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The prophecy of the Chosen One was an ancient Jedi legend that foretold the coming of a being who would restore balance to the Force.^[2]

The idea of balance of the Force, a central tenet of the Jedi Order, referred to the ideal state in which the Force existed in nature, namely as the light side. According to Jedi dogma, the presence of the dark side corrupted and destroyed this natural balance,^[3] and the Jedi viewed it as their duty to restore it.

The prophecy was one of hundreds of obscure legends maintained by the Jedi Order,^[4] though its origins and actual content remain unknown. It was thought to have been created by the earliest Jedi philosophers, after the creation of the Galactic Republic but before the Jedi assumed an active role in it.^[5]

The prophecy detailed the birth of one strong in the Force, who would ultimately bring balance to that mystical energy field through their actions.^[2] It also indicated that this being would, in restoring balance, destroy the Sith, who were the cause of imbalance, with their use of the dark side of the Force.^[6] However, as the Sith were believed destroyed at the Seventh Battle of Ruusan,^[7] the prophecy was disregarded by the Jedi Council.^[2] The prophecy was not explicit, but the Jedi assumed that the Chosen One would be a Jedi, due to the prophecy's being a Jedi prophecy.^[8] But it would later come to pass that Anakin Skywalker would fulfill the prophecy of the Chosen One after 23 years of conspiring with Palpatine to effectively eradicate the Jedi Order in 19 BBY as part of the Great Jedi Purge.^[6]

History of the Chosen One

In the waning days of the Galactic Republic, Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn discovered a young slave boy named Anakin Skywalker on the desert planet of Tatooine. Jinn believed the boy could be the Chosen One himself, due to his extraordinary ability with the Force—brought on by his unusually high midi-chlorian count of over twenty thousand in each cell of his body—and his apparent virgin birth by Shmi Skywalker.^[2] Darth Plagueis of the Sith also discovered the boy's existence, and was disturbed that in his Grand Experiment, he inadvertently created the very thing that would destroy the Sith.^[9]

Despite Qui-Gon's belief of the boy's true purpose in the galaxy, the Jedi High Council was not entirely convinced, and forbade Qui-Gon from training Anakin. However, after Jinn's death on Naboo, his former Padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi, took Anakin as his apprentice. The fact that a Sith Lord slew Qui-Gon may have indicated to the Council that, with the Sith returned, the prophecy could still be completed.^[2]

Although Anakin Skywalker's powers grew as the years passed, he began a slow slide towards the dark side of the Force, in part due to the increasing influence of Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, someone Anakin thought of as a friend and mentor. The High Council was still dubious that Anakin was truly the Chosen One, and Yoda himself even mused that the prophecy could have been misread, and that Anakin could not have been the one destined to bring balance. This assumption became a conviction when Skywalker fell to the dark side and, as Darth Vader, was partly responsible for the fall of the Jedi Order.

The destruction of the Jedi plunged the galaxy into darkness, with the Dark Lords of the Sith in control. Obi-Wan Kenobi, during his confrontation with Vader on Mustafar, stated that he believed Anakin was indeed the Chosen One, but that his destiny had been altered, and the prophecy left unfulfilled. Yoda and Obi-Wan then looked towards the offspring of Anakin to one day overthrow the Sith, possibly hoping they would fulfill the prophecy instead.^[6]

It transpired, however, that the prophecy was still to be momentarily fulfilled; decades later, above the moon of Endor. There, Vader stood witness to a confrontation between the Dark Lord of the Sith, Palpatine, and Vader's own son, Luke Skywalker. When Palpatine unleashed violent Force lightning upon the boy, Anakin Skywalker returned and turned against his Sith Master in a violent attempt to save Luke's life. It was this conscious choice that fulfilled the Prophecy and brought a temporary balance to the Force. Skywalker killed Sidious at the cost of his own life, and in doing so, fulfilled the prophecy by destroying the Sith leadership, his Master's original body and himself.

Having embraced the Light side of the Force once again, Anakin Skywalker passed away, and left his son to continue the teachings of the Jedi, to maintain the balance that he had restored.^[10] His mentor, Obi-Wan Kenobi, accepted him as the Chosen One and agreed to teach him how to become one with the Force.^[11]

Behind the scenes

George Lucas himself has stated that Anakin is the Chosen One and that the prophecy is true, although it had been misinterpreted by the entire Jedi Order.^[12][13]

It is believed by some that the prophecy of the Chosen One is connected to the prophecy of the "Son of the Suns", as mentioned in the second draft script of what became Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope:

This, however, was written in 1975, when the prophecy of the Chosen One had not been developed, and is actually referencing the actions of Luke Skywalker, not his father. This specific prophecy was eliminated in future drafts, but the name and general concept found its way back into canon, but with no reference to the Skywalker family—instead it is a more generic prophecy from Thyrsus,^[14] and a Talz title belonging to Thi-Sen^[15].

In an interview, Lucas compared the difference between the light and dark sides as being a symbiotic relationship and a cancer. A symbiotic relationship is one which benefits both parties and in which neither is harmed, whereas a cancer takes without giving back, eventually causing the death of both parties.^[3] However, this was contradicted by the Mortis arc from Star Wars: The Clone Wars, where the Father specifically states that the Chosen One is supposed to tame both the Light Side and the Dark Side and is supposed to replace the Father upon his death, with the implication that too much of the Light Side would have disastrous implications for the Galaxy at large.^[16] George Lucas, in the commentary for Star Wars: The Clone Wars: The Complete Season Three, also indicated that the concept of bringing balance to the Force involved keeping the selfless (which he referred to as the light side) and the selfish (referred to by him as the dark side) in check.^[17]

Some fans question whether or not the Prophecy was fulfilled, or if it was very effective. In the EU, several dozen Sith and Dark Side practitioners were alive and well when Palpatine was temporarily killed on Endor. Palpatine himself returned to a cloned body a short time later. The Empire managed to retain some of its power, while the Galaxy remained in conflict after conflict. Over a century later, galactic peace would be seriously threatened by a dark side collective known as the One Sith.

However, if one were to view the balancing of the Force in an alternate light, ending at just after Episode VI, the prophecy was fulfilled by settling the conflict between the Jedi and the Sith dating back 5,000 years. The Great Hyperspace War marked the first major conflict between the Jedi and Sith, with its aftermath resulting in continued conflict between the two sides to determine the ruler of the galaxy. Darth Revan, a key figure of the post-great hyperspace war era, was a Sith Lord who passed on his knowledge and teachings of the dark side through holocrons, that would be discovered more than a millennia later by Darth Bane. Darth Bane would go on to create the Rule of Two which over the next millennia would achieve its ultimate goals of destroying the Jedi Order as it stood, as well as complete galactic domination. With the destruction of the Sith, its Empire and the Old Order, a New Republic subsequently took its place with a New Jedi Order to replace the old. With a new galactic rule, which has yet to be fully unified under one power, and the destruction of a multi-millennia old Sith legacy, the galaxy (and by extension the force) can be interpreted as in balance with the prophecy fulfilled.

In addition to the above, the nature of the creation of the Chosen One was also briefly called into question in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. Although The Phantom Menace claimed that the Force conceived Anakin completely without outside influence, Palpatine implied in Revenge of the Sith that Anakin may have been the result of Darth Plagueis' experiments to create life by manipulating Midi-chlorians. The novel Darth Plagues combined both views: Although Plagueis was indirectly responsible for Anakin's creation, the Force conceived of Anakin as a way to stop Plagueis and the Sith.

Appearances

Sources

I find your lack of sources disturbing. This article needs to be provided with more sources and/or appearances to conform to a higher standard of article quality.

• The Essential Chronology
• The New Essential Chronology
• Jedi vs. Sith: The Essential Guide to the Force
• The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia
• The Jedi Path: A Manual for Students of the Force
• "Matt Lanter & the Rigors of Mortis!"—Star Wars Insider 123
• "Secrets of the Force"—Star Wars Insider 123
•  The Clone Wars Episode Guide: Overlords on StarWars.com (content now obsolete; backup link on Archive.org)
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars: The Complete Season Three
• "Family Tradition"—Star Wars Insider 130
• "Luminous Beings Are We"—Star Wars Insider 131
• Book of Sith: Secrets from the Dark Side
• Star Wars: Beware the Sith (Indirect mention only)
• Star Wars: The Ultimate Visual Guide: Updated and Expanded
• The Essential Reader's Companion

Notes and references

See also

• Sith'ari

External links

•  Debunking the "Son of Suns" Myth on StarWars.com (content now obsolete; backup link on Archive.org)