Star Wars

The other day in History class we watched the movie Star Wars; A New Hope. I have seen this movie many times (my brother is a fan...) but I have never watched it while looking for different signs of religion playing into it. Or looking for relations to society today. It was really interesting watching the movie through new eyes. I picked up so much more this time watching the movie then I did all of the other times I have seen this movie. But also you realize how modern day issues in society can give authors or writers inspiration. Like in World War II, there were storm troopers and there were also storm troopers in star wars.  Darth Vader literally translates to Dark Father which can also mean the Devil. So it immediately lets you know who the bad guy is. The movie refers to something called the dark side and the good side. This plays off of the Dao notion, yin and yang. A jedi is kind of like a monk be because at a very young age they are taken in and train their whole lives and they can not marry. That is similar to a monk because monks are also taken in at a young age and aren't allowed to marry. For both, their lives are fully dedicated to being what they are (monk, jedi). I find all of the different references to different religions and cultures in this movie very interesting because seeing, things that you hear about everyday, in a movie so different from our society is very jolting. You look at this movie and think "this is so crazy and nothing like our world" but really there are more similarities then one would originally see or think.

Questions Regarding Religion

Today in history class we all came up with questions that could be asked and fit into the religion unit. All of the questions were based off of common themes that we came up with as a class. We read articles about religion around the world and that is how we came up with the common themes. My article was about how in South Africa, there was a billboard that indicated that atheists are stupid and that they "consider themselves a mistake." This caused the atheists to get angry and take action. So one of the common themes that we found was that action is taken when two religions oppose each other. Other themes that we found were Discrimination, so groups/religions treating people like they are not as good as them. Government and politics and how this can contrast with religion. Monotheism vs. polytheism is another theme that we came up with because polytheism was a lot more prominent a long time ago then it is now. The questions that my group came up with were as follows:

"How has the corruption of society effected religion?" We thought this question was relevant to the themes that we discussed because taking violent action is within the theme of taking action and violent action can corrupt society.

"What causes religious to change in certain areas?" This is more of a question regarding the development of religions and how they can evolve and shape around the environment that the people are living in. So this is probably a good question when talking about different sections of Christianity (Catholic, Lutheran etc.).

"How have monotheism and polytheism effected the development of the world differently?" This is also a question that is about the idea of how religion and ideas can change over the years based on environment or leadership. Different peoples views have changed the relevance of polytheism in society.

"How has religion clashed with government and politics?" This question has to do with how religion can have an effect on politics and people's opinions of those politics. Like an example is Mitt Romney, he is a Mormon and a lot of people are against him just because of his faith. All they see is that he is a Mormon, they don't see his values or his ideas for the country. This is an example of how religion can interfere with politics. Religion can interfere with government because maybe a political leader's religion's values tell him that he should do something but the values of the country and the people might tell him to do something else. This leaves this politic in a dilemma because he/she might not know what to do.

"How has tradition in religion cause conflict?" This is kind of like the the corruption question where violence plays a role. Different people's traditions and beliefs in their religion may conflict and make other religions angry. Like Mormons are allowed to have multiple wives but that is highly frowned upon by other religions.

How Does Religion Shape the World Today

How does religion shape the way people understand and respond to the world around them and how does it reflect on an individuals person experience with religion? This is the first prompt of the second semester. I think that wherever you go and who ever you meet, it is hard not to eventually expose your religion (or your non-religion...?). Sometimes it might be very obvious at people will know the second they see you and other times it might take a long time for anyone to figure out what religion you are. I am not saying that everyone in the world cares what religion people are or that it comes up in every conversation one has with a new person. But eventually this person might find out because for some people religion is a big part of their life. Religion can determine who one might marry or who one might be friends with, but this is not the case for everyone. And also as years goes by and times change, religion is becoming less of a major thing for some people as it once was. But even though people might consider themselves atheist, belief can still play a big role in their lives (or in this case non-belief).


So it shows the way people understand the world because religion can sometimes be the reason a person does something. Like terrorists probably didn't wake up one day and decide that they want to do what terrorists do. They believe that they are doing the right thing for their religion and other people view these people as doing things because of their religion, not just to do it. So if you know someones religion it might be able to help you understand the decisions that they make.