Two Bears Continues.
The Moon.
“There is a hope --- a
righteous court is waiting.
It can forgive, even though
it will condemn.”
M. Yu. Lermontov.
I
already wrote in the chapter Birds:
Swallow (segments LIII-LIV) that Bulgakov’s Yeshua has two origins: divine
and human. In his conversation with Pontius Pilate, which ended the previous
posting, Yeshua speaks from his divine origin. And, as Aphranius would say, “it cannot be otherwise.” Everything
happens according to God’s will, and the question is why God did not get involved.
This
aspect, however, does not exonerate the character of a man. In other words,
people must act in accordance with their principles and stand on these
principles to the end. As M. Yu. Lermontov wrote: “But
there is God’s Judgment... There is a fearsome court... It knows all thoughts
and actions beforehand.”
In
the poem Demon, M. Yu. Lermontov
writes:
“There is a hope --- a righteous court is
waiting.
It can forgive, even though it will
condemn.”
Or,
as Bulgakov presents these two characters, it comes out clear that both Pontius
Pilate and Judas had flaws of character, which had come out during the test.
Pontius Pilate was a coward, while Judas loved money. There is a good reason
why Woland mockingly offers Pontius Pilate to drink poison.
All
dreams, even the most pleasant ones, like the one which the procurator had,
must come to an end, and Pontius Pilate woke up because “Banga [his dog] growled at the moon, and slippery, as though rolled with
oil, the blue road before the procurator collapsed… With his ailing eyes [he]
started looking for the moon and saw that it somewhat moved to the side
and became silvery. Its light overpowered the unpleasant restless light playing
on the balcony before his eyes.”
And
because of this unpleasantness, the interruption of his happy, torn from
reality dream, “the very first thing that [the
procurator] remembered was that the execution had taken place.”
No
longer was the moon creating for him a “luminous road,”
where he would be having walks with the “wandering
philosopher.”
This,
incidentally, once again serves as proof that master did not write Pontius Pilate in Master and Margarita. Then who did? The last page of Bulgakov’s
novel answers this question unequivocally. It was Ivanushka. Ivanushka’s
“Pontius Pilate” dream at the very end of the novel is uncannily similar to the
“Wandering Philosopher” dream which the procurator dreamt. Moreover, both
dreams were taking place on a path made by moonlight.
…And
then this restless but fruitful night for the procurator ends with a good
message:
“The moon was quickly fading; on the other edge of the sky one
could see the whitish spot of the morning star.” A harbinger of Yeshua’s Resurrection, hope for
mankind.
Bulgakov
takes the image of the morning star from a poem by Lermontov:
“Weep!
Weep! People of Israel.
For you have lost your star;
It shall not rise a second
time…”
Thus,
the moon in Bulgakov personifies revenge, death. Three murders in Master and Margarita are connected to a full
moon. Two in Moscow on the eve of the Russian Pascha [Easter], and one in
Yerushalaim, during the Jewish Pesach. In all three cases, the devil [Woland] pronounces
his sentence, which is then being carried out, making all these three killings just,
according to Bulgakov. After all, the devil in Master and Margarita serves as the executor of Yeshua’s
instructions, with Matthew Levi serving as the intermediary. [More about it in Intelligent Cats of Intelligence and in
the forthcoming chapter The Garden.]
Regarding
the first killing in Master and Margarita,
Bulgakov gives us an indication of it already in the first chapter of the
novel:
“A German, thought
Berlioz.
An Englishman, thought Bezdomny. See how he does not feel hot wearing those gloves.
Meanwhile the foreigner cast a glance over the tall buildings… stopping
it on the upper stories, which were blindingly reflecting the broken and
forever leaving Mikhail Alexandrovich [Berlioz] sun.”
The
first killing, just like the other two, is conducted under the moon. The moon
in Bulgakov is linked to the devil. As M. Yu. Lermontov’s poem My Demon goes,---
“…He
loves the clouded nights,
The fogs, and the pale moon…”
“The sky over Moscow as though faded, and one could see quite
distinctly high up there the full moon, not yet golden, but white.”
Sent
by the regent [alias Koroviev and The Checkered One] to the tourniquet, where
exactly Annushka had spilled her sunflower oil [more on this in my chapter Oil, Wine, and Blood], having been
unable to keep his footing on the slippery from the spilled oil pavement, the
falling-down Berlioz was thrown out on the rails, and he “had just enough time to see up there --- to his right or to
his left he could not figure out anymore --- the gilded moon. And then,
all around him the whole street squealed in desperate women’s voices,” and
he saw “a perfectly white face of the woman-tram
driver,” that selfsame Russian woman-Komsomol member, whom Woland had
been talking about.
The
most interesting thing here is that Bulgakov writes next:
“Inside Berlioz’s brain someone desperately shouted: ‘Could it really be so?’”
This
“someone” had to be Woland, who had earlier warned Berlioz about the “Seventh Proof”:
“But I do implore you, before
saying farewell, can you please believe at the very least that the devil
exists?!”
Hence,
--- the “Seventh Proof,” without
which revenge cannot be revenge.
“…Once more, and for the last time, the
moon flashed, but it was already falling into pieces, and then all went dark…
and under the grid a round-shaped dark object was thrown… it was the cut-off
head of Berlioz.”
Thus,
poetically, with the help of the moon, Bulgakov describes what has been left of
Berlioz:
“There on three zinc tables lay what used to be quite recently
Mikhail Alexandrovich Berlioz.
On the first table was the naked, covered in dry blood body with a
broken arm and collapsed rib cage; on another, the head with missing front
teeth, with dimmed open eyes, impervious to the bright lights; and on the third
table, a pile of blood-soaked rags.”
This
cut-off head of Berlioz, as we know, will later serve as the drinking cup
receiving the blood of the “incorrigible scoundrel and baron” Meigel, “the
snitch and the spy.” His murder takes place as the finale of the Ball of the
Spring Full Moon, on the eve of the Russian Pascha.---
“Abadonna took off his glasses for a second. At that very moment
something sparked with fire in Azazello’s hands… The baron started falling face
up…”
As
we know, Woland drinks Meigel’s blood out of the cup made out of Berlioz’s
cut-off head. [See my posted chapter Cockroach,
segment Littleman.] ---
“To each according to his
faith… You are departing to non-being, and I will be happy to drink to being
out of this cup that you are turning into! Woland raised his sword. At this
instant the outer coverings of the head darkened and shrank… and Margarita saw
on the plate a yellowish skull with emerald eyes and pearl teeth.”
“To each according to his faith.” This is
what makes all three killings just.
To
be continued…
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