Goethe

Goethe and his Poems in Praise of Quran and Holy Prophet of Islam

This is a collection of some articles mainly from the author below who is considered to be an authority on Goethe. See the link below for details:

More: 

Katharina Mommsen Professor Emeritus, Stanford University (Endowed Chair for Literature, sponsored by David Packard)

980 Palo Alto Ave. Palo Alto, CA 94301-2223 Tel: (650) 326-6637 – Fax: (650) 328-8639 Email: katmom@stanford.edu

…….To speak first of the figure of Muhammad -Goethe was interested in the type and fate of a founder of religion who spread his message not only by the ward, as did Jesus Christ, but also by aggressive secular means by the sword. For Voltaire it was exactly this latter aspect that led him to such an unjustly negative portrayal in his Mahomet-tragedy.

Goethe intended to give a much more positive portrayal, even if a certain amount of criticisr1 was unavoidable. Among the preserved fragments, it was mainly the famous song of praise-Mahomet’s Gesang-The Song of Mahomet, originally meant as a dialogue sung by Ali and Fatima that expressed Goethe’s interest in Muhammad as a person. Here Goethe portrays the nature of the prophet of a spiritual leader of mankind, in the symbol of a stream. He chose this symbol to illustrate how the spiritual power, from the smallest beginnings, grows into a gigantic force, through unfolding and expanding, and comes to its glorious fulfilment by flowing into the ocean, which here is made the symbol of divinity.

This simile is mainly based on the concept that the religious genius carries the other people as his brothers, bears them along with him, like the large river the smaller brooks and streams, on its way to the sea. It is this very motif that is emphatica11y illustrated.

Let me remind you of the famous verses where it is said of the river:

And now; silver-resplendent,

It enters the plain .. .

And the rivers of the plain

And the streams from the mountains

Shout to him in exultation- Brother!

Brother, take your brothers with you,

With you to your ancient father,

To that everlasting ocean,

Who with outstretched arms

Awaits us …

Later it reads, slightly transformed:

Take your brothers from the plain.

Take your brothers from the mountains

With you, to your father!

And Goethe’s Mahomet hymn ends:

And he carries thus his brothers

All tumultuous with rapture

To their waiting Maker’s hear!.

These verses reveal most clearly how throughout the whole song, also to himself. This was the way he felt about his task, his mission as a poet: to work for mankind, as for his brothers, to carry them along, to bear them upward to a higher farm of life. In this sense alI his work took on for him an ultimately religious aspect. And Goethe did in fact become the spiritual guide and prophet for many people.

In the same way, however, all the fragments of the tragedy that are concerned with Muhammad himself bear the marks of the young Goethe. At that time the poet had in mmd a number of dramatic plans, whose centre was to be occupied by some great figure from history or mythology; in this way he wanted to symbolize what he, as a young felt to be his own uniqueness; the magnitude and force of his creative he regarded as same thing but  at the same time seemed to him his special task and mission, his divine call.