Would Luna Lovegood make a great Jedi Padawan (then later on, a great Jedi Knight) ?

I dont´know who Luna Lovegood is (sounds like a porn-star)


Asmo

Luna Lovegood is a character in the Harry Potter series of books, appearing in books 5, 6, and 7 (out of 7 books.)
Luna is not a main character, in the sense of Harry Potter himself, or Ron Weasley, or Hermione Granger. However, despite being limited to what could be described as a sub-theme character, Luna manages to be relevant and important at a number of crucial junctions in the story.
For more on Luna Lovegood, do a search for Harry Potter on any search engine, browse through the results, and search for Luna in what you find (or, do sub-searches for her in the sites in question.)
 

log in or register to remove this ad

Well, Edna, Why WOULD she make a good Jedi?

I see I am talking to a Harry Potter fan here. After all, we know who Remus Lupin is, do we not?! :)

However, to answer *your* question, I must *first* define what a great Jedi Knight is.

A fine Jedi Knight is someone epitomized by the likes of Qui-Gon Jinn. Think Qui-Gon, think fine Jedi Knight. There's your Short Answer to the (complicated) Question.
Here is an abbreviated version of the Long Answer:

A fine Jedi Knight is:

Since high Wisdom (in the D&D sense) is the Prime Requisite (in my book) of the Jedi Knight, a fine Jedi Knight probably has very high wisdom.
This means, more exactly, a high level of self discipline, self control, inner peace and quietude (something *very* hard to attain, obviously), a high level of judgement and the ability to act decisively on those judgements, an ability to make calm and thought out judgements, humility, open mindedness, a non-judgemental approach, a lack of elitism or elitist attitudes, a lack of arrogance, a lack of righteousness, a strong sense of ethics and understanding of the importance of rules without being supercillious, and other things.
Qui-Gon Jinn has these qualities. So does Luna Lovegood.

A fine Jedi Knight has a high degree of the stat known as Observation (sometimes, the 8th stat in D&D, after Comeliness.)
This means, an ability to focus and concentrate on one's surroundings when one tries, an ability to maintain focus and concentration, an ability to absorb vast amounts of information from observation, that esoteric thing called insight in large quantities, intuition in healthy doses, the ability to see and hear and listen, and perceive things that others would miss, and draw conclusions from information that others would not make.
In a sense, then, Observation and Wisdom are linked. You could consider Observation to be a subset of Wisdom.
Qui-Gon Jinn had a very high score in Observation. So did Luna Lovegood (a point missed by most people in the books, until they found this out the hard way, Quidditch commentary not withstanding.)

It should be noted that a fine Jedi should be a *caring* individual. A *kindly* individual. A *considerate* individual. Decent, forthright, ethical, trustworthy, the kind of person you can count on to stand by you, and who you can let guard your back.
I would even go so far as to say the model Jedi is a gentle, loving person, a peacemaker through dialouge, a warrior only as a last resort.
Qui-Gon was like that. And, incidentally, so was Luna Lovegood.

Intelligence is the second prime requisite of the Jedi Knight, in my opinion.
What is intelligence? In this case, just go with the general concept. The ability to learn, memorize, deduce (Sherlock Holmes, anyone?), all the things that made Hermione Granger so outstanding.
But the greatest and most relevant thing here, was the capacity to weld Intelligence, Wisdom, and Observation together, to create something greater yet. 1+1+1 = 15.
Qui-Gon Jinn could do this. And so could Luna Lovegood.

The final Prime Requisite is Charisma, and here things become more dicey.
Charisma is attractiveness, in an overall sense. Is this person likeable? Got a great personality? A neat person? Attractive? Romantic? Just ... someone who impresses and you just think that person is alright?
Well, Qui-Gon was like this (most people I have ever talked to, seem to think so ...)
Luna? Luna had a much harder time here.

Luna was compromised by the fact that she refused to prevaricate. She told the truth. Just the truth, as she saw it. Sometimes, this did great things. Sometimes, the truth went over like a lead balloon. And sometimes, the truth went over people's heads, and they would gape in incomprehension.
For example, Luna Lovegood would not hesitate to call out the Jedi Council of the Old Republic for the incompetents and hypocrites they were. Not out of malice, but just because it was the truth. She would go on to explain to them (in detail) the necessity of training Anakin, and their foolishness in falling to the Dark Side in giving in to fear, and a lot of other rather painful things (for them) to hear.
And when they became outraged by this, Luna would matter-of-factly, calmly, even gently point out that giving in to Anger was another failing, another way to the Dark Side, then ask them why they insisted on such foolishness?
In short, Luna would go over with the Jedi Masters like ... well ... I think they might prefer a conversation with Darth Vader instead.

Luna also had a particularity: she took the attitude that if a reliable source told her that something was real, it was real (unless someone proved otherwise.)
For example, Narkles were real. So were other things far more impossibly fantastic (that is, fantastically impossible to believe.)
This caused Luna quite a lot of trouble with her peers, but it remained her way of thinking for the rest of her life.

Yet ... in the end, Harry and his friends - as antipathic to Luna as everyone else at the beginning, especially after bad first impressions - eventually became extremely close friends with her, and in the end they were willing to trust her with their very lives.

So where did Luna stand, with Charisma? Somewhere difficult to define, somewhere Enigmatic.
Then again, Qui-Gon was willing to be unpopular when he felt it necessary, even defying the Jedi Council itself repeatedly (and being punished for it, since they played politics and refused to promote him to the Council.)
Luna was not interested in popularity contests anymore than Qui-Gon. Luna was interested in her particular subjects of interest, and in ... being the decent, caring person that she was.

Strength? Dexterity? Constitution?
Unneeded for a Jedi. They used the Force to substitute for all three. With the Force, they could employ strength, dexterity, and endurance far beyond what an olympic champion could hope for.
So Luna's slight, frail build is irrelevant here.

General health?
Both Qui-Gon Jinn and Luna Lovegood were in top health. Qui-Gon, because of his general duties. Luna, because of the demands of Hogwarts.

Does this help? There's a version, as it were, of the Long Answer.
 

Plus, she's Looney.

Definitely not the soulless killing machine that all good Jedi are.

("So...if I kill someone in anger, it's bad, but if I just do it without thinking about it, I'm okay?")

Brad

LOL.

The Jedi were never meant to be warriors, except as a *last resort.*
The Jedi were meant as people who cared, people who helped out, people who used their abilities to make life better for others. Gentle, caring, kindly, loving people and beings whose lives were dedicated to altruism.
The Jedi were diplomats. Scholars. Scientists. Builders and creators. Arbitrators. Interpretators. They (in their original charter, a thousand years back) decided to be as much the glue holding society and people together, as they knew how to be.
A grateful Galactic Republic honored them with the power of Galactic Arbitrators and Keepers of the Peace. And for hundreds of years, they faithfully, humbly, and altruistically did their best to fulfill this given duty (considering the nature of the various races in the Republic, it must have been a really, really hard and frustrating job, at best. The Patience of Job was needed for the job. But then, patience was one of the greatest of Jedi virtues!)

Then, as fate willed, they lost sight of their original charter, and they stopped with the Careful Nurturing and started with the Mindless Doing. Politics made it's dirty way into their midst, and they fell prey to it. After that, yes, they did a lot more fighting and a lot less talking ... and a lot less of everything else they were supposed to actually be doing.

We all know where *that* led to. Jedi Order? What Jedi Order? Exterminated down to the least ... and the last.

Looney, eh? Yeah, a lot of people called Luna that.
Then again, even Obi-Wan decided to roundly criticize Qui-Gon (his own teacher) over his judgement calls and decisions, implying that Qui-Gon was an idiot ('they all see the boy is dangerous. Why can't you?')
 
Last edited:

She doesn't have any midi-chlorians either.

(chuckles)

I'd like to see you prove that. (heh ... quoting Lucius Malfoy here ...)

Let's just say Qui-Gon and Luna Lovegood were both ... Strong With the Force.

Lightsabres? Only a Jedi Knight could build one. So ... Luna would have to complete her Padawan training and make her own lighsabre, no? That's how it worked.
 
Last edited:


Well now ... I have answered many questions, and had a great deal to say regarding the concepts of Rowling and Lucas (I would think a lot of you would disagree on many of my points.)

I return to my question ... does anyone have an opinion? An answer?
 

She would fit in well with the concepts of emotional detachment endorsed by the prequel trilogy.
I dont´know who Luna Lovegood is (sounds like a porn-star)
:hmm:Whats even more peculiar is her father's first name is Xenophilius.:uhoh: Granted that would make a fine name for an Alienist who loves the Far Realm in all the wrong ways.:]
 

She would fit in well with the concepts of emotional detachment endorsed by the prequel trilogy.

Luna, emotionally detached and uninvolved, ala the Old Jedi Council?

This is the Luna who saved the mind and sanity of Harry Potter at the end of Book 5, when nobody else could have.
This is the Luna who risked her life to help him in books 5, 6, and 7.

I agree that Luna appeared to be detached emotionally. But I think she cared very deeply, was actually very attached. She merely had innate calmness, innate self control, that made her appear detached.

Snape, certainly, did not appear to care about Harry Potter. But we saw that this was not true, that he cared a great deal. He used his self-discipline to create an aura of non-caring, in order to fulfill his dangerous role as a special agent.

Different approaches, but both involved self discipline, apparent detachment, and actually very deep attachment.
 


Well now, someone forked this thread into a discussion about Midi-chlorians.
You *do* realize that Luna Lovegood, of *all* people, would really, really enjoy a conversation on the subject. Luna would even enjoy discussing Jar Jar Binks and the Gunguns (indeed, I think Luna would call them out as being brighter and more capable than the Naboo - the humans living on Naboo - based on the events of Episode I. And ... wouldn't she sorta be right?)
 

Pets & Sidekicks

Remove ads

Top