The Religious Trilogy....

I think we all start the new year with the idea that we want to be mentally and physically fitter. Whether this means starting the gym membership up again or reading those books you got for your christmas we're all inclined to see the new year as a time to better ourselves a bit.

So i've started out by learning a bit more about islam. I must confess, I have little time for religion as a life practice but as one of the major issues in the world at the moment I think it's important that we learn a little bit about these sort of things.

So, first stop "The Koran". This can also be spelt "Qur'an" but this reminds me of Quorn a little bit too much and I don't think religion and soya protein meat substitute go together well.

A good place to start is obviously wikipedia, so have a browse through the definition for the Koran here. I was brought up as a catholic so i've obviously got a grasp of the whole "holy text" concept. It's interesting that the Koran actually makes up a kind of holy trilogy with the Torah or old testament and the Gospel or new testament of the christian bible being the final piece sitting in the middle of the two; a bit like "The Two Towers" or "The Empire Strikes Back". In fact, to continue this analogy a bit further the Jewish faith is based on Star Wars, Christians on Empire and Muslims on Jedi. Obviously my apologies go out to anyone offended by this but all religion is based on analogy so get over it.

Now, here's where it gets a bit complicated. All three in theory have the same creator in theory but followers of each part challenge the importance and in some cases the existence of a single or all other parts.

So in Jewish eyes it's all about the core values and laws set up by Star Wars and these laws have to be stuck to, as they are the creator or "George's" law. Christians basically acknowledge that the first part set the scene and was the genuine "word of George" but he had decided at this point to add to the idea of the Star Wars universe and ultimately add a pretty big part to the story. So the new testament is essentially about the father / son relationship and how this relates to the force and the universe as a whole.

Now what's odd about all of this and where it does break away from the Star Wars universe is when you start to think that although there are some who like Star Wars, Empire or Jedi, there are still loads of people who enjoy them as a trilogy. Not in the case of this trilogy! There isn't a believer in the God trilogy, just a bunch of people arguing over which part was the best and a true representation of George's ideas!

Now bear with me... The followers of the original film claim that the Star Wars universe is just for them and only them as they were the original target audience of the film (i.e. Trekkies need not apply!). But with the advent of the second film it's argued that it shouldn't just be about the core faithful, it should be a film for all familys who want to join in. It's even argued by some empire followers that the original followers were no longer welcome to watch the new films. In short they acknowledged that the original was of course part of the Star Wars world but to claim that is was about the original and nothing else was just nonsense!

And so, a long time after the first two parts, a third part arrives on the scene. Now the way the script and film is compiled at this point changes completely. In verses that are designed to be memorised by followers of the genre. They acknowledge that the first two parts exist but believe that Jedi supercedes all previous episodes and also believe that it is the true word as spoken by Lucas and transcribed by his script writer.

Looking at how interlinked and complicated the whole concept has become, it's pretty interesting to look at and learn about. I think that practicers sometimes have this problem that in order to justify their part of the faith, they have to deny the existence of others. This in itself goes against most of the teachings contained in within the trilogy.