10
Mephisto reports to Faust that Margarete’s pastor has appropriated her necklace with the following justification:
The Church has a strong stomach,
Has devoured whole countries
And never yet overeaten.
The Church alone, my dear Ladies,
Can digest ill-gotten gains.47
Faust is indifferent to the corrupting powers of church, state, commerce, and the devil, but is worried about Margarete, now his Gretchen, for along with her necklace she has lost her peace: she “knows neither what she wants nor should.” Mephistopheles is the first to use the nickname—the acknowledgment of her innocence comes as a farewell. She is no longer Margarete, intact, but a diminished version of herself.
Matt 20:29–34. Jesus and the two blind men at Jericho: “O Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!” “What do you want that I should do for you?”48 They tell him they want their eyes opened, and at this request Jesus commiserates with them. They want to see what he sees and he alone knows what this will cost them. As soon as their eyes are opened they follow him, for what other way is open to them? Jericho—the place where the old structures fall away—Jesus the new Joshua. If the blind men had, like Faust and Gretchen, not known what they wanted, they would not have been able to ask for it, the prerequisite for receiving it. Faust thinks he knows; Gretchen knows she does not. Goethe has captured here something of the inescapable in male-female relations, though age is clearly a factor too in one’s self-confidence. Men lose it in middle age; women gain it. This is why Faust had to be made young again by the old woman in a process the ageless Mephistopheles could not facilitate. It takes time, the one thing Mephistopheles does not have.
July 11
Blue sky. One lonely cloud suspended, hardly moving, set like a misty gem in its brilliant background. Where was the sun? Behind me, I suppose. Warm and quiet.
Matt 21:1–10. Jesus enters Jerusalem. The praise of the people is in reality a cry for help, of which they are unaware. Hosanna! Save us! Is it the function of tradition, any tradition, religious or otherwise, to conceal our fragility from us, so that our most urgent, heartfelt pleas resound as honorific nonsense, so that we are no longer able to trace the origin of our most grievous disappointments? The highs and lows of honor. A hungry crowd. A tasty prophet.
I am ignorant of politics and yet not deaf to gossip, of which considerable chatter is given to movements of liberation, rebellion, revolution in the heart of Europe—what to call it depends on who is doing the talking, and who is listening. I feel safer here than in Berlin, where I imagine there is much intrigue. I myself am so dependent on the powers that be that I could hardly wish for radical change, despite my understanding that such dependency is the root of oppression. I like to think I am independent of mind and spirit, as Jesus called his disciples to be, but then there is also an economic aspect to the calling—even the poor and oppressed are bidden to sell what they have and give away the proceeds. One does not have to be a rich young man to balk at this. He was saddened by the good news—I am more likely to be angered. Have I not already given more than I should have to every man I have ever met? And what to show for it either spiritually or emotionally? What entitles the temple priest to the widow’s last farthing? Jesus never asked for money, and he never thought much of those who did. The sun is behind me. Warm and quiet. A single misty gem suspended in a brilliant blue sky. The ground is strewn with palms and psalms resound. There is no way out. Hosanna!
July 12
When I think of the evil things people have said to me and I realize how scarred I have been by them, I understand how important it is to refrain from negative judgment—all judgment if possible, but especially to keep one’s condemnation to oneself. My master is so kind to me and yet so insulting to his peers—even those who praise and support his work, those who would learn from him. There are those who find him perverse.
I am not well this evening. Perhaps it is the heat, or the topic, or something I ate. I need to drink more water to keep up with what I have lost—and the headache, since yesterday afternoon.
Matt 21:12–17. Jesus cleans house. Funny how the mind plays tricks when one is lightheaded. I read “house of prayer” as “house of begging.”49 Those not yet of age50 and infants are more likely to say something praiseworthy than those honored by ordination and academic status. Is it the training that turns men’s heads, or the honors, or both? Perhaps my master’s sharp words are justified. How is anyone seeking truth to second-guess what appears to him, upon careful observation and long reflection, to be true? Jesus, one assumes, took it all in in an instant. Looking and listening were one and the same with understanding. He did not have to visit the Jerusalem temple for five or ten or twenty years to get a feel for what was holy, what was corrupt, and what was reasonable human accommodation. My master has had his long loving look at the Christianity of Copenhagen and come away disenchanted, not with Christ, but with the international cartel that seeks to profit from his sacrifice. When I look such awful truths in the eye, oddly enough I am less angry about the mess men have made of religion, and simply very sad. And determined not to be fooled. Poor Margarete, a child in the hands of the devil—and Marthe, a married woman but none the wiser.51 I have a fever. I will lie down.
July 13
I come to the last page of this journal. The destruction of the Bastille was fifty-eight years ago tomorrow: a lifetime ago. How much has changed? Very little, I think, which is why another much larger wave now threatens. Is Christianity—never mind Christianity—is Christ on the side of those who foment rebellion against the established order? Does he favor Jeremiah, who scorned the preaching of peace where there was none? Does he reject the gospel of submission? For the German mind (and this may include the Danes, broadly speaking), there is no love without order, though certainly there can be order without love. And not merely the Northern Europeans, but the Medievals—Dante represents this so well, this impulse to order in every facet of human and divine love and retribution. I hesitate to call what Dante gives us in his Inferno divine justice, for it is one very brilliant man’s bitter response to exile—justifiable in human terms, but not altogether just.
Matt 21:18–22. Jesus curses the fig tree and it withers on the spot. Only leaves of trees or paper, but no fruit—an offense to our Lord. True faith picks up mountains—mountains of poetry, or theology, or human structures of any kind, and heaves them into the sea. “And everything that you ask for in prayer, if you believe, you will receive.”
Faust and Mephistopheles in the street. Faust eagerly awaits this evening’s arranged meeting with Margarete in her neighbor’s garden. Mephistopheles questions the sincerity of Faust’s feeling for Margarete. Faust cannot find the right word for it—he burns, he glows—is this passion purely instinct, or something eternal?
2. Stichwörter. The German (Stich: prick) conveys a contempt for received notions, not rising to the level of ideas, that the English does not.
3. Lectio Divina. Our journalist employs the Latin term for the practice of slowly and repeatedly reading and reflecting on brief passages of Scripture.
4. Weib, a woman or (colloquially)
