I.George Lucas'religion
II. Star Wars' religion

 

When the first Star Wars film came out, one striking and unexpected phenomenon was the extraordinary and immediate craze for ‘the Force’, this invisible and essential actor of the Trilogy. The famous ‘May the Force be with you’ directly becomes one of the standards of the ’pop culture’, a quotation you cannot miss.
But from the start, the Force is much more. It stirs curiosity, titillates imaginations, causes numerous speculations, to such an extent that Francis Ford Coppola will jokingly suggest to George Lucas to become the founder of a new religion. Twenty years later, however, this phenomenon has done nothing but extend, which is not without effect on the very perception of the Prequels and on their reception. To comprehend the overall issue, several elements should be taken into account. They united to turn Star Wars, a science fiction entertainment film, targeted at a very young audience, into the heart of a religious controversy. A controversy which reveals so much of a society…

I. George Lucas’ religion
According to my sources, Lucas was baptised in a Methodist church and was raised with protestant values. Accessible, by his anthropological processes, to other forms of spirituality, among others the oriental spirituality and particularly buddhism, he defines himself today still as a ‘believer’ – and directly stresses the difficulty to precise ‘in what or whom’. The existence of God is not a problem to him, but the possibility to know something about God is. Should we see an agnostic reluctance there ? Anyway, this is probably the reason he chose to give his children not so much a religious education, than more definitely a form of education to spirituality. I’m giving this information incidentally, since this belongs to his privacy.

Much more revealing for our subject is the interview given to Bill Moyers, entitled ‘Of Myth and Men. The meaning of the Force and the true theology of Star Wars’¹. Let’s remember that the producer and the journalist have in common another series of interviews on a very near subject : those made by mythologist Joseph Campbell in 1986 at Skywalker Ranch.

From the start of the interview, George Lucas stresses again his conscious will to translate old myths under a new form in an original medium. Nevertheless, Lucas also clearly states that his project is not essentially religious :

I don't see Star Wars as profoundly religious. I see Star Wars as taking all the issues that religion represents and trying to distill them down into a more modern and easily accessible construct--that there is a greater mystery out there. (...) I put the Force into the movie in order to try to awaken a certain kind of spirituality in young people--more a belief in God than a belief in any particular religious system. I wanted to make it so that young people would begin to ask questions about the mystery. Not having enough interest in the mysteries of life to ask the question, "Is there a God or is there not a God?"--that is for me the worst thing that can happen. I think you should have an opinion about that. Or you should be saying, "I'm looking. I'm very curious about this, and I am going to continue to look until I can find an answer, and if I can't find an answer, then I'll die trying." I think it's important to have a belief system and to have faith.

In the same interview, G. Lucas precises his creed which meets J. Campbell’s thinking on more than one point :

all the religions are true. (...) Religion is basically a container for faith. And faith in our culture, our world and on a larger issue, the mystical level--which is God, what one might describe as a supernatural, or the things that we can't explain--is a very important part of what allows us to remain stable, remain balanced.

In his view, structured religions keep their pace, in a world which tends to complete secularisation. He defends himself against critics who accuse him of destructuring revealed religions, and of feeding a cheap mass mysticism.

I would hesitate to call the Force God. It's designed primarily to make young people think about the mystery. Not to say, "Here's the answer." It's to say, "Think about this for a second. Is there a God? What does God look like? What does God sound like? What does God feel like? How do we relate to God?" Just getting young people to think at that level is what I've been trying to do in the films. What eventual manifestation that takes place in terms of how they describe their God, what form their faith takes, is not the point of the movie.

Nevertheless, the saga reveals a lot about G. Lucas and his underlying convictions. One can find in it his questioning and his attempts to answer.

MOYERS: Is it fair to say, in effect, that Star Wars is your own spiritual quest?
LUCAS: I'd say part of what I do when I write is ponder a lot of these issues. I have ever since I can remember. And obviously some of the conclusions I've come to I use in the films.

Thus, besides numerous themes, - the relation of man to machines, redemption, the importance of loyalty and friendship, the symbiotic development -, an essential truth is established : man is born (often in pain) during an initiatory progression and, faced to choices, builds his destiny himself. Intuition – trust your feelings – is a privileged access to mystery, to transcendency, a renunciation of rationality in favour of a ‘leap of faith’, as mentioned by a philosopher like Soren Kierkegaard (Lucas explicitly refers to that). Faith into ‘something’ which is not precised, and which depends in effect on the personal, individual experience.

These themes are recurrent in his work, and they become more precise throughout episodes. Intuition is different from emotion ; redemption is obtained through fatherhood ; fidelity to others and to oneself is expressed in various ways. But above all, the relationship to others and to the community becomes increasingly important. The human blossoming now goes through a symbiotic development with the environment, people and objects, each of which cooperates with the other for its survival – in brief, this is the idea expressed very academically by Qui-Gon in the Phantom Menace. Lucas repeats this recurrent theme of symbiotic development in each of his interviews. It is clear that he is very keen on the idea. I think this is one of the keys to understand the Star Wars films, naturally, but also the producer’s projects and more personal achievements. Beyond a vibrant creed, this idea has become a ‘way of life’ for him.

I will conclude this text about George Lucas’ "religion" by stressing that, in the end, his ideological statements are much more philosophical than religious. He did not conceive Star Wars as a bible, but as an entertainment film aimed at a young audience. If it makes people think, so much the better. It initiates a research. It does not give answers – and certainly not dogmatic ones.

II. The religion of Star Wars

When I wrote the first Star Wars, I had to come up with a whole cosmology: What do people believe in? I had to do something that was relevant, something that imitated a belief system that has been around for thousands of years, and that most people on the planet, one way or another, have some kind of connection to.I didn't want to invent a religion. I wanted to try to explain in a different way the religions that have already existed. I wanted to express it all.

G. Lucas always proceeds in the same way. The concepts, either extra-terrestrial or not, are inspired from real elements which allow the spectators to create a link, conscious or not, with their history or their culture. At an architectual level, Otton Gungan inspires himself from the organic style of ‘Art Nouveau’, Theet combines the Venitian diversity, the Roman-Byzantine art and the oriental influence – without leaving aside Renaissance perspectives.

		L'architecture hybride et cohérente de Otto Gunga et de la Cité de Theed. ©Lucasfilm Ltd and TM

But the process is the same for virtual creatures. For example, the sea monsters in the Phantom Menace : sea-killer Opee is a combination of crab and lobster. Fish Colo is a crossbreed between an eel and an octopus, fitted with a crocodile jaw and a luminescent peduncle. Monster Sando is a crossbreed between a sea otter, an elephant seal and a tiger, revisited by elephants and whales.

		La genèse multiforme du poisson Colo ©Lucasfilm Ltd and TM		Croquis préparatoire pour l'aqua-monstre Sando ©Lucasfilm Ltd and TM

The organic fusion produces creatures which are totally credible, because their anatomy though improbable is ‘close’ to the spectators. And again with Sebulba, half-way between Aarachnidas and camels…

The process is strictly identical for this other creation which is ‘religion’ – finally, an element amongst others in the Star Wars world. From an existing factor, G. Lucas creates a hybrid form by combining influences : he borrows from Buddhism, from Taoism, without objection to borrowing from Christianism, Judaism or Islam… In order to be understood and become rooted in the spectator’s imagination, the borrowing must remain superficial. This is how Buddhism and Taoism as perceived (or imagined ?) by westerners are to be found in his work: far away from the diversity and the complexity of the Small or Greater Vehicle, the refinements of Tibetan Buddhism or the ‘tantric’ expression, the subtleties of philosophical Taoism or its religious form, which integrates for example elements from Upanishads (and therefore from the Hindu spirituality).

In summary, to come back to the preceeding comparison, just as you cannot, except as an intellectual game, study the anatomy or the behavioural psychology of a virtual creature, you cannot either create theology out of a virtual religion, nor can you take it literally, as a dogma. On the other hand, these fictions can create interest and curiosity and lead to a more thorough research.

After all, the Phantom Menace has perhaps raised the calling of a dentist with a fan of Darth Maul, of an entomologist with a supporter of Gasgano, of a dermatologist for a Jabba the Hutt devotee .. so why not the calling of a theologist, a Christian, a Buddhist, a Taoist or more simply a believer ???

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1 on-line: http://www.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/articles/0,3266,23298,00.html.