Section Four: Manuscripts

Jacques Derrida, in his book Writing and Difference, quotes Merleau-Ponty:

Communication in literature is not the simple appeal on the part of the writer to meanings which would be part of an a priori of the mind; rather, communication arouses these meanings in the mind through enticement and a kind of oblique action. The writer's thought does not control his lan-guage from without; the writer is himself a kind of new idiom, constructing itself. (11)

This quotation relates to the central concerns of both novels: "What kind of idea are you?" (Verses 95) and "Manuscripts don't burn" (Bulgakov 281). Both of these quotations are pivotal to the idea of the artist's ontology and his relationship to and portrayal of the truth, i.e. the work of art, or in this case, the text. The followers of Mahound and Yeshua--namely their scribes, Salman the Persian and Matthew the Levite--and the texts which they physically write, play a major role in the propagation of their masters' ideas for better and worse.

Avins proposes that "texts that are literally destroyed still exist if they have made a mark on someone or have the potential of becoming known" (284). Arenberg carries this one step further by saying that a true "artistic creation stands on its own as an expression of a moment of eternal truth captured; . . . every imaginative creation on this earth, whether by the artist, the prophet, or the martyr, has a permanent reality" (111). Both opinions are relevant to the present question of artistic creation. It must also be stated that if a manuscript or personal truth requires a reader to evaluate his metaphysical position in the universe, then it has fulfilled its ontological role and will remain with that person in some form or another throughout his life and the lives of those he intersects. Therefore the work and the artist must be able to stand up against the scrutiny of the "What kind of idea are you?" question and pose that question at the same time.

"What kind of idea are you?" echoes prophetically throughout both The Satanic Verses and The Master and Margarita. Rushdie's question, states Suleri, is primarily aimed at Islamic culture and racial/national questions (607). Yet, more encompassing, it can question, within the novel's context, many other things that people believe solely on faith; only truth can withstand an onslaught of such probing questions delivered by questers after the truth. One such question is posed by Rushdie and Bulgakov: how accurate is a text that supposedly holds the truth when it was written by one who is less than perfect, i.e. the artist? A new dimension is added when one realizes that Jesus and Muhammad were only the purveyors of the truth--they were not the ones to record it for future generations. Now how accurate is it? For that matter, can language accurately encompass any idea?

When Yeshua is being interrogated by Pilate, he complains about Matthew the Levite:

"This man follows me everywhere with nothing but his goatskin parchment and writes incessantly. But I once caught a glimpse of that parchment and I was horrified. I had not said a word of what was written there. I begged him, 'Please burn this parchment of yours!' But he tore it out of my hands and ran away." (25)

Bulgakov also portrays Matthew as inept and simple, as one who has tremendous sympathy and good intentions, yet can never seem to accomplish what he sets out to do (Proffer 538). Proffer points out that, contrary to what Yeshua says as he dies, "Glory to the Magnanimous Hegemon!", Aphranius tells Pilate that Yeshua said something about cowardice being the greatest sin--"a saying imputed to Yeshua, one which [Matthew] has on his parchment, the very same parchment that Yeshua swore contained nothing he had actually said" (546). Yeshua will not lie; this statement is most likely true because he refuses to do so at the cost of his life; thus, it can be safely deduced, that he has told the truth about Matthew's manuscript. Therefore, the manuscript is inaccurate (Proffer 546).

Similarly, Salman the Persian, rather than suffering from foolishness, is a shrewd doubter, who "on account of his scholastic advancement was made Mahound's official scribe" (Verses 365). Salman does his job well until it looks as if Mahound is making up rules to benefit his own way of life, including "the question of the women": "out comes the rule book, the angel starts poring out rules about what women mustn't do, he starts forcing them back into the docile attitudes the Prophet prefers, docile or maternal" (366-7). Salman remains faithful until his own revelation one night in a dream when he found himself hovering over Mahound on Mt. Cone. Unsure of his dream identity, whether Gibreel or Shaitan, and excited by the ambiguity, Salman begins to change Mahound's recitation:

Little things at first. If Mahound recited a verse in which God was described as all-hearing, all-knowing, I would write, all-knowing, all-wise. Here's the point: Mahound did not notice the alterations. So there I was, actually writing the Book, or rewriting, anyway, polluting the word of God with my own profane language. But, good heavens, if my poor words could not be distinguished from the Revelation by God's own Messenger, then what did that mean? What did that say about the quality of the divine poetry? (367)

It would seem that, like Matthew the Levite, Salman the Persian did not represent the prophet accurately. Yet the scribe, according to Bardolph, risks the magic of the original idea when he attempts to take it down on paper (5). The reduction of the prophet-poet's words to "the constraints of material production" represents another manifestation of the writer as whore theme (Bardolph 5). Additionally, Salman the Persian and Matthew the Levite, the second they inserted their "own profane language," became an active part of the creative process, opening the door to fiction as a version of Mahound's words, which are a version of Gibreel's words, which are a version of God's and/or Satan's words (Corcoran 159). In essence, the profane words of humans have become divine.

These incidents suggest the difference between the uncorrupted word of the prophet and the historical church (Krugovoy 207). Both writers, regardless of their motivations, have distorted the words of their poets. This twisting, asserts Tumanov, illustrates the way that churches and their parishioners have misunderstood and/or abused the messages of their poets Jesus and Muhammad (57). This distortion of the truth begins the history of intellectual oppression, of satanic verses, that is propagated by the church and state. Berlioz's communist propaganda, Chamcha's Machiavellian verses to Farishta, Ivan's anti-religious poem, the policemen's racism and violence, and other activities begin to limit personal freedom and expression (Tumanov 57). These instances, perhaps, represent the true satanic verses in that they limit personal expression rather than make it possible.

Proffer suggests that Matthew never really understands Yeshua and, as Yeshua tells Pilate, inaccurately translates his words (538). Besides being a poor scribe, Matthew shows no compassion in his readiness to kill to avenge his dead master, further distorting Yeshua's teaching (Proffer 539). Proffer's observation about Matthew may also be applied to Salman the Persian. He cannot understand Mahound's compassion for his community; Mahound does not ignore his people's needs in the expression of his own truth. Couple this misunderstanding with his changing of Mahound's words, and it would seem that Salman represents Submission's first blasphemer.

While the circumstances are different, the essential question is the same: if it is not the word of God, then whose word is it? All sources seem to point to God's antithesis, the archetypal perverter of the word: Satan.