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The camera cuts regularly to bystander Vader as he watches both the agony of his son's loving self-sacrifice—a crucifixion really, and the trilogy's only graphic violence—and, in contrast, the Emperor's odious delight in torture and murder. In short, Luke chooses to die because he has at last comprehended and embraced the heart of Yoda's teachings: that the universe runs by love and that love should pervade all thought and action (for the theologically minded, it is a perfect rendition of the notion of substitutionary atonement).

His witnessing of Luke's strength, faithfulness, and care recalls Vader to the good person he once was as Anakin Skywalker, before his still-mysterious seduction to the dark side (Lucas depicts the beginning of this very process in Episode I: The Phantom Menace and Episode II: The Attack of the Clones [2002], and completes the process in Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, opening this week).

Seeing his son's willingness to die rather than use the power of the Force for aggression and murder, Vader musters the faint remnants of love and goodness of his days as a father and as a Jedi. On the verge of death himself, Darth Vader rises to destroy the Emperor in order to save his own son. In perfect symbolic appropriateness, the waves of electricity that fell on Luke now devour Vader and mortally wound the already weakened man. At the cost of his own life, Vader acts to save his son, and in doing so—as the last scene of Return makes clear—he is restored to full spiritual brotherhood with Obi-Wan and Yoda. In destroying the evil that first seduced him, Vader once again becomes a Jedi. Thus the title The Return of the Jedi: it points in a straightforward way to the transformation that no one guessed was likely or possible. Through the son's witness of love, the father is redeemed, and the father and son meet in reconciliation and true communion.

Continued: Part 4

Reprinted from Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies (Eerdmans). Used by permission. To purchase a copy of Catching Light, click here.

Copyright © 2005 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

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In his book, Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies, author Roy M. Anker writes about finding meaning and morality in the intergalactic saga.Part 2 of 4.

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Star Wars Spirituality: Part 4	Printer view
In his book, Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies, author Roy M. Anker writes about finding meaning and morality in the intergalactic saga. Part 4 of 4.