After the fateful duel between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker in Star War: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, Obi-Wan confiscates his fallen apprentice’s lightsaber. However, canon suggests that Anakin had forged the iconic weapon himself, implying blatant theft on the part of Obi-Wan after their fight. While Obi-Wan’s new Disney+ show Obi-Wan Kenobi, which will take place on Tatooine after Revenge of the Sith, is likely to shed more light on the dormant years of the lightsaber’s lifespan. There is still quite a bit of context that can be retrieved from Ben Kenobi himself during the main saga that helps answer the question of why he confiscated Anakin’s saber.

During the age of the Republic, the era of Star Wars that saw Jedi in abundance, lightsabers were often forged by their owners. Anakin’s first lightsaber was forged using three crystals that had been called to him in the Crystal Caves. When it was destroyed, it is fair to presume that he would have created his replacement saber shortly after the battle on Geonosis. Throughout Anakin’s many lightsaber duels in The Clone Wars, and at the beginning of Revenge of the Sith, he was already using his new lightsaber; the very one that would later be wielded by Luke Skywalker and Rey.

When examining Obi-Wan Kenobi’s dialogue across both the original and prequel Star Wars trilogies, it is clear that Kenobi kept Anakin’s lightsaber because of the immense respect he had for the weapon and what it signifies. To him, a Jedi’s lightsaber was a symbol of peace and one that would bear the legacy of its wielder’s generations. Being a Jedi in the Star Wars universe draws obvious comparisons to real-world religions (especially Catholicism), and a Jedi’s saber has the same spiritual reverence and symbolic importance that is given to many sacred objects throughout our various faiths, such as a rosary in Catholicism or a kippah in Judaism. On Tatooine in A New Hope, Kenobi dismissed the clumsy nature of a blaster while singing the lightsaber’s praises. He described the lightsaber as, “an elegant weapon for a more civilized age.” He explained to Luke that they were used by guardians of peace and justice, which clearly displayed his admiration for the ideals of the Republic era, and what the Jedi once upheld.

Further, it is clear that, to Obi-Wan, an object of this importance wasn’t meant to be left out of sight, let alone to be consumed by lava. On Coruscant, when Anakin lost his lightsaber chasing shapeshifting assassin Zam Wesell, Obi-Wan made sure to retrieve the lost saber. When he returned it to Anakin, he sternly remarked, “This weapon is your life.” Furthering the implied connection between a saber and its Jedi wielder, The Rise of Skywalker had shown Rey performing a burial of that very saber, representing a ritualistic burial of the Skywalker bloodline on Tatooine. When Anakin was presumably destroyed on Mustafar in Revenge of the Sith, Obi-Wan took the lightsaber as a way to preserve and show respect for the friend he once had before Anakin was corrupted by the Sith. Since the saber had not yet been bled by Anakin, it preserved the part of its wielder that was good.

Having known that Anakin’s wife was pregnant, it likely crossed Obi-Wan’s mind, being spiritually centered, that he could pass it down to Anakin’s kin as an inheritance. The Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi has the chance to address these intentions, as the second trailer featured an argument between Ben and Luke’s uncle Owen regarding training Luke in the ways of the Force. While only time will tell how much of the series will feature Anakin’s lightsaber, it is clear that Obi-Wan didn’t have a personal gain on his mind when he reached for Anakin’s lightsaber at the end of Star War: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith.