Star Wars confirms why lightsaber users don't get burned by their own weapon

There’s no question that the lightsaber is one of the most iconic and powerful wielded weapons in cinematic history and let’s be honest, we’ve all had imaginary lightsaber battles at some point in our lives, right?

We were first introduced to the lightsaber in the 1977 movie, Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope. From the moment we saw Obi-Wan Kenobi train a young Luke Skywalker in the ways of the Force, wielding a real-life lightsaber has been a dream of every Star Wars fan (just like Ewan McGregor and Liam Neeson).

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Granted, for obvious reasons, we’ll never get a chance to wield a real lightsaber because they don't actually exist and I’m not talking about a fancy replica. Yet, if we did own a real lightsaber, there’s every chance we’d accidentally chop off a limb or at the very least, the plasma beam will likely burn our face.

Sure, we know that they’re trained Jedi and whatnot but how is it that we’ve not seen a Jedi at least singe their skin or clothing? Well, as reported by Looper, the book Star Wars Lightsabers: A Guide to Weapons of the Force has the answer, it seems.

The book explains that the reason why lightsabers don't burn their users is due to a magnetic field emitted by the in-universe rare material, the Kyber crystal as well as built-in positive and negative charged lenses. So, there you have it, in the hands of trained Jedi (or Sith), the lightsaber is relatively safe, as long as you’re not running down a hallway with it pointed forward.

The most recent Star Wars live-action product is The Acolyte with its episodes released weekly on the streaming platform Disney Plus with its final and eighth episode airing on 16 July 2024.