{"id":2970,"date":"2010-01-27T21:34:00","date_gmt":"2010-01-27T21:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/01\/forgiving-darth-vader\/"},"modified":"2010-01-27T21:34:00","modified_gmt":"2010-01-27T21:34:00","slug":"forgiving-darth-vader","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2010\/01\/forgiving-darth-vader.html","title":{"rendered":"Forgiving Darth Vader"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Today in my religion and science fiction class, we brought together earlier discussions of Star Trek and Star Wars as mythologies for our era. In order to provide a humorous introduction to a comparison and contrast of these mythologies, I started things off with this video:<\/p>\n<\/iframe>\n<p>We ranged far and wide, but one interesting theme, that of conquering evil by redemption rather than killing, led to an interesting question: Should <strike>Hitler<\/strike> Darth Vader be <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=o55Hvf_dhbk\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">forgiven<\/a> if he repents? His death at the end of Return of the Jedi sidesteps the issue, but what if he had lived? Should he have stood trial? Should he have been executed or spent his life in prison? Should he have been set free?<\/p>\n<p>A friend and colleague who is also sitting in on the class posed this question in a <a href=\"http:\/\/answers.polldaddy.com\/poll\/2605521\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">poll<\/a> on the <a href=\"http:\/\/religionandsciencefiction.blogspot.com\/2010\/01\/woud-you-forgive-darth-vader.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">religion and sci-fi blog<\/a>. Why not cast your vote?<\/p>\n<div class=\"separator\" style=\"clear: both;text-align: center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikivisual.com\/images\/e\/e5\/Spirits.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" border=\"0\" height=\"170\" src=\"https:\/\/en.wikivisual.com\/images\/e\/e5\/Spirits.jpg\" width=\"400\"><\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"blogger-post-footer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" src=\"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/7622297540113836091-5097969272263659367?l=exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com\" alt=\"\"><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today in my religion and science fiction class, we brought together earlier discussions of Star Trek and Star Wars as mythologies for our era. In order to provide a humorous introduction to a comparison and contrast of these mythologies, I started things off with this video: We ranged far and wide, but one interesting theme, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n<title>Forgiving Darth Vader<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Today in my religion and science fiction class, we brought together earlier discussions of Star Trek and Star Wars as mythologies for our era. 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