The Sisko is of Bajor

The Sisko is of Bajor

Benjamin Lafayette Sisko.  To the crew of DS9 he was their captain.  To Jake he was a father.  To Jennifer and later Kasidy he was a husband.  To the people of the Federation he was a soldier, a commander and a war hero.  To the Bajorans he was one of their most revered religious figures: the Emissary of the prophets.  Sisko's arc across the series is an intriguing one.  His journey from emotionally wounded widower and single father and reluctant officer following orders to religious figure, soldier, diplomat, statesman, decorated combat officer and eventually a god.

Reluctant and Unsure

Arriving at Deep Space Nine he was unsure and reluctant.  A widower after the death of his wife Jennifer at Wolf 359 he was a single father, raising his teenage son Jake alone.  After 3 years at Utopia Planitia he was assigned as commanding officer of Deep Space Nine, the recently abandoned Cardassian mining station at Bajor, formerly known as Terok Nor.  As reluctant as he was to take the assignment, he was equally so to accept the title of Emissary of the Prophets, the title given him by Kai Opaka upon realizing that in fulfillment of an ancient prophecy he was destined to become the Emissary.  He would lose some of the reluctance after making first contact with the Prophets-the wormhole aliens after discovering the Bajoran Wormhole (which the Bajoran people revere as the Celestial Temple).  He would teach the Prophets much about linear time, and they would teach him that his existence was "not linear".  It would be some time though before he would truly become comfortable with being the Emissary.  

Challenges

As the years passed Sisko would deal with challenges from Bajoran politics to the Maquis to first contact with the Dominion.  He would take command of a ship, the USS Defiant and become an influential figure in Federation politics.  He would be instrumental in the fulfillment of Trekor's Third Prophecy and at the same time make possible communication through the wormhole.  He would begin a relationship with Kasidy Yates and get a promotion to captain.  The following year he would encounter another who would claim to be the Emissary: Akorem Laan, a Bajoran poet time displaced by the prophets.  This would prove to be a test by the Prophets to make Sisko accept his place as Emissary.  The next year Sisko, deciphering a riddle left behind by the ancient Bajorans discovered the ancient city of B'hala, a task which apparently could only be accomplished by the Emissary.  

At War

The Dominion War began with the mining of the wormhole and the loss of Deep Space Nine to Dominion forces.  Two months later Sisko would lead the mission to retake the station, his fleet breaking through Dominion lines and the Defiant arriving at Deep Space Nine, but not before the minefield was eliminated.  Out of options and facing a massive Dominion fleet arriving through the wormhole Sisko took the Defiant into the wormhole to confront the fleet.  He would certainly have died in the attempt had the Prophets not intervened.  Pulling Sisko out of time and to the Celestial Temple the Prophets told him that he could not sacrifice himself, to which Sisko countered that he had no choice.  The Prophets said that corporeal matters did not concern them, an obvious falsehood as Sisko pointed out, since the Prophets were deeply connected to Bajor, even once saying that they were "of Bajor".  The Prophets acquiesced and destroyed the entire Dominion fleet in the Wormhole, over 2800 ships.  They told Sisko that "a penance must be exacted" and prophetically said "The Sisko is of Bajor, but he will find no rest there.  His pah will follow another path".  

Destiny

As the year ended and the Federation began an offensive war against the Dominion, Gul Dukat, possessed by a pah-wraith would board Deep Space Nine and release the pah-wraith into the Celestial Temple via an orb.  The wormhole would close and the orbs would go dark.  The Emissary would be called upon to find a way to drive out the pah-wraith and restore the Prophets to their rightful place.  Not only would he discover the tenth orb, the orb of the Emissary in the sands of Tyree, he would also discover hidden truths about his own family.  His real mother, Sarah, who disappeared shortly after his birth was at the time of his conception and birth inhabited by a Prophet.  Thus Sisko was part Prophet and was always destined to be the Emissary.  In the words of the Prophet in the form of Sarah Sisko "because it could be no other".  In the late months of that year Sisko and Kasidy would marry, despite repeated warnings from the Prophets that "your path is a difficult one.  She can not share it with you" and that if he did marry Kasidy he "will know nothing but sorrow".  The prophet also told him, cryptically and somewhat ominously "your greatest trial is about to begin".  This would soon prove true as Sisko, after commanding a new USS Defiant at the battle of Cardassia would defeat Gul Dukat, the Emissary of the Pah-Wraiths, pushing him off the precipice into the fire caves with the Kosst Amojan, forever sealing both in the Fire Caves with the pah-wraiths.  This however would only be done at the cost of Siskos life.  Sisko would be saved by the Prophets, who at the last minute transported him to the celestial temple.  The Emissary had completed his task.  He had apparently shed his corporeal existence and become one with the prophets.  It was his destiny, ordained before his birth.  His life, as the Prophets had told him long before, was not linear.  His disappearance and absence from the lives of Jake, Kasidy and her unborn child would be the great sorrow the Prophets spoke of. 

 
J.R.R. Tolkien wrote:

The road goes ever on and on
down from the door where it began
now far ahead the road has gone
an I must follow if I can.
Pursuing it with eager feet
until it joins some larger way
where many paths an errands meet
and whither then? I cannot say.

Sisko's path, from emotionally wounded single father, to reluctant religious figure, to soldier and commander, to literal god is a journey of healing, of self realization, and of acceptance.  For several years Sisko didn't fully accept the role of Emissary and in fact tried to distance himself from it, only finally coming to embrace it after meeting Akorem Laan who also tried to claim the title.  He would later use his power and influence as Emissary to protect Bajor, not only by getting Bajor to remain neutral during the Dominion War, but by convincing the Prophets to destroy the Dominion fleet that would have overrun the Federation.  At the time of his marriage to Kasidy Sisko had even bought land and planning to build a house on Bajor, further cementing his connection to the planet.  Siskos journey, the path the Prophets set for him to walk, started before his birth with Sarah, prophet-possessed, marrying his father and conceiving him and ended in the Fire Caves on Bajor and in the Celestial Temple.  Like anyone's life, the road he travelled, and that we as the audience travelled with him was filled with twists and turns, challenges and decisions both easy and hard.  Its ending, beyond Sisko becoming one with the Prophets is uncertain.  Sisko's being part-prophet and the path being his preordained destiny only tightens his bond with Bajor.  The Prophets words, ever cryptic, were equally as true: the Sisko is of Bajor.