Grey Jedi Code Anyone?

I tend to believe that "light" and "dark" are highly subjective terms when describing Jedi and they are open to wide interpretation by the individual. In my world everything ends up somewhere in the "grey" anyway, so why bother with the distinction? Nobody will be completely "light" or completely "dark".

I do see value in the importance of BALANCE in this code. My personal journey as a Jedi has really been about achieving harmony. Accepting that there is evil in the world while doing my best to be a good person. I firmly believe that a Jedi should be a guardian of peace, but I allow for the use of violence to achieve that peace if necessary.

Speaking to the idea of being a "soldier" or "guardian" of balance, I will go as far as to say that this role is unnecessary for a Jedi as the Force will always achieve balance on its own, regardless of any one Jedi's actions.

This is one of those places where the fiction and our lives branch. For instance, darksiders in the fiction are often very self-conscious baddies. Bwa ha ha and all that. In our community, people I know who embrace their dark side are not cartoonish villains bent on world domination.

Please correct me (gently) if I am wrong, but I always understood grey Jedi to be Jedi who were open to using anger as a solution to problems and things like that. No exclusively, of course, but they were open to the idea. But they weren't out to hurt anyone.

I recall a discussion of grey Jedi and balance that ended with one person saying, "so what? You want balance? So, after you save someone you go kill someone else?" I laughed until it became clear that he was being serious. Yikes.

The existence of the categories doesn't bother me as such. But getting caught up in them, drawing social lines, getting sectarian, that's all pretty ugly. And the light can do it as easily as the dark. Or the grey.

Or earth tones. I'm starting a new side. If you're not with us...

I always saw Mace Windu (my Jedi hero) as sort of a gray Jedi. His problem was that he was so focused on idealistic peace, that he was blinded to his own actions. His polarizing thinking is less than sexy. haha.

BUT, I did admire his ability to use the Darkness within him for good.

Think about it... we all do have elements of darkness in us. We have this possibility. It's not so good to suppress it! When we suppress parts of our being, we are not letting them turn into strengths. Rather, we keep them weaknesses. I'm not 100% sure what to DO with my darkness (often, it leads to really interesting romances and very creative sparks and schemes), but I like having it around.

While I don't disagree with the general idea of the code, balance and all of that, I don't think it should be what is aspired to. For me being a Jedi is about aspiring to be something better while understanding that I'll always be working to get better or closer to the ideal. This is why I like the "yet" code, because it acknowledges that we will never be rid of emotion or passion but that we are aspiring to something greater.

As human beings we will always be a shade of grey, how dark that shade is depends on what I was aiming for. If my aim is for the middle it will be easier to come up short and slip to the "dark side." If I aim higher, to be better, then if and when I fall short (and as a human I will fall short) it will be somewhere in the middle but will be closer to the "light side."

Cabur Senaar wrote: This is one of those places where the fiction and our lives branch. For instance, darksiders in the fiction are often very self-conscious baddies. Bwa ha ha and all that. In our community, people I know who embrace their dark side are not cartoonish villains bent on world domination.

Hey, now! *twirls mustache* Easy on the generalizations... :whistle:

My opinion is that the Jedi, being a knight of light is already the reflection of the balance of many forces. Likewise all rainbow colors forming white, Jedi is formed by many forces, but all of them always in equilibrium.
No one expects you not fall in love as Jedi, but that passion does not become a possession, otherwise we see relationships that end in death, for example. Frustration generates anger, anger generates fear, and all this makes you do bad things to you and others.
But that's my opinion.

Alethea Thompson wrote: There is no Dark Side, nor a Light Side
There is Only the Force
I will do what I must to keep the balance
The balance is what keeps me together
There is no good without evil, but evil must not be allowed to flourish
There is passion, Yet peace
Serenity, Yet emotion
Chaos, Yet order
I am the wielder of the flame, the protector of balance
I am the holder of the torch, lighting the way
I am the keeper of the flame, soldier of balance
I am a guardian of balance
I am a Gray Jedi



This is apparently fan made, so I'm curious what everyone has to say on it.

Being a fence sitting grey Ying Yanger "person" I don't think anything needs to be changed here.

If an individual finds inspiration and value with this then good for them. I mean that sincerly. What people find/use for inspiration is personal just as long as they find it. So many don't. If it speaks to me or it doesn't that's all OK too.

i tend to prefer the Jed'aii Code. The Jedi Code seems to encourage suppression of natural negative urges and emotions. Instead, they should be accepted as part of us and analyzed, but their energy channeled into pro-social action.
Suppression of so-called dark urges in the books seems to have led to the creation of the Sith, and in real life, such things as the Church Sex scandals. total suppression of natural urges seems to lead to extremely negative long term consequences.

Logically, white-hat and grey-hat do the same when the world is shifted towards dark. Isn't this the current state?

Believe as you wish, however the question is what is the consequence of believing.