Why do jedi use lightsabers

Indeed, they shouldn't even be able to swat aside blaster bolts; that requires a far more significant awareness of the Force, a talent called "double vision" in which the Jedi experiences both present reality and future threat at the same time. A Jedi has trained to trust the Force on an instinctive level, and thus moves the blade to block the blaster bolt, potentially even returning the shot.

Jedi Apprentices learn to block blaster bolts early on in their training, precisely because the skill develops that deep and intimate relationship with the Force. In Star Wars Rebels , Kanan notably stopped training Sabine well before he got to that point, suggesting he did not expect her to be able to achieve this even when she had bonded with the Darksaber.

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Create a free Team What is Teams? Learn more. Why do Jedi use lightsabers? Ask Question. Asked 6 years ago. Active 4 years, 3 months ago. Viewed 19k times. Improve this question. Mikasa 7, 4 4 gold badges 34 34 silver badges 84 84 bronze badges.

OOU - Rule of cool. Because a gun is way too easy. Because blasters aren't capable of deflecting blaster fire and cutting open doors. Have you seen how poorly people shoot those Blasters? Show 8 more comments. Active Oldest Votes. Improve this answer. Wad Cheber Wad Cheber 65k 58 58 gold badges silver badges bronze badges. Was just about to mention that myself! Out-of-universe there is precedence of carrying a blade for symbolic and religious reasons.

The Jedi clearly use their lightsabers as weapons more than modern Sikhs use their Kirpan, but the symbolic value holds true a Sikh's Kirpan is their mark. I think the admonition that "A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, never for attack" is relevant here also, since a lightsaber is an obvious symbol and deterrent and also provides more defensive options than a blaster.

It's interesting that we don't see people backing down in the face of the mere activation of a lightsaber in the movies, as it seems like that should happen often - but perhaps during the time of the movies the Jedi are not seen as being as formidible as they actually are.

Jedis: "a cut above" your average galactic denizen. Does the word "youngling" grate on anyone else's nerves? Show 4 more comments. Eric Towers Eric Towers 7 7 silver badges 7 7 bronze badges.

Revan waged war against the Republic for several years, attracting numerous rogue and Dark Jedi to his cause. When he founded his own branch of Sith, Revan observed the tradition of using red-hued blades laid out by the original Sith.

Many of his followers followed suit, and red lightsabers became recognized as the mark of a darksider. Double-bladed lightsabers also saw common usage among the Dark Jedi and Sith Lords. This era saw a surge in the usage of personal energy shields by armed forces, rendering blasters partly obsolete. As blaster usage experienced partial decline due to the shields, melee weapons such as swords became more common.

In order to make the weapons more durable, almost all weapons of the era were created using cortosis woven into the blade, allowing them to stand up against lightsabers. Another typical design feature on Sith weapons was the usage of dual-blade guards.

Eventually, the Republic managed to reclaim its lost territory. During this period, lightsaber usage and technology remained largely unchanged, although it should be noted that the usage of naturally formed crystals from Ilum became almost universal among Jedi, causing the variety of lightsaber colors to drop, as the vast majority of crystals that formed on Ilum took on either a blue or green hue.

It is notable that during the reign of Kaan , Sith apprentices were provided with stock lightsabers rather than having to create their own. Maul considered the creation of the crystals he used as a mark of Sith superiority over Jedi. When the Clone Wars began, Jedi lightsabers experienced a change in focus. Rather than being created as a meditative exercise, heavy-duty lightsabers built to stand up to the rigors of war became the norm.

Stolen from the Jedi Temple by the Mandalorians several millennia prior, the weapon had been passed down the line among the warriors, eventually coming into the possession of Pre Vizsla. Vizsla wielded the weapon against Obi-Wan Kenobi in a brief duel. With the Great Jedi Purge , lightsabers were outlawed. To further hinder surviving Jedi, Palpatine had many of the sites where Jedi traditionally collected lightsaber crystals razed or quarantined, and placed strict sanctions on any crystals available on the market that could be used on such, such as Corusca gems.

Most of Palpatine's servants and disciples, such as his Hands or his Dark Side Elite , favored the simple standard lightsabers. These lightsabers were created on Kamino for the Imperial saber guard and the Starkiller clones , and called for the mass importing of special crystals for them. The crystals in question were likely synthetics , due to the red coloration common to most, though the weapons supplied to most of the clones featured silver blades.

In 15 BBY , landspeeder racer Thall Joben was in possession of a lightsaber that had been left in his speeder by its previous owner. When Luke Skywalker set about constructing his lightsaber , he based the design on schematics supplied by Obi-Wan Kenobi that he found in a journal. Notably, he was forced to use a synth-crystal for his weapon, as he lacked any knowledge of the sites where Jedi traditionally gathered crystals, most of which having been razed during the Purge.

The resulting crystal possessed a green coloration, due to Skywalker's meditations upon it during its formation. Notably, Palpatine did not force his other disciples to wield red lightsabers, but as they were mere Dark Jedi rather than true Sith , he may have felt that the tradition did not apply. He himself wielded a trophy lightsaber with a blue coloration at this time.

After Palpatine's final death, there remained several dark side cults and groups either formed by surviving Dark Jedi. A notable group were the Reborn. Due to the large number of Dark Jedi within the Reborn, supplied by a special cloning method that granted Force-sensitivity, Desann was forced to manufacture lightsabers for the group.

This resulted in a notable innovation in lightsaber construction techniques, as beforehand lightsaber manufacturing was impossible due to the non-uniform nature of the crystals, which required painstaking, individual fine-tuning.

Also, as all the lightsabers were identical assembly line creations, they all utilized red crystals. While the development of lightsaber-manufacturing techniques was a significant advancement in lightsaber technology, the Jedi, as well as most other Force-using traditions, kept to the old methods where lightsabers were self-fabricated by students in order to individualize the weapons, and test the abilities of the adept in question. Imperial Knights with silver blades vs.

Darth Krayt with a set of coral lightsabers. Many years later, as the Imperial Remnant recovered in strength, they also formed a new Force Order; the Imperial Knights. The Knights were noted for their self-fabricated weapons, although they all followed the same design and used white crystals in their weapons. This helped individualize their weapons but still mark them out as Imperial Knights. While the Empire and the Sith worked together, the Sith turned on the Empire and usurped the throne, causing a civil war within the Empire.

The lightsaber construction methods of the Sith differed from the Jedi and Imperial Knights in that many of their lightsabers were apparently constructed from a material similar to the Yorik coral used by the Yuuzhan Vong. They also utilized synthetic crystals, in observance of tradition. The schematics of Anakin Skywalker's second lightsaber. The typical lightsaber hilt consisted of a metal cylinder between twenty-four and thirty centimeters in length.

The hilt had a pommel cap at the bottom which sometimes held a backup power cell. The lightsaber mechanisms were contained within the hilt. High levels of energy generated by a high-output Diatium power cell was unleashed through a series of focusing lenses and energizers that converted the energy into plasma. The ideal number of crystals was three, though only one was required. Once focused by the crystals, the plasma was sent through a series of field energizers and modulation circuitry within the emitter matrix that further focused it, making it into a coherent beam of energy that was projected from the blade emitter.

This containment field also caused the blades to make contact with other lightsabers blades without passing through like other forms of energy. This trait is seen when lightsaber wielders can block and parry other lightsaber blades. Qui-Gon Jinn cuts through a blast door. A lightsaber blade was a mass-less form that neither radiated heat nor expended energy, other than that emitted as visible light, until it came into contact with something solid.

The power of the energy blade was so great that it could cut through almost anything, although the speed through which it cut depended on the density of the subject. One important note about lightsaber wounds is that they rarely bled profusely, even when a limb had been severed. This is because the energy blade cauterized the wound as it passed, and thus even a severe wound did not tend to bleed heavily.

When cutting through dense material, the immense electromagnetic field generated by the arc caused resistance rather than letting solid matter enter and interrupt the arc. This gave the blade a feeling of being solid when immersed in dense material. Rarely, some solid materials could actually pass through the electromagnetic field and short out the arc. The former stormtrooper picks up the Anakin blade and uses it to fend off Kylo Ren. Though Finn eventually falls to Ren, he survives the attack, and when he drops the lightsaber, Rey picks it up to continue his attack.

Rey has already evidenced some nascent skill with the Force — though she's never been trained, she successfully blocks Kylo Ren from penetrating her mind, uses the Jedi Mind Trick to escape captivity, and summons the fated Anakin lightsaber when it falls in the snow. It looks likely — and many fan theories posit — that Rey will eventually complete Jedi training, given that the Force is so strong with her.

But she hasn't. Not yet, at least. Still, the lightsaber seems to respond especially well to the touch of a Jedi.