Jedi Order
The Jedi Order was a noble religious order of protectors united in their devotion to the light side of the Force. With a history dating back thousands of years before the rise of the Galactic Empire, the Jedi Knights—noted for their lightsabers and natural ability to harness the powers of the Force—stood as the guardians of peace and justice in the Galactic Republic. The Order was originally established on Ahch-To in the Unknown Regions. In later years, the Jedi Grand Temple on the Core World Coruscant served as the hub of all Jedi activity in the galaxy. The Temple was also a training school for younglings and Padawans, who learned the ways of the Force under the supervision of Jedi Masters, twelve of whom were elected to serve on the Jedi High Council—the Order's highest governing authority. The High Council's staff officers were the Grand Master, who functioned as the leader of the Order and was a title reserved for the wisest Jedi Master, and the Master of the Order, who served as the Council's appointed leader. The Jedi Code governed the Order's way of life; therefore, every Jedi was duty-bound to observe and uphold the Code or else risk banishment from the Order's ranks.
The emergence of the Sith Order was the result of a schism that fractured Jedi unity, dividing the Order between the Jedi who remained faithful to the light and a group of renegades that followed a rogue Jedi into exile for exploring the dark side of the Force. Thenceforth, the Jedi and Sith warred with each other for centuries. Although the last conflict concluded with the fall of the Old Republic, the ancient Sith all but perished as well, allowing a new Galactic Republic to rise under the protection of the Jedi Order. Unknown to the Jedi, however, the Sith endured in secret for a millennium beginning with Darth Bane, the sole-surviving Dark Lord of the Sith who reformed the Sith way by creating the Rule of Two—a rule limiting the Sith Order's ranks to two members: a Sith Master to embody the power of the dark side, and a Sith apprentice to covet that power. While the Jedi and Republic moved on, their ancient wars with the Sith fading from memory, Bane's legacy spawned a lineage of Sith Lords that culminated in the rise of Darth Sidious approximately three decades before the Battle of Yavin.
During the final years of the Republic, the galaxy was beset by political instability and social unrest which, in turn, created a secessionist crisis that ultimately resulted in the formation of the Confederacy of Independent Systems. Lacking the sufficient manpower needed to protect the galaxy, the Jedi became commanders and generals in the newly-formed Grand Army of the Republic. For roughly three years they commanded armies of clone troopers in a conflict known as the Clone Wars, engaging the Confederacy's battle droid forces led by Count Dooku—a former Jedi Master who became a Sith Lord—and the cybernetic warlord General Grievous. Though the Jedi fought to preserve the Republic, the government they served was secretly taken over by Sidious who, as Senator Sheev Palpatine of Naboo, rose to power in the Senate and became the last Supreme Chancellor of the Republic.
The Chancellor's machinations culminated in the execution of Order 66, a secret protocol that turned the Jedi's clone soldiers against them, leading to an all but total extermination of the Jedi Order. With the most of the Jedi eliminated, Sidious supplanted a thousand years of democracy with a new government known as the Galactic Empire.
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Type
Religious, Monastic Order
Demonym
Jedi
Leader Title
Controlled Territories
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