Jediism, The Religion Of The Jedi, The Force is strong with this one... Options

Just when you think you've seen it all...

http://www.thejediismway.org/

While many see it as a joke, a small minority of people have truly adopted "The Force" as their religion and its early practitioners called it "Jedi," as George Lucas didn't give a name for the religion that the Sith and Jedi practiced. Though a new movement has decided to call it "Jediism."

This has got me thinking. What if more people started to believe in it? What if in 20 or 30 years enough devout followers adopted this as their religion that their combined faith and energy pooled together to bring the Force into existence? Do you think it would come into existence? If it did, would you try to master its ways? Merely hypothetical conjecture for now, as, in my opinion, it is too new of a religion to have any real power. But what about in a few decades? Lucas did admit that he based most of his ideas for the Force on Taoism.

Your thoughts?

This post has been edited by Slayden: Jul 15 2007, 06:45 AM

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Very good points. I tend to agree with you for the most part. My personal beliefs, however, don't include the "we're all one unified being" aspect. Connected maybe, but I believe that we are all individuals independent from each other. We can interact with each other, travel through and use the astral, and perform supernatural feats, but I don't think we are our own gods and that we are all one god and that the cosmos and everything in it are all one... thing.

When it comes to Jediism, I agree that the Force already exists but works a little differently than in Star Wars and goes by differnt names. However, since there are some differences between what already exists and the Star Wars version, my curiosity is sparked at the possibility of these people creating a different "sub-plain" to the plains within the astral realm that more closely resembles the Force in Star Wars, complete with negative and positive aspects (Lightside/Darkside) that influence its followers, though I doubt to the degree of influence found in the fiction.

As a side question, Vagrent Dreamer, what is the difference in the philosophies between the New Jedi Order and the Old Republic Jedi? I never delved that deeply into Star Wars other than from the movies and games. I played KotOR I and II, and I played Jedi Knight II and III, so some idea on what the differences are, but I'd like to hear it from you since you got into it so much more deeply than I have.

I got into White Wolf's The World of Darkness pen and paper RPG series instead. Ironically, Demon: The Fallen was my favorite, followed by Vampire: The Masquerade and Wraith: The Oblivion. Mage: The Ascension, Hunter: The Reconing, Mummy: The Resurection, and Kindred of the East were all pretty good too, but Changling: The Dreaming was too immature for my tastes. I have almost the entire three- or four-hundred some odd number of books in the WoD series on PDF, including the novels.
Man this is WAY off-topic. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/offtopic.gif) Ignore my rambling if you like. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blablabla.gif)

When it comes to Jediism, I agree that the Force already exists but works a little differently than in Star Wars and goes by differnt names. However, since there are some differences between what already exists and the Star Wars version, my curiosity is sparked at the possibility of these people creating a different "sub-plain" to the plains within the astral realm that more closely resembles the Force in Star Wars, complete with negative and positive aspects (Lightside/Darkside) that influence its followers, though I doubt to the degree of influence found in the fiction.

To me the biggest difference between Star Wars and our own reality is that we apparently tend to consider things like evocation to be in one category, and psionics/telekinesis in another, whereas to the Jedi, it's basically all just using the Force, irrespective of what you're doing.

In my own head, the Force from the original three films is a fairly direct, but also somewhat simplified analogy for astral space; Qui Gon's talk of "the will of the Force," doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me, in that I would view a being with a will as being something connected to the Force, but not the Force itself.

Without it meaning to, I could see Jediism as essentially being a somewhat more limited version of Buddhism, with maybe a few Western occult elements thrown in. Lucas was, of course, trying to appeal to a Western audience. Yoda to me was fairly clearly inspired by the current Dalai Llama, albeit with a greater degree of arrogance.

As such, while I wouldn't have anything against Jediism as a concept at all, I'd probably prefer to study Buddhism instead; it's purely a case of going straight to the horse's mouth. Given that it also is a much older, organically developed belief system, you'd be likely to find that it has a much deeper and more extensive basis, as well.

As for the question of whether or not the Force will ever come into existence, I'd have to give the Hackish answer, Mu, simply because to me, the Force already does exist. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/starwars.gif)

This post has been edited by Petrus: Aug 30 2008, 12:29 AM

As such, while I wouldn't have anything against Jediism as a concept at all, I'd probably prefer to study Buddhism instead; it's purely a case of going straight to the horse's mouth. Given that it also is a much older, organically developed belief system, you'd be likely to find that it has a much deeper and more extensive basis, as well.

This is purely a matter of preference i suppose. For myself i found Buddhism and Taoism first, and then Jediism close to the same time. At the time it brought together a lot of the things that i admired in those faiths and also allowed me to explore my own personal spirituality, taking elements of all three. I think that while going back to original old sources is important that sometimes it is just as important to explore and build from the past, in a more present oriented way ... in other words creating a new modern spirituality that works. That is what Jediism accomplishes for some. While Jediism isn't as important to me as it was years ago it will always be a part of my background, even if today my personal spiritual practice includes magick, and many other rituals.

As for the question of whether or not the Force will ever come into existence, I'd have to give the Hackish answer, Mu, simply because to me, the Force already does exist. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/starwars.gif)

I agree wholeheartedly.