"And if I fall as Lucifer fell..."

[SixImpossible]

Please help me explain this line to dd. Javert sings it in Les Miserables while trying to work his way through his moral dilemma: mercy versus justice.

Javert has a moral framework of crime and punishment - people do bad things and must be punished. Only those who never do wrong are worthy of being considered good people. Lucifer was an angel who could have been good but who chose to do bad and was thrown out of heaven as a punishment (you don't need to go into the details of hell with DD if you don't want to). Javert's song "stars" is about how he sometimes feels very alone in his moral high-ground but he finds the unchanging perfection of the stars comforting.

Lucifer was the brightest of God's angels but he was guilty of pride (thinking too much of himself) which is why he had to go, and it broke God's heart. I think Javert's worrying (rightly) whether pride is clouding his decision making.

As an aside, I've always thought it such a shame, as the name - bearer of light - is gorgeous!!!

I did not know about Lucifer and pride. Now that makes sense to me. Dd and I understood that Javert is no longer so sure that he has the moral high ground, but could not understand why he thinks that flexibility might lead him to make a wrong decision. But he is not worrying about flexibility. He is worrying that his inflexibility is leading him into pride, and therefore he might "fall as Lucifer fell".

He's not worried about falling himself. The lyric is "and if they fall, as Lucifer fell"

Is it?!

I must Google!

Reading the lyrics changes my understanding: he is not debating any moral dilemma at all! He is emphasising his rigidity and certainty. Righteousness is the only way, his way. Valjean has fallen from grace by virtue of being a criminal. Each has his place. And if the righteous break the rules they fall from grace and burn (in hell, presumably).

Exactly six - he's completely certain that the world is divided into Good People and Bad People and that he is a Good Person and Valjean is a Bad Person. His worldview is fixed and unchanging like the stars and he feels the need to be able to rely on this. His later crisis after Valjean forgives him shows just how much he can't cope with concepts of mercy, forgiveness and redemption - these concepts don't fit with his understanding of himself or the world around him.

Good discussion. And that is why, when Javert lets Valjean go, his whole world is turned upside down - he doesn't understand his own actions and how he can live with his own actions as they don't fit the rigid code that he has always applied. So he too has to 'fall'.

Or is it because, after he lets him go, he finally understands that his rigid black and white good and bad world just doesn't fit and he therefore regrets his life's work?

Javert would have been happier had Valjean killed him. Saving his life left him "in the debt of a thief" and he couldn't abide that. Yet at the same time, can he morally go and arrest Valjean knowing he is in his debt. He had no choice.

In the book, before he commits suicide, he leaves a letter to his boss detailing all the ways he thinks the police system should be improved. Javert lived and breathed his job and valued his integrity so when that was taken away from him, he had no option in his mind but to end his life.

I do really like the character of Javert, he is as tortured as anyone else in the story.

Well Javert letting Valjean go is an addition to the plot in the film that makes no sense IMO and isn't in the original stage musical. In the original, Javert would never let Valjean go and his suicide is triggered by the shock of this "bad bad criminal" claiming to have been redeemed and now being a good man, and acting with mercy and forgiveness towards Javert. Javert can't cope with this and feels that he can't live in a universe where Valjean's worldview is allowed to triumph "there is nothing on earth that we share; it is either Valjean or Javert"

Alifeofpie have you read the book?

Valjean makes Javert listen to his story then lets him go I steadying of killing him as the rebels wanted, but also gives Javert his address and basically says "turn up tomorrow and I'll come quietly." Javert agrees as he is now in Valjean's debt and is all conflicted. Javert goes home, intent on returning for Valjean but decides against it and kills himself (for the reasons explained above).

Years previously, the very same situation happened (Valjean said to Javert "I've got an important thing to do but afterwards you can arrest me") but Javert didn't believe him and wouldn't let him do the important thing so Valjean had to escape and go on the run again in order to do the important thing (help Cosette).

I really struggle with Javert's suicide. It feels out of character, almost weak. He is a man who never gives up, never gives in. Suicide is the act of a damned man, for the suicider damns himself. Why does Javert consider himself damned? Yes, it is either Javert or Valjean, there is no place for both, but surely the act of a righteous man would be to remove himself from the situation without falling from grace?

I've not seen the movie, but I read the book eons ago and love the musical score of the play and listen to it a lot.
I do think Javert believes that he's damned no matter what he does.

To let Valjean go would be to go against the very foundation of his belief system. Unfortunately, so would accepting that Valjean was even capable of changing and becoming a good man, but he does understand the debt for his life. He doesn't see his life being saved as an act of mercy - to him it was an act of pity, and even a taunt.
To believe anything else would be to throw doubt everything he's ever believed and done.
He can't repay the debt and live with himself, but he also can't remain in debt to this man. The only alternative he sees is to remove the debt by rendering it meaningless.