The main problems of Master and Margarita briefly. Philosophical issues of the novel The Master and Margarita. Philosophy as a sign of high classics
And the dead were judged according to what was written in the books, according to their deeds...
M. Bulgakov
M. Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita” is a complex, multifaceted work. The author touches upon the fundamental problems of human existence: good and evil, life and death. In addition, the writer could not ignore the problems of his time, when human nature itself was breaking down. (The problem of human cowardice was urgent. The author considers cowardice to be one of the greatest sins in life. This position is expressed through the image of Pontius Pilate. The procurator controlled the destinies of many people. Yeshua Ha-Nozri touched the procurator with sincerity and kindness. However, Pilate did not listen to the voice of conscience, but followed the lead of the crowd and executed Yeshua. The procurator was afraid and for this he was punished. He had no peace day or night. This is what Woland said about Pilate: “He says,” Woland’s voice was heard, “he says the same thing. , that even under the moon he has no peace and that he has a bad position. This is what he always says when he is not sleeping, and when he sleeps, he sees the same thing - the lunar road and wants to go along it and talk with the prisoner Ga-Nozri, because, as he claims, he didn’t say something back then, long ago, on the fourteenth day of the spring month of Nisan. But, alas, for some reason he fails to take this road and no one comes to him. Then, what can you do, you have to. talk to him to himself. However, some variety is needed, and to his speech about the moon he often adds that most of all in the world he hates his immortality and unheard-of glory.” And Pontius Pilate suffers for twelve thousand moons for one moon, for that moment when he became cowardly. And only after much torment and suffering does Pilate finally receive forgiveness^
The problem of excessive self-confidence and lack of faith also deserves attention in the novel. It was for lack of faith in God that the chairman of the board of the literary association, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Berlioz, was punished. Berlioz does not believe in the power of the Almighty, does not recognize Jesus Christ and tries to force everyone to think the same way as him. Berlioz wanted to prove to Bezdomny that the main thing is not what Jesus was like - bad or good, but that Jesus as a person did not exist in the world before, and all the stories about him are simply fiction. “There is not a single Eastern religion,” said Berlioz, “in which, as a rule, an immaculate virgin would not give birth to a god, and the Christians, without inventing anything new, in the same way ripped off their Jesus, who in fact never existed in alive. This is what we need to focus on.” No one and nothing can convince Berlioz. Woland and Berlioz could not convince him. For this stubbornness, for self-confidence, Berlioz is punished - he dies under the wheels of a tram.
On the pages of the novel, Bulgakov satirically depicted Moscow residents: their way of life and customs, everyday life and worries. Woland is interested in what the inhabitants of Moscow have become. To do this, he arranges a black magic session. And he concludes that not only greed and greed are inherent in them, mercy is also alive in them. When the Hippopotamus tears off Georges Bengal's head, the women ask him to return it to the unfortunate man. And Woland concludes: “Well,” he responded thoughtfully, “they are people like people, they love money; but this has always been... humanity loves money, no matter what it is made of, whether leather, paper, bronze or gold. Well, they are frivolous... well, well... and mercy sometimes knocks on their hearts... ordinary people... in general, they resemble the old ones... the housing problem has only spoiled them...”
The novel “The Master and Margarita” is about great love, about loneliness, about the role of the intelligentsia in society, about Moscow and Muscovites. It reveals itself to the reader in an endless variety of topics and problems. And therefore the work will always be modern, interesting, new. It will be read and appreciated in all centuries and times.
Question 47. The main themes and problems in M. A. Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita.”
1. “The Master and Margarita” is a philosophical novel.
2. Theme of choice.
3. Responsibility for your choice.
4. Conscience is the highest form of human punishment.
5. Interpretation of biblical motifs in the novel.
1. The novel “The Master and Margarita” is the pinnacle work of M. A. Bulgakov, on which he worked from 1928 until the end of his life. At first Bulgakov called it “The Engineer with a Hoof,” but in 1937 he gave the book a new title - “The Master and Margarita.” This novel is an extraordinary creation, a historically and psychologically reliable book about that time. This is a combination of Gogol's satire and Dante's poetry, a fusion of high and low, funny and lyrical. The novel is characterized by the happy freedom of creative imagination and at the same time the rigor of the compositional concept. The basis of the plot of the novel is the opposition of true freedom and unfreedom in all its manifestations. Satan rules the show, and the inspired Master, a contemporary of Bulgakov, writes his immortal novel. There, the procurator of Judea sends the Messiah to execution, and nearby, fussing around, berating, adapting, and betraying the completely earthly citizens who inhabit Sadovye and Bronnaya streets of the 20-30s of our century. Laughter and sadness, joy and pain are mixed together, as in life, but to that high degree of concentration that is only accessible to literature. “The Master and Margarita” is a lyrical and philosophical poem in prose about love and moral duty, about the inhumanity of evil, about true creativity.
2. Despite the comedy and satire, this is a philosophical novel, in which one of the main themes is the theme of choice. This topic allows us to reveal many philosophical questions and show their solutions using specific examples. Choice is the core on which the entire novel rests. Any hero goes through the opportunity to choose. But all heroes have different motives for their choice. Some make a choice after much thought, others - without hesitation and cannot shift responsibility for their actions to someone else. The choice of the Master and Pontius Pilate is based on their negative human qualities; they bring suffering not only to themselves, but also to other people. Both heroes choose the side of evil. Pilate faced a tragic dilemma: to fulfill his duty, drowning out his awakened conscience, or to act according to his conscience, but lose power, wealth, and perhaps even life. His painful thoughts lead to the fact that the procurator makes a choice in favor of duty, neglecting the truth that Yeshua brings. For this, higher powers condemn him to eternal torment: he gains the glory of a traitor. The master is also driven by cowardice and weakness, disbelief in Margarita's love. He pretends to be crazy and voluntarily comes to a mental hospital. The motive for this action was the failure of the novel about Pilate. Burning the manuscript. The master renounces not only his creation, but also love, life, and himself. Thinking that his choice is the best for Margarita, he unwittingly dooms her to suffering. Instead of fighting, he runs away from life. And despite the fact that both Pilate and the Master take the side of evil, one does it consciously, out of fear, and the other unconsciously, out of weakness. But heroes do not always choose evil based on negative qualities or emotions. An example of this is Margarita. She deliberately became a witch to bring back the Master. Margarita has no faith, but strong love replaces her faith. Love serves as her support in her decision. And her choice is correct because it does not bring grief and suffering.
3. Only one hero of the novel chooses good rather than evil. This is Yeshua Ha-Nozri. His only purpose in the book is to express an idea that will be subjected to all sorts of tests in the future, an idea given to him from above: all people are good, so the time will come when “man will move into the kingdom of truth and justice, where no power will be needed at all.” . Yeshua not only chooses good, but he himself is the bearer of good. Even to save his life, he does not renounce his beliefs. He realizes that he will be executed, but still does not try to lie or hide anything, since for him telling the truth is “easy and pleasant.” We can say that only Yeshua and Margarita made the truly right choice; only they are able to take full responsibility for their actions.
4. Bulgakov also develops the theme of choice and responsibility for one’s choice in the “Moscow” chapters of the novel. Woland and his retinue (Azazello, Koroviev, Behemoth, Gella) are a kind of punishing sword of justice, exposing and naming various manifestations of evil. Woland arrives with a kind of revision to the country, which is declared the country of victorious goodness and happiness. And in fact it turns out that people remain the same as they were. At a variety show performance, Woland tests people, and people simply throw themselves at money and things. People made this choice themselves. And many of them are justly punished when their clothes disappear, and the chervonets turn into stickers from Narzan. A person's choice is an internal struggle between good and evil. A person makes his choice himself: who to be, what kind of person to be and whose side to be on. In any case, a person has an internal, inexorable judge - conscience. People who have a bad conscience, who are guilty and do not want to admit it, are punished by Woland and his retinue. But he does not punish everyone, but only those who deserve it. Woland returns to the Master his novel about Pontius Pilate, which he burned in a fit of fear and cowardice. The atheist and dogmatist Berlioz dies, and those who believe in the power of love and words, Kant, Pushkin, Dostoevsky, the Master and Margarita, are transported to a higher reality, for “manuscripts do not burn,” the creations of the human spirit are imperishable.
A true understanding of the “Moscow” chapters of the novel is impossible without deep penetration into the history of Yeshua. The story of Yeshua and Pontius Pilate, recreated in the Master’s book, affirms the idea that the struggle between good and evil is eternal, it lies in the very circumstances of life, in the human soul, capable of sublime impulses and enslaved by the false, transitory interests of today.
5. Bulgakov's version of biblical events is extremely original. The author depicted not the death and resurrection of the son of God, but the death of an unknown wanderer, who was also declared a criminal. Yes, Yeshua was a criminal in the sense that he transgressed the seemingly unshakable laws of this world - and gained immortality.
These two temporal and spatial layers are connected by another grandiose phenomenon - thunderstorm and darkness, the forces of nature that engulf the earth at the moment of “world catastrophes”, when Yeshua leaves Yershalaim, and the Master and his companion leave Moscow. Each reader of the novel, closing the last page, asks the question of whether the end of all life is so clearly defined, whether spiritual death is inevitable and how it can be avoided.
Bulgakov's talent as an artist came from God. And how this talent was expressed was largely determined by the circumstances of life and by how the writer’s fate unfolded.
In the early 20s of the 20th century, he conceived the novel “The Engineer with a Hoof,” but in 1937 it received a different name - “The Master and Margarita.” This work is an extraordinary creation, never seen before in Russian literature. This is some kind of fusion of Gogol's satire and Dante's poetry, a fusion of high and low, funny and sad.
Bulgakov wrote “The Master and Margarita” as a historically and psychologically reliable book about his time and people, and therefore the novel became a unique human document of that remarkable era. But at the same time, this narrative, full of deep thoughts, is directed to the future; this is a book, as they say, for all times. There is reason to believe that the author had little hope for the understanding and recognition of his work by his contemporaries.
In the novel “The Master and Margarita” there reigns a happy freedom of creative imagination and at the same time the rigor of the compositional concept. Satan rules the great ball, and the inspired Master, a contemporary of Bulgakov, writes his immortal novel. The Procurator of Judea sends Christ to execution, and nearby, fussing around, berating, adapting, and betraying the completely earthly citizens who inhabit the Garden and Bronnaya streets of Moscow in the 20s and 30s of the last century. Laughter and sadness, joy and pain are mixed in the novel, as in life, but in that high degree of concentration that is only accessible to a fairy tale or poem. “The Master and Margarita” is a lyrical and philosophical poem in prose about love and moral duty, about evil, about true creativity, which always overcomes inhumanity and breaks through to light and goodness.
The events in the novel begin “one spring, at the hour of an unprecedentedly hot sunset, in Moscow, on the Patriarch’s Ponds.” Satan and his retinue appear in the capital.
The Diaboliad, one of the author’s favorite motifs, here in “The Master and Margarita” plays a completely realistic role and can serve as a brilliant example of a grotesque-fantastic, satirical exposure of the contradictions of living reality. Woland sweeps over Bulgakov's Moscow like a thunderstorm, punishing all kinds of untruth and dishonesty.
The very idea of placing the prince of darkness and his retinue in Moscow in the 1930s, embodying forces that defy any laws of logic, was deeply innovative. Woland appears in Moscow to “test” the heroes of the novel, to pay tribute to the Master and Margarita, who remained faithful to each other and love, to punish the bribe-takers, covetous people, and traitors. Their trial is not carried out according to the laws of good; they will appear before the face of hell. According to Bulgakov, in the current situation, evil should be fought with the forces of evil in order to restore justice. This is the tragic paradox of the novel. Woland returns to the Master his novel about Pontius Pilate, which the Master burns in a fit of fear and cowardice. The myth of Pilate and Yeshua, recreated in the Master’s book, takes the reader to the era of the emergence of Christianity, to the origins of European civilization, affirming the idea that the struggle between good and evil is eternal, that it lies in the very circumstances of life, in the human soul, capable of sublime impulses and enslaved by the false, transitory interests of today.
A fantastic plot twist allows the writer to unfold before us a whole gallery of characters of a very unsightly appearance. A sudden meeting with evil spirits “turns you inside out,” reveals the essence of all these Berliozs, Brass, Maigels, Nikanor Ivanovichs and others.
However, it is not the devil that is scary to the author and his favorite characters. The devil, perhaps, really does not exist for Bulgakov, just as the God-man does not exist. In his novel there lives a different, deep faith in historical man and in immutable moral laws. For the writer, the moral law is contained within a person and should not depend on religious fear of future retribution, the manifestation of which can easily be seen in the inglorious death of the well-read but unscrupulous atheist who headed MASSOLIT.
And the Master, who created the novel about Christ and Pilate, is also far from religiosity in the Christian sense of the word. He wrote a book of enormous psychological expressiveness based on historical material. This novel about a novel, as it were, focuses in itself those contradictions that all subsequent generations of people, every thinking and suffering person, are obliged to resolve with their lives.
The master could not win. By making him a winner, Bulgakov would have violated the laws of artistic truth and betrayed his sense of realism. But does the final pages of the book really emanate pessimism? Let's not forget: on earth the Master still had a disciple, Ivan Ponyrev, who had received his sight, the former poet Ivan Bezdomny; The Master still has a novel on earth that is destined to live a long life.
“The Master and Margarita” is a complex work. There are many interpretations of it. I think people will think about “The Master and Margarita” for a long time, write a lot, and argue a lot.
M and M (1929-1940) – the peak of Bulgakov’s creativity. Issues: psychological, social, but the main ones: moral and philosophical. Bulgakov's novel is called philosophical, philosophical and moral. This is a deeply philosophical novel, a tragedy novel. The Master's novel world is full of wonders and built on a reliable foundation. Everyone inside is saved (Margarita and cream). The master is not inside, and he cannot be saved. Bulgakov himself turned out to be beyond the control of the miracle he invented for the reader. The highest good for a person is to rely on the one who takes life. The Master is the only truly tragic image in the novel. The Master's tragedy is the reflected tragedy of the author.
As the content of the novel is revealed, a third, deeper layer emerges - where Yeshua operates. This layer is fundamental.
Main topic - power and time. Power is presented in concentrated form, in the form of dictatorship. Under such conditions, can a dictator and an artist not come into conflict? This theme determined the duality of the novel.
Kara overtakes everyone, even beyond the physical existence of a person.
The moral and philosophical meaning of the novel lies in the categorical rejection of any form of life that suppresses the spiritual principle in a person and reduces a person to the level of a biological being. This is the “Last Judgment” of the administrative system and its creators. A novel about the Master and a novel about Pontius Pilate are not one, but two novels.
Theme of good and evil is one of the most important in the novel. Bulgakov believes that evil always balances good. The spreaders of evil on earth are people who are driven by the thirst for power, wealth, envy, cowardice and fear. These feelings are conductors of evil.
The main test of evil in the novel is Woland and his retinue (Korovyov, Behemoth, Azazello). Woland is the prince of darkness, Satan, but for Muscovites he is a foreigner, a professor of black magic. Testing people in the conditions of the new Soviet reality, Woland comes to the conclusion that people, as before, are greedy and envious (this is evidenced by a trick performed by Woland’s retinue in a variety show, when money rained down on the stage, everyone rushed after it, and after a while they turned into transparent pieces of paper). The bearer of evil is needed in order to reveal the vices of humanity.
So, can evil be useful? This is a difficult philosophical question that many philosophers have tried to answer. Woland is closest to Mephistopheles from Goethe's Faust. You can notice their external similarity: “...The right (eye) with a golden spark at the bottom, drilling anyone to the bottom of the soul, and the left - empty black, kind of like a narrow eye of a needle, like an exit to a bottomless well of all darkness and shadows. Woland’s face was slanted to the side, the right corner of his mouth was pulled down, and on his high, balding forehead there were deep wrinkles parallel to his sharp eyebrows...”
“I am part of that force that always wants evil and always does good” - Bulgakov took this self-characteristic of Goethe’s hero as an epigraph to the novel.
Having retained Woland's external resemblance to Mephistopheles, Bulgakov endows him with opposite functions, entrusting him with the mission of fair retribution to a person after his death, that is, trial and sentencing.
But Woland should not be made a fighter for justice. People, first of all, carry their own punishment within themselves (So Pontius Pilate suffers, is tormented by remorse - this is his punishment. He atones for his crime and therefore he gets “light”). Yes, Woland does everything that befits Satan. But he is not omnipotent, so he does not touch those people who have a clear conscience and who carry goodness within themselves. Good is beyond his control. This is one of the main ideas of the novel.
Yeshua in the novel is the bearer of “light”. In the novel he is associated with Christ. And indeed, they have a lot in common: faith in the all-conquering power of good, in the fact that the time will come when humanity will move into the kingdom of truth and justice. But Bulgakov deliberately departs from both the historical and the gospel versions. For him, Yeshua is not a god, but first of all a man who has not caused harm to anyone either in thought or deed. He sees the best that is sometimes hidden in a person, he believes in the power of good and the good nature of man. The image of Yeshua embodies the traditional Christian idea of mercy. In the face of death, Yeshua remained true to his convictions, he chooses death, and ultimately deserves “light.”
So, in the novel Woland and Yeshua appear before us. How do they relate to human spiritual capabilities? Woland believes that the entire history of mankind is the history of crimes. For Yeshua, man is by nature good (“there are no evil people in the world”), only social conditions disfigure people.
Both evil and good, Bulgakov argues, exist equally in the world, but they are generated primarily by people themselves. Bulgakov believes that every person should be free in his choice.
Speaking about good and evil, one cannot help but remember the Master. The master is immersed in creativity and does not think about self-interest at all; he writes a novel rather even for himself. But, faced with the world of writers, which is busy with everything but creativity, he could not stand the persecution and hated his novel. This erased the master from life; he stopped fighting for his novel. Giving up creativity turned out to be disastrous for him. His refuge has become a clinic for the mentally ill - only there can he find the peace that “good people” deprived him of. The master strives for light, strives for good. But he refused to fight for his novel, showed cowardice, and therefore he was denied “light.” The meeting of the Master with Woland occurs only thanks to Margarita, and deliverance from suffering is due to the intercession of Yeshua. Without the request of the “light,” the lovers who had found each other would have been left on earth, in their secret refuge. It is unknown what their fate would have been. The heroes deserve peace.
Thus, the intervention of higher powers does not lead to a change in life itself, it only accelerates the course of events.
Goodness educates and exalts a person, evil and indifference spoil him. You need to believe in people, in your own strength, in the power of good, then the truth will be revealed.
The dialectic of good and evil. The course of history is the eternal confrontation between good and evil, light and darkness.
Freedom is not freedom. Pontius Pilate is not free, he is a man of a totalitarian state. Yeshua has inner freedom, it is this that gives him strength. Pontius is cowardice, it destroys a person. But he was given forgiveness - he was able to take the blame upon himself. B shows that guilt must be expiated not with blood, but with repentance. Only conscience and repentance can cleanse and resurrect.
According to Bulgakov, light is a paradise where those who bring good to people go. Peace is independence, solitude, it is a condition for creativity. The one who has lived his life honestly, who is not burdened by the pangs of conscience, who does not punish himself for betrayal and cowardice, deserves peace. B emphasizes that the Master is an artist, not a fighter. He remained true to himself, did not change his ideas about the mission of the artist - this is the victory of the master over power and over time.
Each author puts his soul into his works, his vision of certain issues that face humanity at this stage of its development or were centuries ago. The number of these very questions varies: in some works there may be two or three of them, in others - more than ten. One of such multi-problem works, in my opinion, can be considered the novel by Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov “The Master and Margarita”.
In this book, one of the most interesting is the image of Margarita. The main character of this novel combines such traits as vengeance and mercy, cruelty and self-sacrifice. It looks strange, but without shadow there is no light. Ideal people cannot be found because they do not exist. Everyone has both dark and light sides. Mercy and self-sacrifice appeared the moment the Master’s beloved learned Frida’s story.
Our experts can check your essay according to the Unified State Exam criteria
Experts from the site Kritika24.ru
Teachers of leading schools and current experts of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation.
Despite the strict ban, Margarita showed special attention to this guest of Woland’s ball. Frida committed a sin by killing her child, for which she was punished. Her life became a nightmare, turning every night into the worst moments of her existence. A young woman looking for salvation found it in the person of the main character, who sacrificed her desire, which could be used in the name of saving the Master. Margarita spent this desire on a guest of the devil's ball, with whom life brought her together for the first time. Isn't this mercy and self-sacrifice?
There is an opinion that many people do not like the novel “The Master and Margarita” because the evil in it is not the devil, but the people themselves. I agree with this opinion, because I believe that Woland is not a negative character. He is, rather, a neutral character who exposes human vices and punishes people for their atrocities. A very indicative moment in Variety associated with money falling from the ceiling. Spectators began to catch them, excitement grew, the words were heard: “What are you grabbing? It’s mine! It was flying towards me!” Everyone tried to get a bigger and sweeter piece. I believe that Satan's goal was to try to understand whether people had changed during the period that he was away from our world. The session of black magic summed up the entire journey of the sir and his retinue: “... people are like people. They love money, but that has always been the case... Well, they are frivolous... well, well... and mercy sometimes knocks on their door hearts... ordinary people... In general, they resemble the old ones..."
Many works by various authors also reveal such a problem as creativity. In this work, she is shown through the image of the Master. This man quit his job to write a novel and poured his soul into it. He later admitted to a homeless man that after his novel was criticized by Latunsky, “joyless autumn days” came. The main character differed from the members of the Massolit organization in that he was more concerned about creativity, and not about the well-being of his acquaintances.
I believe that the main secret of the success of this novel is that Bulgakov managed to combine a fantastic plot and deep philosophical subtext. Each reader will find in this work problems that are close to him.
Updated: 2017-08-16
Attention!
Thank you for your attention.
If you notice an error or typo, highlight the text and click Ctrl+Enter.
By doing so, you will provide invaluable benefit to the project and other readers.
