#40 vari?: She joyfully hurries over to the gods, each of whom embraces her at length in an access of joy.)
Thus, thanks to Wotan’s choosing illusion over truth, the Giants grant Wotan his illusion of transcendent love and immortality by restoring Freia to him, which can only freely be enjoyed by the gods if the Giants (mortal man’s egoism) do not openly stake their claim to her. But nonetheless, by satisfying the Giants’ demand for the true and only source of actual satisfaction in this life, the worldly power of the Ring, Wotan subliminally acknowledges that our egoistic animal instincts have the final word. Thus, in exchange for their agreement not to stake their claim to Freia directly, Wotan grants the giants the feeling that through Freia’s gifts the Giants can actually satisfy their selfish urges, since he acknowledges the primacy of those urges by granting them control over Alberich’s sources of true power, his conscious mind, his imagination, and his hoard of knowledge. #37 (The “Loveless Motif,” a segment of #18) is heard here as Wotan exults in the fact that since Freia is restored to the gods their endless youth will be restored also. Undoubtedly Wagner is telling us that Wotan’s motive in redeeming Freia is his lovelessness. In this transaction neither the Giants nor Wotan have any concern with Freia as the goddess of love, their potential source of transcendent value, but only with Freia as goddess of immortality, who assuages man’s fear of the end. Thus we hear the Loveless Motif #37.
[R.4: L]
As the first fruit of Wotan’s decision to place the Giants (Wotan’s own instinctive feelings) in control of Alberich’s keys to worldly power, the Giants fight over the spoils until Fafner kills his brother in a manner so brutal and cynical that it shocks the gods into speechlessness:
(Fafner has wasted no time in spreading out an enormous sack, into which he prepares to pack the hoard.)
Fasolt: (to Fafner: #26a:; #41:) Don’t be so greedy. Grant me some, too! Equal shares befit us both (:#26a; :#41).
Fafner: You set greater store by the maid than you did by the gold, you lovesick loon! It was hard to make you exchange her, you fool. You wouldn’t have shared her if you’d wooed freia; (#? [a Loge motif?]:) if I now share the hoard, it’s fair that I keep the biggest half for myself (:#? [a Loge motif?]).
Fasolt: You infamous rogue! You’d insult me so? – (to the gods) I call on you as judges: justly and fairly divide the hoard! (Wotan turns contemptuously away.)
