Number Sixty-Four / Sixty-Five

Die Vertreibung aus dem Paradies ist in ihrem Hauptteil ewig: Es ist also zwar die Vertreibung aus dem Paradies endgültig, das Leben in der Welt unausweichlich, die Ewigkeit des Vorganges aber (oder zeitlich ausgedrückt: die ewige Wiederholung des Vorgangs) macht es trotzdem möglich, daß wir nicht nur dauernd im Paradiese bleiben könnten, sondern tatsächlich dort dauernd sind, gleichgültig ob wir es hier wissen oder nicht.

Expulsion from Paradise is in its main aspect eternal: that is to say, although expulsion from Paradise is final, and life in the world unavoidable, the eternity of the process (or, expressed in temporal terms, the eternal repetition of the process) nevertheless makes it possible not only that we might remain in Paradise permanently, but that we may in fact be there permanently, no matter whether we know it here or not. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

The Expulsion from Paradise is eternal in its principal aspect: this makes it irrevocable, and our living in this world inevitable, but the eternal nature of the process has the effect that not only could we remain forever in Paradise, but that we are currently there, whether we know it or not. [Hofmann]

Commentary

I don't know, but I guess that number sixty-four ends at the colon, and number sixty-five is the expansion after it.

If paradise as a condition is eternal, and therefore outside ordinary clock time, then to be there once is to be there always. So there is eternal presence in paradise, and eternal expulsion from Paradise. In that case, the question would not be how to find the way back, but how to realize the extent to which you are still there.

To be in paradise without knowing it is not expulsion, and if that is possible, then it shows paradise is not only a state of mind. Paradise might be defined as an eternal place you get expelled from. The door is open and the man doesn't go through; in this case, you are in paradise but you must leave, forever be leaving it. This is like the inverse of the castle, isn't it? Or is it that the way to belong to the castle is to try to get inside it, without success?

Number Sixty-Three

Unsere Kunst ist ein von der Wahrheit Geblendet-Sein: Das Licht auf dem zurückweichenden Fratzengesicht ist wahr, sonst nichts.

Our art is a way of being dazzled by truth: the light on the grotesquely grimacing retreating face is true, and nothing else. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

Our art is an art that is dazzled by truth: the light shed on the rapidly fleeing grimace is true -- nothing else is. [Hofmann]

Commentary

Only the light is true; the grimace or face are not, and perhaps neither is its yielding or backward motion. It's interesting that both translators feel the need to insert an adverb of their own before zurückweichenden, which means to yield backwards or behind. Kafka directly invokes neither rapidity or grotesqueness. By choosing to emphasize the grimace itself, Hofmann discards the face, -gesicht, which makes it. The light shed on the grimace itself might be, at least, the registration of some suffering, if we include in suffering other such negative possibilities as disgust or anger. Whereas, the idea here seems to be that the face itself is yielding as it grimaces, being drawn away from the hypothetical witness, not so obviously in flight, but only going back. What I see as I read this is the grimacing face retreating without turning away, whereas, with a rapidly fleeting grimace it is the expression that moves across the stationary face.

Is this light on the grimacing face the same dazzling light mentioned in the first half of the aphorism, or is it a contrast? We in our art, or skillfulness, are only good at dazzling ourselves with a truth whose light we can't really see by, and so it is all too much like blindness. The real light is a faint light that only momentarily illuminates an expression of pain or rejection, which, as it pulls away from us, denies us any opportunity to address it or otherwise enter into some exchange with it. Perhaps it retreats not from the witness but from the light; this could mean that the truth is that disappointment or unpleasantness of reality -- not viciousness, just nastiness -- which comes out when you look for it. There may be here a tacit criticism of the sort of art that ostentatiously aims at the heights, instead of more humbly, but perhaps on the other hand more arrogantly, probes the depths.

Truth is supposed to grant sight, not deprive or injure sight, and the analogy to light is made plain in the second half -- our skill is to be blinded by truth, perhaps to show truth in all its brilliance even as it overwhelms us and therefore cannot be fully seen, or seen at all -- there is another analogy, between truth as blinding light and law as the open but impassible door.

Number Sixty-Two

Die Tatsache, daß es nichts anderes gibt als eine geistige Welt, nimmt uns die Hoffnung und gibt uns die Gewißheit.

The fact that there is nothing but a spiritual world deprives us of hope and gives us certainty. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

The fact that the only world is a constructed world takes away hope and gives us certainty. [Hofmann]

Commentary

Namely, I suppose, the certainty that all we see is coming from within us, and therefore nothing can be that isn't somehow already figured in us. Hope and certainty are not compatible, and there is plainly an exchange of them implying equivalency. Being before the law one hopes for law, but without certainty. The constructed world is a closed set, but being constructed and being spiritual are not exactly the same although the difference may not matter here.

Hope seems to belong to another world which must be inaccessible in order to belong to hope; any accessible place is not hoped for, it's only farther away. Going there will not satisfy your hopes but only alter your location. Satisfying your hopes is a miraculous and incalculable thing that cannot be accounted for even if it happens.

Number Sixty-One

Wer innerhalb der Welt seinen Nächsten liebt, tut nicht mehr und nicht weniger Unrecht, als wer innerhalb der Welt sich selbst liebt. Es bliebe nur die Frage, ob das erstere möglich ist.

Anyone who loves his neighbor within the limits of the world is doing no more and no less injustice than someone who loves himself within the limits of the world. There remains only the question whether the former is possible. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

Whoever in this world loves his neighbor does just as much and just as little wrong as who in this world loves himself. Remains the question whether the former is possible. [Hofmann]

Commentary

Both translations mark this aphorism cancelled.

"... innerhalb der Welt" is the component that seems to require the most attention. It is important enough that Kafka insistently repeats it, so his topic is not love, but loving within the world. This might link up with the previous aphorism; so that loving within the limits, in an ordinary way, is not really different in character from self love.

He touches on, but I think unintentionally, the idea that we can mistake self love for love of others. The main idea here, though, is that loving the self and loving others within the world is neither here nor there, if the latter is even possible. Loving outside the world, I assume here as a renunciate, is the variation in love that would get the one beyond this indeterminate state of value, neither more or less unjust. Put another way: favoring you is not that different from favoring me, if we're both elements in the world. Perhaps, only when leaving the world behind for good do you move on to the level of loving all mankind, and so to a kind of love in which self-love and love of the neighbor are different in an important way?

Number Sixty

Wer der Welt entsagt, muß alle Menschen lieben, denn er entsagt auch ihrer Welt. Er beginnt daher, das wahre menschliche Wesen zu ahnen, das nicht anders als geliebt werden kann, vorausgesetzt, daß man ihm ebenbürtig ist.

Anyone who renounces the world must love all men, for he renounces their world too. He thus begins to have some inkling of the true nature of man, which cannot but be loved, always assuming that one is its peer. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

Whoever renounces the world must love humanity, because he is also renouncing their world. Accordingly, he will begin to have a true sense of human nature, which is incapable of anything but being loved -- assuming, that is, that one is on the same footing as it. [Hofmann]

Commentary

This says that, when someone renounces the world, he or she doesn't give up only his or her world, but the world of humanity as such. This means that the renunciate doesn't retire to a private world, but either gives up any world, or enters into some higher, superhuman world that is not his or hers. Perhaps this means that renouncing the world is not just giving it up, but giving it as a gift; which would mean in turn that the renunciate doesn't turn from the world as a worthless mistake or an illusion. The world would therefore be renounced even as it is acknowledged to be a true value.

It could be that Kafka means the world may depend in part on renunciates, because they contend with the whole world as such and so bring the whole world into experience. The result of this is a better understanding of what humanity is, presumably by seeing how humanity understands the world, which can only be a concept, being too big and old to fit into human experience.

Being a peer of mankind -- and ebenbürtig can mean evenly matched as well, so this equivalence is not necessarily a peaceful one! -- is necessary if one is to be in a condition of loving mankind. That means that the renunciate, who loves humanity, must continue to be human or at least at a human level. The renunciation doesn't make him an angel, it makes him or requires of him that he be a lover of mankind. Mankind can only be loved, but only by a peer, which might not mean another human, it need only mean someone at a human level. Loving mankind doesn't make you human, but only a peer of humanity, as it makes it possible for you to renounce the world. Kafka seems to be saying that every lover of mankind must renounce the world. I don't think he means that you have to renounce mankind in order to love it, but that it if you love it, you must renounce it in order to be its peer, which is necessary in order to go on loving it.

Why can't you hate mankind? Is it because hating mankind is still very human, while loving mankind seems to be superhuman? Why can't you be indifferent to mankind? Is it because that indifference is only a kind of subhumanity, which puts you below the level of mankind? There might be overtones here of the previous aphorism about cheating, too much, too little, in the middle.

Number Fifty-Nine

Eine durch Schritte nicht tief ausgehöhlte Treppenstufe ist, von sich selber aus gesehen, nur etwas öde zusammengefügtes Hölzernes.

A stair not worn hollow by footsteps is, regarded from its own point of view, only a boring something made of wood. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

To its own way of seeing, a wooden stair moderately hollowed out by people's footfalls is just some knocked-together article of wood. [Hofmann]

Commentary

This aphorism is marked cancelled in both translations. Does this mean that only the used stair knows it's a stair? Or that the unused stair despises itself for being useless? Kafka's fiction is full of inanimate things that seem to be parts of other things, or parts of a system, about which it has only secondhand or otherwise sketchy information. It is an example of a thing that is stripped down apparently to nothing but function, which is then also stripped of function. Odradek, the odd wooden thing, might be one of those nameless, ad hoc machine parts you sometimes come across in the entrails of a car or a clock; it isn't an artifact with a real name, like a cog or a gear, it may not be an artifact.

This aphorism is cancelled, and I think I see why. There's some activity in it, but not enough.

Number Fifty-Eight

Man lügt möglichst wenig, nur wenn man möglichst wenig lügt, nicht wenn man möglichst wenig Gelegenheit dazu hat.

One tells as few lies as possible only by telling as few lies as possible, and not by having the least possible opportunity to do so. [Kaiser/Wilkins]

The way to tell fewest lies is to tell fewest lies, not to give oneself the fewest opportunities of telling lies. [Hofmann]

Commentary

Both translations mark this aphorism cancelled. It seems entirely straightforward, which might have made it too one-sided to be worthwhile. I wonder if telling lies is equivalent to cheating in the preceding aphorisms. If so, then the idea of avoiding or burning out evil would be a matter of giving oneself fewest opportunities, rather than simply not telling lies.