In the Mozart opera The...
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In the Mozart opera The Magic Flute Prince Tamino and Papageno must undergo severe "tests and trials" to make sure that they are "worthy" of the love of those promised to them, Pamina and Papagena. Only if they "endure" will they be permitted even to live with much less to love the ones promised to them. In the end, in fact, Prince Tamino, having proved himself in all things up to the final trial by the elements of fire and water, is joined by his betrothed, Pamina, so that they, together, can either endure together or parish together. Having endured, they find bliss in each other's arms and in their ultimate marriage in which they presumably "live happily ever after" as fairy tales would have happiness last.
Those "clothed in white robes" are "they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." Is life itself not such a "test and trial," a "tribulation," not to speak of the persecutions those whom John addresses in this book had to go through? How much more, then, than Prince Tamino and his betrothed do the saints rejoice in the family of God's people where "the Lamb is their shepherd," seeing to it that they "hunger no more, neither thirst any more; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat."
Those "clothed in white robes" are "they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." Is life itself not such a "test and trial," a "tribulation," not to speak of the persecutions those whom John addresses in this book had to go through? How much more, then, than Prince Tamino and his betrothed do the saints rejoice in the family of God's people where "the Lamb is their shepherd," seeing to it that they "hunger no more, neither thirst any more; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat."
