WHAT I LEARNED FROM HOFFMAN

By John Santosuosso

      I will admit I would rather go to a baseball or football game than an opera. Fortunately my beloved spouse has much more culture than I do. By accompanying her to the opera, whether live or on screen, I actually managed to pick up a veneer of culture and a liking for many operas. As the child of a friend of ours once remarked when asked if he liked his new school, "It is sort of an acquired taste."

      Recently we saw a production of Jacques Offenbach's "Tales of Hoffman." First performed in 1881, it is the only opera Offenbach ever wrote. While it seems to be produced rather frequently, some opera critics will claim one was enough. They have not always been kind to Offenbach's effort, and producers have been quite willing to tinker with it, adding an aria if they felt like it and deleting something else if they found it unnecessary. It is not really one of my favorites either. I would rather see Mozart's "Don Giovanni," in which my spouse when we were on a date excused herself at intermission only to reappear as a dancer in the final act, or Puccini's "Tosca," and of course anything that has Isabel Leonard in it. "Tales of Hoffman" gets a bit "redundant," as in each act our hero introduces you to a new love affair gone sour. However, you need to stick around for the final curtain. In the last five minutes Offenbach hits it out of the park.

      Hoffman, before the night is over, ceases to be a scorned lover and becomes something of a philosopher. It finally dawns on him that, "You learn through love. You learn much more through tears." Sadly, that seems to be the case. Love requires relationships. Relationships are eventually broken in a variety of ways, and that often leads to pain which in turn leads to tears. Few if any of us ever escape that pain. The Episcopal Burial Rite reminds us that even our Lord wept at the grave of his friend Lazarus (BCP p.497) The often overlooked Old Testament book of Lamentations depicts the entire Hebrew nation weeping over loss of family, friends, and country. Hoffman learned you do not get out of this life before you shed your share of tears.

      If this is the case then what is it the tears might teach us, even though the lesson may be painful? How well I remember the morning when I was having a quiet moment at home only to have the silence broken by a phone call from a dear friend whose wife had died suddenly and unexpectedly less than an hour before. In the midst of his tears the only thing he could hold onto at that time was the love and comfort he felt he could never lose from Jesus. That was a difficult way to learn a valuable truth. Our relationships might die. However, no matter how dark the night may seem and how total our inability to see the light, there is no place where the darkness overcomes this divine love.

In Isaiah chapter 53 we encounter the Suffering Servant. To the Jew this is symbolic of the nation of Israel. To the Christian it is a reminder of Jesus.

The servant takes on the wounds of the world, in order that the beings of this world may live. And in the battle with the powers of darkness, the servant promises because of that love our relationships will be restored, and we will live in the house of the Lord forever. 

Let us never be afraid to love. Let us also remember we are never alone. We have been promised the tears will be temporary.

"See the home of God is with mortals.

He will dwell with them;

they will be his peoples,

and God himself will be with them and be their God;

he will wipe every tear from their eyes;

Death will be no more,

mourning and crying and pain will be no more,

for the first things have passed away.

      Revelation 19:3-4