Section Five: Disciples and the Felix Culpa

God's plan, avers Bulgakov, includes "evil" and the ability to choose. Evil is necessary for two reasons: Woland states that good needs a foil to remain good, for what is light without shadow? And what is called blasphemous gives individuals something to think about in order to decide the right path for themselves. Evil is fortunate in that it necessitates choice and thought. In this way, satanic verses can be looked at from the point of view of a felix culpa. Bulgakov illustrates this in his epigram:

"Say at last--who art thou? "That Power I serve Which wills forever evil Yet does forever good."

Bulgakov's epigram is taken from Goethe's Faust and represents the paradox of the felix culpa, i.e. Satan desires to cause harm to God's creation, yet all of his schemings only result in a good outcome in a universe ruled by an omniscient, beneficent God.19 In light of this idea, both Verses and Master are less heretical and their truths (ultimately the same) can be understood. For if Satan (Woland) works for God in the latter, why not the former?

In Bulgakov's work, Woland is an integral part of God's design; for, by the chaotic actions of Woland, order is able to be, once again, divined. Woland acts, according to Proffer, as a physical manifestation of the characters' consciences, and motivates them to do the right thing, at least for the time being (532). Bulgakov's Satan is able to cut through the façades of assumed morality and comme il faut to get at the essential truth; he recognizes the fact that he is a necessary part of the divine workings of the universe, a fact that Matthew (and probably all orthodox Christians) cannot understand: evil is a mechanistic necessity of good. The satanic question is what kind of idea am I? Woland says to Matthew, in their encounter above Moscow, after the latter wishes him poor health:

"I am afraid that you will have to reconcile yourself to my good health," retorted Woland, his mouth twisted into a grin. "As soon as you appeared on this roof, you made yourself ridiculous. It was your tone of voice. You spoke your words as though you denied the very existence of shadows or of evil. Think, now: where would your good be if there were no evil, and what would the world look like without shadow? Shadows are thrown by people and things. There's the shadow of my sword, for instance. But shadows are also cast by trees and living beings. Do you want to strip the whole globe by removing every tree and every creature to satisfy your fantasy of a bare world? You're stupid." (348)

Satan, therefore, fulfills his role of inspiration in performing God's will. Essentially he is God's representative as a physical manifestation in Bulgakov and a metaphorical one in Rushdie; Woland, states Haber, works through darkness to denounce and shatter the status quo in order to encourage and inspire life and freedom (403). "Woland's rôle," states Sahni, curiously enough, "is that of an Archangel of the Master and Margarita" (195); and Ericson complies by saying that Satan was the inspiration for the master's novel (22). Gillespie and Weeks call Woland an administrator of divine justice who is more akin to the Old Testament's Lucifer than the New Testament's Satan, and Glenny sees him as an integral aspect of a dual godhead (89, 226, 247).

Satan/Woland requires people who meet him to act, or react, to his attacks on their comfortable, rational existence. Proffer suggests that this forced activity, whether it is thought or simple reaction to a stimulus, is his main concern ("Genre" 628). Woland battles against entropy, sloth, and all of those who prostitute themselves to be successful in a material world of fake values. He is the "Spirit of Truth" that shuns fa�ades and clears the way for individuals to find their own truths. Even further, he prods nonthinkers into thinking, makes them ask the question: What kind of idea am I?

The various critical views of Woland and his purpose all seem to agree that he is an agent of God's will that makes individual thought and action possible in an attempt to find a unique individual voice. Woland also acts as restorer, producing the master's novel from the fire; Woland resurrects the master's truth from destruction.

After an unsuccessful attempt to publish his novel on Pilate and subsequent attacks by critics, the master decides to burn his novel and succumb to the ministrations of Dr. Stravinsky. Hart suggests that the artist must have the courage to constantly defend his work against attack by those meaning to stifle or assimilate; while the master believes that he is the kind of idea that can inspire, he gives into the crippling external pressures and enters the peaceful haven of madness (177). The master, like Yeshua, shows his abilities in divining truth and his own voice to eschew the mediocrity of his day, but lacks the courage to remain true to his beliefs and defend them to the death (Haber 391, 399).

Woland, however, believes that the master's voice is too important to be silenced: "Manuscripts don't burn," he states as he presents the restored novel to its owner (281). But the master remains nonplused: "I have no more dreams and my inspiration is dead" (286). The master's acquiescence to societal forces earns him peace at the novel's end, but not light after he and Margarita swallow poisonous wine (Proffer 563).

Gibreel Farishta also takes his own life and the life of his love, Allie Cone, after he, too, fails as an artist. Farishta's life has been written by others--he is the victim of others' narratives and assumes the role of spokesperson for each one throughout Verses (McLaren 64). Caught between visions of lust, Rosa Diamond, the Curtain's whores, and Mirza Saeed Akhtar, and visions of spirit, the absolute, one God and his word which brings history to an end, Gibreel longs for an answer form these disparate voices he hears in his dreams, yet he remains passive to their desires: "What is an archangel but a puppet? . . . The faithful bend us to their will. We are forces of nature and they, our masters" (Verses 460). Gibreel is also used by Sisodia and his ilk for monetary gains from his popular "theologicals."20 When Farishta tries to incorporate his dream experiences of Mahound and Ayesha into films, he loses popularity, a further victim of a society that desires a steady diet of brainless palaver. He becomes the victim of others' verses, including Chamcha's, and, Othello-like, kills Allie and himself to find peace, but not light (Myers 165).

Simawe affirms that the archangel Gibreel might allegorically represent Imagination: "an ever-expanding energy that keeps rupturing and bursting all kinds of idolized theories, ideologies, and religions" (196). In this way, Farishta also parallels Woland besides the master. He attempts to translate to his society a retelling of the myth of Muhammad, just as the master's heterodox novel retells the story of Jesus and Pilate. The master and Farishta both parallel Satan in his attempt to awaken a somnambulant society. Both Farishta and the master are muses for those who are willing to listen.

If Farishta and the master represent muses or archangels, who then are their prophets? Both Ivan Nikolayich Poniryov and Saladin Chamcha are defined by Rushdie's epigraph from Daniel Defoe's The History of the Devil:

Satan, being thus confined to a vagabond, wandering, unsettled condition, is without any certain abode; for though he has, in consequence of his angelic nature, a kind of empire in the liquid waste of air, yet this is certainly part of his punishment, that he is . . . without any fixed place, or space, allowed him to rest the sole of his foot upon.

Both characters estrange themselves in an attempt to adopt an alien identity: Ivan takes the name Bezdomny in his attempt to become to become an atheist, communist poet, Chamcha forsakes his Indian heritage in order to become a proper Englishman. Chamcha, too, changes his name from the Indian Salahuddin Chamchawala, to the shorter, anglicized version Saladin Chamcha; his new surname means "spoon" with all of it obsequious connotations (Aravamudan 14). Both Chamcha and Bezdomny are shaken by a fantastic event at the beginning of their stories, wind up in a hospital somewhere in the middle, and end up on a path to self identity, proving Farishta's statement "to be born again, first you have to die" true.

Ivan, despite his efforts, does not make a good communist poet. His poem, commissioned by Berlioz and MASSOLIT, does not question Christ's existence, like a good atheist should, but shows Jesus as a man:

It was hard to say exactly what had made Bezdomny write as he had--whether it was his great talent for graphic description or complete ignorance of his subject, but his Jesus had come out . . . well, completely alive, a Jesus who had really existed, although admittedly a Jesus who had every possible fault. (Master 11)

This passage suggests Ivan's ability to be receptive and open to new ideas, no matter where they might come from. Perhaps this is why Woland narrates the first part of the master's novel to Berlioz--the typical communist whose "life was so arranged that he was not accustomed to seeing unusual phenomena"--and Bezdomny: to show the futility of clinging to beliefs as stifling as Berlioz's and affecting Ivan's creativity (Master 10). Woland's narrative and Berlioz's subsequent death push Bezdomny to question his adopted ideologies and land him in Stravinsky's asylum, truly homeless. Hart suggests that the devil's verses have "been planted in fertile soil" (172). Ivan, now that he has glimpsed a vision of higher truth, can no longer survive in the current communist zeitgeist (Haber 407).

Similarly, after his fall from the Bostan with Gibreel, Chamcha begins to realize that he does not belong in his adopted country. He begins to assume the corporeal shape of evil, simultaneously stripped of his physical and social identity (Verstraete 329). Yet the metamorphosis depicts the culmination of a dehumanization that began with his career as a voice without a body on British radio and television, and, states Myers, likens him to the homeless vagabond Satan. Arrested, beaten, and dehumanized by the British authorities without any interference or help from Gibreel, Chamcha lands in the hospital, a subjugated, estranged animal still trying to accept his circumstances with a British stiff upper lip. In their respective hospitals, Chamcha and Ivan meet their own people.

Bezdomny is further influenced by his encounter with the master, inmate no. 118. The master relates his story about his novel, Margarita, and his fall, while Ivan tells of his brush with Woland. The master makes Bezdomny promise to cease his production of poetry--in essence, to stop whorring his talents for the communist state. Ivan readily complies and "they sealed the vow with a handshake" (Master 134). From this point, Ivan becomes even more receptive to the master's words, so much so, in fact, that he dreams the execution of Yeshua. Proffer concludes that the master's novel, Woland's narration, and Ivan Bezdomny's dream all share similar styles and content which "implies that there is one truth which may be divined by the true artist" (537-8). Or, in a more postmodern vein, it demonstrates the influence of a great mind on those who are open to questioning their lives. Gibreel and Salman the Persian also share similar dreams where they are both the inspiration, i.e. the angel Gabriel, for Muhammad; and since Mahound shares in this dream by receiving the Word, he is, although paradoxically, also sharing the same vision of the truth (Verses 112, 367).

Similarly, Chamcha continues to lose his carefully constructed order while he changes physically. His hospital ward contains others like himself: immigrants who, his manticore companion explains, have been transformed by the words of the natives. "They describe us," he explains, "That's all. They have the power of description, and we succumb to the pictures they construct" (Verses 168). Yet, Chamcha is not as easily convinced as Ivan was by the master; he still dreams of making love to the Queen suggesting a strong sexual attachment to England. But, by the chapter's end, Saladin heads "east east east" with his new, black friend whom he would not have even talked to a day before; she symbolizes the darkness that he has tried so long to forsake in his own life (171).

This darkness embraced by Chamcha is focused on Gibreel in the form of verses. His change forces him to discard his Englishness--his wife and career--and focus all of his contempt toward the man that allowed him to be taken away and brutalized: Gibreel Farishta. Kerr suggests that Chamcha realizes his humanity by hating, by embracing that satanic aspect of himself that he has so long despised and repressed (178). He restores his physical appearance only by acting through hate, by playing Iago to Gibreel's Othello. He breaks his English conditioning by exploiting Gibreel's insecurity and jealousy when it comes to Allie Cone. Yet, only when Gibreel ironically and unexpectedly saves Saladin from the burning Shaandaar Café is Chamcha ready to forgive and be born again.

Both Verses and Master end with the rebirth of Chamcha and Ivan. Ivan, true to his vow, renounces his poetry and becomes a historian, while Chamcha returns to India and embraces his community, his family, and his humanity. The master and Margarita visit Ivan on their way to eternity. Ivan states:

"I'm glad you came. You see I'm going to keep my word, I shan't write any more stupid poetry. Something else interests me now--" Ivan smiled and stared crazily past the figure of the master-- "I want to write something quite different. I have come to understand a lot of things since I've been lying here." (361)

Yes, the master agrees, "You must write the sequel to it" (361). After a farewell kiss from Margarita, Ivan no longer feels he needs to remain in Stravinsky's clinic: "perhaps I'm not so sick after all" (362). The master symbolically passes the banner to Ivan, making him responsible for his own individuality and his own voice: "Farewell, disciple" (362).

Master's epilogue shows a Moscow returned to the godless decadence that characterized it before Woland's visit: "the events described in this truthful account have faded from most people's memories--with a few exceptions" (380). Ivan, now professor Poniryov of the Institute of History and Philosophy, has remained true to his vow with the master. He has given up the prestige and its concomitant material advantages to become a professor on society's periphery (Weeks "Defense" 58). Ivan has assumed an aspect of normalcy, i.e. he has become a productive member of his community, but the change is only ostensible. Dreams of his fantastic experiences still plague Ivan during Easter, symptomatic, avers Haber, of one who has glimpsed a higher vision but remains a member of a stifling social order (407). Ivan's continuing struggle, caught between individual beliefs and societal values, takes courage to endure. He as a teacher may now influence the minds of a new generation to embrace their individual natures--to think and not blindly subscribe to another's narrative and vision of truth. He is now in a position to utter his own satanic verses which initially cause suffering, but ultimately emancipate.

Chamchawala's freedom begins with the reconciliation with his father, Changez. Indeed changes and multiplicity are symbolized by a wonderful lamp of wishes and possibilities--all he must do is rub the lamp and believe in its power. The atmosphere of India begins to affect Saladin:

Saladin felt hourly closer to many old, rejected selves, many alternative Saladins--or rather Salahuddin�s--which had split off from himself as he made various life choices, but which had apparently continued to exist, perhaps in the parallel universes of quantum theory. (523)

Chamcha begins to realize that death brings "out the best in people . . . We are still capable of exaltation, he thought in celebratory mood; in spite of everything, we can still transcend" (527). While only through death can one be born again, it first violently disrupts and terrifies before one can be born again; the ambiguity of his father's last minutes--"Why the horror? And, whence that final smile?"--makes Chamcha existentially aware of his own mortality and forces him to act (532). Changez's death teaches Salahuddin terror and allows him to embrace his own voice not defined by England, the Qur'an, or any other absolute source, save himself and his lamp of possibilities.

One of Chamchawala's last actions in the novel is the rubbing of the lamp that he inherited from his father. This action produces, as if by magic, Zeenat Vakil:

His old English life, its bizarreries, its evils, now seemed very remote, even irrelevant, like his truncated stage name. "About time," Zeeny approved when he told her of his return to Salahuddin. "Now you can stop acting at last." Yes, this looked like the start of a new phase . . . an orphaned life, like Muhammad's; like everyone's. A life illuminated by a strangely radiant death, which continued to glow, in the mind's eye, like a sort of magic lamp. (534)

Salahuddin, unlike Gibreel, receives another chance because he has embraced his humanity. He has accepted the inevitability of change and the multiplicity of voices around him, but while he listens to all, he lets no single absolute voice control his life.

McLauren submits that while "we freefall through the worlds of Rushdie's imagination, we are forced to take the responsibility for our own readings, our own choices" (64). While Rushdie and Bulgakov may not offer readers any truth, they both stress the importance of community and empathy in composing one's own truth. The artist, like Ivan, Chamchawala must see himself in relation to his community and his own humanity. The satanic element is part of that humanity and must not be ignored, but should be embraced and questioned and allowed to have a voice. This satanic element allows growth and change, both of which are integral to human life. For if an absolute truth is allowed to rule one's life, change, growth, and history itself will come to an end, like in Rushdie's nightmare vision of the Imam. If one knows the absolute truth, then what would be the point of living other than to convert heathens, to banish Satan, and stop thought altogether? A constant dialectic between new and different verses provides the necessary impetus for growth and individuality.

Finally, a new look at Bulgakov's epigram becomes necessary. Evil and good in this paper have diverse meanings depending upon who defines them. Tyrannical, absolute powers see evil as that which questions the truth, while good follows and does not question. Bulgakov and Rushdie suggest that the opposite is true: evil is blind conformity, while good asks what kind of idea. So the epigram's paradox might be interpreted as taking on a dual role where both views are considered. Satan wills forever evil, i.e. he questions and causes others to question the powers that be, and, by so doing does forever good by making sure that humans do not go to sleep and relinquish their voices. The "Power," then, is art.

Yet, the "Power," in a more orthodox sense, could also mean God. Salman's alterations to Mahound's words are, according to the felix culpa, what God meant to have in the Qur'an in the first place, just as Matthew's "fictions" have become the cornerstone of Christianity--all according to the plan. Though they both distorted the words of the artists, the literalness of the texts is unimportant; the quest for truth must take place within everyone's soul. Wright avers that one should not consider the verses in the gospels and the suras false because of their alterations, for the fundamental messages remain intact (1169). These verses were not written to be historical artifacts, but to help people on their ways to discovering their identities (Wright 1169). Both Farishta's and the master's stories are accurate, and, in the light of the felix culpa, they are God-serving; for Satan is God's heavy, or an aspect of God. Indeed, there seems to be a "dual Godhead" in both novels, i.e. evil is a necessary appendage of good (Glenny 247). King states that the distinction between good and evil is uncertain, for "they are so mixed up that Satan and God appear one, two parts of each other" (434). Evil, as Woland states, is necessary.

Yet, if God is omniscient, then why would he need to keep people in line? For, as Yeshua preached, there would be no truly evil people in the world (Frank 293). And what of Rushdie's further enigmatic verse:

(I'm giving him no instructions. I, too, am interested in his choices--in the result of his wrestling match. Character vs destiny: a free-style bout. Two falls, two submissions or a knockout will decide.) (Verses 457)

To avoid the quagmire of the free-will/determinism issue, this question must be answered generally. Glenny says that "Yes--[man] is responsible . . . as a spiritual being, endowed with a moral consciousness, he is always responsible to his own conscience--and he is always alone" (240). Sahni states that "freedom . . . is a necessary prerequisite for creativity," and that the master's "problems and search [for the truth] are applicable to all intellectuals and creative artists" (191). God, in his infinite wisdom, gave people choice, and this choice should be used to find the truth in this world of distractions that leads back to God--and life is the search for this truth. Indulgence in these distractions is the true evil of the world, which Tolstoy called the comme il faut of society; conformity to greed, false morality, and materialistic idolatry are but a few examples.

Utilizing the postmodern perspective, if humans truly are existentially alone in their choices, the individual must be true to himself and his own moral convictions, not to those of the masses. Woland is the issuer of justice who holds the perpetrators responsible for unexamined beliefs and actions, e.g. Berlioz is cast into oblivion for his false acceptance of societal atheism and the greedy masses of Moscow are at the very least embarrassed, and at the most nearly frightened to death by devotion to societal standards. And, Woland rewards those who are deserving: the master and Margarita are consigned to an idyllic limbo while Pilate is released from his limbo and is able to have his walk with Yeshua. Whichever perspective may be true, the felix culpa or the existentialist individual, remains irrelevant as long as the individual is true to his own sagacious truth, like Yeshua and Mahound.

This same evil is being battled in Rushdie's oeuvre. Farishta has become a public figure, and has conformed to the lasciviousness and greed of society by the latter half of the book. He is a victim of Chamcha's satanic verses which precipitate him killing himself and his love, Alleluia Cone; like Margarita sharing the fate of the one she loves, Allie Cone is consigned to a shot in the head. By the end of Verses, the newly reborn Salahuddin Chamchawala, with his love, Zeenat Vakil, is left free from a corrupting society to seek his own truth. A vision of London, similar to that of Bulgakov's Moscow, has been put through a time of devilish fires and destruction caused by, you guessed it, Satan's influence upon Saladin--who changed him physically into a goat ("making him literally satanic" says Suleri) and mentally into one who hates himself--and the rest of the oppressed, minority population (612). Film makers, politicians, actors, lawyers, and writers all fall victim to the scourge of the city and the satire of Rushdie's pen (King 146). False emancipators abound in the Verses: the nameless, exiled Imam and the charismatic Ayesha, whose followers pay dearly for their blind devotion to them. Only Mahound, the true artist, who almost made a critical error in his conformity to societal demands by accepting the satanic verse, should be acknowledged as a speaker of truth and "an embodiment of a unitary narrative and its related elegance" (Suleri 615). The only satanic verses that represent evil are those that demand unwavering, unthinking loyalty to an absolute truth.