Theology of Wagner's Ring Cycle II

Richard H. Bell is Professor of Theology at the University of Nottingham, UK. He studied theoretical physics at University College London and theology at Oxford and Tübingen. He is author of Provoked to Jealousy (1994), No one seeks for God (1998), The Irrevocable Call of God (2005), Deliver Us from Evil (2007), and Wagner's Parsifal (2013).

In his two previous volumes on the music of Richard Wagner, Richard Bell demonstrated his grasp of his subject and the importance of his project not only for students of music but also for those in the humanities more generally. This volume continues the task of opening up for readers the importance of Wagner's towering presence in Western music. This book especially shows why embracing music, art, and literature is such a necessary broadening of the intellectual horizons of contemporary theological study. This original and pioneering study is required reading for all those seeking to understand better the challenges facing contemporary life and the contribution that Wagner's music can make to that task.Christopher Rowland, Emeritus Dean Ireland's Professor of Exegesis of Holy Scripture, University of OxfordRichard H. Bell's new book argues that we can interpret Wagner's Ring cycle as a Christian allegory. Bell's meticulous scholarship dismantles the prejudice that Wagner's worldview was essentially non- or even anti-Christian, exploring the composer's relation to contemporary German philosophy, to Lutheran teaching, and to notes for a planned five-act opera on the life of Jesus. Clearly written and thoroughly researched, this is a book that will illumine, provoke, and even edify its readers.George Pattison, Professor of Theology & Modern European Thought, University of GlasgowApplying a theological lens to familiar ground, Richard Bell argues in these volumes that Wagner's Ring cycle can be seen as a Christian allegory. Through a rich account of the composer's intellectual world, the author unpacks such classic theological concerns as nature and the fall; love, death, and immortality; freedom, necessity, and providence; and redemption - to the great benefit of both Wagnerians and theologians.Stephen McClatchie, Professor of Theology & the Arts, Huron University College, London, Ontario

• List of Musical Examples | viiiList of Figures | viiiPreface | ixAcknowledgements | xiAbbreviations | xiii1 Introduction to the Theology of the Ring | 12 Jesus of Nazareth Sketches | 33 God and the Gods | 194 Nature | 525 Fall, Power, Desecration of Nature, and Capitalism | 896 Love | 1137 Sexual Ethics and Law | 1728 Death and Immortality | 1899 Freedom, Necessity, and Providence | 20710 Siegfried and Brünnhilde | 21911 Redemption | 24512 Aesthetics, Allegory, and Myth | 277Bibliography | 289Index of Authors | 307Index of Biblical Texts | 313Index of Wagner's Works | 317Index of Subjects and Names | 321