Human greed, cowardice, and the redemptive power of love are distinguishable themes in Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita. At the beginning of the novel, the Devil arrives in Moscow and performs black magic at the Variety Theater, satirizing the vanity and greed of the Muscovites. The Soviet citizens, whose lives are so arranged that they are unaccustomed to supernatural events, are faced with their real world which has been displaced into something completely crazy and fantastic. In the world where evil, loathing, hypocrisy, and despair left no trace of humanity, the Devil is the force that brings justice. Throughout the novel characters are punished or rewarded by Woland, presumably Satan, and his retinue. The contradictory nature of the characters that dispense justice is the novel’s main premise (Weeks 25). Justice is the underlying theme of the novel.
The novel has a very strong binary structure that resolves itself in unity. The two plot lines have corresponding and juxtaposed characters, and are connected through repeating dual motifs of sun and moon, light and dark, good and evil, truth and lie, Yershalayim and Moscow. Bulgakov’s Margarita is not a classic female character, with mere features of empathy and kindness. Margarita is also a witch with an unleashed sexuality and wickedness. In the novel she is called on to fill both the role of Virgin Mary and to serve as Queen of Hell at the Grand Ball.
Margarita is a dynamic figure. Unlike the Master, “who retreats under the attacks from the critical establishment and burns his manuscript,” Margarita has unstoppable determination (Weeks p. 39). She is the one with a quest to save her beloved Master and his manuscript about Pontius Pilate. Margarita turns into a witch and performs justice. She punishes Latunsky, the literary critic who ruined the Master. On her broom ride Margarita releases uncontrolled anger and violence. The devastation she causes to Latunsky’s apartment and the DRAMLIT HOUSE is similar to the chaos and disarray caused by Woland and his retinue at the Variety Theater. In her pursuit of justice, Margarita is allied with Woland. Margarita nevertheless is not evil, just as Woland is far from playing the role of adversary (Weeks 43).
Throughout the novel Woland fulfills the epigraph: “I am part of the power which forever wills evil and forever works good.” He punishes people in Moscow, he retrieves the manuscript of the book that was burnt, and gives Master and Margarita peace. Here Bulgakov is proposing an alternative to traditional Christian theology (Weeks 43). In Bulgakov's cosmology God and Devil are one. Ultimately there is no evil. In the novel good and evil coexist like light and darkness (Weeks 42). Towards the end of the book, as Woland and company prepare to leave Moscow, we are reminded that “after all, shadows are cast by things and people, and what would good do if evil didn’t exist, and what would the earth look like if all the shadows disappeared” (Bulgakov 305).
No one in the book, except Yeshua, is entirely good or evil (Weeks 25). In her battle against injustice Margarita is merciful. Her motherly compassion emerges in her care of the little boy in Latunsky’s apartment building and in her relationship to Ivan Bezdomny (Weeks 34). As a reward for her service at the Satan’s Ball, Margarita pleads for Frieda’s redemption. The very handkerchief with which she killed her child torments Frieda eternally. Margarita asks Woland to grant mercy, to which Woland remarks that mercy is not in his department - evidence that he serves in a kind of “heavenly hierarchy” (Weeks 43). Instead he instructs Margarita to carry out forgiveness. In a sense, Margarita performs both justice and mercy. In her role as a witch she functions in parallel with Woland, and in her more compassionate role, she is equivalent to Yeshua, who performs mercy and believes in the basic goodness in every human. “There are no evil people in the world,” says Yeshua (Bulgakov 20).
Bulgakov’s worldview differs from the traditional Christian one in his treatment of good and evil (Weeks 42). God and Devil are made compatible in the novel, each performing his function in the world. Justice is enforced by Woland. Christ, and in some instances humans, perform mercy. This is how Bulgakov sees and interprets the world: justice and mercy operate together to create balance. He believes in the “necessary balance of powers within the universe” (Weeks 43). The answer seems to be his belief and faith in some kind of a world order that ultimately makes the horrors of Stalinism right.
Everything that Woland does when he comes to Moscow amounts to justice. At the end, Master and Margarita receive justice and fly away with Woland and the company. When Margarita asks Woland to grant forgiveness to Pontius Pilate, who has been tormented for two thousand years, Woland says that, “Everything will be made right, that is what the world is built on” (Bulgakov 323). This is how Bulgakov deals with the evil of Stalinism. He believes that there is a way out of the underground of the Stalinist world.
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