Parsifal: A Christian's View  (part 2 of 2)
Presented to the Wagner Society of Washington DC, September 2000

by Lou Santacroce
The following material is copyrighted c 2000 by Lou Santacroce, and is posted on the website
of the Wagner Society of Washington DC by special permission.
Unauthorized duplication, downloading, or storage for retrieval at a later date is a violation of applicable laws.
Link to Part 1 of this talk.

But, at the end of this act -- when Parsifal regains the spear and uses it to make the sign of the cross -- that castle will disappear and the garden will whither into a desert strewn with faded flowers. Evil will be seen for what it is: a deception, a counterfeit. Klingsor's castle will collapse in the presence of goodness; proof that darkness cannot stand before light. But, meanwhile, Klingsor -- who perhaps once envisioned himself as Grail King -- has absolute control over a negative or counterfeit version of the grail kingdom, and is lord over all he surveys.

Except for Kundry. She is the only creature in Klingsor's counterfeit kingdom whom he does not control completely. Perhaps this is because, whatever Kundry is, she's no counterfeit. Klingsor knows this, and he hates her for it. "Nameless One," he calls her; "She-devil of old! Rose of Hell! Herodias you were, and what besides? Gundyggia there, Kundry here!" The nastiest names he can think of; none of which, by the way, make any case for the argument that Klingsor is reciting Kundry's past incarnations. What he's doing here is the equivalent of an angry man spitting fire at a woman he is angry with: "Jezebel! Lady MacBeth! Mata Hari!" Another way of saying, "You're a bitch just like all the others!" Except that Kundry is really none of the above. She is not a woman who does evil for the pleasure of it -- a she-devil; neither is she a demonic spirit of lust -- the Rose of Hell. She has never engineered the death of a good man in revenge for a perceived insult, as Herodias did to John the Baptist when he told Herod his relationship with her was illegal under Jewish law. As for the name Gundryggia...well, I spent quite a few hours on the net trying to research that name. One writer calls her "a wandering spirit of Norse mythology," although he quickly goes on to other things and never comes back to elaborate; someone by that name turns up in a poem by Mary Shelly, the author of Frankenstein; and Cosima quotes Wagner in a diary entry for 1877 referring to her as "a weaver of war." Still another writer suggests a derisive play on words; the equivalent of "Kundry, Shmundry!" What Kundry really is -- as she herself will tell Parsifal near the end of Act Two, is a female version of Ahasurus, the man who laughed at Jesus as the Messiah carried the cross to Calvary, and was condemned, by a look from the savior, to eternal wandering: "I saw Him -- Him!" Kundry relates; "and I laughed...Then, His glance fell on me." In short, Kundry is the Wandering Jew.

Except that she's not Jewish. She couldn't be, not with an avowed anti-Semite like Wagner for a creator. Remember that Kundry will be saved at the end of this opera. After nearly a thousand years of misery, she will find redemption and forgiveness. At her death, she will fly to Heaven and straight into the arms of the savior she once mocked. There was no room in Wagner's Heaven for a Jew, even a repentant one. Yes, we all know that he toyed with the idea of subjecting Herman Levi to a forced baptism, and we know that he occasionally spoke highly of certain individual Jews. But, we must also remember that, for Wagner -- as for all anti-Semites -- Jews are a race, not a religion. Using that line of un-reasoning, it would be as impossible for a Jew to become as Christian as it would be for an African to become Chinese. Besides all of this, the Bible tells us that most of the Jews who accompanied Jesus on the way to Calvary and through the crucifixion were weeping, not mocking. The Pharisees -- who had engineered His arrest and trial -- were the mockers, and they were back in their homes, gloating to each other that that troublemaker was out of the way once and for all. No; the Bible says that those who mocked Jesus on His way to the cross were Roman soldiers and followers of pagan religions. Kundry would have been part of the crowd of pagans, hurling insults at Jesus, and daring Him to save Himself by coming down from the cross. Considering her gifts for service and seduction, I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest that she may have been a prostitute serving at one of the pagan temples.

Paul warns that "God cannot be mocked" and "A man reaps what he sows." (Gal 6:7) And Wagner might have had these scriptures in mind when he availed himself of some words spoken by Jesus that were so misinterpreted during the first century that even the man who wrote them down warned against their misuse. In the last chapter of the Gospel of John, the author reports a conversation between Jesus and Peter, where the risen Messiah gives his disciple an inkling of the hard life that he will have as an ambassador for Christ. John reports that Peter points to him and asks Jesus, "Lord, what about him?" To which Jesus replies, "If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you. You must follow ME." John goes on to say that "Because of this, the rumor spread among the brothers that this disciple would not die." Well, it was too good a story for Wagner to pass up, even though his use of it betrays a somewhat imperfect understanding of Jesus, who -- we must remember -- preached forgiveness, even to the point of forgiving those who plotted against him from the cross.

If "Parsifal" takes place during the Middle Ages, Kundry has been alive for about a thousand years, although she hardly calls it living. In addition to her eternal wandering, Kundry suffers an additional punishment; she has never been able to experience real, joyful laughter since the day she laughed at Jesus. All of her laughter is derisive, sarcastic, and bitter. She's long-since regretted the act that brought her this punishment; she tells Parsifal, "From world to world I seek Him, to meet Him once again." And, although she won't be redeemed until the final minutes of the opera, she has reaped one reward from her search, a major sign from above that her cry for forgiveness is being heard: she's the only woman to have been drawn to the Grail Castle. In fact, she seems to have been at the castle longer than anyone except Titurel. Once again, Gurnemanz fills us in on the background of the story during his Act One narrative: "While building the castle there, he found her sleeping in the undergrowth/Benumbed, lifeless, as if dead." She now serves the company by functioning as a message-runner during the Holy Wars to which the knights are called. Gurnemanz upbraids the young squires when they deride her as a "wild beast" and a "sorceress," saying: "When all things stand uncertain/How to send tidings to brothers fighting in far off lands/And hardly knowing where/Who, before you are resolved/Storms away/Flies there and back/Tending the message with care and devotion...When, in danger, there's need of help/Her zeal bears her like an arrow through the air/Nor does she ever ask for thanks./I say, if this is harm/'Twould do you some good." Of course, if the knights knew of the curse Kundry lives under, they might inform Gurnemanz that such courage comes easily to one who cannot die.

Kundry's other form of service is to scour the earth in search of potions, balms, and elixirs that might help to ease the sufferings of Amfortas, the Grail King. She does this even though both of them know that only one thing will end the pain. "What will it help?" she cries, when the king tries to thank her for her latest gift. Of course, in Act Two, we'll learn that this is another form of contrition, since she is the person responsible for those sufferings.

We'll also learn that Kundry occasionally falls under the spell of Klingsor and disappears from the castle for a time. These disappearances are usually followed by a young grail knight's defection to the other side. No one ever connects the two events because -- according to Wagner's stage notes -- Kundry appears at Monsalvat as a crazed wild woman with loose garments, piercing black eyes, and a deep reddish-brown complexion. But, when luring knights to their doom in Klingsor's garden, she changes into what Wagner describes as "a youthful woman of great beauty...lying on a bed of flowers, clad in a revealing, fanciful garment, rather in the Arabian style."

Now, what's going on here? Which is the real Kundry; the humble penitent who lives to serve the knights, or the evil seductress who helps Klingsor lure young knights into breaking their vows to the grail?

By the end of the opera, we learn that the real Kundry is exactly who she appears to be in Act One: a penitent and sometimes bitter sinner. But, at the same time, she can't seem to resist the temptation to return to the person she was before that fateful day at Calvary.

Well, as we all know, old habits die hard. Earlier, I quoted Paul on this, in his letter to the Romans. Let me quote it again: "I find this law at work: when I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For, in my inner being, I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members." (Ro. 8:21-23)

Paul makes reference to the idea of "running ahead of the race," of trying to make shortcuts in the paths that God has laid out for us. He says we do this, not out of laziness, but hubris; in effect, telling the only perfect being in the universe that we've managed to improve on His plan! In "Parsifal," Kundry and Amfortas have heard the prophecy that promises their eventual redemption, but they're chafing under the one requirement that seems to accompany all of God's promises: patience.

So, Kundry keeps on doing the only things she knows how to do -- seduce and serve -- in the hope that, through one of these actions, she may find a shortcut that will bring her the redemption she seeks, in what she feels will be a more timely fashion. Of course, by the time we meet Kundry, she has lived so long and is so miserable that her notion of redemption is that she be allowed to die: "Sleep, sleep, DEEP sleep... Death!" she sings when she finds herself transported to Klingsor's magic garden. Although she doesn't know it, she has adopted a very Christian viewpoint. The New Testament tells us that, when we accept Jesus as the sacrifice for our sins, we die to the ways of the secular world. Of course, we are then immediately resurrected to a new life in Christ, as symbolized in baptism by total immersion, in which the convert is completely submerged -- buried, as it were -- in water, before rising from this symbolic grave as a new person in Jesus.

Someone once said that "the definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over, and expect a different result." Kundry has, in a sense, bought into that definition by trying to hurry things along. When pulled -- however unwillingly -- to Klingsor's castle, she tries to find redemption through what she calls love, which is really just sex. But, she has no luck with the knights who are drawn there; once she's had them, they renounce their association with the grail and go chasing off after the Flower Maidens. The one knight who did not join Klingsor's army after being seduced was Amfortas, and he went back to Monsalvat. So, Kundry now has perpetual reminders of her failures wherever she goes: traitor knights who no longer lust for her at Klingsor's Castle, and a king with a wound that will not heal in the Grail Kingdom. At the Grail Castle, she seeks redemption through service; through good works. But the balms that she scours the earth to obtain in an effort to heal Amfotas' wound offer only temporary relief, if any, and the young squires revile her, calling her a "heathen" and a "sorceress." Neither seduction nor service appears to be bringing her day of redemption any closer, and her practice of doing the same things over and over while expecting a different result have driven her, if not insane, than at least mad with grief.

Here, Wagner is denouncing two philosophies with which he was well aquatinted. In Kundry's quest to find redemption through physical love, he exposes the practice of "worshipping the created instead of the creator." (Romans 1) Unbridled sexual activity as a path to closeness with a god is an old pagan practice, older even than the patriarchs, and denounced in both the Old and New Testaments. It is a form of worship that Tannhauser advocates during the song contest in Act Two of that opera, and the type of worship that a younger Wagner seems to approve of at least partially when he has Elizabeth sing of the stirrings she has felt at hearing some of Tannhauser's earlier songs. But, an older, wiser Wagner -- the composer who, nearing the end of his life, has collapsed, helpless and broken, before the Christian cross -- now denounces this form of worship by showing us how the practice only serves to increase Kundry's despair.

But, Kundry's attempts to win salvation through service to the grail knights ALSO fail to bring about the desired results, and here Wagner -- the former kappelmeister at a Catholic church -- seems to be denouncing the Catholic doctrine which teaches that salvation can be obtained through good works alone. The New Testament plainly states -- in several ways -- that belief in the substitutionary death of the Messiah -- Jesus -- is the only path to redemption. And although the author of the book of Hebrews states that "faith without works is dead," he also states that it is only our belief in the redemptive power of the cross that is credited to us as righteousness. Because we can perform no act that could equal the blood atonement that Jesus made for sin, any righteousness that we might gain through works is considered as "filthy rags" in comparison. Perhaps Kundry is dimly aware of this when she tells Gurnemanz, "I never help...I never do good." Kundry's inability to obtain redemption through her good deeds is Wagner concurring with the Bible's message that salvation is a free gift from God; the expression of His grace -- which the dictionary defines as "unmerited favor" -- in that -- as Paul says -- "while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. "

Kundry is not the only character in "Parsifal" who tries to "run ahead of the race" in the quest for redemption through death. The other is the Grail King himself, Amfortas. Amfortas was made Grail King by his father, Titurel, when the patriarch of Monsalvat became to old to carry on the duties of a monarch. With all the zeal of youth, Amfotas longed to end the threat to the grail kingdom posed by Klingsor, and rode out alone to do battle with the evil magician. Here is an important distinction: Amfortas was not one of the traitor knights who were lured to Klingsor's castle while wandering through the woods and then elected to abandon the grail and serve its enemy following his defeat; he deliberately set out for the castle in order to destroy Klingsor. He began his journey with the best of intentions. He even carried with him -- for a weapon -- a Holy Relic: the lance with which a centurion named Longinus had pierced the side of Christ as he hung, dead, on the cross. The Bible tells us that both blood and water flowed from the wound. Jesus told His followers that He would be a "fountain of living water" for them, and the Old Testament tells us that "the life is in the blood." Amfortas no doubt thought he bore with him a weapon which would ensure victory.

But, being young and inexperienced, Amfortas forgot the scripture which warns that victory in battle -- whether spiritual or physical -- is "not by might, not by power, but by My spirit, says the Lord." The scriptures tell us that reliance on anything other than God's power is folly and can only lead to disaster. Amfortas attempted to rely on the lance -- as well as his own abilities as a knight -- in order to obtain victory in battle. By relying on his own, inferior abilities instead of God's, he was unable to resist Kundry's advances and, while distracted by the lusts of the flesh, lost the lance to Klingsor, who used it to inflict a wound that will not heal. At least not until the "pure fool, made wise by compassion" arrives.

Amfortas is an example of both the sin that is the inevitable result of trying to "run ahead of the race" and the misery that is the unavoidable outsome. Now, what IS the sin that Amfortas has committed? Sex with Kundry? Well, yes, obviously; but the sex is only secondary to a graver offense. It is not as much a transgression against the seventh commandment -- against adultery -- as it is a violation of the first: 'Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." Christianity teaches that we de-throne God and set up an idol in His place whenever we make something other than Him the supreme object of our adoration and affection, even for a moment. Amfortas was called to serve the grail and, like the other knights, he had to remain celibate. In his hour of temptation with Kundry, he obviously did not call upon God for help, for the bible says that "God...will not allow you to be tempted beyond your power to endure, but will -- with the temptation -- provide a means of escape, that you may be able to endure it." (1 Cor. 10:13) As a result, Amfortas fell into sin, and -- like Esau in the Old Testament, who sold his birthright to his younger brother Jacob for a bowl of pottage -- he despised his inheritance for a moment of physical gratification, and the pain of this transgression is with him continually. In fact, we can say that Amfortas has sustained TWO wounds that will not heal: one to his flesh -- caused by the lance -- and another to his heart, the product of his guilt and repentance.

[By the way, just as an aside: since the knights must take a vow of celibacy, how did Titurel come to have a son? Although Wagner never mentions it, the answer must be that -- like many priests at that time -- he had married, raised a family, and been widowed before the angel entrusted him with the grail and called him to found Montsalvat.]

Amfortas now lives in perpetual physical and emotional pain. His agony is most acute during the night: "the night of pain grows light" he sings when we first meet him, and the reference here is surely to the scripture which assures us that the darkness of evil is always overcome by the light of God." Like Kundry, he waits for the promised deliverer, "the pure fool," and like Kundry, he believes the deliverance that the fool will bring is death. Also like Kundry, Amfortas tries to hasten the coming of his final relief through a shortcut: the grail ceremony. And, just as it gives Kundry pain beyond measure when she is compelled by Klingsor to seduce the young knights who are lured to the castle, so the suffering of Amfortas is increased whenever he uncovers the grail.

The Bible teaches that the mere presence of God causes us to become aware of our sinfulness, and our need for redemption. Peter reacts to one of Jesus' miracles by falling to his knees and begging, "Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!" (Luke 5:8) Amfortas feels the pain and guilt of his transgression every time he uncovers the grail and confronts the purity that it represents. He looks to the grail in the hope that it will provide physical death; but, it is the grail that sustains LIFE, his life as well as the lives of his knights! The grail is, in fact, the symbol of ETERNAL life; so, as many times as he has uncovered it in the hope that it will provide death, he obtains only more life. Here, we might observe that Wagner may not have renounced Catholicism entirely; redemption HAS been promised to Amfortas, but -- meanwhile -- he lives in perpetual pain as he awaits his day of restoration. In effect, Amfortas lives in Purgatory, a state which is never mentioned in the Bible but, -- in Catholicism -- is a place where repentant sinners undergo temporary -- as opposed to eternal -- suffering, in preparation for their eventual entrance into Heaven.

Amfortas no doubt knows the New Testament scripture which warns that "the wages of sin is death;" and, as the opera continues, he and we see that death comes in different forms, and that it affects those around the sinner as well as the sinner himself. For the time comes when it becomes too painful for Amfortas to carry out his responsibilities toward the grail and its kingdom. He refuses to uncover the grail any longer; and, since no one else can perform the ceremony, the kingdom begins to decay apart. In the Old Testament books of Kings and Chronicles -- the record of how apostasy crept into the kingdom, causing corruption, decay and the eventual banishment of the entire nation of Israel into exile -- defilement always begins from the top down. The Old Testament records how the KINGS of Israel and Judah "did evil in the sight of the Lord," and led their people into ruin. When Amfortas refuses to perform the grail ceremony any longer, he is -- in effect -- abandoning his subjects to their own devices, as surely as the apostate kings abandoned their subjects by refusing to obey God's laws and turned toward pagan idols.

Remember: the grail provides both physical and spiritual sustenance to its followers. Deprived of its sight, Titurel dies and the knights are reduced to foraging in the forest for roots. Those who, in Genesis, were given the command to "fill the earth and subdue it," are now reduced to imitating the creatures they were created to command. And it follows, by implication, that the knights are beginning to seek their own spiritual sustenance as well. Deprived of the guidance which the grail provides, they are liable to adopt any number of apostate beliefs. The fact that, as Act Three opens, Klingsor's kingdom has been destroyed provides no safety net for them. No where does Wagner tell us that Klingsor himself has suffered his final defeat. Like Satan -- and like Randell Flagg, the Satanic figure of Stephen King's novel, The Stand -- Klingsor merely re-appears in another place, in another guise, at another time to begin another cycle of evil, until the day when he is bound forever in the bottomless pit, in the place where the worm dieth not, and the fire is never quenched. (Mark 9:48)

The scene in which the knights demand that Amfortas perform the grail ceremony one last time seems to indicate their awareness of how quickly they are losing touch with the spirit that drew them to Montsalvat, and how desperately they need to reconnect with that spirit. Not yet at the point of open rebellion, they accuse the king of having brought the present crisis about by talking to EACH OTHER about the sins of Amfortas, rather then by confronting the king directly, and by demanding that he "perform his office for the last time." Their desire to see the grail -- to bask once again in the symbol of Christ's continued presence among men -- over-rides all other desires. Amfortas has kept them from the grail because it aggravates his wound and reminds him that he has despised his inheritance. Jesus said, "He who loves his own life more than me is not worthy of me." By sinning with Kundry and losing the lance to Klingsor - and, now, by refusing to perform his office -- Amfortas has loved his own life -- his own way -- more than Jesus, and the knights know it. It's an interesting scene, with a message that harks back to the time of Samuel the prophet: wait upon the Lord. In that story, Saul, the first king of Israel, is camped with his army in Gilgal, waiting for Samuel to arrive and offer the appropriate sacrifice -- which only the priest can perform -- so that the army can go into battle against the Philistines. But Samuel is delayed, and Saul begins to quake with fear as his army begins to desert. For seven days, Saul waits as his men slip away, a few at a time. Finally, Saul illegally takes the office of the priest upon himself and offers the sacrifice. Just as he is completing the ceremony, Saul shows up, saying "You have acted foolishly...now your kingdom will not endure." (1 Samuel 13:13-14) One of the recurring lessons taught throughout the entire Bible is that "God's word never returns to him void:" if He promises to show up, He will be there. The prophesy that a "pure fool made wise through compassion" will deliver Amfortas and -- by extension -- the Grail Kingdom, was not made in secret. When Amfortas relates the story to the squires during his narrative, he is relating an oft-repeated prophecy. Surely, if the squires know the story, the knights are aware of it as well. But, in their fear and desperation, they nearly ruin everything by taking matters into their own hands, "running ahead of the race" by trying to force Amfortas to uncover the grail "one last time." With those words, they acknowledge that they are conscious of their actions.

Amfortas is also aware of what the knights are doing, and he seizes the opportunity to turn their anger to his own advantage. For 30 years, he has longed for death, and now he might be on the verge of getting his wish. Out of his pain and guilt he has fashioned a warped solution to everyone's problem; if the knights will only kill him, "the grail shall glow of itself" for them, and everyone will be happy.

By Act Three, the entire Grail kingdom needs redemption, and they are just about to get it. Amfortas will be redeemed; healed of his wound, and freed from the guilt that has ruled his life for more than 30 years. But he will no longer be king. He will continue to serve the grail, but in a different -- and probably minor -- capacity. Amfortas is Wagner's version of the Levitical priests who practiced idolatry during the last years of Israel's monarchy before the exile. Near the end of the book of Ezekial, the prophet is given a vision of the nation's future renewal, including a vision of a new temple where services will resume, and God's people will be restored, even the apostate priests. But, says the Lord, "The Levites who went far from me ...after their idols...may serve in my sanctuary, having charge of the gates of my temple and serving in it...they may...stand before the people and serve them. But...they are not to come near and serve ME as priests or come near any of my holy things or my most holy offerings; they must bear the shame of their detestable practices. Yet, I will put them in charge of the duties of the temple and all the work that is to be done in it." (Ezek. 44: 10-14) Like those idolatrous Levites, Amfortas is forgiven; he is redeemed; he will not suffer eternal damnation for his sin in placing momentary pleasure above his duty as king. But, because -- like Easu -- he despised his inheritance in this manner, he will not be allowed to return to his former high office. He will continue to serve the grail; he will continue to be sustained by the grail. But he will never be able to draw as close to the grail as he did as its king. That privilege is now passed the one who served as the catalyst for that redemption, for Parsifal is not a Christ-figure, but an example of the Christ-like life that believers are called upon to live.

The Bible teaches that God cannot abide the presence of evil. Therefore, He never condones sin, and never ordains it for any reason. However, He often uses the sin of one person -- and its ramifications -- for the edification of others. The Joseph of the Old Testament is sold into slavery by his brothers, who are jealous of the special attention given him by their father. He's then falsely imprisoned because his master's wife is enraged that he will not sleep with her. All of these actions are sin, neither instigated nor condoned by God. Yet, God uses these situations to place Joseph into a position whereby he becomes the second most powerful person in Egypt, saves the country from starvation during a seven-year famine, and is re-united with his brothers, whom he forgives with the words, "You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good." (Gen. 50:29) What might have happened if Joseph's brothers has just...say, beat him up instead of selling him into slavery? Christianity tells us that -- since God's plans cannot be thwarted -- and since His intention was to save Egypt from the famine and bring the future Israelites to the land from which Moses would later emerge to lead them into the PROMISED land -- He would have raised up someone else, under different circumstances, to do the job. Joseph and his family may still have been involved in the plan, but Joseph may not have had to become a prince of Egypt in order to effect God's design for Israel.

Using this line of reasoning, we can say that it was not necessary for Amfortas to be seduced by Kundry or wounded by the lance in order for Parsifal to appear at the grail castle. Like everyone who found the grail, he was certainly called to Monsalvat, but not necessarily to become the Grail King. His original call might have been to serve as a knight -- or, considering his naivete, a squire. In fact, if Amfortas had called upon God during his temptation in Klingsor's garden, there would be no need for a new grail king. But, because of that sin, and because Parsifal himself obeyed the grail's summons by finding Montsalvat, and because he overcome the same temptation which felled Amfortas by using the same power available to us all , he will be given the training he needs not only to become a grail knight, but to become the new grail king.

At a time when a "man of valor" was defined as one skilled in the art of war -- able to fight bravely and destroy his foe without mercy -- a man whose chief attribute was a gift for compassion would not be held in high esteem. In fact, he would probably be reviled as a fool, no wiser than a little child. Yet, Paul writes that "the foolishnes of God is wiser than man's wisdom," (1 Cor. 1:25) and Jesus Himself teaches that "unless you become like a little child, you cannot enter the kingdom of Heaven." (Matt. 11:25 & 18:3-5) For, in addition to being ignorant in the ways of the world, a child is also completely innocent and completely trusting, requiring instruction in over to develop wisdom and discernment. Parsifal arrives at Monsalvat in such a child-like state that he doesn't even know his own name. He doesn't know that he has set his feet on holy ground, or that it was wrong to kill the swan. He has certainly never heard of the grail, and he even has to ask if those who menaced him on his way to the castle were wicked. [And, by the way, here's another interesting point. Why would anyone want to menace a boy hiking through the woods with his bow and arrows? Not a lot of child molesters lurking in the woods back then, after all. Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that the prophecy of a "pure fool, made wise by compassion" who will arrive to heal the Grail King and restore the kingdom IS known outside of Monsalvat. We know that Klingsor is aware of the prophesy; he says so the first time he opens his mouth: "The time has come...already my magic castle lures the fool I see approaching from afar, childishly exultant." Perhaps he has previously sent some of the renegade knights out to try and prevent Parsifal from reaching Monsalvat. In any event, someone seems to know that Parsifal will eventually grow up to become the hero of the story, and has tried - and failed -- to nip the prophesy in the bud.]

What's amazing is that -- despite all the evidence before them, no one at Monsalvat -- except perhaps Kundry -- seems to have any inkling that the boy Parsifal is the fulfillment of the prophesy. And, if everyone seems to have blinders on their eyes during Act One, the reason is simple. It lies in an answer that film director Alfred Hitchcock once gave to a reporter who asked why one of his characters -- caught in a life-threatening case of mistaken identity -- simply didn't go to the police. Hitchcock replied, "He doesn't go to the police because it's DULL."

Parsifal gives the knights -- and the audience -- further proof that he is the fulfillment of the prophesy during the communion service near the end of Act One, when he clutches his hand to his heart at the sound of Amfortas' lament. This empathetic gesture - along with his remorse at having killed the swan -- tells us that he is feeling the first, primal stirrings of compassion, but his inability to articulate those feelings -- or even to understand the communion service he has just witnessed -- tell us that he has a long way to go before he becoming the wizened man who will redeem the grail from unclean hands. He is, at this point, very much like a person who has some vague idea that Christianity is something very important, but has never read the Bible or even attended a church service. I'm thinking of the young hippies of the late '60's and early '70's who often referred to Jesus as "the first flower child" or "the first non-violent revolutionary." Like Parsifal at the end of Act One, their knowledge was more than incomplete, it was downright primitive! They were on the outside, looking -- as Paul put it -- "through a glass darkly." They needed to come inside, sit at the master's feet, and learn both the correct theory and the proper practice of Christianity. I know; I was one of them. So, in his own way, is Parsifal, and Gurnemanz is so irritated with the boy's inability to grasp everything at once that he ejects Parsifal from the castle with a roar of rage, heedless of the prophesy that rings in his ears even as he does so.

Parsifal continues to move in total naivete through most of Act Two as well. He defeats the renegade knights who guard Klingsor's castle with no hostility in his heart, and receives no wounds during the battle, in keeping with the Psalm which assures believers that "A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you." (Psalm 91.7) He doesn't know that the knights are apostates; if he did, he would probably kill them in a fit of righteous indignation. Instead, he merely inflicts a few wounds, enough to effect a retreat, and continues on his way.

When confronted with the seductive charms of the Flower Maidens, he again reacts in all innocence: "You lovely children," he sings; "...if I call you beautiful, does that seem fitting...are you then flowers?" And he is only mildly irritated when they all swarm around and quarrel among themselves to see who gets to seduce him first. In all of this, neither Parsifal's body nor his suspicions are aroused. The Bible teaches us that the devil is a lazy -- though wily - adversary. His basic form of attack is to use the easiest, most tried-and-true of all the temptations that beset us. For most men, the easiest mode of attack has always been sexual immorality, and the swiftest means of achieving it is the most direct. Faced with the choice of continued chastity, or sex with a group of naked or nearly naked and willing flower maidens, many knights of the grail have made the latter choice.

But, one cannot make a valid choice between good and evil without an awareness of both. Parsifal knows nothing of evil. He is like the person Paul describes in his letter to the Romans, who "knew not what sin was until the law" told him. (Ro. 3:20; 7:7-8) If Parsifal is to grow into the chosen one predicted by the prophesy, he must become a PURE fool, made wise through compassion, and purity is not a state that is attained through ignorance. Parsifal cannot choose to be pure at this point because he has never felt the temptation of impurity.

Having failed at seducing Parsifal with the easiest and most obvious method -- the Flower Maidens -- Klingsor sends in the big guns, in the form of Kundry. Unwilling and confused as she is, she still manages a subtle tactic. First, she awakens Parsifal's memory by telling him his name; remember he's lived most of his life not knowing it. This immediately sparks his interest. Then, she tells him about his mother, in a narrative that would cause even the strongest knight to weep bitter tears. Kundry begins the tale with Parsifal's birth, which she claims to have witnessed: "How Herzeleide did laugh then...when the delight of her eyes offered joy to her pain. Softly couched in gentle mosses, caressing, she lulled him to sleep...In the morning he woke to the warm dew of his mother's tears. All tears she was, child of sorrow; tears for the love and death of your father. To guard you against like perils was her highest duty's command...from the strife and fury of warriors, she hoped to hide and shelter you in peace...Ne'er must you learn anything...Yet her grief you perceived not, nor the surging of her pain, when at last you did not return, and all trace of you was lost. She waited day and night...her grief consumed the pain. She courted silent death; sorrow broke her heart -- And Herzeleide died."

What Kundry is trying to do here is move Parsifal to self-pity, so that she can offer to comfort him. Of course, her idea of comfort will deprive Amfortas and the grail knights - and Kundry herself -- of their redemption. And, for a moment, she appears to have succeeded. Parsifal sinks to the ground singing "Alas! What have I done?...Sweet, gentle mother...your son has to be your murderer." He appears to be experiencing guilt for the first time. In reality, he is feeling compassion for his mother and her sufferings. It's still a primitive form of compassion of course, because, right now, he can only experience the feeling; he doesn't yet know what to do with it. But Kundry, believing she is winning the battle, begins to close in for the kill: "Have you ne'er known pain?," she sings feinging concern; "Then comfort's balm has ne'er refreshed your heart. This calamity you bemoan, this distress; now atone for it in the comfort which love offers you."

Now, Parsifal cries out the way a sinner with little or no knowledge of God does when faced with an insurmountable crisis and no where to turn; he cries out for help to a force that he can barely name: "Could I forget my mother?," he cries; "WHAT ELSE HAVE I FORGOTTON?" He's asked for information, and he's just about to get it.

Meanwhile, Kundry ISN'T getting it! She's still hearing Parsifal's cries of compassion and pleas for knowledge as the wailing of a young man in the throws of self-pity. And this time, the comfort she offers is more than a little grotesque: "Learn to know the love that enveloped Gamuret, where Herzeleide's searing passion seized him! She, who gave you body and life...she offers you today, as the last greeting of a mother's blessing, the first kiss of love." Literally or metaphorically, she appears to be offering Parsifal an incest fantasy. And as she bends over the boy to kiss him and remove forever any hope that the Grail Kingdom will continue, Parsifal gets his answer.

The Bible's story of Adam and Eve and the disobedience that led to man's present, fallen state is the story of a choice. Humanity's first couple was given Eden to tend, and told that they could eat the fruit of any of the trees in the garden except for the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It stood right next to the Tree of Life, from which they had NOT been forbidden to eat. But, Satan -- who took the singularly appropriate form of a snake -- convinced them that knowing both good and evil would make them "like Gods," and they succumbed to temptation, and were, indeed, awakened to a knowledge of good and evil. In fact, the first thing they knew was that they had done evil! Like Adam and Eve, Amfortas was given a choice between eating from the Tree of Life -- service to the grail, which required celibacy -- and partaking from a Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which -- in this case -- translates into breaking his vow of celibacy with Kundry. Let me repeat the scripture from Paul's letter to the Corinthians: "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful; He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able to endure, but with the temptation will also provide a way of escape, that you may be able to endure it." (1 Cor. 10:13) So, not only is there an opportunity to make a choice, there is help available in making the RIGHT choice. Amfortas did not ask for that help; thinking himself wise, he made the wrong decision and came to a fool's end. Parsifal, by his own admission a "stupid, blundering fool," chooses the Tree of Life; he calls for the promised help, and receives a revelation. Instantly, he is given the knowledge of how Amfortas received his wound, and why it will not heal. He receives a vision of the grail and a commission from Jesus Himself to redeem the symbol of His eternal presence among men. He realizes that the woman who is trying to seduce him in Klingsor's Magic Garden is the same woman he met at the Grail Castle, and he is able to resist all of her additional attempts at seduction. Yet, his gift for compassion is undiminished: "For your salvation, too, I am sent," he tells her; "Redemption I offer you as well...love and redemption shall be yours."

The Bible teaches that Satan was defeated for all time when Jesus rose from the dead, three days after His crucifixion and death. Of course, Satan is still out there, wrecking havoc on unbelievers and thinking he can win the final battle. So, it's not surprising that Klingsor - the satanic figure of the opera -- has ignored the prophesy of the grail: "let the prophesies say what they will," he rants; "Too young and stupid, you'll fall into my power." Even at the last, as he hurls the lance at Parsifal, Klingsor is convinced that darkness can dispel the light.

But Parsifal, once he knows what -- or WHO -- the light is (remember, in Act One he asks "Who is the grail?") rejects everything else as counterfeit. Matthew relates how Jesus withered a fig tree with a word (Matt. 21:19), telling His disciples that -- if they have faith the size of a mustard seed, they can order a mountain to throw itself into the sea, and it will happen just as they command. Parsifal's awakening has given him that seed of child-like faith which believes -- completely and without reservation -- that Jesus is exactly who He claims to be, and that the word He preaches is absolutely true.

The Bible says that the Word will be confirmed by signs and wonders; and what's more wondrous than the way that Parsifal uses his new-found faith to destroy Klingsor's kingdom! There is no fear in the boy when Klingsor hurls the lance; he instinctively knows and believes the scripture which assures all believers that "No weapon formed against you shall prosper," and his faith is rewarded when -- instead of striking home -- the lance stops in mid-flight and hovers, motionless, above his head, allowing Parsifal to pluck it our of the air.

Now, the most natural thing in the world -- at this point -- would be for Parsifal to hurl the spear back at Klingsor, strike his target, and so destroy the evil magician. But, Parsifal is now completely infused with the spirit of God; he knows that -- as the Psalm says -- it's "not by might, not by power," but by the spirit of God that this "mountain" shall be removed. So, he uses the lance to make the sign of the cross -- the symbol of redemption; GOD'S weapon, which conquers all. "With THIS sign," he says, "I banish your magic! Just as it will heal the wound you caused with it/In rack and ruin shall it now destroy this fraudulent luxury." INSTANTLY, the mountain is removed; Klingsor's kingdom is destroyed.

From the moment of Kundry's kiss, the depth and breadth of Parsifal's knowledge has been increasing by the moment! But, he doesn't yet understand that redeeming the grail will involve his becoming the new grail king, and it's a good thing he doesn't. Something else the Bible teaches is that, with certain rare exceptions, God tends to work with His people on a "need-to-know" basis. Otherwise, we might be tempted to "run ahead of the race;" that is, we might try to rush His timing, which is not like our own sense of time. Peter reminds us that, "With God, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like a day." (2 Pe 3:8) If Parsifal, in his innocence, knew the ultimate resolution of his commission, he might be tempted to rush back to Monsalvat and proclaim himself king immediately. In that case, the reaction of Guernemanz and his fellow knights would be similar to the knights at the song contest in "Tannhauser," and the grail kingdom would die along with its chosen savior. And, although Parsifal comes a long way in the time between Kundry's kiss and the destruction of Klingsor's kingdom, he has not yet become the man who will wander back to the Grail Castle in Act Three. Remember, he is to be made wise through compassion before he can fulfill his commission. In order to do that, he needs to be taught ABOUT compassion: what it is, how to use it, how NOT to use it.

When we first come to Jesus, we are like little children just born into the world. We have some primitive consciousness of who He is, and an instinctive knowledge that - just as an infant can't survive apart from its mother - we can't survive without the light of God in our lives. At this beginning stage of our walk with God, we may even feel emboldened enough to take a major step of faith. I remember going with a group of new Christians to the local office of the Church of Satan and trying to preach some sense into them. Others that I knew went much further than that; they quit high paying jobs and sold their homes to go to Bible College, eventually becoming ministers and missionaries. They knew felt they'd been given a sign, and they believed the sign came from God Himself, just as Parsifal knows that HE has received a sign when the lance hovers above his head instead of finding its mark. At that moment, he steps out in faith by grasping it and making the sign of the cross.

But, in spite of the boldness which accompanies the awakening of faith, and despite the success of that initial stepping out in faith, most new Christians realize that they are still children when it comes to knowing Jesus, knowing His will for our lives, and learning how to distinguish HIS voice and HIS direction - which, the Bible teaches, is always perfect - from our OWN inner voice - which often tells us only what we want to hear - or Satan's voice, which only speaks in order to deceive. And, as we learn to follow Jesus, what we also learn is how inadequate our own desires, our own knowledge, and most of all - are own strength is compared to what He will give us if we surrender ourselves to Him.

Schopenhauer said that man attempts to annihilate the self in order to achieve "nirvana." Christians have a different purpose in mind. The Bible tells us that - since The Fall - it has been the very NATURE of man to do evil, and evil is the one thing that God cannot abide. Our goal, then - as Paul says -- is to "put off the old man" - the person that we once were before coming to Jesus - so that "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me." Another way Paul puts it is to describe Christians as "dead to ourselves, but alive in Christ." This is one of the reasons why so many branches of the Christian faith baptize by total immersion; the old, sinful man is symbolically buried beneath the water, and out of the depths rises a new man, dead to sin, dead to self, dead to the world, but alive in Christ. This baptism symbolizes the beginning of a life-long journey that will only be completed in Heaven. Most of us begin the journey thinking it will be an easy path, that the final goal will be achieved in one fell swoop; but, the truth is that it is difficult beyond measure to die to self. It is a long, slow, gradual process, and it is only by the grace of God that we manage to travel as far as we get in this lifetime. Like any new Christian, Parsifal is about to learn just how long and arduous that journey can be. In the first act, his compassion was dull and inarticulate, more like pity than empathy. At the close of Act Two, he has begun to understand that he has been given a gift, and that he must now learn how to use it. Like most of us, he imagines an easy journey back to Monsalvat; even his parting line to Kundry: "You know where you can find me again," speaks of a quick return. He's promised salvation for her as well as for Amfortas, but he knows he's not ready to lead them to it just yet, although he thinks it will happen sooner than it does. Parsifal seems to know instinctively that compassion not tempered by wisdom is an empty virtue indeed. So, while the rest of us are milling about in the lobby, sipping an over-priced drink, he will be growing in God and - little by little - dying to self. Wagner will show us nothing of that journey because he knows that each of us journeys along a different path, a path tailored to our individual selves, specially designed and guaranteed to root out the last vestiges of self, if we continue to walk in faith. Parsifal is no where near the end of that journey when his wanderings lead him back to the grail kingdom. I've already pointed out that the journey is never completed in this lifetime, but there comes a point when we have progressed enough to begin working with the gifts we've been given. Otherwise, Christ's commission to "go into all the world and preach the gospel" (Matt. 28:28) could never be fulfilled. Parsifal has made considerable progress on his journey by the beginning of Act Three, so much so that he now understands his gift for compassion and has attained a level of expertise that will enable him to use it with discretion.

Paradoxically, he believes himself to have made little or no progress at all! In fact, he believes he has spent most of his journey straying from the path, rather than following it. "Yet, alas," he tells Gurnemanz in his Act 3 narrative, "Ne'er finding redemption's path, in pathless wanderings I was driven about by a savage curse. Countless perils, battles, and conflicts forced me from the path, just when I thought to find it." The further we progress along the path, the more we draw near to God; the more we draw near to God, the more we die to self; the more we die to self, the more we become conscious of the holiness of God; and the more we become conscious of His holiness, the more unworthy we feel. So, when Gurnemanz tells of how Monsalvat has deteriorated, thanks to Amfortas' refusal to perform the grail ceremony, Parsifal is overcome with guilt; in fact, Wagner's stage notes call for him to "spring up in great pain." Parsifal overflows with compassion as he laments his failure to learn the lessons of his journey quickly enough to have arrived earlier and so prevented the Brotherhood of the Grail from deteriorating to this point: "...'twas I, I who brought about all this misery," he sings. "Chosen for deliverance, I am lost in the maze."

But, Parsifal knows that he has done at least one thing right; he has never used the lance in battle. For the lance is a symbol of his gift -- his spiritual gift -- and his willingness to "garner wounds from weapon upon weapon" rather than wield it tells us that he has never used it to win worldly battles. Parsifal knows that his gift was God-given, and he long ago resolved to use it only in pursuit of the things of God. "Do not lay up for yourselves treasure on earth," warns Jesus; instead, "lay up for yourselves treasure in Heaven. For, where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." So, Parsifal has kept the holy relic for its intended use. "Undefiled I have borne it at my side," he tells Gurnemanz. His journey not completed, but his vision sure, Parsifal is ready to begin his ministry.

But, first, he must be baptized, which here is the symbol of his ordination as a knight, and his anointing as king of the grail. Jesus was also baptised - by John the Baptist -- before beginning his earthly ministry. And, as if to remind us that Parsifal is not a Christ-figure, Wagner has left this task to Gurnemanz, who is certainly no John the Baptist. John recognized the deliverer when he saw Him, and even balked at the idea of baptizing the Messiah, until Jesus told him to "let is be so for now." Gurnemanz, remember, angrily banished the young Parsifal from the castle at the end of Act One, even with the voice of the grail prophesy ringing in his ears. Only in hindsight dies he realize his error. But, with the death of Titurel and Amfortas' complete unwillingness to perform his duties as king, it falls to Gurnemanz as the senior knight to perform the act that will ordain Parsifal as a knight of the grail, and give him the spiritual authority to perform his duties as priest and king.

A note here on what Kundry is doing while all of this is going on. She first bathes Parsifal's feet with water, then draws golden phial from her bosom and anoints his feet, drying them with her hair. Jesus washes His disciple's feet at the Last Supper, then reminds them that if He -- the Master -- does a servant's work by washing his disciple's feet, so they should serve others. Kundry's washing of Parsifal's feet reminds us the time Jesus was invited to eat at the home of a prominent Pharisee. As ____ tells the story, Jesus and the Pharisee were reclining at the table when "a woman who had lived a sinful life" entered the house and began to wash Jesus' feet with her tears, before drying them with her hair. First century readers would have recognized the phrase "living a sinful life" to mean prostitute. The woman had probably been a temple prostitute at one of the pagan shrines, and had been moved to repentance while hearing Jesus preach. Washing his feet was an outward sign of her her repentance and her faith that Jesus has authority from God to forgive sins. And her belief was rewarded: "Your faith has saved you, " says Jesus, to the astonishment of the Pharisee; "Go in peace." (Luke 7:36-50) Later, He gives His desciples - His chosen ones - the authority to do the same, saying, "Whatever you forgive on earth is forgiven in Heaven." By washing Parsifal's feet, Kundry acknowledges that he is also God's chosen one, with the same authority to forgive sins that Jesus gave to His disciples. She affirms her belief in the promise he made to her near the end of Act Two: "For your salvation, too, I am sent." And no sooner has Parsifal been ordained, then he scoops up water from the sacred stream and sprinkles it on Kundry, saying "My first duty I hereby fulfill; receive baptism and believe in the Redeemer!" It is all that she's been waiting for these thousand years.

Now, Parsifal hastens to heal Amfortas of his wound and restore the grail ceremony, so that the brotherhood can once again behold the symbol of Christ's continuing presence among men. Two groups of knights enter the Grail Hall, one legion bearing Amfortas on his sickbed, the others bearing the body of Titurel. Without the sustaining power of the grail, the morale of these knights has deteriorated to the point where they are nearly in open rebellion against their king. They no longer address Amfortas directly; instead, they talk bitterly about him to each other in his presence: "Who did slay Titurel; him that, in God's care, once God Himself protected? Who denied him the right of the grail's favor?" asks the first legion. "He whom there you bear," says the second group; "The guilty guardian." They will now force Amfortas to uncover the grail "one last time." Amfortas refuses, inviting the knights to kill him and end his misery once and for all; and, for just a second, it almost appears that the knights are about to do it, and the penalty for killing God's designated authority be damned. Like King Saul, who would not wait for Samuel to arrive and offer the sacrifice before the battle, the knights are on the verge of losing everything because of their inability to believe God's promise that a redeemer will arrive. They are trying to "run ahead of the race;" they know the prophesy, but they are all out of patience. However, thanks to Parsifal's gift for compassion, they will be spared Saul's sin -- and his fate -- in the nick of time.

And here, Parsifal shows the knights -- and us -- just how much he has learned about compassion during his long journey back to Monsalvat. For, not only does he heal Amfortas of his wound, pronouncing him "whole, purified, and atoned," but also he acknowledges that the grail king's suffering was the instrument that God used to help make him wise. "Blessed be your suffering, which gave the timid fool the highest power of pity, the might of purest knowledge." And, as he begins the communion service, the only ritual which Jesus Himself asked us to perform in His memory, the voices of the knights and squires blend with "voices from above" to sing the opera's final chorus: "Highest Holy Wonder! The redeemer is redeemed!" The grail has been reclaimed from unclean hands; the symbol of Christ's continuing presence among men has been restored, and all humanity may look upon it and remember His promise that "I will never leave you nor forsake you."

"Parsifal" was written near the end of Wagner's life, when he was already suffering from the heart ailment that would kill him. He knew he was fatally ill, just as he had known for 30 years that "Parsifal" would be his final work. Many come to a knowledge and acceptance of God only when faced with a grave or incurable illness. Because of the utterly Christian nature of this "stage-consecrating festival music drama," I believe that this was so with Wagner. Faced with the inevitability of death, and the reality of the living God, he abandoned all the philosophies and compromises that he and the rest of the world uses in an attempt to either deny the existence of God or to minimize His importance in our lives. Frederich Nietzsche -- speaking contemptuously -- said that, with "Parsifal," Wagner had sunk, "collapsed, helpless and broken" before the cross of Christ. Yes; I believe that Wagner did just that and, for his final opera, expressed his new-found faith in what -- for me -- is one of the most majestic works of art ever inspired by God. The Bible tells us that the angels rejoice whenever a sinner repents, even if that repentance comes at the close of a life filled with sin. I believe that those angels now rejoice to a distinctly Wagnerian tune.
last update: 26 May 2002 Link to Part 1 of this talk.
Return to Past Events page.
Return to Archives page.
Return to WSWDC main page.