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How should Jediism be considered in terms of religion/spirituality?

For my claimed religion, my introduction to it started out as purely interest because of my love for the Star Wars movies. However, as I’ve looked into it, I’ve decided that it suits me better than the Christianity that I was raised on.
But it leaves me wondering, because we don’t have a named deity (unless you consider a personality-less energy called “the force” to be a name/deity), we don’t have majorly recognized holidays, we have a relatively small following; however, we do have creeds, rules and set morals. We also allow the mixing of other spiritual practices, and we encourage other Jedi to be open minded about spirituality.
So would we be atheists, agnostics, or theists?

ErnestoVG 3 Feb 25
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36 comments (26 - 36)

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1

I presume you're referring to Taoism which I'm given to understand is what The Force was inspired by.

If you embrace Taoism "because it suits you" that is intellectually honest and it doesn't sound like you're out to impose Taoism or its norms on others.

If by some quirk of history, the US were "a Taoist nation" instead of an allegedly "Christian nation" (in other words, Taoism were the dominant / majority religion) then you could take it to the bank that you'd have a nice diverse selection of Taoist holidays. One could start a whole other thread making them up, might be fun. As it is, you are choosing a tiny minority religion and you'll get no government endorsement for whatever rituals or customs you want time off for. It's just one of the trade-offs for choosing a hobby / club house that's not in the mainstream.

Personally my view is that if you're going to belong to a tiny minority and that's bothering you for lack of holidays you might as well belong to a less tiny minority (atheists) and just embrace the no-holiday thing loud and proud 😉 I mean what do you NEED religion for exactly? That's the question to ask yourself. Taoism (or most sects of Buddhism) has no god anyway, so you're effectively an atheist anyway, might as well be an areligious one.

Although it's possible to regard Buddhism or Taoism similar to deism -- that there is a hovering amorphous Something presiding over existence, but it's non-interventionist. Then you have to wonder -- how would you tell a non-interventionist god, an absent / indifferent god, and a non-existent god apart? You can't really. They all behave EXACTLY the same. Reality plays out EXACTLY the same. And to me it's no comfort and has zero explanatory or predictive power to choose to believe, without evidence, that some sort of deity is "in control" even in the limited sense of holding things together.

3

Coincidentally, (and a little off topic) Mark Hamill is getting his own star on the Hollywood's Walk of Fame .

William Shatner tweeted him 2/22/18:
"Congratulations! BTW ask for a star on the south side of the street. I'm on the north side and don't want to devalue the neighborhood."

To which Hamill tweeted back:

"Thanks, Bill, It wouldn't be as special without a classic Shatner-burn from you! Live Long, But Get Lost- , mh."

Love it: "Live Long, But Get Lost"

cava Level 7 Feb 25, 2018
0

You mean actually practicing Jedi-ism without metachloriates? No actual spoon bending? What's left is just a code of behavior. So I humbly suggest that this is close to Confucianism.

1

I don't bother with these questions about what it is or isn't. I'm Agnostic so I can be fine not knowing.

Me too, agnostic, but I haven't figured out atheists either- why deny something that was never there in the first place, like man made gods? There may be a cognitive entity behind Nature but it has never come forward and revealed anything.

0

Your kidding right?

1

At least you can't deny that it is based on fiction.

0

I think the Vulcan religion is more logical. It is also inspired by a mix of Eastern spiritual practices and stoicism, and has its share of woo, but at the core of that religion is logic. I think most humans, myself included, could benefit from studying logic.

0

When I was a TA in cultural anthropology, in an Anthropology of Religion undergraduate class I had a student write an essay about how she grew up in an utterly irreligious houshold (and by irreligious, I don't be agnostic, and certainly not athiest, religious and spiritual matters were just not addressed in her family). The closest thing to a creed was the Star Wars ethos. For some people "Jedi" is, indeed, at least very close to a religion. But I also believe that for many Jedi there is an element of the facetious in their "belief". Others are probably really serious about it.

Of the great religions, I would say Jedism would be closest to Buddhism, in that Jeddism is a religious philosophy (or rather, partially formed "philosophy" based on a partial literary ethos.) In some way this is a blessing, Jedism is obviously based on epic fiction. All but the demented know it is not really real. On the other hand the literary ethos Jedi is based on was not meant to be a religious text. Jedi's source material is relatively simplistic as literature, and disturbingly violent and simplistically dualist.

0

I guess that makes me a Vulcanite, Spock's reasoning was always impeccable.

0

Cross Taoism with a heavy dose of Zen Buddhism and Pantheism, and you get Jediism.

0

IDGAF, just happy I could fuck with religious people in the military and put JEDI on my dog tags.

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