Why would anyone want to be a Jedi in the first place?

Question: Why would anyone want to be a Jedi? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm serious.

No sex (at least, not a whole lot), no wife, no family... Adventure (heh), excitement (heh), a Jedi craves not these things. Years of grueling treatment, and for what? What's the reward? And then you probably end up getting a limb cut off, or worse.

Speaking of sex, how many people in the SW saga have gotten any? Han and Leia, no doubt (I'm sure Han cut a wide swath before settling down with the Rebellion). Anakin and Padme, obviously. Owen and Beru. For everyone else though, I am in serious doubt. Luke is a virgin and apparently will always stay one. Yoda? Obi Wan? Even Mace -- geeez I can't picture Samuel L. staying chaste! Poor Jengo has a son, but didn't even need a woman to have him!

Ok, back to my point: What is the reward in becoming a Jedi?

 

You get a lightsaber.

-SWIG

 

Adventure, lightsabers, and constantly saving the day

 

"Luke is a virgin and apparently will always stay one."



ROTF

 

It is not forbidden for Jedi to have sex.

 

Right. Jedi are perfectly free to visit ladies of the night.

 

They probably become a jedi because of a sense of responsibility to use their skills to help others. Like when someone joins the military. They aren't forbidden sex or adventure. But they put their fate in someone else's hands. They risk their lives for a greater cause.

The only thing is if they don't like it, they only have to serve their term. We don't know if many jedi pass the training or even stay in the order very long after they become jedi. I imagine only a few out of the class Yoda was teaching would have went the distance. Maybe Dooku isn't the only one who's left the jedi.

Everyone assumes that jedi only get kicked out or they leave on bad terms. But, I'd be willing to bet that after someone gets tired of the lifestyle, they can leave if they want. It's probably a common thing, like retirement.

Anyway, I'm rambling... sorry about the long post...

MTFBWY

 

Why does anyone want to be a cop or a teacher or a priest/nun or a soldier or a mother?

From the outside, on paper, they read and can be thankless, futile jobs/roles. But they obviously come with their own rewards. You need to experience it yourself to find out.

 

"Maybe Dooku isn't the only one who's left the jedi."

According to the EU (and early versions of the AOTC script), there have been 20 Jedi (the "Lost Twenty") who left the order.

"Why does anyone want to be a cop or a teacher or a priest/nun or a soldier or a mother?"

Add moderator to that list.

 

Awww come on, we all know the benefits of being a moderater: highlighted username!

 

So if they leave by choice, do you reckon there's some sort of Jedi halfway house they can move into. Or are the streets of Coruscant lined with drunken shells of burnt out jedis all spouting on about how they used to be jedis but someone called Norm forgot to pay them so have you got the price of a ticket home (while their dogs are peeing on your feet)?.

 

Reasons to be a Jedi:

Hack off somebody's arm in a bar? No problem. No one calls the police, no legal charges are pressed...

Steal a speeder? See above.

You get to make astoundingly bad decisions: Yoda senses fear in Anakin's training? Let's go for it! Anakin, since you constantly disobey orders and have a romantic attraction to Padmé, why don't you escort her back to Naboo? Dooku says a Sith Lord called Darth Sidious is controlling the Senate. Sorry, don't believe a word of it.

Being trained in the martial arts makes you the ideal candidate for diplomatic missions for some reason.

Free once-a-week robe dry cleaning at the Jedi Temple laundry.

You get to associate with amazingly gullible and unobservant aliens. Army, what army? Who's the army for? See 'em for myself? Uh...yeah, that's why I'm here. To inspect the army I obviously didn't know about. Yeah.

 

As far as we know, until Anakin Skywalker chose to follow Qui-Gon Jinn and become a Jedi, NO Jedi entered the order of his or her own volition. If memory serves, Jedi candidates were sensed and chosen not long after they were born, and taken from their parents for Jedi training as infants. Nearly all Jedi have spent all of their conscious lives as Jedi; they know no other life (hence, no problem with attachments).

Anakin Skywalker was the first to consciously choose to become a Jedi Knight, and therein lay the problem: he had already formed attachments, and after several years under Obi-Wan's tutelage, he found that being a Jedi was *not* everything he thought it would be (which is one of the fundamental reasons behind his eventual turn to the Dark Side).

 

Just because someone leaves the order, doesn't mean they'll be a bumm. They could get normal jobs. Dooku became a politician. Some could be farmers, mechanics, whatever... just normal people. Ex-soldiers don't just become bumms, lying around in the streets.

Just because a jedi leaves the order also doesn't mean he'll be a shell of the man he used to be. The reason someone would leave the order would be because he would no longer be content with that lifestyle, not that they failed at it.

 

"Why would anyone want to be a Jedi in the first place?"

When your about one or two years old you do what your parents or guardians do. They had no choice because they didn't understand. Although it's different for Anakin and Luke because they made the decision to.

"What is the reward in becoming a Jedi?"

Your own lightsabre and the ability to use the force to do special things. Mind control people to fall off cliffs and give you money for nothing!

 

The Jedi are meant to be an organisation devoted towards understanding the Force, and keeping a check on its powers.

The reason they take in students is to make sure that there aren't any rogue Force-users left around the universe. They could cause a lot of misplaced damage, so the Jedi seek out young children strong in the Force to both continue the Order's legacy and to prevent the Dark Side taking hold in the uninformed.

So being a Jedi is much more a calling that a vocation, IMO. You have a lot of responsibility to use your powers wisely. You are capable of feats that normal men cannot match, but you are also expected to use those powers to help others and never to advance your own desires.

Qui-Gon put it best - "It will be a hard life..."

But as someone born with strength in the Force, a necessary one.

 

Mind control people to fall off cliffs and give you money for nothing!

Yeah!

 

so Jedi can have sex!!! i never realised it!! but its soo obvious!!

PHEW!! now i can be a jedi!!

 

DamonD wrote :

So being a Jedi is much more a calling that a vocation, IMO. You have a lot of responsibility to use your powers wisely. You are capable of feats that normal men cannot match, but you are also expected to use those powers to help others and never to advance your own desires.


That's it , the old Republic jedi did not choose to become ones, but put in a position that they should/had to become one ? wich to me is a showing of the flaws that the old order had

 

OceanPacific in the EU Luke marry's Mara Jade and they have a son. Duh!

 

The Expanded Universe doesn't exist out here. The movies must survive on their own.

 

Sorry, I guess I have to think movie wize now.

 

Think what you want. I was only having a bit of fun. No harm intended.

 

Not like younglings choose anyway. Only Anakin it seems.
If you were a parent, would you give up your child for Jedi training? And that child will probably never see you again.

 

Question: Why would anyone want to be a Jedi? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm serious.

For those huge Jedi jumps alone. Dang talk about the landing alone and waking you up in the morning! WHHHEEE! Course, I prolly would be a bad Jedi. I'd find a huge jump place and be doing it over and over again.

No sex (at least, not a whole lot), no wife, no family...

Actually I can understand that. I can understand not having a need for a family in the sense you refer to.

Adventure (heh), excitement (heh), a Jedi craves not these things. Years of grueling treatment, and for what? What's the reward?

Ahhh! You defeat yourself in this statement. There has to be a payoff. Sometimes there is no other "pay" other than you helped when perhaps someone didn't want it. Or you helped, when someone was too over-come to know it. Some people like this field, others do not.

And then you probably end up getting a limb cut off, or worse.

It would seem only the brash do, Luke.. Vader. Obi-wan doesn't seem to nor Yoda.

Ok, back to my point: What is the reward in becoming a Jedi?

Well for starters, they saved a Queen to leed freedom to her planet. I would think, for one walking that path, that would be a huge thing. Could be wrong though or you disagree.