Skip to main content

star wars - Does the concept of the Abrahamic god exist in the galaxy far, far away?


As noted in this question, the concepts of heaven and hell appear to exist in the galaxy far, far away; Han even mentions the latter in The Empire Strikes Back:



RANDOM JERK REBEL GUY: Your Tauntaun will freeze before you reach the first marker!


HAN SOLO: Then I'll see you in HELL!




The modern concepts of heaven and hell have their origins in the so-called Abrahamic religions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.


Therefore, since the galaxy far, far away has heaven and hell, it is logical to ask if the galaxy far, far away has some concept of the Abrahamic god.


Adding fuel to the fire, DVK's answer here notes that Han's freighter contains a compartment he hasn't been able to open. The ID number on the compartment is identical to the ID number on the crate in which the Ark of the Covenant is stored in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Surely, if a holy relic associated with the Abrahamic god of Judaism is referenced (and perhaps located) in the galaxy far, far away, it is sensible to ask if that same god is known to some of the galaxy's inhabitants in some form or another.


enter image description here enter image description here


Does the concept of the Abrahamic god of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam exist (in any form, or to any degree) in the galaxy far, far away?


Note 1: I don't think this is addressed in the movies, and although I would prefer a canonical answer, Legends will do, if nothing else is available. However, the Star Wars Holiday Special is not an acceptable source.


Note 2: The substance of this question is fundamentally different from "Do Heaven and Hell exist in Star Wars", because that question and its answers don't address the Abrammic god in any way.



Answer






  • First, let's address the evidence presented in the form of Han using the word "HELL":




    1. First of all, Star Wars using a specific Earth word is not an indication that the thing it refers to has Earth origin. E.g. see "ducks".




    2. OP's out of universe statement that "HELL" is a "Abrahamic" thing is wrong on two levels. You managed to commit BOTH a Type 1 and Type 2 error.





      • Judaism, at least in its early form, had NO concept of Hell, at least in the form even remotely close to a Christian concept. This issue doesn't majorly impact the conclusion of the answer, but I feel is important to note as background.




      • Secondly, (and more important) Hell as a concept is in no way unique to Abrahamic religions - see Ancient Greek Tartarus (NOT Hades, but even Hades had special regions for punishment of the souls of deservingly bad people. For an uber-random example, recall Sisyphus and Tantalus).






    3. Moreover, we have "Seven Corellian Hells" mentioned in canon, which means Han was FAR more likely to refer to that than to a Christian "Hell". Occam's Razor demands it.







  • Canon analysis


    Outside of OP-excluded Christmas Special which had no "Christmas", or decidedly non-canon "Christmas in the Stars" :), I have never seen any canon (down to C-canon) mention of Earth Abrahamic faiths in TGFFA.


    This is confirmed by searching Wookiepedia for basic religious terms and finding nothing in-universe: Moses, Commandments, Torah, Judaism for Judaism. The closest you get is Aing-Tii monks' ship named "Sanhedrim", and they most assuredly were not theologically OR biologically Jewish.


    Similarly, Wookiepedia has no mention of "Jesus" or "Christian" or "Trinity" or "baptism" that's in-universe. Admittedly, I didn't check Islam, for lack of knowing which core terms to search for outside "Mohammed".




  • UPDATE: As per an Easter Egg, while Abrahamic faiths may not exist, their artifacts apparently might: Han Solo's freighter, Eravana, is strongly implied to carry The Ark of the Covenant that Indiana Jones was last seen storing in US Government warehouse.





    • While it's fair to ask if that implies that the belief in the contents of that religion also exists, the answer is "absolutely doesn't necessarily imply". If you recall Indiana Jones, the OTHER person who was interested in the Ark of the Covenant was none other than der Führer. Who most certainly can be assumed NOT to believe in the contents of Judaism - the religion which centers around the Covenant.




    • However, it does mean that possibly, some collector wanted the Ark as a powerful, or simply rare, artifact - which Han's freighter is choke full of, as per Visual Dictionary - which in turn means they MAY be familiar with the tenets of the religion involved, as that religion holds the explanation for why the artefact matters and has power. However, that isn't proven conclusively and remains a firm "maybe".







Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.
Post a Comment
Read more

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...
Post a Comment
Read more

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...
Post a Comment
Read more

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...
Post a Comment
Read more