Faustus-Mephistophilis relationship

In Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus, the title character learns too late that selling his soul
to the devil is not a good plan. Not only is it a questionable bargain to trade one’s soul for twenty-
four years of supposed superpowers, but Faustus either wastes his powers on frivolities or is not
granted what he asks for. Mephistopheles is quite crafty when he promises Faustus his obedience. It
soon becomes apparent that it is Faustus who is the servant to Lucifer and his demons. Dr. Faustus is
something of a Renaissance man, knowing physics, astrology, divinity, and other sciences. However,
he rejects these fields. Not only does Faustus turn his back on God, he profanes God’s name to
summon the demon Mephistopheles. Mephistopheles appears, but not because of Faustus’
summons. He explains that demons naturally appear when people curse God, in order to take their
souls. Already, Faustus believes he has more power than he actually does. Furthermore,
Mephistopheles cannot automatically become Faustus’ servant at his command because the demon
already serves Lucifer first and foremost, so Faustus makes Lucifer an offer he can't refuse: he will
sell his soul to the devil himself in exchange for twenty-four years of life with Mephistopheles at his
beck and call. Perhaps because of his prideful and self-important attitude, he believes he is being
unjustly persecuted. Faustus uses these feelings to justify his dangerous actions. If he believes God
has rejected him, Faustus can in turn reject God. Because Faustus is so blinded by pride and so
vulnerable because of his unhappiness, Mephistopheles has an easy time deceiving him. He appears
to warn Faustus not to make the deal: “Oh, Faustus, leave these frivolous demands, / Which strike a
terror to my fainting soul”. However, Mephistopheles is thinking of his own torment by being in a
constant state of hell. The concept of hell in Dr. Faustus is not a physical location, but instead the
absence of God. Mephistopheles does not show true concern for Faustus’ soul, constantly deceiving
him and confirming Faustus’ misconceptions. When the demon has Faustus sign the contract with his
own blood, Mephistopheles tells him that Lucifer will claim his soul. Faustus is slow to realize that he
is not the one in control, that Lucifer has all the power and that Mephistopheles is merely humoring
him. Indeed, Mephistopheles, Lucifer, and Belzebub reveal their true colors when they begin taunting
Faustus in Act 2. Faustus is having some emotional distress, calling on Christ to save him. The demons
appear almost instantly and scold Faustus for calling out to God. Lucifer says, “Thou call’st on Christ
contrary to thy promise;” Belzebub adds: “Thou shouldst not think on God” (2.1.87-88). Chastened,
Faustus apologizes and makes some extreme promises to make up for his transgression: “And
Faustus vows never to look to heaven, / Never to name God or to pray to him, / To burn his
scriptures, slay his ministers, / And make my spirits pull his churches down” (2.1.92-95). Lucifer
seems appeased by Faustus’ hasty promises, even if he does not believe them. It is enough that
Faustus realizes who is truly in control. To further distract Faustus from the severity of his situation,
they put on a show for him, showing him the Seven Deadly Sins. From then on, Faustus has lost any
true authority he once possessed. Faustus no longer asks for Mephistopheles to perform incredible
feats, seeming to forget his desire to be emperor over the world, move continents, and other such
deeds. Instead, he is busy playing pranks and silly magic tricks on people of the court. He seeks fame
and attention, content with mediocrity and pettiness, not the majesty he once imagined. It seems
that part of the bargain says that Faustus will get what he wants, but what he desires will change.
From the beginning, Mephistopheles does not grant his first request, that he supply Faustus a wife.
The demon placates Faustus with some seemingly friendly advice, telling Faustus that he does not
know what he wants. Mephistopheles plays into Faustus’ desire for quick and easy pleasures.
As Faustus’ bargain grants him only insignificant magic tricks and denies him whatever he requests,
Faustus really gets a raw deal. He cuts himself off from God, losing the divine blessing to achieve
great things. He asks Mephistopheles for things that demons cannot grant him, such as a holy
matrimony, or knowledge of the secrets of the universe. There is not much at all that the bargain can
do for Faustus, yet he places himself in the devil’s hands for empty promises. The cruel joke is that
Faustus at first does not know the severity of his damnation. He jests when Mephistopheles tells him
that he is already in hell. Only when it is too late does Faustus realize the true meaning of hell, when
he is cut off forever from God and forever damned.

Dr. Faustus as atheistic play

Christopher Marlowe’s theological disposition is one that has been debated and particularly comes
into focus in the play Doctor Faustus, where the central theme is the eternal salvation or damnation
of Faustus. While it was the common thematic focus of theatre at the time, one might question why
a man who was believed to be atheist would compose a tragedy with heavy religious themes. The
reason for this is most likely to critique the Christian belief systems at the time. The initial instance in
which divinity is addressed in the play is in the first scene where Faustus analyzes popular
metaphysics. In his rejection of Christianity, he cites that belief in Christianity only leads to death,
the result of sin. The irony of this is that he neglected to read the rest of the passage which states
that God provides eternal life. Marlowe uses this moment as a hyperbole to draw attention to the
Calvinistic belief of predestination. When Faustus states “Che Sera Sera,” what will be shall be, he is
essentially saying that there’s no point in studying religion when the outcome would be determined
regardless of your actions. This causes Faustus to believe that religion will cause him to die an
eternal death, the logical opposite to eternal life. The topic of the “eternal death” is also one
discussed in the play through the character of Mephistopheles. Mephistopheles states in the fifth
scene that he is in hell wherever he is because Hell is not a place, but rejection from the gates of
Heaven. Faustus, on the other hand conceives Hell as a location. This is shown through his disbelief
of Mephistopheles’ statement about hell. This is also portrayed when he swears by Hell’s waterways
of Styx, Archeron, and Phlegethon, as described by The Divine Comedy. Faustus’ represents the
proverbial Everyman; he I inherently flawed. This representation applies to man’s view of Hell and
how it is unsound. Mephistopheles, on the other hand is a heavenly being whose understanding of
the afterlife is empirical. Through this scene, Marlowe conjectures that religion is fallible, because
the embodiment of Hell, one of its main components, is conceived by man, not created by God. This
would mean that Christianity could not be taken seriously. The most easily recognizable scene that
enforces Marlowe’s opinions regarding religion is when Faustus plays childish pranks on the pope.
Aside from being an entertaining aspect for the largely protestant audience of British theatre, it
provides a charge on both Catholicism and the protestant split. Marlowe utilizes the opulence of the
Pope’s lifestyle to satirize the fact that Catholics venerate the pope, who is no more divine in his
ambitions than the next man. Faustus’ pranks also serve as a comparison to the protestant church
challenging the Catholic Church. The childish antics of Faustus seem to say something about
Marlowe’s opinions about the schism in the church. In the end of the play, an old man urges Faustus
to repent. While Faustus could still repent according to most Christian beliefs, his refusal to do so
results in his eternal damnation. At this point, it appears that Faustus has the ability to repent when
the old man attempts to convince him to. The reality of the matter, however, is embodied in
Mephistopheles’ threat to Faustus. He states that he will “arrest” Faustus’ soul if he does not come
with him. This means that, while it appears he has had a chance for salvation, his consorting with the
devil has made repentance an impossibility. Throughout the play, Faustus does little wrong in terms
of his actions. These are petty pranks with no real negative implications. Despite this, he ends up
separated from God. Marlowe uses this point as a satirical commentary of the beliefs of the
protestant church. He shows how the Protestants belief that the eternal fate of an individual’s soul is
not dependant on the dealings that person has done in life, but solely on whether or not the person
accepts that Christianity is an absolute truth. Christopher Marlowe uses his tragedy, Doctor Faustus
to contest and satirize Christianity. His commentary addresses many different denominations. The
underlying remarks further reinforce the belief that Marlowe was an atheist. Multiple instances
throughout the play support his views on the church and explain his motives in writing Doctor
Faustus.

Dr Faustus as autobiographical play

A study of Marlowe’s great tragedies cannot but convince us that Marlowe possessed the power in
its fullest degree of projecting himself into his chief characters. The most important quality of his
works is the subjective or autobiography note. Here lies the greatest difference between
Shakespeare and Marlowe as dramatists. There is a complete effacement of Shakespeare’s
personality in his plays. We cannot say that this or that passage reveals Shakespeare’s personality or
mind. But Marlowe couldn’t but project his personality into the chief characters of his plays –
especially in his four great tragedies: Tamburlaine, Doctor Faustus, The Jew of Malta and Edward II.
Before discussing the subjective note in his plays any further, we should have a fair idea of Marlowe’s
life, his career, the influence of the Renaissance on him, and his ambitions.Marlowe came of parents
‘ base of stock’. He was the son of a shoe maker. But he was fortunate enough to get school
education and had a chance to go to Cambridge to specialize in theology and got Doctorate in
Divinity. But his abandoned his career in theology and joined the theatrical companies in London to
become a dramatist. But seeing a difference between himself as poor and his companions as rich,
though they were much inferior to him in intellect, Marlowe rebelled against the established norms.
This was also perhaps the main cause of his rebellion against religion and its normal orders. He was
much criticized and branded as the Atheist. He also possessed a dual personality. He was a dramatist
and poet in London, but also had relations with the underworld. However, Marlowe was a man of the
Renaissance and an embodiment of the spirit of his age. He was a saturated with the spirit of
learning, exploring and experimenting with its hankering after sensual pleasure of life and with its
inordinate ambition and supreme lust for power and pelf. He was profoundly influenced by
Machiavelli, the famous Italian social and political writer, who discarded all conventional moral
principles to achieve the end by any means, fair or foul. A close and critical study of works of
Marlowe convinces us that all his tragic heroes clearly reveal the chief characteristics and
temperament of the great dramatist. All his tragic heroes are absolutely dominated by some
uncontrollable passion. To achieve their end, they throw overboard all established moral scruples or
religious sanctions and never avoid using horrible means, for example, his cruel and tyrant
Tamburlaine with his craze for limitless power defies all authorities on earth and in the heaven. His
stone-heated Barabas is dominated by a senseless craze for gold and doesn’t shirk from committing
the worst type of crimes to achieve his end, thus he seems to be an embodiment of Machiavellism.
To gain super human powers through knowledge, his Doctor Faustus sells his soul to the Devil in
pursuit of his passion. His heroes have a scant regard for religion as Faustus says, “ I count religion
but a childish toy” another significant point is that all tragic heroes of Marlowe are poets and convey
their feelings and emotions to the audience in the superb poetic language, but of all Faustus is a poet
par excellence just like Marlowe himself. His utterance about Helen is magical and fascinating: Was
this the face …. Towers of Illium? And Marlowe himself was a great poet of passion. Of all the tragic
heroes of Marlowe, Faustus bears the most striking reflection of Marlowe’s own self. We know that
Marlowe was the second child of a Canterbury shoe-maker and in the very beginning of the play, we
are told of Faustus’ parentage as: Now is he born, his parents base of stock. Harold Osborne has
pointed out that Marlowe like Faustus came of parents ‘base of stock’ and was destined for the
church but turned elsewhere. We should not press the analogies too far, but we cannot ignore them
as the parallelism is too obvious. Doctor Faustus very powerfully expresses Marlowe’s innermost
thoughts and authentic experiences. So it can be regarded the spiritual history of Marlowe himself.
Marlowe’s inordinate ambition led him to revolt against religion and society, to defy the laws of man
and laws of God and such defiance is bound to bring up acute mental conflict resulting in deep
despair and certain defeat. So, both Marlowe and Faustus experience terrible mental pangs and
agonies. Doctor Faustus’ tragic death also has resemblance. After living twenty four years in sensual
activities, Faustus had to surrender his soul to the Devil. Marlowe’s Bohemian and boisterous life, too
came to a tragic sudden end in tavern brawl at the hands of a shady character of the London
Underworld at the age of twenty nine. Marlowe lost himself into his works. Doctor Faustus is strewn
with unmistakably autobiographical suggestions. Reading the play we cannot refrain from concluding
that it is the spontaneous expression of its writer’s innermost thoughts and authentic experiences.

Significance of angels in the play, and other appearances

The most straightforward way of describing the part played by the Good and Evil Angels in Doctor
Faustus is that they are external, visible embodiments of the two impulses that are at war within
Faustus' mind. Their first appearance is at the beginning of the very important Scene 5, in which
Faustus actually signs his pact with Mephastophilis. It is likely that in any staging of the play they will
have appeared on either side of - and perhaps slightly above - Faustus, thus emphasising their role in
physical terms. Such figures were familiar from morality plays and, as in Doctor Faustus, they usually
spoke alternately, each putting one side of argument. Here, it is the role of the Evil Angel to tempt
Faustus with the power he is promised by the Devil, while the Good Angel reminds him of the
dangers of his behaviour. When they reappear, at the beginning of the equally significant Scene 7,
they continue in these roles, with the Evil Angel strengthening Faustus' resolve. The Angels make
only one further appearance, in the same scene, at the point where Faustus realises that there are
some questions that Mephastophilis will not answer and that he has reached the limits of what he
can gain from his devilish bargain. As on previous occasions, the Angels are seen at a crucial moment,
when Faustus is wavering. On this occasion, by contrast with their earlier appearance in Scene 7, the
Good Angel has the last word and Faustus appears to be weakening to such an extent that
Mephastophilis brings in Lucifer and Beelzebub to remind Faustus of his bargain. After Scene 7, the
Good and Evil Angels disappear from the play and their function is taken over by the Old Man, who
appears only in Scenes 12 and 13. This represents a very important shift in the play, for Faustus is not
being appealed to by non-human beings but by a fellow human being and one who has lived his life
according to Christian precepts. From this human, Christian perspective, the Old Man brings Faustus
a number of warnings and messages: hat the Christian way is still open to him if he repents, he
reminds Faustus of the foul nature of his sins, by contrast, he also reminds Faustus of the redemptive
power of Christ's blood. More than once he uses the word ‘sweet', to refer both to God's grace and
to Faustus himself, whom he also addresses as ‘good'. The sweetness is in direct contrast to the
foulness of Faustus' sins; and, when applied to himself, it demonstrates that the Old Man retains his
faith in Faustus as a soul who might yet be redeemed. Later in Scene 12, the Old Man reappears and
witnesses Faustus' speech to Helen beginning, ‘I will be Paris, and for love of thee' (Scene 12, 96-
108). He is conscious that Faustus has turned his back on repentance. He is then attacked by a
number of devils, whom he defies by his turn towards God, emphasising the strength that he gains
from his faith. This attack is the outcome of Faustus' request to Mephastophilis, made as proof of his
determination not to repent. Mephastophilis' reply is extremely interesting, because it emphasises
his weakness when he encounters a truly believing Christian. The episode serves to remind the
spectator that Faustus did not have to sign away his soul. He made a choice – a choice which might
have been different had his faith been stronger.