Sha Ka Ree

"Consider the questions of existence. "Who am I? Why am I here? Does God exist?" These are the questions man has asked ever since he first gazed at the stars and dreamed. My Vulcan ancestors were ruled by their emotions. They felt with their hearts… made love with their hearts… and believed with their hearts. Above all else, they believed in a place where these questions of existence would be answered. Modern dogma tells us this place is a myth… a fantasy concocted by pagans. It is no fantasy! I tell you it exists! My brothers, we have been chosen to undertake the greatest adventure of all time – the discovery of Sha Ka Ree."

– Sybok, 2287 (Star Trek V: The Final Frontier)

Sha Ka Ree was a location in pagan Vulcan mythology from which all of creation was said to have originated, and man's questions about life and existence could be answered. In our cultures, Sha Ka Ree was known by many other names: The Source, Heaven, the Human conception of Eden (or Paradise), the Klingon Qui'Tu, the Romulan Vorta Vor, and a name unpronounceable in the Andorian language. It was said to be located in the galactic core.

The renegade Vulcan Sybok embarked on a quest to locate Sha Ka Ree, recruiting a large number of followers via telepathic manipulation. By 2287 he was finally able to acquire control of the USS Enterprise-A using this technique. Sybok informed Captain Kirk that he had located Sha Ka Ree via visions given to him by God himself. Although Kirk initially thought Sybok to be mad, his visions seemed to be proven correct when, after successfully penetrating the Barrier, the Enterprise crew encountered a planet on the other side. However, they found out the being on the planet was not God, but a malevolent alien entity that tried to trick them into freeing it from the planet. (Star Trek V: The Final Frontier)

According to the Star Trek Encyclopedia (4th ed., vol. 2, p. 288), as well as Lisabeth Shatner's book Captain's Log: William Shatner's Personal Account of the Making of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, the name Sha Ka Ree is an allusion to Sean Connery, who was originally planned to play Sybok. However, according to Garfield Reeves-Stevens on the Star Trek V DVD commentary, it is a play on "Shangri-La".

The script spells the name as "Sha Ka Ree", but the region 1 DVD captions spell it as "Shakari".