Master and

Master and Margarita 9
nessed by Matthew Levi, the murder of Judas in the moonlit garden of
Gethsemane.
Bulgakov’s treatment of Gospel figures is the most controversial aspect
of The Master and Margarita and has met with the greatest incomprehension.
Yet his premises are made clear in the very first pages of the novel, in
the dialogue between Woland and the atheist Berlioz. By the deepest irony
of all, the ‘prince of this world’ stands as guarantor of the ‘other’ world.
It exists, since he exists. But he says nothing directly about it. Apart from
divine revelation, the only language able to speak of the ‘other’ world is
the language of parable. Of this language Kafka wrote, in his parable ‘On
Parables’:
Many complain that the words of the wise are always merely
parables and of no use in daily life, which is the only life we
have. When the sage says: ’Go over,’ he does not mean that we
should cross to some actual place, which we could do anyhow
if it was worth the trouble; he means some fabulous yonder,
something unknown to us, something, too, that he cannot designate
more precisely, and therefore cannot help us here in the
least. All these parables really set out to say simply that the
incomprehensible is incomprehensible, and we know that already.
But the cares we have to struggle with every day: that is
a different matter.
Concerning this a man once said: Why such reluctance? If
you only followed the parables, you yourselves would become
parables and with that nd of all your daily cares.
Another said: I bet that is also a parable.
The first said: You win.
The second said: But unfortunately only in parable.
The first said: No, in reality. In parable you lose.
A similar dialogue lies at the heart of Bulgakov’s novel. In it there are
those who belong to parable and those who belong to reality. There are
those who go over and those who do not. There are those who win in
parable and become parables themselves, and there are those who win in
reality. But this reality belongs to Woland. Its nature is made chillingly
clear in the brief scene when he and Margarita contemplate his special
globe. Woland says: