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Existentialism
Franz Kafka (1883 - 1924)
Before the Law |
Du
hast mich letzthin einmal gefragt, warum ich behaupte,
ich hätte Furcht vor Dir |
Before
the Law stands a doorkeeper. To this doorkeeper there comes
a man from the country and prays for admittance to the Law.
But the doorkeeper says that he cannot grant admittance at the
moment. The man thinks it over and then asks if he will be allowed
in later. "It is possible," says the doorkeeper, "but not at
the moment." Since the gate stands open, as usual, and the doorkeeper
steps to one side, the man stoops to peer through the gateway
into the interior. Observing that, the doorkeeper laughs and
says: "If you are so drawn to it, just try to go in despite
my veto. But take note: I am powerful. And I am only the least
of the doorkeepers. From hall to hall there is one doorkeeper
after another, each more powerful than the last. The third doorkeeper
is already so terrible that even I cannot bear to look at him."
These are difficulties the man from the country has not expected;
the Law, he thinks, should surely be accessible at all times
and to everyone, but as he now takes a closer look at the doorkeeper
in his fur coat, with his big sharp nose and long, thin, black
Tartar beard, he decides that it is better to wait until he
gets permission to enter. The doorkeeper gives him a stool and
lets him sit down at one side of the door. There he sits for
days and years. He makes many attempts to be admitted, and wearies
the doorkeeper by his importunity. The doorkeeper frequently
has little intervies with him, asking him questions about his
home and many other things, but the questions are put indifferently,
as great lords put them, and always finish with the statement
that he cannot be let in yet. The man, who has furnished himself
with many things for his journey, sacrifices all he has, however
valuable, to bribe the doorkeeper. The doorkeeper accepts everything,
but always with the remark: "I am only taking it to keep you
from thinking you have omitted anything." During these many
years the man fixes his attention almost continuously on the
doorkeeper. He forgets the other doorkeepers, and this first
one seems to him the sole obstacle preventing access to the
Law. He curses his bad luck, in his early years boldly and loudly;
later, as he grows old, he only grumbles to himself. He becomes
childish, and since in his yearlong contemplation of the doorkeeper
he has come to know even the fleas in his fur collar, he begs
the fleas as well to help him and to change the doorkeeper's
mind. At length his eyesight begins to fail, and he does not
know whether the world is really darker or whether his eyes
are only deceiving him. Yet in his darkness he is now aware
of a radiance that streams inextinguishably from the gateway
of the Law. Now he has not very long to live. Before he dies,
all his experiences in these long years gather themselves in
his head to one point, a question he has not yet asked the doorkeeper.
He waves him nearer, since he can no longer raise his stiffening
body. The doorkeeper has to bend low toward him, for the difference
in height between them has altered much to the man's disadvantage.
"What do you want to know now?" asks the doorkeeper; "you are
insatiable." "Everyone strives to reach the Law," says the man,
"so how does it happen that for all these many years no one
but myself has ever begged for admittance?" The doorkeeper recognizes
that the man has reached his end, and, to let his failing senses
catch the words, roars in his ear: "No one else could ever be
admitted here, since this gate was made only for you. I am now
going to shut it."
Ce
qu'on fait n'est jamais compris mais seulement loué ou blâmé.
Nietzsche, Gay Science |
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