The Path To Hell Is Paved With Good Intentions - Tumblr Posts

Fear is the Path to the Dark Side, Fear Leads to Anger, Anger leads to Hate, Hate . . . Leads to Suffering

I don’t think that there’s a single Star Wars fan that doesn’t remember the sentence. It’s iconic and a prophecy of what Anakin’s life would be like in 13-14 years.

But has anyone considered that it isn’t just the fear, anger and hate that is in your heart that leads to the Dark Side and suffering?

Yes, Anakin was afraid. Who honestly wouldn’t be afraid after nine years as a slave, where you could be sold if your owner considered you useless or fell onto hard times or just no longer needed a slave with your talents, Anakin himself tells Padmé that he wouldn’t have lasted long if he wasn’t good at building things, and you’re surrounded by twelve of the most powerful people in the galaxy, hoping that they will accept you into their ranks and instead they read you like an open book and act like you missing your mother and worrying about her because she’s still a slave and your Master lost heavily on bets he made is a bad thing and will lead to a bad place.

However, I would argue that the whole fear, anger and hate leads to the Dark Side is a two way street. Yes you can get there by yourself but others can and often do help on the way.

The Jedi Council was AFRAID of Anakin and what he represented. They were afraid because if he really was created by the Force that meant that the Sith, who they dismissed being around still just a few hours ago, were either back or had never been destroyed and, if you want to delve into the prophecies in Master and Apprentice, faced condemnation and destruction because of their actions or lack of action. And if reading the Bible and knowing Human Nature no one likes to be told that they are not living a good life and that there will be consequences for their choices. So if Anakin is the Chosen One than that would mean that the Sith are back or never were destroyed like they thought and if the prophecy of the Chosen One is right than the prophecy about the loss of many Jedi lives could happen and that prophecy says that the Jedi had lost their way which is/led to their destruction so that means that they’re doing something wrong and no one wants to think or believe that they’re not living a good life and need to make changes.

So Anakin represented the possible beginning of their end, not something ANYONE likes to think about, and when they were able to confirm that the Sith were back/still around fear moved in. Fear because they had somehow missed the Sith for a thousand years and fear of what would happen to the Jedi Order.

Anger is harder but I am sure that the Jedi Council felt anger towards Anakin. Some of it was no doubt because he didn’t always listen and obey, hard to control, some of it could have been fear/anger at the idea that the Jedi Order was ignoring its mandate to protect people and that many Jedi would be lost because of it and Anakin represents that.

And while they probably didn’t outright hate Anakin they were angry and later grew to hate how Palpatine maneuvered them into letting him have access to Anakin which led them attempung ti use Anakin to spy on Palpatine which helped lead to their downfall.

I just don’t understand why they just either tried harder to dissuade the friendship, even if it meant assigning Obi-Wan and Anakin to someplace far away from Coruscant, or simply telling Palpatine that they needed Anakin elsewhere in the war, besides there are other Jedi better suited for the role he wants, and immediately assign Anakin offworld to help any number of Jedi that needed support.

And then we have Mace Windu who acted on fear, anger and hate when he learned from Anakin that Palpatine was the Sith Lord they had been looking for all these years.

So we get the destruction of the Jedi Order, something that the Jedi Council had feared for some time, because of fear, anger and hate which led to the suffering of surviving Jedi as well as the galaxy because they had unintentionally helped put a Sith Lord in power but also gave him a powerful and deadly Apprentice/enforcer.

So we have fear, which led to anger, anger that led to hate and the hate gave way to suffering.

And that veered off but instead of ending up in the weeds I ended up at a slightly different destination. Either way: your fear, anger and hate don’t necessarily lead YOU to the Dark Side and suffering but it can lead others to it.