The “no attachments” doctrine is about not letting your feelings interfere with a mission and being willing to let things go when need be. Obi-Wan loves Satine, in The Clone Wars, he even says, “It’s not that we’re not allowed to have these feelings, it’s natural”, but he doesn’t let it interfere with a mission like Anakin does. And when Satine dies, Obi-Wan lets her go. He doesn’t succumb to the dark side. He doesn’t close out his emotions. He feels his emotions but then moves on. When Bo-Katan tries to emotionally blackmail him, he doesn’t fall for it, because he can’t let his emotions cloud his judgement. The same thing happens after Qui-Gon’s death. He openly cries, but then moves on and honors his memory by training Anakin.
I quote only this small passage, because I’m lazy and I don’t want to quote every statement you made in your reply.
I don’t think the Jedi rules are 100% wrong. I agree with some parts of them, but I disagree with other parts of them. And most importantly, I disagree with their practical application by the Jedi.
Must we learn to let go? Yes, of course. But letting go doesn’t mean not caring about the people we love. We are all attached to someone (in the Buddhist sense), because when we discover that a person we love is in danger of life, then we are all worried, we are all worried about losing that person. In my opinion there is nothing wrong with this, and we shouldn’t suppress the fear of loss. I think it’s right, not only to be concerned about the people we love, but also to try to protect them and prevent bad things to happen to them. Wanting to protect people close to us is a natural human instinct, thinking that it’s wrong and trying to repress it, in my opinion, is not right and doesn’t lead to anything good. Learning to let go is right, of course. But letting go should be the last thing you should do, not the first. If you find out that someone you love is in danger of life, then you should do everything that’s lawful (that is, everything that doesn’t lead you to hurt others) to save that person, and in case you fail, despite you did your best, then, only then, you have to let go. Letting go should be what you do when you realize that you can’t do anything else.
Also, you can’t expect a person to let go immediately. If a person we love dies in front of us, then it’s normal to be sad for a while, you can’t expect a person to see someone die in front of their eyes and a few seconds later act like nothing happened. It’s not human, and above all it’s not healthy, because letting go immediately means repressing oneself. And as everyone knows, repressing oneself where it’s not necessary never leads to anything good. The fact that some people, under certain circumstances, manage to let go immediately is not a valid excuse to justify the Jedi doctrine, because not everyone can let go immediately. We’re not all equal, and we shouldn’t be expected to be all equal. Each of us has different personal needs, because we’re not robots.
Furthermore, I think that being totally selfless, like the Jedi claim to be, is impossible. Love always requires a certain degree of possessiveness. If I love someone, I want to be with that person not only because I like him/her as a person, but also because the presence of that person makes me happy and makes me feel good. If the presence of that person didn’t make me feel good, then there would be no reason for me to engage in a romantic relationship with that person in the first place. In love, you have to give and receive. You give your love in the hope that your love will be reciprocated and that the exchange of that love will make you happy. A stoic love without attachment is simply not true love, but a generic feeling of relative interest. If we find out that someone we love is in danger of life, then it’s right to try to save him/her. Not just because we want that person to be good, but also because that person makes us feel good. In life one cannot be either entirely selfless or completely selfish. You need a balance, and that’s what neither the Jedi nor the Sith (as well as George Lucas himself) have ever understood.
Also, I don’t think that the Jedi can give lessons about what absolute love and compassion mean, since they were the first not to practice this phantom “universal love”. If they really did have unconditional love for the entire Galaxy, then they would have paid more attention to civilians and ordinary people instead of lock themselves in their own Temple and put themselves at the service of corrupt politicians, and maybe they would have cared more about the millions of people who lived in slavery and disease on Tatooine and other criminal-controlled planets. “I’m not here to free slaves”, Qui-Gon said. A great example of unconditional love for every sentient being, I must say! It’s too easy to practice “absolute love and compassion” exclusively with the people we know. And yet, this is what the Jedi do, because I don’t remember having ever seen them going out in the middle of the streets to help starving people. I mean, they didn’t even had to left Coruscant to do it, because you know, the low levels of Coruscant are already full of poor people who need help. So the Jedi should stop thinking of themselves as the custodians of absolute truth, because they’re the first to not practice what they preach.
In addition, talking about Obi-Wan as the perfect example of a person who lets go immediately is, in my opinion, wrong. Yes, Obi-Wan managed to let go immediately when Siri Tachi died, but he couldn’t let go immediately when Qui-Gon was killed. When Maul killed Qui-Gon, all Obi-Wan did was attack him aggressively and violently. I mean, this is no mystery to anyone, just review the scene of the fight between Maul and Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan was so upset and angry that he let his emotions take over, and as soon as the shield opened he immediately threw himself at Maul, attacking him. Of course, after killing him, Obi-Wan calmed down and ran to Qui-Gon to hear his last words. But in the meantime he fought Maul and killed him, driven by anger and aggressive feelings. So, I think Obi-Wan is quite hypocritical in criticizing Anakin, because he did pretty much the same, although on a smaller scale.
The Jedi think Dooku could never kill anyone. That’s true. But let’s examine carefully what both Mace Windu and Ki Adi Mundi say. Ki Adi Mundi says: “He’s a politically idealist, not a murderer”. After that, Mace says: “You must know, My Lady, that Dooku was once a Jedi. He could never kill anyone, it’s not in his character”. Well, to be honest, the only thing I see in this dialogue is simply the Jedi being arrogant. Yes, they don’t think that Dooku could ever kill anyone, they don’t believe that he’s a murderer. But why do they think that? But it’s clear, because he was once a Jedi, and for God’s sake, everyone knows the Jedi are perfect, so even if one of them leaves the Order, he could never become a murderer. It’s not that the Jedi are saying those things about Dooku because they sincerely respect him and have affection for him, but simply because they have so much faith in their own teachings that they think that even if someone leaves the Order, he could never become a murderer or hurt others.
In addition, the statue that the Jedi have dedicated to Dooku inside the Temple is not a commemorative or appreciative statue. In the Temple library there are 20 statues, depicting the so-called Lost 20, that is, 20 Jedi masters who at some point decided to leave the Order. Dooku is part of the group of the Lost 20, and the Jedi have placed his statue in the Temple library, not to commemorate him, but simply as a warning. Further information here: https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Lost_Twenty/Legends
So, despite what you say, those who left the Order were frowned upon, and leaving the Order was seen as something almost shameful, reprehensible. To say that Anakin could have left the Order at any time without any repercussions is, therefore, absolutely false. Despite this, however, Anakin was planning to leave the Order after the end of the War to live with Padmé on Naboo, as is clear from Revenge of the Sith.
In conclusion.
Although the idea of learning to let go is basically right, I think the Jedi have implemented it too radically. Instead of forbidding attachment (as intended by Lucas),I think they should have taught how to control it, allowing people to express the fear of loss in a balanced way. Their wrong teachings played a very important role in Anakin’s fall, because they didn’t allow him to handle his emotions in a healthy and human way (because I repeat, suppressing the fear of loss is neither healthy nor human). Then, if we also add Anakin’s manipulation by Palpatine, who taught Anakin to handle his negative feelings in the wrong way, then we have Darth Vader as a result. Darth Vader is simply what you obtain when you mix up a person with already existing emotional problems, the wrong teachings of the Jedi that doesn’t allow this emotional problems to be solved correctly, and finally Palpatine’s willingness to take advantage of all the above to carry out his own agenda.
