{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 272/1916-09-04/p094","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"It is a curious thing with this Mephisto-Ahriman. The beings that belong to the spiritual world come down into his spheres, and - yes, he actually falls in love with these beings. Goethe quite rightly describes a love scene between Mephisto and the angels. The devil has understanding. And a love affair between Mephisto and the angels is truly an absurd love affair, that is what Mephisto also calls it, it is truly an absurd love affair. But how is it that this absurd love affair can still affect him? That feelings of love arise in him at all? If he had not lived at Faust's side for so long and wanted to beguile Faust by stimulating such feelings in Faust in a particularly enticing way, they would not have crossed over to him. And so here again you have a deep wisdom, a wonderful wisdom. The devil actually has no erotic or other love in the earthly sense. He doesn't have it. Love affair is of course absurd for him, because we know that the earth is the cosmos of love. He is from the cosmos of wisdom. But he is out of place, he wanders around on earth and always wants to incorporate the earth into his realm. This means that he repeatedly finds himself in a position to incorporate into himself qualities that are developed on earth and that no longer fit his nature. In order to gain a soul, he must prepare this soul for the devil, that is, make it suitable for the qualities that Lucifer implanted at the beginning. But in doing so, he himself becomes infected by these qualities and once again makes himself incapable of keeping this soul. You see here in the big picture what happens on a small scale. Imagine that man is also capable of arousing passions, but if he develops them to a certain point, they destroy his organism at the same time. So you can only do it to a certain point. The devil must, as it were, vampirically absorb human qualities into himself so that he can arouse the passions in Faust. But in doing so, he destroys his own true devilish nature. This is how the absurd affair with the angels comes about, and he becomes inattentive and does not even realize that the angels are snatching his soul away. This darkening of consciousness, this transition of consciousness into the subconscious, had to occur in him.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"12. The “Entombment” the Essence of the Lemurs, the Fat and Scrawny Devil","site_heading":null,"date":"1916-09-04","location":null,"word_count":411,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/272/1916-09-04/p094","alignment_confidence":"high","alignment_reason":"beads:identity","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Faust, the Striving Human Being","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA272/English/SOL2024/19160904p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/272/1916-09-04/p094"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/272/1916-09-04/p094","paragraph_aligned":true}],"record":{"record_type":"unknown","scope":"volume","note":"How this text was taken down (shorthand transcript, listeners' notes or manuscript) is not on record here. Unknown is not an assurance of a stenogram: check the edition's own notes before resting an argument on one word.","evidence":null,"evidence_translation":null,"evidence_source":null},"paired_german":{"status":"paired","german":[{"locus":"GA 272/1916-09-04/p094","passage_number":94,"text":"Es ist schon einmal mit diesem Mephisto -Ahriman eine kuriose Sache. Da kommen die Wesen, die der geistigen Welt angehören, in seine Sphären herunter, und - ja, er verliebt sich eigentlich in diese Wesen. Goethe schildert ganz recht eine Liebesszene zwischen Mephisto und den Engeln. Der Teufel hat Verstand. Und eine Liebschaft zwischen Mephisto und den Engeln ist wahrhaftig eine absurde Liebschaft, so nennt sie auch der Mephisto, es ist schon eine absurde Liebschaft. Aber wie kommt es denn, daß ihn diese absurde Liebschaft doch befallen kann? Daß überhaupt Liebesempfindungen in ihm entstehen? Hätte er nicht so lange an der Seite des Faust gelebt und den Faust betören wollen dadurch, daß er in Faust dergleichen Gefühle besonders verlockend angeregt hat, so würden sie auf ihn nicht übergegangen sein. Und so haben Sie hier wiederum eine tiefe Weisheit, eine wunderbare Weisheit. Der Teufel hat eigentlich keine erotische oder sonstige Liebe im irdischen Sinne. Die hat er nicht. Liebschaft ist natürlich für ihn absurd, denn wir wissen ja, daß die Erde der Kosmos der Liebe ist. Er ist aus dem Kosmos der Weisheit. Aber er ist deplaciert, er wandert auf der Erde herum und will immer die Erde seinem Reich einverleiben. Dadurch kommt er immer wieder in die Lage, sich selbst Eigenschaften, die auf der Erde entwickelt werden und die jetzt zu seiner Natur nicht mehr passen, einzuverleiben. Er muß, um in die Hoffnung kommen zu können, eine Seele zu erringen, diese Seele für den Teufel präparieren, das heißt, sie geeignet machen, die Eigenschaften, die Luzifer am Beginne eingepflanzt hat, zu erfassen. Aber dadurch wird er selber von dieser Eigenschaft angesteckt und macht sich wiederum unfähig, diese Seele halten zu können. Sie sehen hier im Großen bei dem Teufel ausgebildet dasjenige, was im Kleinen eintritt. Denken Sie sich einmal, der Mensch ist auch dazu veranlagt, Leidenschaften zu erregen, aber wenn er sie bis zu einem gewissen Punkte entwickelt, so zerstören sie ihm zu gleicher Zeit den Organismus. Man kann es also nur bis zu einem gewissen Punkte treiben. Der Teufel muß menschliche Eigenschaften gewissermaßen vampirisch in sich einsaugen, damit er in Faust die Leidenschaften erregen kann. Aber damit zerstört er in sich selber seine rechte Teufelsnatur. Dadurch ist es möglich, daß die absurde Liebschaft zu den Engeln entsteht, und er unaufmerksam wird und gar nicht merkt, daß ihm die Engel die Seele wegschnappen. Diese Umdüsterung des Bewußstseins, dieser Übergang des Bewußstseins in das Unterbewußte, das mußte schon bei ihm eintreten.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":408,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/272/1916-09-04/p094"}],"english":["GA 272/1916-09-04/p094"],"method":"identity","confidence":"high","correspondence":"established","length_check":{"de_words":408,"en_words":411,"ratio":1.01,"partial":false},"pairing_state":"verified","verified":true,"evidence":["length","meaning","anchors","audit"]},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.05,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":6892,"original_word_count":6568,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Faust, the Striving Human Being","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA272/English/SOL2024/19160904p01.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 272/1916-09-04/p094"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. 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