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Here's some thoughts from Brian on Anakin, the Chosen One, the Sith, and the Jedi.

From: Pendell1    4:14 am
To: Sapphire Princess (Newbirth) unread

Couple points. 

I actually think Anakin WAS the chosen one.  He was supposed to fulfill the role of Nebuchadnezzar. 

Read Jeremiah 25:15-26.   Isreal at the time was completely corrupt, and so were the surrounding nations.  So God appointed Nebuchadnezzar (the king of Sheschach, or Babylon, in the prophecy) to serve the cup of wrath to all the surrounding nations and to Isreal. And when all of them had drunk the cup to the dregs, the king of Babylon would drink it too. 

I see this as a perfect parallel to what the Jedi experienced at Anakin's hand. The Jedi, like ancient Isreal, were at the height of their power -- and they had a beautiful temple. But like the ancient Isrealites, they had lost their way.  In their fear of the dark side, they had allowed themselves to forget the true source of their power, which is compassion. Love. 

Because of this, they had lost touch with the true Light, and they became blinded.   They were no longer aware of the Sith's moves, having lost their foresight to delusion and ASSUMING they knew what the prophecy meant when it meant something else entirely. 

Weeds do not grow in a well-tended garden. The reason Palpatine was able to flourish in the senate and subvert the galaxy as he did was because the Jedi had neglected their watch, fallen asleep, grown complacent and confused. 

As Nebuchadnezzar was to Isreal, so Anakin was to the Jedi -- an instrument of violence to throw down the old, corrupted order and to make room for a new order of Jedi, the one starting with Luke.  One that would remember it's basic principles. One that would try to SAVE those in darkness (like Anakin), not destroy them.

This is a clue that Obi-wan and Yoda never quite latched onto.  Luke had a better sense of the force than they did, for Luke never lost sight of the potential for redemption in his father, and worked for his restoration to the Light. Obi-wan and Yoda had completely lost this faith, and not only advocated that Luke destroy this man, but that they deliberately lied to try to trick him into this choice!  

As I said, the old Order had completely lost it's moorings.   And so Anakin was appointed to be an instrument of wrath, clearing away the old detritus that the Jedi order could be reborn anew.    Darth Vader swept through the galaxy destroying all the Jedi, and he continued to do so until *every last Jedi* of the Old Order was destroyed.  Not until Obi-wan and Yoda were safely in their graves did Darth Vader at last die.  He couldn't. Because if the emperor had been overthrown *at any given point* before this had happened, the Old Order would have re-asserted itself, and it all would have been for nothing. 

When the last of the Old Order had died, the purpose of the Sith was completed.  Now that they had successfully served the cup of wrath to all the galaxy, the time had come for them to drink the cup they had served to so many others.  And so at last Luke had the power and the ability to conquer Vader -- not through the raw, naked force of the Dark Side, but by love and compassion drawing him back to the Light.   And so Anakin, who had been driven to the Dark by the Old Jedi's lack of compassion (remember Yoda's counsel to Anakin in the temple when he was afraid for his wife's death?  It still makes me burn with anger!)  was drawn back to the light by the compassion and love of the new.  He was at last empowered to break the dark servitude he had been enslaved in for decades,  and overthrow his hateful master.   So both the Emperor and Darth Vader died that day -- the one by annihilation of the body, the other by the free choice of Anakin Skywalker to kill that part of himself.

And so Anakin fulfilled the prophecy of bringing balance to the Force. Not only had he successfully destroyed all the Sith, but he also destroyed all the Jedi as well, leaving the galaxy free to become a Republic under the guidance of younger, wiser Jedi.

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And more from the same person:

From: Pendell1    4:34 am 
To: Sapphire Princess (Newbirth) unread

Wanted to add one more thing. 

The novelization explains the whole "bring balance to the Force" thing. 

From the Jedi point of view,  the Dark Side always exists.  It's like a weed.   It doesn't matter whether the Jedi live or don't live. It doesn't matter if every Sith in the galaxy is dead -- still the Dark Side will flourish and grow again, because men (and aliens) are selfish, greedy, self-absorbed, self-centered. 

Evil always exists.  "Balance" happens when evil exists but is kept in check, by the government and by the Jedi.   If the galaxy is a garden, and weeds always exist, the garden is in balance when there are gardeners keeping the weeds in check, uprooting them so that healthy plants can live out their lives without being strangled or crowded out by self-seeking weeds.  There can be no better condition than "balance", because the utter eradication of evil cannot be brought about by human hands. It is part of human nature, and cannot die while humans live.

But when the instruments of Order THEMSELVES become weeds -- then the balance is decisively tipped to the dark.   When the gardeners pull up the healthy plants and allow weeds to grow, then the whole garden is in danger of becoming weeds.  The garden becomes a jungle.   This is what happened when the Sith took over. With the removal of the Jedi and the subversion of the Republic into an entity that actively fostered evil, the balance was badly upset.

Truth be told, the balance was ALREADY upset in Episode I.  The Republic was already fast becoming an agent of evil, due to it's corruption.  The Jedi, as I demonstrated in the last post, were nowhere near what they should have been in preventing the spread of evil.   The balance faltered, until it tipped so heavily that Republic became Empire, and the Jedi were destroyed. 

Anakin restored the balance not only by destroying the Emperor and the Sith, but also by destroying the Old Republic and the Jedi as well.

You see, it wasn't enough simply to kill the Emperor.  The Emperor (as we learn from the ROTJ novelization) was taking advantage of and furthering trends that already existed.  Even without Palpatine, The Old Republic was STILL corrupt and the Jedi were STILL blind.  Anakin had not only to destroy the Empire, but to destroy the CONDITIONS that had brought about the Empire in the first place. 

Had both Anakin and Palpatine died in Episode I, the Old Republic STILL would have become the Empire. It would just have taken longer.  It's corruption and the Jedi's blindness were great, and becoming greater. So great that sooner or later some evil man of power and purpose could take over the whole thing -- not because he was so strong, but because the immune system had utterly failed.  

Only when the last vestiges of the Old Republic were swept away in Ep. IV, and only when the last of the old Jedi had died in Ep. VI, was it possible for a New Republic and a New Jedi Order to arise, one that would start out far less corrupt than the old, and give the galaxy peace for another thousand years or so. For nothing mortal remains incorrupt.    

When this happened at last, the Sith had no more reason to exist. And so they were destroyed -- not by the power of Darkness, but by the power of Love and Compassion, two weapons that the Enemy does not understand at all, and thus cannot enter into his calculations.

That is why Palpatine died. He could not perceive compassion as anything but a weakness, and for all his foresight and his cunning and his immense power and his mighty battle station and the uncounted Imperial Navy he was undone because he simply could not perceive the real power and strength that lay in love. And so he was destroyed by a Father's love for his child.

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Could Anakin be the Chosen One of the prophecy? What do you think?

Two more thoughts

Forgot one other thing about the movie. Buzz' post on Adam and Eve reminded me. The chancelor is like Satan and Anakin like Adam and Eve. Yoda specifically and the cousel as a whole are like God. Anakin's downfall was believing the lie that there is more, than the Jedi are holding something back from him, that they do not have his best interests at heart. Like Satan with Eve, the chancelor gets Anakin to doubt the goodness of the Jedis; he gets him to believe that they are trying to hold him back from his full potential.

And the Jedi were, because we all have the capacity for both great good and great evil, and they wanted to protect Anakin from that forbidden fruit; they wanted his to only use the force for good. Just as Adam and Eve knew about good AND evil after eating the fruit, so Anakin chose to believe the chancelor and learn about evil so that he would be more powerful than any Jedi before, just as Satan told Eve she would be "like God."

Last thought, and not sure how it relates to God. I'll take any of your guys' thoughts on the subject. When Anakin turns to the dark side, he starts thinking in black and white absolutes. Obi-Wan tells him that is how a Sith thinks. The Jedi see all sides of things and tend to mould their actions to each situation. They kill when they have to, and spare when they have to (something Anakin was terrible at - he *always* did the wrong thing, killing when she should have saved and saving when he should have killed). Jedi generally don't kill; they save lives, yet it would have been right to kill the chancelor. Anakin only sees in black and white. How does this relate to our faith as Christians, or does it?

Thoughts on Star Wars Episode III, The Revenge of the Sith

I was blown away! This was SUCH a good movie. I'm just sorry there won't be any more. I rented Episode 4 (the first one made) to make the continuity stong in my mind. But now it all makes sense: The Sith come to power in this one, as the remaining Jedi hide, and the next one starts with Luke and Leia grown up and is titled "A New Hope."

Anakin was supposed to furfill prophecy I see. But the Jedi did correctly guess toward the end that they may have misinterpreted the prophecy. As we the viewers all known, Anakin's child, Luke, is the Chosen One.

I find it VERY interesting how Anakin wound up becoming Darth Vader. He goes to the dark side to save Padme from dying in childbirth, as his dream told him would happen. He would do anything to save her. And yet, Padme does die in just the way the dream fortold.

Isn't it just like Satan to give us a means to get something we want (a wrong means), get us to walk down the path, even pledge ourselves to him, and then NOT give us the thing we sought after?

I just have one question. What DID Padme die of? The droid said she was healthy, but that she had lost the will to live. The chancellor told Anakin that Anakin had killed her with his anger. Which is right?

I have to say I cried when Anakin started going over to the dark side. And I really felt for Obi-Wan. All his dreams, his view of Anakin as the furfillment of prophecy, and his love for him as a brother - all that and he had to turn away, walk away as Anakin was on the verge of death. I sensed that gave him no pleasure. He was doing what he had to do, but, as he even stated, Anakin broke his heart. He had poured years of his life teaching this boy that growns up to become his enemy.

I respect Obi-Wan more after this movie than from any other. He has all the best intentions at all times, but sometimes he REALLY screws up. It is then that I recall the end of episode 6, when he appears to Luke with Anakin back at his side, and he is smiling. It's a reminder that even the worst mistakes will all eventually be put right. The friends turned enemies turned friends again. All is forgiven.

I think the final betrayal for Anakin was when Obi-Wan thought Anakin would die and walked away. At a time when he needed his friend, he was abandoned, and the chancellor was the only one left to pick up the pieces (literally). Now someone remind me, just as the chancellor killed his mentor, doesn't Anakin eventually kill him, way down in Episode 6?

The other thing that struck me is, after it became clear Anakin had turned from the light side, Yoda never told Obi-Wan "I told you so." I expected him to remind Obi-Wan that the counsel had told him way back in the beginning that he was too old to train. Maybe he felt responsible, too. At any rate, Yoda simply offers Obi-Wan more training under Obi-Wan's old master.

One man can change so much. If Obi-Wan had simply left Anakin alone and NOT trained him, Luke would have come along in time and been the Chosen One. Additionally, if Anakin had not saved the chancellor, the whole rest of the series would have been different. Because Anakin goes to the dark side, much suffering happens. To save Padme, he sacrifices anyone and everyone else. In the end, he loses Padme, too. He loses everything, including the only people that really cared about him.

In the end, there is hope, though. Leia is adopted to one family, and Luke to another. One question - who were the people who adoped Luke? I missed the quick dialogue where that was explained. And who was the man who took Leia? I don't recall him playing much, if any, part in the other movies. Who the heck is he?

Those are my thoughts. Star Wars lives!