The Faustian Deal as an Archetype: Individuation by the Process of Integration of the Shadow

This paper serves as a reflection only; I am beginning to organize thoughts in my head around the concept of integration of the shadow. If one is not aware of the terminology in reference to the shadow please read my previous reflection on an introduction to the shadow.

I will explore the archetype of the Faustian deal. This concept is of interest to me because of how often I have see the concept relived through popular media. Basically a Faustian deal refers very specifically to a deal that is made between humanity and some form of a malevolent Trickster for wisdom, wealth, power, etc… The terminology comes from the story of Dr. Faustus. Though he was a historical character, there isn’t much that can be said of assurance as to how he lived.

The two main authors penning the story of Faust are Johannes Goethe and Thomas Marlow. The two stories focus on completely different themes, and seem to even have different points. This reflection will mainly focus on Goethe’s Faust. It will then trace the movement of Faustian deals in modern media; I will begin with Star Wars, in relation to turning to the dark side, Ghost Rider, and Spawn. The latter two are comic book characters.

I had always been interested in this idea, early on because there is no Biblical ground for it, but more recently as I consider morality and ethics in a world that is not black and white. I began to notice themes in the media when I was very young. It started by watching movies where these deals were taking place, one that comes to mind is the George Burns movie, Oh God you Devil. I was later introduced to Todd McFarland’s Spawn, and when I was in college I read a Star Wars comic book series called Dark Jedi, where Luke “goes over” to the dark side, his reasoning, to defeat a Sith Lord.

While working as a hospital chaplain I began to read the works of CG Jung, and learned of the concept of the archetype, and his take on fantasy and dream interpretation. At that point I began noticing recurring characters in television and books. There is always a protagonist, always an antagonist. Often there is a Trickster, a Hero, a Mother, a Father, and then there was the ever-present Shadow.

This reflection is part of my journey. I can’t help but wonder, why does our culture tell the story of Dr. Faustus over and over again… what inherent need does it meet? Lets begin by tracing this need in Star Wars.

Star Wars
In the beginning Darth Vader is to be understood as an evil force bent solely on controlling the universe through terror. One important question is, is that the case? In the original movies Vader’s character development is interesting, if one were to open their mind they would see by “Return of the Jedi,” that Darth Vader no longer represents what he was proposed to be. What is Vader’s goal after finding Luke, his son? His goals are to first overthrow the Emperor, and then rule the universe with Luke as father and son. Vader believes that with Luke at his side, if he embraces the Sith side of his personality they will be strong enough to overthrow the Emperor.

It was always interesting to me that in their universe this epic battle is based off a Prophesy, “the one who will restore balance to the force.” In the beginning of a New Hope Obi Wan believes this is through Luke but with the addition of the prequel’s we find that this thought fell originally with Vader himself. In the end of “Return of the Jedi,” who is it that destroys the Emperor, it is not Luke who refuses to embrace his hate, but his father who acting out of hatred for the Emperor and love and concern for his son that destroys Palpatine.

The prequel movies build Anikan to be a new hope himself, but with deep confliction. He never learns to temper his rage but seems only to try and repress it, this is first completely evident in the second movie when he destroys the sand people at the death of his mother. He never learned to deal with grief, so by the third movie when he has found that his beloved would die he partakes in a Faustian deal, why? For love. We find that Vader has more depth than could be imagined from his original appearance.

Any true Star Wars fan will also have moved beyond the canonical series of movies and moved into the literature. In the canonical literature there is a comic book series that is very important to this discussion, “Dark Jedi.” In this series we find that the Emperor is not really dead but has been biding his time. We find that as the ability to use the force grows it destroys the body, thus the reason he became so deformed fighting in the third episode. How will a Jedi deal with this? Qui-gon Jin and Obi-wan found a way to deal with it through death, the Emperor through cloning. We find the he has grown beyond the bounds of his own skin and lives again through a clone.

Once Luke figures this out he understands his father all the better. He is forced to ask the question, is it possible to beat true evil through some perceived purity. He even begins to realize that he must embrace the dark side of the force; this realization comes to him as he takes a knee and refers to Palpatine as, “my master.”

Todd McFarland’s Spawn
We find the Faustian deal more upfront in the comic book series Spawn. A mercenary, one that has done many bad things, is on his deathbed and is given one more chance to be with his love by Malbolsha the devil. He is given five years then is expected to lead the armies of Hell. Malbolsha tricks him, and he awakens to find that he is deformed and five years has past. Wanda his love has moved passed him and married his best friend, they have a child, though oddly enough we find that the child is probably Spawn’s.

Spawn awakens to find a choice lay before him, whom will he follow? Not choosing is not an option by refusing to choose he chooses “Evil,” by choosing “Good,” he loses all hope of finding his love once more.

God must battle the devil; this seems to be the rule. Throughout history, through stories and through Literature we find the archetype of the “Divine Battle,” a battle that must be fought, it is interesting to me that in the case of Faust (Goethe), Star Wars, Spawn, and Ghost Rider God uses a, “demonic” force to win.

Ghost Rider
Ghost Rider is an earlier form of the Spawn storyline, tricked my Mephistopheles to sell his soul and live in servitude, his father does not die of cancer. There is always a trick when it comes to a Faustian deal though, in this case his father later dies in a wreck. Ghost Rider is forced to walk the world alone, belonging to the Devil. Later he learns to control his powers and fights against the devil himself. The character in touching his shadow is strengthened to deal with darkness.

Faust
I will spend my time with Faust as understood by Goethe, and remain most in the first book. Goethe’s first book is a love story. There are many character but I see three as major archetypes, not exactly as something different, but as stages.

Mephisto: in the prologue in a conversation with God he calls himself the Devil, later in the book he is called other things but desires most the name, Mephisto, or Mephistopheles. He is representative of the trickster, the one who is given the task of upsetting the balance. It seems that Goethe takes a queue from the book of Job. In a conversation with God a deal is struck, a deal, or one might even say a bet, in which Faust is set up as the deciding factor. Faust’s faithfulness is not decided by his morality but by his intellect, Mephistopheles engages Faust in the intellect. He stands as a liberal in a conservative world, offering Faust the opportunity to change his stance on life to something more progressive. Put simply he offers Faust a life where he can move away from helping those around him as a doctor but enjoying life, finding something that will finally entertain him.

Margaret: If Mephisto represents to me extreme liberalism she then is blind orthodoxy. Margaret takes issue not only with Faust not adhering to a creed but his association to Mephisto. She actually tells Faust that she loves him except when she is around Mephisto, then she hates him. There is a wonderful scene where She and a friend of hers are gossiping about a woman who is pregnant out of wedlock.

In the end her way of thinking is too inconsistent with the life she has begun to live since she met Faust. Though she is redeemed at the end of her life, she is put to death for the drowning of her illegitimate child. The child belongs to Faust.

***Take into account I have simplified the story and have simplified the characters. The characters are deep and on their own represent something deeper and fuller than my inadequate descriptions. Also take into account I am making these descriptions to emphasize a point, and this is the vision I have taken from the book, not necessarily the one intended by the author.***

Faust: Standing between what was and what could be Faust is forced to look upon both worlds. Though he did not enter in hastily he still entered into a pact with the Devil. There was something found wanting in his life, something he needed. Every day as a doctor he acted kindly to the underprivileged, working often pro-bono. The world that surrounded him revered him, for not only did he work for the poor, he taught wisely and raised those beneath him. But there was something missing something Faust was not able to do with the cards that had been dealt to him that is where Mephisto steps in.

Mephisto gave him youth, helped him find love, taught him regret, and at some point made concrete a morality that was slipping away. It was in the guilt over Margaret’s death that Faust is reminded one must live a certain way. Something that he had forgotten before Mephisto, and while walking with Mephisto. It was Mephisto that gave him the opportunity to learn more, to attempt to exhaust knowledge, all knowledge under heaven and earth.
Mephisto, then in the second book gave him an army. He sent him to help a king and in that time worked with the king. At his death he tricked Mephistopheles. In a final act of kindness, not only is he sure he can’t know everything, he puts himself in a situation where he convinces the devil to work to better mankind.

Goethe paints Faust as a picture of wisdom, though he may not be innocent as a dove, he is sly as a serpent. Faust understands that answers are not simple, like Margaret thought, but through Mephisto he understands some answers aren’t worth it.

This story has been told over and over again. Why is humanity so dead set on selling its soul to the devil? We live in a culture that uses phrases like, “Lesser of two evils,” and asks questions like, “do the ends justify the means.”

Edgar Allen Poe wrote a story called “Never Bet the Devil Your Head.” He describes it as his one “moral,” tale. In the story Poe does not stand between Progression and Orthodoxy, between perceived good and evil but accepts the dichotomy. In accepting that dichotomy no matter how tongue in cheek, he rejects his shadow, a shadow he faced in the rest of his writing. Poe recommended we never bet the Devil our head, but we never learn, why is that?
Maybe we have to bet the devil our head. Maybe we have to sell our soul to the devil to survive. I know what your saying so let me say this, I don’t think it literally, but in a figurative sense, we have to balance the force, not dichotomize it. I don’t think this ignores morality, nor does it ignore the wisdom of understanding good and evil. If we walk into a room with a set dichotomy someone isn’t going to fit. We can pretend that all people are Republican’s or Democrats, Liberals or conservatives, Believers or Unbelievers, Good or Evil, but at some point, someone will walk in to this room who doesn’t fit.

Our culture tends to ignore the shadow, thinking that if we don’t look at the darkness within ourselves it isn’t there. The thing is when we look into our own darkness often we find that we have damned things that themselves are not dark. It is as if we look at all people who oppose violence as weak, and the people that are willing to fight as killers. Not all solders kill babies, and not all pacifists are doing it because it is the right thing to do. But if we can label people who don’t think like us as evil, then we are good, we don’t need to reconsider life or to think about new things because we have arrived, and we can stop the car. I am a fan of life as a journey, where the hell we go isn’t as important as how the hell we get there… or vice versa, where the heaven we go isn’t as important as how the heaven we get there. Death… a place to rest? A new adventure? I don’t know but I can’t journey if I don’t have any road.

Can we look into our own darkness without being swallowed by it? And if we are swallowed are we stuck for good, is it as clear as “never bet the devil your head,” or can Darth Vader still make the right choice, even after making all the wrong ones.

Folks, there is power in the dark side of the force, and psychosis lives there too. We can ignore him, or maybe it is time to sit and have a discussion with Mephistopheles. Maybe it is time to learn what he knows. Morality is action. We are moral if we function within our bounds of ethics. Things… things are not moral, even actions.

The Bible says in Isaiah 45:7 “I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things. (KJV)” I don’t always know what this means, I know it isn’t referring to tornado’s and I know it doesn’t mean God isn’t good. But I know that in Genesis 1:3-4 for there to be light there has to be darkness. All the characters of these stories worked with their shadow side, integrating those things in it necessary for life and for higher consciousness, and were able to reject the things that were not moral… so what is hidden in your shadow that will bring you to higher conscious… and what there will kill you?