The Sith in ‘Star Wars’ Had Their Own ‘Chosen One’ Prophecy; Will Fans See It In Canon?
The Jedi’s “The Chosen One” prophecy in Star Wars can be debated back and forth. Was it sloppily added in to make Anakin Skywalker’s story more interesting or high stakes? Or was it done well and truly fulfilled at the end of Return of the Jedi? Regardless, it’s a part of canon and does connect the prequel and original trilogies really well. But in Star Wars’ Expanded Universe (aka EU and Legends), the Sith have a prophecy that is very similar.
Just like the Jedi’s ‘Chosen One’ prophecy, the Sith had the ‘Sith’ari’
To recap, before George Lucas sold Star Wars and Lucasfilm to Disney, there was a massive catalog of comics, books, and video games that made up Star Wars. From the time Return of the Jedi premiered up until he sold the studio, tons of stories were told about the Star Wars universe. Now, all of those stories and legends aren’t “canon,” so they don’t exist in the current franchise unless they get mentioned down the line.
One of the coolest aspects of the EU was how in-depth it went into the Sith. Many people might have overlooked this, but at the start of the prequels, the Jedi think the Sith are extinct because they’ve been gone for 1,000 years. Legends explains why that is, and it revolves around the Sith’ari.
The Sith’ari is their version of “The Chosen One” prophecy. It reads, “The Sith’ari will be free of limits. The Sith’ari will lead the Sith and destroy them. The Sith’ari will raise the Sith from death and make them stronger than before.”
Basically, the prophecy foretold of this Sith’ari, which means “Lord” or “Overlord” in the Sith language. They would bring about a powerful era of Sith, but ultimately destroy them all with it. While that seems like a counterproductive way to uplift the Sith, the destruction would make them stronger than ever before.
Darth Bane was the true Sith’ari
To put it into the context of the current timeline, this all is taking place thousands of years before the prequels. Like 28,000 years or more ago. In 28000 BBY, King Adas of Korriban lead that nation and the Sith for thousands of years. The Sith considered him the Sith’ari, and he gladly took that title. However, when he died without fulfilling the rest of the prophecy, they dispelled the notion he was the Sith’s chosen one.
Then, around 1000 BBY, Darth Bane came around. He destroyed the Brotherhood of Darkness, which was a group of Sith that Darth Bane considered a version of Jedi, just on the Dark Side. Bane believed that the bloodline and Force among the Sith was stretched too thin and so he’s the one that instated the Rule of Two for Sith. We see this in the current timeline in Star Wars, where there can only be a master and apprentice within the Sith.
This ultimately made whichever two Sith existed at a time so much more powerful than the previous generations. And this ultimately made the Sith go extinct, leading to the 1,000 years without them leading into the prequels. All of this clearly marked Darth Bane as the Sith’ari.
Darth Plagueis, master to Darth Sidious, and Sidious both claimed the title of Sith’ari or a form of it. However, the true Sith that completed the prophecy was Darth Bane, who destroyed the Sith but gave them the power they needed to hide for millennia.
This prophecy from ‘Legends’ feeds well into canon, and should be included in future stories
This is all from Legends, though, even though Bane, Plagueis, and Sidious all exist in canon Star Wars. The wars of the Sith, the Old Republic stories, and Sith’ari isn’t, though. At least not in-depth. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be.
Especially with the creation of the new High Republic era content coming out of Lucasfilm, the time to mention the Sith’ari and the massive legends of the Sith is now. It would be extremely easy to bring it up in this new content because it fits into why it’s high peacetime for the Jedi.
The High Republic stories we’re going to get takes place around 200 years before The Phantom Menace. They’re living in a world where the Sith are supposed to be extinct, which is also the Jedi’s way of thinking at the start of Episode I. It all leads into canon really well, and would open up opportunities for movies or shows revolving around the Sith empire, which would be absolutely incredible to see.
