The Understanding of the Concepts of “Free” and “Freedom” Sccording to Faust’s Final Monologue Before Death and his Seashore Colony as Goethe’s Vision of “Totalitarianism”

Abstract

The concept of free (“frei”) appears in the Second Part of the Tragedy in Act Five, namely in Faust’s final monologue before death, in line 11580:

Faust:
Free earth: where a free race, in freedom, stand

(“Auf freiem Grund mit freiem Volke stehen”) [V. 11580] (Goethe 2001: 203).

In this line apart from the concept of free, what strikes our attention is:
1. People/race (“Volk”),
2. earth/ground (“Grund”) (This word in German also means ground, earth, base). Whereas the content of the notion of “freedom” and, consequently, “freedom”, which Faust himself conceives of in these notions, must be determined in the context of and
in comparison with the other concepts given in this verse.

At the same time, it is clear that if we want to understand exactly what Faust means by the concept of “free”, then “freedom”, which Faust promises to the people of his colony or abstract humanity in the vague and uncertain future, if we want to understand exactly what he means by it, at a first glance, whether it is a kind of political message or a political will (or, in general, the question is whether the concept of “free” has a political content here), we must define what Faust himself is the voice of this message at the moment. At the same time, it must be clarified, on the one hand, who the “people” are whom Faust promises “standing on free land”, and on the other hand, it must be clarified what kind of “people” his visionary “free people” are.

To accurately define the content of these concepts (“free”, “freedom”, “people”, “land”), the following words of Faust are noteworthy, in which he addresses people working on ports and dams on the seashore:

Faust: I will gain power and property! It’s all business, glory – none! (“Herrschaft gewinn’ ich, Eigentum! / Die Tat ist alles, nichts der Ruhm”). [...] It is ordered to fulfill it rapidly, at all speed! (“Geboten schnell, zu schnell getan!”) [...] The master’s word alone declares what’s right. Up from your beds, you slaves! Man on man! (“Des Herren Wort es gibt allein Gewicht. / Vom Lager auf ihr Knechte! Mann für Mann!”). Reveal the daring of my favoured plan. Seize the tools: on with pick and spade! 11505 Let the end-result be now displayed. Strict order, and swift industry/ then the finest prize we’ll see: And so the greatest work may stand, one mind
equal to a thousand hands. (“Genügt Ein Geist für tausend Hände”). [...] How the clattering of shovels cheers me! It’s the crews still laboring on (“Es ist die Menge, die mir frönet”) [V.10197-10198; 11382; l11501– 11510; 11539-11540] (Goethe 2001: 163, 201, 202).

Thus, in Faust’s dominion, in its seashore colony, there is an obvious tyrannical, authoritarian, dictatorial rule (“Herrschaft”) and a rule similar to that of a totalitarian regime, because the political disposition is of a radically hierarchical structure, where Political is abolished (“das Politische”) (H. Arendt): On the one hand, Faust, who is “lord”, “sovereign” (“Herr”) and lone ruler, the sole political leader, almost the Führer, who is silently obeyed and worshiped by his direct subordinates (like, Mephistopheles), as well as the population of the colony (“I will gain power and prosperity”); On the other hand, his “slaves” («Knechte»), that is, the politically,
economically and socially disenfranchised population of the Faust colony, in Faust›s “terminology” “the mass” (“Menge”) – “it is the mass that worships, obeys, glorifies”; Furthermore: On the one hand, Faust, who, as the unchanging central figure of the elite
ruling class, plans various political, economic, military, or technocratic projects (“One Mind”), who single-handedly issues state orders (compare “take into Hand Shovels and Bars”, “Only the word of the lord has power”, “In time, stand up slaves!”), and he
is Legibus solutus – one who is beyond the law, above the law, and the law does not apply to him, and on the other hand, the lumpen-proletariat, which has become a slave to the construction of seaports, canals, and ports, has become obedient and speechless (“it is commanded to do it quickly, so do it quickly”).

Consequently, the “people” (“Volk”) mentioned by Faust in his visionary words refer not to a politically free population but the “people” as an economic and political instrument, a mass pulling force based on which the political leader (Faust) and his
narrow political elite (Mephistopheles and his three high and strong subordinates) carry out monumental technocratic and economic projects and global colonization. Consequently, the concept of “people” refers to the functionality of people and not to their citizenship.

In Faust’s seaside colony totalitarianism is the type of regime and apart from using total propaganda and repressions – Faust: Spurred by force or hope of pleasure, By pay, enticement or press-gang! (“Und so verbringt, umrungen von Gefahr, / Hier
Kindheit, Mann und Greis sein tüchtig Jahr. / Solch ein Gewimmel möcht ich sehn”) [V. 11577-11579] (Goethe 2001: 203) –mass work, working culture, and gigantic constructions are being aesthetically acceptable, which creates the illusion of care for people. In reality, these enormous establishments have a propagandist function and have characteristics of ideology, because they highlight superiority, absolutism, oneness, and truthfulness – Faust: Childhood, manhood, age’s vigorous years, Surrounded by dangers, they’ll spend here. I wish to gaze again on such a land (“Und so verbringt, umrungen von Gefahr, / Hier Kindheit, Mann und Greis sein tüchtig Jahr. / Solch ein Gewimmel möcht ich sehn”) [V. 11577-11579] (Goethe 2001: 203).

Thus the population of the Faust colony, its so-called “people” are the disenfranchised proletariat of the new age, the future of modernity, or the millions of people locked up in concentration camps and “gulags” whose sole function is to be a driving force in the complete subjugation and control of nature. It is in this work that he gains “freedom” that is, liberation from dependence on nature when the population of the Faust colony completes the construction of coastal dams and the complete drying up of the swampy surface of the land seized from the sea.

Given the above, the “land” mentioned in Faust’s pre-death visions – “ground” (“Grund”) – obviously has no mythical or sacral meaning, but this concept refers to “land” as a “dead” matter, a geological fact. Accordingly, the semantics of the word “ground” refers to “soil” or “ground” and refers to the “land” that is only the object of technocratic, engineering, and economic development: thus, “ground”, i.e. cultivated, developed “land”, soil, arable land; “Grund”, i.e. a mineral deposit, a land abducted from the sea. That is why Faust does not say the word “Erde” the semantics of which considers the earth to be predominantly a mythical and sacral phenomenon, in the interior of which (“Erde”) the “soul” clothed with divine-cosmic elements, the socalled “spirit of the land” (“Erdgeist”) operates. Unlike the “romantic” and meta-physicist Faust of the first part of the tragedy, for the colonizer and technocrat Faust of the second part, this “land” or “Erde” has lost its value and is seen as a mere technical data.

Thus, because of the despotism and tyranny established in this coastal colony, Faust does not envision the contours of a free and legal state, and the concepts of “free land” and “free people” uttered in his promises cannot be linked to political freedom,
because he has already made the present political conditions for decades “totalitarian” and the political agenda of his colony is forever defined. This is a precondition for the future to be similarly “totalitarian”.

Therefore, “freedom” (“Freiheit”) promised by Faust to future mankind and his concept of “Free” (“frei”) means:
1. Liberation from dependence on nature through obedience to nature, full control of the forces of nature;
2. Freedom, free, as a technical-engineering characteristic and not as a political and axiological-ethical situation: in particular, freedom as a release of space for colonization-technocratic works (compare “I will open spaces for many millions”; the ground is solid, it borders and encircles the sea with a strong membrane”).
3. Freedom, free as a political, social, economic, and militaristic restraint based on force, brutality, and violence (Faust and Mephistopheles as its “icons” and “adepts”) – Mephistopheles: (Geist: the brutal spirit of the modern epoch – K.B.) The ocean’s freedom frees the mind/ there all thought is left behind! / You only need a handy grip [...] You have the might, and so the right (“Man hat Gewalt, so hat man Recht”) [V. 11177-11179; 11184] (Goethe 2001: 192).