't kill the Emperor himself, but he could make Anakin reflect on his life and kill the Emperor.
— George Lucas, Cut Magazine, 1999

If good and evil are mixed things become blurred - there is nothing between good and evil, everything is grey. In each of us we have balanced these emotions, and in the Star Wars saga the most important point is balance, balance between everything. It is dangerous to lose this. In The Phantom Menace one of the Jedi Council already knows the balance of The Force is starting to slip, and will slip further. It is obvious to this person that The Sith are going to destroy this balance. On the other hand a prediction which is referred to states someone will replace the balance in the future. At the right time a balance may again be created, but presently it is being eroded by dark forces. All of this shall be explained in Episode 2, so I can't say any more!
- CUT interview 09/07/99?

The film is ultimately about the dark side and the light side, and those sides are designed around compassion and greed. The issue of greed, of getting things and owning things and having things and not being able to let go of things, is the opposite of compassion - of not thinking of yourself all the time. These are the two sides - the good force and the bad force. They're the simplest parts of a complex cosmic construction.
- Time interview (Bill Moyers) 03/05/99

So for me, those that use the Dark Side are the cancer. The Sith are the cancer. The Jedi are the cure. The Jedi don't seek to destroy all evil in the universe. They just look to maintain the balance which means taking out any threat that poses a risk to this delicate balance.

That's what I said!

That's another way of looking at it though I don't think this is how it works. The Dark Side will always exist. You can't get rid of greed in the universe. The Dark is needed for the light to exist. If there was no suffering there would be no compassion. However, the role of the Jedi is to ensure that the dark side doesn't overpower the light and take over the galaxy. That is why the Jedi must remain in the light - for if they didn't they wouldn't be able to combat the Dark Side. They would just add to it.

I don't believe Lucas meant "get rid of all evil" but rather he was referring to the Sith. As we see in other interviews, he talks about balance between light and dark. And like I say, you can't get rid of all evil in the universe. Evil will always exist. The Jedi just try and ensure that it remains balanced with good/light so that the dark side doesn't oppress the galaxy.

 

But we know there are other groups who use the dark side yet balance was restored when the Sith were destroyed. This can only mean that the Sith caused the imbalance by spreading evil across the galaxy and that other dark side users simply weren't spreading enough evil to tip the balance.

It's also the case that every living person connects to the Force to some extent. So anyone that does something evil empowers the dark side. This is why the clone wars caused the greatest imbalance - evil was everywhere. It's not just about force users. The Empire and FO empower and use the dark side.

There will always be people doing evil things and empowering the dark side. The Jedi have to first stop those who have the power to spread evil far and wide - be it a force wielding dark sider or someone like Tarkin, Hux or Thrawn. I think this makes it clear that balance = equality of light and dark.