Parsifal

Parsifal - or also in German Parzival - refers to

• a historical figure that really existed (incarnation of Mani)
• a legend story told, with various copies from the 13th century but also artworks such as the opera by Richard Wagner (see below)
• the name given to all candidates mature enough for initiation
  • all pupils of the great initiate Titural were called Parsifal: everyone mature enough for initiation, to receive the secret of the Holy Grail: a Parsifal had to have freed himself from all influences that would pull him down through exercises (this is described in 1909-08-27-GA266/1, see Schema FMC00.394 below)
  • Parsifal (or Perceval, “pass through the vale”) was the name given in medieval times to all such candidates for initiation into the Mysteries. A 'Parsifal' had to undergo three stages in inner experience. The first stage was known as 'dumbness', the second `doubt, the third 'godliness'.

• but most importantly in spiritual science: an archetype for Man and the initiate in the age of the consciousness soul. The legend story referred to above is deeply symbolic and contains the challenges for Man in this new age. In that respect the Parsifal story is to be positioned together with the stories and streams of Arthur and the Holy Grail. For a broader perspective, see also: Christ Module 6 - Principle in image and story, Schema FMC00.118A and Schema FMC00.114

Aspects

• the Parsifal storyline
  • main characters
    • Parsifal
      • see also, on earlier incarnation of Mani, coverage on Manicheism#Individuality of Manes or Mani
    • Herzeleide: Parsifal's mother
      • earlier incarnation of Individuality of Julian the Apostate or KRI - Karmic Relationships Individualities#KRI 44: Tycho Brahe - Julian the Apostate
    • Feirefiz: Parsifal's half-brother
• stages in Parsifal's experiences from an esoteric perspective
  • stages are described as:
    • 1/ compassion (also for animals)
    • 2/ rising above desire (without killing desire from outside) or: emancipation from a love dependent on the senses
• Amfortas and Parsifal: astrality's struggle with egoism (1913-03-26-GA145)
• the relation of Parsifal, the Son of Light (Abel), and Feirefis, the Son of Fire (Cain) - re Keyserlinck reference below, and Streams of Abel and Cain
• Parsifal is permeated by the motif of 'Sälde', 'being penetrated by a certain feeling or inner sensation of happiness or bliss'. This arises because the transition from the kidney activity to the liver activity takes place in this period. In the 12-14th century the liver activity becomes most important, whereas before it was the kidney activity .. a change from 'dullness' to 'illumination' (see Spiritual scientific physiology#1922-10-22-GA218)

.

• [2.5] - literature and versions
  • the opera by Richard Wagner (1813-1883): Wagner's inspiration on Good Friday 1857 near Lake Zurich (as referenced by Rudolf Steiner), he worked on the opera in the period 1857-1882
• [2.6] - historical research into people and events
  • Individualities
    • Parsifal as the only incarnation of an important individuality on Earth, Mani or Manes - re Keyserlinck reference below, and Schema FMC00.117 on Bodhisattva
  • location

Inspirational quotes

1914-01-06-GA148

We must learn to ask questions in the spiritual stream. In the materialistic stream everything is designed to stop people from asking questions.

2024-08-20 - Rawn Clark taken from Musings #4 youtube video

we all have to address the ways in which our behavior is shaped and manipulated by external forces

and we have to look at why and who ... these are important question questions for the modern human being: who? why? where? when? ask ..

ask questions .. just always ask questions - it's the most powerful thing you can do .. is to question everything

Illustrations

Schema FMC00.116 shows the symbol for Good Friday and Easter: the spiritual sun in the physical sun.

Schema FMC00.114 is an overview table with the key names for the three stories, and the link to the threefold soul (see 1913-02-07-GA144)

See also: Human character - the I and threefold soul

Schema FMC00.380: shows the polarity during the development of Man's I-consciousness, from sentient soul to intellectual soul. Above in the language of the Bhagavad Gita, below in the language of the Grail.

On the right: Man's sentient consciousness in the world, illustrated by the sensory perception and cosmic influences from nature working from outside: in-streaming from without. On the right, Man developing the twelve-foldness from out of his own inner center.

For an explanation see: Enlivened images#1920-05-16-GA201 as well as Human character - the I and threefold soul

Schema FMC00.394 are the illustrations for the elaboration of a feelings based process that a Parsifal candidate initiate was brought to feel with his whole soul experience (see lecture references, p 427-454 in the 2007 EN edition). See the link with the pentagram symbol, and compare with meditation image given a few years later on Schema FMC00.629.

Lecture coverage and references

General

1905-12-03-GA092

note: the below is another translation than the version on rsarchive

We want to look today at the world of medieval legends from the perspective of the theosophical (anthroposophical ) worldview. There are two important legends that are characteristic of the intellectual and spiritual development of Europe in the Middle Ages: the two legends connected with the Grail.

Concerning the deepest truths, the sagas of earlier spoke to the people through myths and legends. If, in those times, one had tried to teach the people living in the regions of Northern and Central Europe the sort of concepts we hear today in the theosophical world view, the people of that period would have got nothing from it. The sagas spoke to every nation and era in a way that nation and era could understand. In doing so, they always took account the law of rebirth and reincarnation.

[Druids]

The sagas who told the peoples of Northern and Central Europe the secrets of the world, were Druids. Druid means "oak". When it is said that the Teutons worshipped "under oak trees", this did not only mean that they worshipped under actual oaks, but also that they were led by Druids. And when it is said that Boniface "cut down the oak tree" this signifies that the old Druid religion was conquered by Christianity.

Note: Winifrid Boniface (Saint Boniface) ca. 675-754 was an Anglo-Saxon Christian missionary to Germanic parts of the Frankish empire. He is said to have cut down the Donar Oak ( Oak of Thor), a sacred tree of the Germanic pagans and by doing this showing the victory of Christianity over pagan religion.

A real truth is related here in legend form: the Druids wove real truths into their legends. All the souls who take up our worldview today were once addressed by a Druid priest. He spoke to them in a way that was suited to those times. All of us who absorb the theosophical worldview have heard the same things before in myths and legends, otherwise we should not understand them at all. This is the secret of the great Masters: they live in the consciousness that they are among people who incarnate again and again.

[the legend]

Throughout the Middle Ages the fundamental truths of Germanic Central European culture lived in great legend. When we get acquainted with this legend, we understand the nature of the Middle Ages. The Druid priests cultivated an awareness that, far in the West, there had once been an advanced civilisation. This civilisation had been in a land called Nifelheim (German Nebel = mist) because of its peculiar atmospheric conditions which were completely different from our own.

This primordial Germanic legend is thus really relating the truth. It points to an ancient primal land (Atlantis) that once existed between Europe and America, where the Atlantic Ocean now is. This very ancient land of Atlantis sank, and with it went treasures of power and wisdom. These treasures are referred to as gold, and their demise is related in the legend as the sinking of the Nibelungs horde of gold. The Nibelung treasure has to be raised up in a new way, awoken, and further towards the East, in Europe.

First Wotan and then Siegfried were the initiates whose task it was to bring back to present-day Europe the ancient treasure, to make fruitful once more, in a certain way, the Nibelung horde for the newer civilisation. The fact that the legend presents us with an initiate Wotan, helps us to look deeply into another very ancient civilisation. The letters W and B correspond to each other. Wotan, Woden is the same as Bodha, Buddha. Wotan is indeed the Germanic form of the word Buddha.

[see: Wotan Impulse]

This brings us to a common origin of the European Wotan religion and the Asiatic Buddha religion. The Buddha religion did not spread so much in India as among the peoples of Asia who still had something of the Atlantean culture in them. The Wotan peoples had also brought their way of seeing things from Atlantean culture. Their further development was expressed in the legends told to them by their Druid priests. The rescuing of the Nibelung treasure — Atlantean culture — is expressed particularly beautifully in Wotan and Siegfried.

In these legends, which can be found from Russia to France and England via Germany, there is a tragic prophetic quality which can be seen everywhere where the Druids taught. This prophecy said: A Twilight of the Gods will come. We are what remains of Atlantean civilisation. We have to die out so that something better can enter. Our initiates are prophets of what is coming . In all those who are initiated in the same way as Siegfried, a definitive quality of tragedy comes to expression.

"The Song of the Nibelungs" contains a very ancient form of initiation: the Nibelungs' distress, the Nibelungs' lament.

[see: Nibelungen]

The very advanced pupils were taught that another would come who would bring spiritual life. The mood of the Twilight of the Gods spread everywhere.

[for twilight of the Gods, see Ragnarok]

All lived with a sense — and the advanced pupils with the certainty — that another would come who would be completely different from their initiates. This was expressed in the legend of Siegfried.

In Scandinavia and Russia they had the Drotte mysteries which corresponded to the Druid mysteries. Drotte is another term for Druid.

[see Druidic and Trotten mysteries]

Everywhere in the old mysteries the name of the original great initiate is Sig. All names that contain "Sig" can be traced back to Sig, like Sigurd, Sigmund, Sieglinde and so on, for example. Siegfried was the initiate who found peace in initiation. "Friede" ( Ger. = peace ) means that which leads people beyond all doubt: it is the satisfaction of a longing, the longing for knowledge, for power. In all the portrayals of him, Siegfried is depicted as being invulnerable.

[see also: Spiritual guidance of mankind#Sig - Wotan]

The Greek initiate Achilles, was vulnerable on one spot, on his heel. After slaying the dragon, Siegfried becomes invulnerable except for a spot between his shoulder blades. This is where the cross is to be borne. This symbol played a profound role in the ancient mysteries. They said there: You are all vulnerable on the place where One will have to carry the cross, the cross-bearer, will be the great initiate who is no longer vulnerable. This gives the Nordic legend its great quality. This wisdom was an apocalyptic wisdom.

All occultists know that this wisdom spreads out from a central oracle-site of twelve initiates, from the so-called White Lodge.

[see: White Lodge]

Wisdom is carried out from there into the world. And never is the situation other than that each individual is aware of his connection with the others. Everywhere there were twelve members of the Lodge.

[for circle of twelve, see also Druidic and Trotten mysteries#Overall - general]

Such too were the Apostles. The consciousness of those who only had intimations, and the wisdom of those who really knew, led back to the Round Table of King Arthur.

[see: Arthur stream]

This is no less than the great White Lodge which, in the Siegfried initiation, related to the people what it had to say to the world. Great initiates were members of the Round Table, which existed up to the time of Queen Elizabeth I of England. Then it closed down for political reasons.

Two very distinct political currents led the consciousness of ordinary people in the Middle Ages back to primal times. Among the Franks, who were fortunate enough to conquer the west of Europe, there was a ruling dynasty which actually traced its origin back to the time of Atlantis. They were called the Wibelungs or Nibelungs, from which the word Ghibelline later arose.

Note: From the time of the Hohenstaufen kaisers (1138 - 1254), this is what the followers of the German kaiser was called, in contrast to the Guelphs, who followed the Pope. The Ghibellines were sympathetic to the Holy Roman Emperors.

Historians are uncertain as to the origin of the name, and opinions differ. This duality contributed to the chronic strife in the cities of northern Italy in the 13th and 14th centuries which was reflected in Dante's "Divine Comedy"

Originally, the assumption of power was derived from what had been brought over from Atlantis. Because it was thought and sensed that a Twilight of the Gods was coming, a certain tragic quality was connected with the ruling dynasty. It was said: Those who want to know can certainly become initiates, but they must be superseded by something else.

[legend of Barbarossa]

This mood was initially expressed in the well-known legend of Barbarossa. Something was then added that is not included in the original legend. Barbarossa was rightly seen as a continuation of the old Frankish rulers. The Hohenstaufen were the Ghibellines, Waiblings, Wibelungs, Nibelungs, in contrast the Welfs, the Guelphs.

The more penetrating tale adds to the well-known Barbarossa legend that Barbarossa brought the Holy Grail from Asia to Europe. As a physical personality, he himself lost his life in the process, and now waits for his time to come. In this is expressed the whole mood of the Middle Ages with regard to the old heathendom and the new Christiandom.

People began to consider their own folk- soul and said: We brought our culture from old Atlantis. But it is destined to perish; Christianity must take its place. But it will rise again purified, cleansed, raised up to Christianity. People began to make a transition from the end of the decline to the beginning of the ascent. People began to regard the course of a deeper Germanic spiritual culture as one whereby the clairvoyant Atlantean consciousness was superseded by something still to come. One had once more to master natural boldness, piety, virtue, but in a new way.

People had three notions, an idea of three definite forces: Wotan (Odin), Villi and Vé (in Norse mythology, Villi and Vé were the brothers of Wotan). Wotan is intuitive power as depicted by the initiate; Villi is the will itself; Vé is the heart (in DE: Gemüt) with a tragic quality, where it becomes apocalyptic. Now a new time was to come. Now, through Christian teaching, a transition was to be made, and one was to ascend again to what had been before the Twilight of the Gods.

[see Schema FMC00.618 and variants]

That Barbarossa is waiting in a mountain indicates that he is an initiate. A "mountain" is the place of initiation. Christ went with his disciples "up into a mountain" — into mysterium. Ravens signify an initiation for Barbarossa.

In Persian initiation ritual a distinction was made between seven levels of initiation. "Raven" means the first level of personal initiation. Ravens indicate the connection that still exists between the initiate and his surroundings. We can think of Elijah's ravens. We also find ravens in relation to Wotan: they transmit his communications to the surrounding world. Thus the initiate Barbarossa also had ravens around him, which maintained his connection with the world.

Barbarosa had brought the Holy Grail from the Orient. This Holy Grail was preserved on Mons Salvationis, the mountain of salvation. It is now surrounded by the successors of King Arthur's Round Table, the twelve knights who received Christian initiation in addition to the old pagan initiation. One who wished to be initiated into the secrets of the Holy Grail became a Christian initiate.

One became a Christian initiate by passing through all forms of doubt, and then finding a firm footing in connection with Christ himself. One thing is necessary for this: direct trust in the figure of Christ. The first disciples laid such particular emphasis on the fact that Christ had been among them. They said: We want to bear witness that we were with him. We touched his wounds with our hands. What we make known is what we have seen and heard ourselves. Paul became an Apostle because he truly saw the Risen One in spirit. What matters is the unmediated experience, attained not through wisdom and logic but directly.

[Parsifal]

It is clear to us what Parsifal needs to achieve on his wanderings. Parsifal's mother is called Herzeleide (German Herz = heart; Leiden = suffering). Wolfram von Eschenbach was an initiate; if we read his Parsifal with profound attention, between the lines and words, we find that the name Herzeleide, Parsifal's mother, is precipitated from the tragic quality that lay in the German heart. One who does not take the Parsifal path bears suffering in their heart; they have to struggle through to peace.

Wolfram von Eschenbach knew how to clothe the legend in a wonderfully beautiful form. With this one fact ( i.e. the name Herzeleide ) he intended a deeply inward symbol ( bearing in mind that a feminine individual always signifies consciousness ): namely, that Herzeleide is the condition of consciousness with which Parsifal sets out. Initially he has a tragic consciousness. He struggles his way, with a naive, simple consciousness, through everything that worldly knighthood can offer, in order to come to the secret of the Holy Grail.

[see Holy Grail]

We must hold this in conjunction with the Barbarossa legend. Barbarossa went to Asia to seek the secrets of the Holy Grail, Christian initiation. But he lost his life on his way to the Holy Grail. He has to wait "in the mountain" until Christianity can connect with the former initiation. Barbarossa brought Christianity but did not achieve the deeper initiation of Christianity.

Parsifal is the new Christian initiate, the great symbol that succeeds the Siegfried initiation. Siegfried conquered his lower nature, the dragon, the snake. Parsifal becomes the initiate of the Holy Grail, who comes to know Him who is invulnerable. The original idea of Christianity is brought to expression in Parsifal. He no longer knows the idea of reincarnation. A single life between birth and death was seen as the only one. It was one incarnation that had value. People no longer looked up to manas, buddhi and atma.

[see Man's higher triad and the 'Golden triangle' in the legend and secret of the Molten sea]

Parsifal-initiation was directed only towards reaching a consciousness of our connection with Christ, to considering only one incarnation in which the human being reaches knowledge through compassion, and not compassion through knowledge as happens in theosophy.

Theosophy teaches us to recognise how we are connected with all human beings. Through it we realise that we are ourselves responsible for what our brother does. Theosophy leads to compassion through knowledge. But humanity had for a time to pass through a period of development where it was to find knowledge through compassion. It had to go down into the depths of compassion, because one can also reach knowledge there.

It had to be like this so that people learnt to know the full importance of this earthly world. Christianity was to educate humanity so that the significance of the earthly world would be understood. For this reason humanity had first, in a moral respect, to be conducted, led down to physical life. Only then could it come to the great achievements that begin in urban culture...

1913-03-26-GA145

covers Amfortas and Parsifal: astrality's struggle with egoism

1914-01-01-GA149

Parsifal  <-> subconscious, historical Christ Impulse: "the Christ Impulse flows on as though through subterranean channels in the depths of the soul. " and .. "how the soul of Parsifal is related to the new, subconscious, historical impulse permeated by the Christ aura, the Christ Impulse, although he knows nothing of it"

1914-01-02-GA149

explains how the Christ Impulse works in the subconscious 'under the surface' of contemporary human daily consciousness .. we are not consciously aware that we have a seed or spark of Christ consciousness in our 'I' .. and the etheric aspects of our heart and blood

quote A

.. the soul of Parsifal is related to the new, subconscious, historical impulse permeated by the Christ aura, the Christ Impulse, although he knows nothing of it ..

see the spiritual nature of the consciousness soul, flowing from right to left on Schema FMC00.431 on Human character - the I and threefold soul quote B

It can be left to each individual to judge whether the religious faiths scattered over the Earth will one day find themselves in agreement with what is here meant by the harmony of all religions. And he can decide also whether what should be understood by the unity of religions is not more closely related to the secret of the Holy Grail, as we have tried to describe it, than is a great deal of talking about the unity of religions, which may in fact be about something quite different.

Anyone who wishes to hold fast to a narrow creed will certainly not be immediately convinced by what has been said. This is because he pays heed to the superficial course of events, and so to the external aspect of the real deeds of Christ, which are themselves of a spiritual nature.

How a man was led by his karma to the spiritual deeds of Christ; how Parsifal was driven along this path, wherein is prefigured the unity of religions on Earth—that is what we have wished to bring before our souls. And we should keep in mind that continuation of the Parsifal saga which says that when the Grail became invisible in Europe, it was carried to the realm of Prester John, who had his kingdom on the far side of the lands reached by the Crusaders. In the time of the Crusades the kingdom of Prester John, the successor of Parsifal, was still honoured, and from the way in which a search was made for it we must say: If all this were expressed in terms of strict earthly geography, it would show that the place of Prester John is not to be found on Earth.

Was that meant to be a hint, in the European saga that continued the Parsifal saga, that since then, without our being conscious of it, the Christ has been working in the hidden depths of the East; that the religious controversies, which take their course on the conscious level in the East could be assuaged by the outflowings and revelations of the true Christ impulse, as was meant to happen, in accordance with the Parsifal revelation, in the West?

Was the sunlight of the Grail called upon to shine above all other gods on Earth as is symbolically indicated by the fact that when the maiden carried in the gold-gleaming vessel with the secret of the Grail within it, the radiance of the Grail outshone, the other lights?

Ought we to expect - quite contrary to current beliefs - that the Christ power, still working unconsciously, will appear in a changed form and as Ex oriente lux, in the old phrase, will meet with that which has appeared as light in the West?

Should one light be able to unite with the other light?

But for that it will be necessary for us to be prepared - we who are placed by karma in the geographical and cultural environment over which passed the path of the Christ .. when in higher realms, He had permeated Jesus of Nazareth in order to journey to the East.

Let us look up and feel that the Christ passed through our heights before He was revealed on Earth. Let us make ourselves capable of so understanding him that we shall not misunderstand what He will perhaps be able to say to us one day when the time has come for his impulses to flow through other earthly creeds.

Parsifal and Feirefis

See also Paradise legend and Streams of Abel and Cain.

Keyserlingk

reports on her esoteric conversations with Rudolf Steiner:

In the Uhland edition of Parsifal with a foreword by Rudolf Steiner, an episode occurs that is not found anywhere else: the journey of the young Grail Queen Repanse, who is awaited in India as the wife of `Fire-Fils' (Feirefis). She had embarked in Marseilles to take the emerald-green vessel, containing the Blood of Christ, the Graul, to the land of Priest-King John. When the Graul was carried ashore, the Graul Castle upon the heights lit up in flames to receive it.

I thought about this for a long while, and the `Fire-Sons' of India who are to appear as magnificent figures at some future time, merged in my mind with the word Fire-Fils, which has the same meaning as Fire-Son. Feirefis is the dark brother of Parsifal, who is to succeed the latter as Grail King.

Following on this thought I then enquired: `Is Feirefis a Fire-Son?'

Rudolf Steiner: 'Yes, Feirefis is the Fire-Son.'

I: 'And Parsifal the Light-Son?'

Rudolf Steiner: 'Yes,' and then he said a few words which I wanted to write down, but could not quite manage, and so he dictated them to me: `'Parsifal is the Light-Son. He is the only incarnation of an important individuality on earth.

and continues:

Thus:

• Parsifal, the Son of Light (= Abel), and
• Feirefis, the Son of Fire (= Cain)

are the sons of God, divine brothers of man, whom he has lost

• and whom Seth, the son of Earth, must get back again.

They meet us in three streams:

• the golden Arthurian knights or Michael/Sun knights;
• the silver knights, who guard the Grail through the holy wisdom of the moon; and
• the iron knights, who, in black armour and with the diamond lance, tarry in mortality until, conquering death, Christ with His light will penetrate the darkness.

Note regarding 'the only incarnation of important individuality': GA264 maps various incarnations of high individualities to storylines in the gospels and the Bible, and there Mani or Manes is stated to be the individuality that incarnated as Parsifal. However Mani also incarnated in Babylon in the 3th century.

Wagner's 19th century opera

Wagner (1813-1883) worked on the opera Parsifal in the period 1857-1882

More than anyone else, Richard Wagner made it possible for people to take this in without knowing it. Richard Wagner was a missionary whose mission it was to give something full of significance to the world, without humanity being aware of this truth. .. .. The strange music written by Wagner would create quite specific vibrations in the ether bodies of those who listened to it. The ether body is connected with all the profound motions of the blood. Richard Wagner understood the secret of the purified blood. His melodies hold the vibrations that have to be in the human ether body when it becomes purified in the way that is necessary so that the secret of the grail may be received.

Related pages

• Christ Module 6 - Principle in image and story
• Holy Grail
• Christ Impulse - meeting of two streams

References and further reading

See also more under the 'References and further reading section' of related topics such as Holy Grail.

General

• Assja Turgenieff: 'Parsivals Suche nach dem heiligen Gral' - illustrations (12 Steindrücke) (1952)
• Charles Kovacs: Parsifal and the search for the grail (1998)
• Ewald Koepke:
  • Richard Wagners Gralsimpuls : ein Vortrag (1983, after a lecture 1983-02-09)
  • Rudolf Steiner und das Gralsmysterium : Der Prüfungsweg des Parzival (2005)
• Ueli Seiler-Hugova:
  • Das grosse Parzivalbuch: Wolfram von Eschenbachs Parzival als ein moderner Einweihungsweg, der zur Integration und Individuation führt (2014)
  • Table of Contents
• Ellen Schalk: Kyot and Parsifal stellar script

• Mathieu Laffrée/Marianne Holberg: 'Die Suche nach dem Heiligen Gral : Seelenentwicklung und Geistesschulung' (1986 in DE, original based on four lectures in NL: 'Parzival en het mysterie van de graal')
• Wolfram von Eschenbach: 'Parzival (Prosafassung von Richard Baumann. Mit Kommentaren von Werner Greub und Walter Johannes Stein) (2019)
• Eileen Hutchings: 'Parzival - An introduction'
• Sonia A.L. Setzer: 'Parzival, a Forerunner of the Modern Human Being' (2024)

Wagner's Parsifal

• Hermann Beckh: Das Christus-Erlebnis im Dramatisch-Musikalischen von Richard Wagner's Parsifal (1929)
• Franz E. Winkler: 'For freedom destined : mysteries of man's evolution in the mythology of Wagner's Ring Operas and Parsifal' (1974)
• Bernd Lampe: Parzival (1986)
• Franz E. Winkler:
  • The mythology in Wagner's Parsifal (1968)
  • Richard Wagner : Der Ring des Nibelungen ; verbunden mit einer Betrachtung über Parsifal - das Mysterium des Grals ; Versuch zu einem tieferen Verstehen (1981)
• Friedrich Oberkogler:
  • Parsifal : eine Bühnenweihfestspiel von Richard Wagner ; eine musikalisch-geisteswissenschaftliche Einführung und Werkbesprechung (1969)
  • Parsifal: der Zukunftsweg des Menschen in Richard Wagners Musikdrama (1983)