-- From Revenge of the Sith by Matthew Stover"The Sith had changed. The Sith had grown, had adapted, had invested a thousand years' intensive study into every aspect of not only the Force but Jedi lore itself, in preparation for its revenge. The Sith had remade themselves.
They had become new.
While the Jedi--
--The Jedi had spent that same millennium training to refight the last war.
The new Sith could not be destroyed with a lightsaber; they could not be burned away by any torch of the Force. The brighter the light, the darker their shadow. How could one win a war against the dark, when war itself had become the dark's own weapon?"
This makes sense when you consider how set in their ways the Jedi had become and how sneaky the Sith had. Anyway, my thought was that after the fall of the Jedi Order and the rise of the Empire the Sith had their ascendency. They ruled for some 30 years compared to the Jedi's 1,000 but still.
In the end the Sith were overthrown by the Jedi.
Okay, so the Jedi become dominant again. After that point it is the Jedi (under Luke) who has modified its tactics and training regime to combat the Sith foe that exist at that time.
But the Sith did not change, they continued to use the tactics that they used successfully against the Old Jedi Order.
So it seems that the continual battle between the Sith and Jedi is that one gains domination the other goes into hiding. The one in hiding learns about the tactics of the other and eventually strikes back, causing the one that was winning to go into hiding. And on and on the vicious cycle goes.
Currently, it is the Jedi who has gained ascendency and a new Sith (under somebody -- maybe Lumiya) which is hiding. The fight continues unabated only the time in between the fights change.
The second concept didn't cause me to do much deep thinking because its profound enough as it is. I gather the italized texts at the begining of each chapter into a whole and read it all together. Its a very nice and interesting thing. Here it is:
-- Revenge of the Sith by Matthew Stover.The dark is generous.
It's first gift is concealment: our true faces lie in the dark beneath our skins, our true hearts remain shadowed deeper still. But the greatest concealment lies not in protecting our secret truths, but in hiding from us the truths of others.
The dark protects us from what we dare not know.
Its second gift is comforting illusion: the ease of gentle dreams in night's embrace, the beauty that imagination brings to what would rpeel in day's harsh light. But the greatest of its comforts is the illusion that the dark is temporary: that every night brings a new day. Because it is day that is temporary.
Day is the illusion.
Its third gift is the light itself: as days are defined by the nights that divide them, as stars are defined by the infinite black through which they wheel, the dark embraces the light, and brings it forth from the center of its own self.
With each victory of the light, it is the dark that wins.
The dark is generous, and it is patient.
It is the dark that seeds cruelty into justice, that drips contempt into compassion, that poisons love with grains of doubt.
The dark can be patient, because the slightest drop of ran will cause those seeds to sprout.
The rain will come, and the seeds will sprout, for the dark is the soil in which they grow, and it is the clouds above them, and it waits behind the star that gives them light.
The dark's patience is infinite.
Eventually, even stars burn out.
The dark is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins.
It always wins because it is everywhere.
It is in the wood that burns in your hearth, and in the kettle on the fire; it is under your chair, and under your table and under the sheets on your bed. Walk in the midday sun and the dark is with you, attached to the soles of your feet.
The brightest light casts the darkest shadow.
The dark is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins--but in the heart of its strength lies weakness: one lone candle is enough to hold it back.
Love is more than a candle.
Love can ignite stars.
