Parsifal: Sex and Character: eros-amor/agape-caritas

Speranza

Parsifal and Tristano reflect the Schopenhauerian (and also Buddhist) doctrines according to which suffering is an inevitable part of life, and DESIRE is the cause of suffering.

In Tristan we are shown that even the desire to escape from this world causes suffering.

In Parsifal we see KUNDRY, a marvellously world-demonic woman who brings to men the suffering of seduction.

We also see how an attempt at seduction can bring a flash of enlightenment.

Unlikely as this might sound, there is a precedent for such an experience in one of the Buddhist scriptures.

In Tristan and in The Victors Wagner was still resisting Schopenhauer's teaching that sexual love (EROS), as a manifestation of the erotic and demonic will or will-to-live, was a hindrance to salvation.

By the time Wagner wrote the libretto of "Parsifal: dramma mistico in tre atti", Wagner has almost let go of his belief in redemption through love (EROS, AGAPE, PHILIA, CHARITAS).

In the second act of Parsifal we see the opposition of two different kinds of love.

(a) Kundry offers Parsifal sexual love: EROS -- 'έρως or amor CUPIDITAS -- "amore" in the metrical translation --

(b) PARSIFAL responds (to her confusion) by offering her loving-kindness: AGAPE -- 'αγάπη or caritas.

EROS-AMOR according to Schopenhauer, leads only to suffering.

AGAPE-CARITAS can lead to salvation, or healing.

Cosima Wagner records a statement by Richard Wagner about how Kundry had experienced Isolde's transfiguration many times.

Isotta dies in the hope that she will be united with Tristano in the realm of eternal night.

Kundry in Parsifal and Brünnhilde (who in the 1856 ending of Gütterdämmerung declares herself redeemed from rebirth) DIE in the knowledge that they will NOT be reborn.

If one believes, with Schopenhauer and Wagner, that existence is a burden and this world a vale of tears, then the death of Kundry at the end of Parsifal is something positive.

After centuries of wandering, KUNDRY finds eternal rest in a blissful nirvana.

Parsifal remains in the world, however, to work for the salvation of all sentient beings and in a totally self-sacrificing manner to serve them.

So, although it is by no means life-affirming, the ending of Wagner's Parsifal is, in a way and against all the odds, optimistic.