Hey there! I've been recently reading and following your blog and I really appreciate your take on fanfiction from a Christian perspective. Now here’s something that I’d like your take on. I’m a big Star Wars fan and I’ve been reading a lot of Star Wars fanfiction over the past 2 and a half years and I’ve been thinking of doing some of my own Star Wars fanfiction. I am also a conservative Christian who follows the biblical, young Earth paradigm when it comes to ancient history, (tbc...)
...has wondered for a long time whether some of the deities of ancient pagan mythologies were based on real early post-Flood peoples, and has thought about incorporating elements from that, as well as elements from other franchises that I'm interested in, such as the DC and Marvel universes, into my fanfiction. But of course, as as many Christians have found, dealing with mystical power from anything other than God or a mysterious part of the natural world, even from a pantheistic entity and whatever gray area exists in between are simply parts of the Force that have been affected by the spiritual energies of God, Satan, their respective spirit armies, and the souls of physical living beings (all organic sentients being descended from Noah and his family), with the darkness being sin that has tainted the Dark Side and the gray area? What if there is a Jedi Order out there that acknowledges and worships the True God and is willing to use the Light Side of the Force(which God dominates the most) to advance His Kingdom, in contrast to the mainstream Jedi Order that uses what they think is the Light Side, but is actually a lighter part of the gray area, to advance their own agenda? What if Anakin Skywalker, who was believed by the mainstream Jedi to be conceived by the Force and the Chosen One of their prophecy, was instead actually the son of the crown prince of a humanoid alien race of powerful, god-like, but God-worshiping Force sensitives(this prince's father being Zeus's cousin and mother being Odin's sister), from whom Anakin and his mother (who was actually a born Earthling and a Gypsy Holocaust survivor) were stolen by their enemies while he was still in the womb, his mother’s memories being altered to think that there was no father involved in his conception? How would all that do for a Star Wars fanfiction from a Christian perspective? Please let me know whenever you get this question.
First of all, old being of mythology being based off of real people/events: Definitely an idea that’s been tossed around before, and I love it every single time. One of my favorite theories is that many pagan gods were actually giants (see:Goliath), and that giants like like Goliath were actually Nephilim. Now, the Bible directly calls Nephilim “heroes of old, men of renown,” which puts them in an interesting grey area, considering that were, in fact, the offspring of demons. Being, at least in part, human, they would have had souls with free will, and therefore it was completely up to them, despite their demonic parentage, to be good or evil as they pleased. So, some of them using their massive stature to make themselves “gods” is completely believable and perfectly likely (that would be a temptation and something that they could get away with, and if a temptation exists, someone’s going to do it). What the others did, who knows. In fact, I’m not sure if there’s anything that states that all Nephilim were giants. Maybe only some of them were. Either way, there’s lots of material to be used there. Stick to the Bible, but be willing to work with theories that aren’t against Scripture.
As far as this very interesting Star Wars idea you have here goes, there’s a lot to say and this is a little bit all over the place, so I’m going to address every topic one at a time.
First of all, I have to say that I think you’re overcompensating. That’s not necessarily a bad thing! I think it shows that you have a lot of creativity when it comes to integrating the fictional with the spiritual, which is hard to do. But this is a lot of stuff, all very complicated, and hard to sort out. Really, I had to read your whole ask several times over to understand exactly what you meant.
I wouldn’t even begin to try integrating Earth mythologies into the Star Wars universe. There are plenty of false religions in Star Wars and if you want to throw some of those in there so that there’s some spiritual variety to show that this isn’t a world of nothing but atheists an weird Force mystics, that would probably work better for you and be more understandable for your readers. After all, Star Wars is in a galaxy far, far away. False Earth religions don’t really have a place there.
To tackle the matter of the Force: the Force has been described as an energy created by all living beings. Now, you could take this as a spiritual idea, and say that souls and spirits give off an energy that can actually be used, like a tool, to manipulate the physical world and champion the mind. This could be used for good (Light Side) or evil (Dark Side).If you want to think of this more more scientifically, which also works when you’re using a Christian standpoint because, hey, God made science, you could take advantage of the fact that it has been scientifically proven that all living things do give off energy, and people who have the potential to use the Force are simply people who are attuned to that energy and can harness it. Again, it would be how you used it that made it Dark or Light. Always come back to free will here.
[Also, a slight dilemma here: You mentioned “using the Force to advance to His Kingdom.” I’m not exactly sure what you mean by this, but it sounds a little bit like a sort of ladder-climbing religion. One can only be saved and “reach” God’s kingdom through Christ, and through Christ alone. When it comes to writing Christianity in a fictional universe that doesn’t exactly lend itself to that, it always best to keep everything as simple as possible. Coming up with complex explanations and stories is, first of all, not good for any story, and, second of all, just asking for trouble. Eventually, you’ll hit a wall that you can’t climb over, simply because your story has to much baggage. Cut all the extra fluff away and simplify it.]
Anakin being a virgin birth is... a little difficult, seeing as that’s only happened once, and that was Jesus. Anakin is obviously not Jesus. However, as the Force does have some scientific ties in canon with the midichlorians, I’m sure that you could come up with a totally made-up scientific explanation for his birth. NOT including information from the extended universes of Star Wars, which are too vast to keep up with and too inconsistent to be considered canon anyway, we don’t know much about midichlorians except that they reside in the cells of living organisms and that, the more of them that you have, the more potential you have to use the Force. So, basically, you can do pretty much anything you want with midichlorians. An option I can think of off the top of my head: midichlorians can actually fertilize an egg, and Anakin’s hardly the only one, but he’s the first one anybody’s noticed. This would explain Anakin’s insanely high midichlorian count: he’s literally half-midichlorian. Trying to make him some displaced prince of a powerful race is... too much, I suppose? It’s interesting, but ultimately unnecessary, and really just too hard to keep up with. Anakin is already a very complicated character in his own right. Again, cut the extra fluff away. Give it the simplest, most easily understood explanation you possibly can, and then keep rolling. Although, looking back, your idea that his mother’s memories could have been somehow tampered with or incorrect could still work in many different scenarios, but that’s all up to how much you’re comfortable with.
Prophecies are excellent but often misunderstood tools in storytelling. The prophecy of Anakin restoring balance (that is, stopping the Dark Side from growing to a point that it overtakes the Light), is a very good one because it does not paint Anakin as any sort of mystical being, it simply says, “A person will do this, and it will be good.” This is just fine to use in a story and another way to stick closer to Star Wars canon.
As far as a God-worshiping Jedi Order goes, I say this would be hard to pull off. The Jedi Order and everything they believe is corrupt. The original Jedi Code did not demand that they have no marriage or children, nor did it tell them to stuff all their emotions in a box. The original Jedi Code told them not to let their emotions to control them, and it warned them against anger, which leads to hate and suffering. The Bible does the same thing! But the Jedi Order as seen in canon had twisted “don’t let your emotions get the better of you” into “don’t let your emotions do anything and have complete control over everything even though that’s not healthy.” So your best bet, really, is to have individual Force-users (not necessarily Jedi, although they’re a safe bet) realize the corruption of the Jedi Order and decide to seek the truth about the universe on their own. In seeking truth, if they are truly determined, they will find God, which gives you an excellent opportunity to writie about about a spiritual journey of someone who had a very twisted understanding of power coming to know who that power truly comes from (God) and what it means.
The less complicated you make things, the easier it will be to hold it all together. You have an amazing amount of creativity, but you have to think about your audience. The Star Wars universe is already extremely complicated, so what you want to do is not add to it, but take what is already there and use it to the best of your ability. And judging by how much you came up with, you have more than enough ability.
