In the Holiday Spirit, a Look at How Religion Has Shaped ‘Star Wars’
As we are deep into the heart of many religious holidays around the world, with the fanbase of Star Wars wishing Merry Christmas on all the myriad of platforms, perhaps it’s an appropriate time to ask where (and how) religion plays a role in Star Wars.
The best place to find answers is the creator of Star Wars himself, not Yahweh or Ra, but George Lucas. What has Lucas said over the years about mythology, religion, philosophy, and their place in his space saga?
Using an interview he did with Bill Moyers in 1999 as part of the campaign for The Phantom Menace, Lucas discussed many topics, religion included. Here are some key takeaways that will give some insight into his opinion. Here is what the Baptist minister turned journalist, and self-proclaimed Methodist Buddhist said:
BILL MOYERS: “Joseph Campbell said that all the great myths, the primitive myths, the great stories, have to be regenerated if they’re going to have any impact, and that you have done that with “Star Wars.” Are you conscious of doing that? Are you saying, ‘I am trying to recreate the myths of old? Or are you saying, ‘I just want to make a good action movie?’
GEORGE LUCAS: “Well, when I did “Star Wars” I consciously set about to recreate myths and the classic mythological motifs. And I wanted to use those motifs to deal with issues that existed today. What these films deal with is the fact that we all have good and evil inside of us and that we can choose which way we want the balance to go.
They went on to explore how he saw his place as a preacher of sorts, a mentor towards the intended audience.
BILL MOYERS: A professor I know said that he recently asked his freshman class how many of them had seen all three of the trilogy, and everyone in the class raised his hand. And he said to me, ‘I hope Lucas knows he’s mentoring an entire generation of young Americans.’
GEORGE LUCAS: I have a philosophy that we all teach, and we all teach every day of our lives. And it’s not necessarily what we lecture. I’ve discovered kids don’t like lectures at all. But it is really the way we live our lives. And what we do with our lives and the way we conduct ourselves. And once in a while they listen to the lectures. So when I make the films, I’m very aware of the fact that I’m teaching on a much larger scale than I would just as a parent or somebody walking through life. Because I have this megaphone. Anybody in the media has a very large megaphone that they can reach a lot of different people with, and so whatever they say, whatever they do, however they conduct themselves, whatever they produce has an influence and is teaching somebody something. And I try to be aware of what it is I’m saying.
BILL MOYERS: What do you make of the fact that so many people have interpreted “Star Wars” as being profoundly religious?
GEORGE LUCAS: I don’t see “Star Wars” as profoundly religious. I see “Star Wars” as taking all of the issues that religion represents and trying to distill them down into a more modern and more easily accessible construct that people can grab onto to accept the fact that there is a greater mystery out there. When I was 10 years old, I asked my mother — I said, ‘Well, if there’s only one God, why are there so many religions?’ And over the years — I’ve been pondering that question ever since. And it would seem to me that the conclusion that I’ve come to is that all the religions are true, they just see a different part of the elephant. A religion is basically a container for faith. Faith is the glue that holds us together as a society. Faith in our culture, our world, our — you know, whatever it is that we’re trying to hang on to is a very important part of, I think, allowing us to remain stable. Remain balanced.
BILL MOYERS: And where does God fit in this concept of the universe? In this cosmos that you’ve created, is the Force God?
GEORGE LUCAS: I put the Force into the movies 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, you know, religious system. I mean, the real question is to ask the question, because if you are having enough interest in the mysteries of life to ask the questions ‘is there a God or is there not a God?’ That’s, for me, the worst thing that can happen. You know, if you asked a young person, ‘Is there a God?’ and they say, ‘I don’t know.’ You know? I think you should have an opinion about that.
BILL MOYERS: Do you have an opinion, or are you looking?
GEORGE LUCAS: Well, I think there is a God. No question. What that God is, or what we know about that God I’m not sure. The one thing I know about life and about the nature of the human race is that it — the human race — has always believed it’s known everything. Even the cavemen thought they had it all figured out and they knew everything there was to know about everything. Because that’s what — that’s where mythology came from. You know, it’s constructing some kind of context for the unknown. So we figured it all out and it was fine. I would say that, you know, cavemen had, you know, on a scale — and understood about one, you know? Now we’ve made it up to about five. The only thing that most people don’t realize is the scale goes to a million.
They later moved on to discuss caution when approaching entertainment and replacing real theologies.
BILL MOYERS: The central epic of our culture has been the Bible. And it’s about fall, wondering, redemption, return. But the Bible no longer occupies that central place in our culture today. More and more people today are — young people, in particular, are turning to the movies for their inspiration, not to organized religion.
GEORGE LUCAS: Uh-huh. Well, I hope that doesn’t end up being the course that this whole thing takes because I think there’s definitely a place for organized religion, and it’s a very important part of the social fabric. And I would hate to find ourselves in a completely secular world, where, you know, entertainment was passing for some kind of religious experience.
BILL MOYERS: One reason when critics said that “Star Wars” has been so popular with young people, it’s religion without strings attached, that it becomes a very thin base for theology. In fact…
GEORGE LUCAS: Well, it is a thin base for theology, that’s why I would hesitate to call the Force God. When the film came out, almost every single religion took “Star Wars” and used it as an example of their religion and — and were able to relate it to young people and saying, ‘This is what’ — and relate the stories specifically to the Bible and relate stories to the Koran and, you know, the Torah and things. And so it’s like, you know — if it’s a tool that can be used to make old stories be new and relate to younger people, that’s what the whole point was.
Lucas later emphasized that there isn’t one source of inspiration for Star Wars and that it is universal.
BILL MOYERS: Have you been influenced by Buddhism, because “Star Wars” came along just about the time there was this growing interest in America in Eastern religions, and I notice in “The Phantom Menace,” the new Episode One, that they discover this slave child who has a — an aura about him. And it reminded me of — how the Buddhists go out to look for the next Dalai Lama.
GEORGE LUCAS: Mm-hmm. Well, there’s a — again, a mixture of all kinds of — of mythology and religious beliefs that have been amalgamated into the movie, and I’ve tried to take the ideas that seem to cut across the most cultures, because I’m fascinated by that and I think that’s one of the things that I really got from Joe Campbell, was that — what he was trying to do is find the common threads through the various mythology, through the religions.
I don’t wish to come to any conclusions here, as I will let the man speak for himself, but that George was trying to welcome all into his galaxy far, far away is a lesson we should all embrace as Star Wars fans. This spirit of symbiosis and the holiday cheer is a fitting reminder as we start and embrace a new year.
You can read the full interview on BillMoyers.com.
Star Wars is the earliest film Ryan can remember seeing, and a been a passionate fan ever since. You'll find him lost in the woods somewhere or being the neighborhood grouch all other times.
