The Speaker is dead? Falling a few feet to the ground after being released from his bindings killed him??? Or did I miss something?

Yes, he's dead. There's a scannable room after the campaign where Ghost makes that pretty clear.

It definitely wasn't portrayed very well or made very clear in the cutscenes.

The speaker has one mission in D1, which is to rescue the Traveler's shard "Nothing is more important now".

He exiled Osiris for looking for answers as opposed to working on helping people.

It seems the Speaker is there for guidance, and his responsibility is to represent the Traveler's interests like a legal guardian rather then an in game guardian.

Given the psudo worship of the Traveler, and Ghaul's own issues, Ghaul missed this point and expected that the Speaker was some sort of chosen priest. When the speaker says he see's all Ghaul has done, I took that as he understood what kind of person Ghaul is. The Traveler doesn't react when the speaker is killed. It only reacts as Ghaul starts siphoning light to empower himself. Taking the Light theoretically should have severe repercussions, much like giving Darkness does. By Taking the light the Traveler would feel it had been found again by the Darkness, cutting it with "million knives". Causing another pulse just like what it did during the collapse.

Nah, most likely Bungie just didn't know what to do with him moving forward and so killed him off.

i can see that being the case. I would hope that there is more to it than that though.

I never understood the purpose of the Speaker. He didn't do anything! He even tells Ghaul that the Traveler doesn't speak to him...so what is his purpose?

I think that Bungie, all of us and Ghaul all thought the speaker was a significant component of the Traveler but after learning more about him realized he was just a zealot, and that was the main point of the Ghaul/Speaker story line, to expose the Speaker as just some random jabrony.

Consul recognized this immediately because of his age and wisdom. He let Ghaul do his thing but eventually got tired of it and ended the game. Ghaul eventually realized it too and killed Consul as the scapegoat for essentially destroying the ideology he had based his entire campaign on. Also, Ghaul be crazy...so...logic does not apply to his actions. He wanted to convince the Speaker he was worthy so the Speaker would bestow the Traveler to him. When he found out the Speaker was a fraud, he forcefully tried to take it.

If Guardians can be resurrected over and over and over by ghosts, who were created by the Traveler, then it only makes sense that the Traveler can bring back dead people too. If the Speaker was legit, then it makes sense to me that he shows back up again somewhere.

This makes perfect sense and I hope the speaker was a fraud and never comes back. I hated that guy for exactly the reasons you laid out: He reeked of fraud. "I could tell you the stories... [but I won't]" "You saved the world from the black garden! [so here's a single mote of light]" "I never said the traveler spoke *to* me [but I heavily implied it in order to get my position of power and prestige]." Screw that guy.

I think that Bungie, all of us and Ghaul all thought the speaker was a significant component of the Traveler but after learning more about him realized he was just a zealot, and that was the main point of the Ghaul/Speaker story line, to expose the Speaker as just some random jabrony.

Consul recognized this immediately because of his age and wisdom. He let Ghaul do his thing but eventually got tired of it and ended the game. Ghaul eventually realized it too and killed Consul as the scapegoat for essentially destroying the ideology he had based his entire campaign on. Also, Ghaul be crazy...so...logic does not apply to his actions. He wanted to convince the Speaker he was worthy so the Speaker would bestow the Traveler to him. When he found out the Speaker was a fraud, he forcefully tried to take it.

If Guardians can be resurrected over and over and over by ghosts, who were created by the Traveler, then it only makes sense that the Traveler can bring back dead people too. If the Speaker was legit, then it makes sense to me that he shows back up again somewhere.

Nah, most likely Bungie just didn't know what to do with him moving forward and so killed him off.

I think this was probably true as well. Also, I'm glad they did. I hated that prick.

Yeah, I could see this working. If the Speaker were just another Guardian... why hold him captive instead of killing him like the hundreds or thousands of others the Red Legion killed?

Because Ghaul had been studying the Traveler for years, and knew of the Speaker.

The Speaker was a priest, essentially, and judging from Ghost's dialogue, clearly not the only one (probably just the most prominent, since he was around before the walls were built).

He's a Warlock like any other (he even has/had a normal Ghost), but one who is very devout in his philosophy. His faith led Ghaul to confuse him as someone who literally communes with the Traveler, and so he captured him.

Anything more is reading a bit too much into things, I feel.