                           19981008.00
From: Bill Edwards 
To: review@netcom.com
Subject: Die Andere

I hope you will excuse yet another mail message, but I just wanted to
tell you that I finished Die Andere.    I found the scene with Murphy
exhilarating.  He tells *the exact truth* about all of the parties to
the wedding--including himself.    I suppose we are take his prophecies
as true predictions of all of their futures (in vino veritas)?   I admit
I wonder what is next for Dorothea.

 The end of the book is shattering as it depicts the  destruction of
Doehring's house.   What is left for him, I guess,  is  the world of the
intellect that is captured in the written word.  Is there any sense in
speculating what happens next to Doehring, or do we know that he lives
out his life alone, but with the consolation of philosophy and
literature?    I also can't help but wonder how and why the house was
destroyed, but maybe Murphy indirectly prophesied that as well., as a
consequence of the sins of all who participated:  "the wages of sin are
death" (Rom 6:23).

I hope all goes well with your construction.  Regards. -- Bill Edwards

Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1998 08:45:31 -0400
To: Ernst Meyer 
From: Bill Edwards 
Subject: Re: Die Andere
Status: RO

>In pursuing the distinction between faith and knowledge which
>is a focal point of my relationship to the church, I was reminded
>of Job, who did not say "I believe that my redeemer liveth,"
>but "I know that my redeemer liveth." (Job 19:25) I have compared
>the various translations accessible to me, unfortunately the original
>Hebrew is not; and I am startled by the differences in interpretation
>of this verse in the Septuagint, the Vulgate, the King James Version,
>Luthers deutsche Bibel and the New English Bible. I can only infer
>that the source is extraordinarily obscure.

Thanks for very much for your mail!  Reading Die Andere was a remarkable
and engrossing experience for me on a number of levels:  linguistic,
intellectual and emotional.  I read [translated] some portions of it to my
wife, and it engendered discussions.

Let me try to hack out the Hebrew of Job 19:25 a bit with a very rough
word-for-word translation:

Hebrew: 'ani  y'da`ti     go'li       chai
English:  I   have known  my Redeemer lives

The word for "Redeemer" in this context may imply someone who will redeem
Job from death.  Elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible it can mean "kinsman", i.e.
the one who is willing to do the part of a kinsman, or even "avenger".  But
"have known" I think translates the Hebrew correctly at that point.  The
context of this passage in Job, of course, is that Job is pleading for
mercy from his comforters who are pursuing him relentlessly with their
indictments.

The theological relationship of faith and knowledge is very tricky. On the
one hand, the writer of 1 John says, "I write these things to you who
*believe* in the name of the Son of God, so that you may *know* that you
have eternal life" (1 Jn 5:13).  On the other hand, the Christian Church
early condemns the Gnostic heresies that require a special *knowledge* to
escape the trammels of the material world.  I personally think that human
knowledge is very limited and has to be aided by faith, but that obviously
comes out of my faith stance, which is an axiom that I cannot prove or
disprove. -- Bill

=====================

It is gratifying to think that the characters of Die Andere are so
real to you that you ask yourself what becomes of them after the
novel's end. Not in the least critical of your affectionate inquiry,
I would nonetheless point out that there is some esthetic value in
contemplating the characters as inventions limited by the framework
of the plot, lest as hypothetical historical human beings,
their characteristics be diffused into the general mediocrity
and indifference of existence.

That having been said, I confess that an early conception of mine
was of a trilogy, the last volume of which would end with Dorothea's
suicide.  I discarded this plot when it became clear to me as I grew
older that death ought not be so disparaged: that under the right
circumstances and at the right time, it can be as marvelous
as life itself.

In the three copies that I had printed on the Xerox machine at Staples,
I grouped the chapters into four units which I entitled respectively:
Fruehling, Sommer, Herbst und Winter. Why these subtitles did not
find their way into the Internet version, escapes me.

As I wrote the book, the closing lines of Goethes Faust echoed
in my ears:
            Alles Vergaengliche ist nur ein Gleichnis
            Das Unzulaengliche, hier wirds Ereignis,
            Das Unbeschreibliche, hier ists getan.
            Das Ewig-Weibliche zieht uns hinan.

(The quote, which is from memory, may be corrupt.) An explicit
allusion to this verse occurs in the Aufstieg description of
chapter 3.

From time to time I consider expressing my affection for the
characters by writing a sequel. That it should be in my power
to determine their destinies is a profoundly humbling thought.
It is, in the end, a power which I do not want. It is, I suppose,
a reflection of my physician's role in life, that I long to
make everything whole again - alles wieder gut zu machen.
But in that case I should have succumbed to the idealization
of which my spokesman Murphy is so consistently critical.
Murphy least of all would approve of a happy ending; and as
for the unhappiness of the ending as I wrote it,
sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

=================

As for the contest between knowledge and faith, I find it
difficult not to lapse into the confessional mode which I try
hard to avoid. All my *confession is by indirection. Goethe once
said that all his writings were Bruchstuecke einer groszen
Konfession.

The practical person distinguishes by that he knows and what
he does not know. What he knows is an recapitulation of his own
experience. When that experience is insufficient to provide
him with (reliable) knowledge, he improvises and compensates
for the uncertainty of his assumptions by assertions of belief,
by declarations of faith.

Whatever the Evagelists or the Apostles say about faith,
whatever the Church Fathers decreed must be taken on faith,
reiterated by the sermons of generations of priests and of
pastors; the average, common Christian distinguishes between
that which he knows and about which he is certain; and
that which he does not and cannot know, but which the
peer pressure of his fellow Christians persuades him to
assert to be true, - on faith.  So that in the spiritual koine
what is known by faith is a smidgeon less certain than
what is known by experience.

The Mystic, - count me in, - by way of contrast, can dispense
with faith, because he _knows_. That is what fascinates me about
Job's assertion: Ich weisz, dasz mein Erloeser lebt. He knows
what others must laboriously accept on faith, because what
he knows is within him, is part of his experience, is part of
his life. For someone like Job, to question the immediacy of
the divine is more incongruous than to question the immediacy
of the light of the sun when it streams on him, or the darkness
of night, when it envelops him.  And for the mystic all that
is not thus immediate, and it includes most dogma, - is,
however interesting it may be, beside the point.

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