Forgiveness

Questions on this topic? Just ask!

Through the mid-twentieth century, academic treatments of forgiveness were largely theologically based. The latter part of the century saw the start of a secular discussion of forgiveness within analytic philosophy. The topic provides rich ground for philosophical reflection.

Participants in the discussion often focus on three issues: what forgiveness is, how it is accomplished, and when it is justified. Regarding the first, many appropriate Bishop Butler's claim that forgiveness is the overcoming of resentment. It is widely thought to be accomplished through compassion, perhaps by an imaginative process. The question of justification raises interesting issues about whether forgiveness can be required or whether it is always supererogatory.

There is, however, a prior question of considerable philosophical interest: How is forgiveness, so understood, even possible? Most would agree that not just any elimination of resentment counts as forgiving. You could not forgive by simply taking a pill that rendered you incapable of resentment. Nor does simply forgetting count as forgiving. Forgiveness requires overcoming resentment in the right way. However, it is not merely hard to say what that way is; it is unclear whether there could be such a way.

To keep forgiveness distinct from other responses, such as excuse or contempt, the forgiver must not deny (a) the seriousness of the wrong, (b) the moral standing of the wrongdoer, or (c) his or her own moral standing. Overcoming resentment by denying either the seriousness of the wrong or one's own claim against being wronged is excusing. Overcoming resentment by denying the standing of the wrongdoer is showing contempt for the wrongdoer, excluding him or her from the class of persons whose actions matter. To forgive, one must affirm the seriousness of the wrong and the importance of both oneself and the wrongdoer. Forgiveness must be uncompromising. The difficulty is that the three claims that forgiveness must not deny seem sufficient to ground the resentment that forgiveness must overcome. How, then, is forgiveness possible?

If resentment were necessarily vengeful or malicious, one could overcome it without compromise by achieving compassion. But resentment—that anger over a wrong that is incompatible with forgiveness—is not necessarily vengeful or malicious. One can empathize with the plight of the wrongdoer, have no desire to see him or her harmed, and still resent the wrong. Thus, in contrast with a widely held view, compassion will not secure forgiveness.

If the three most obvious ways to overcome resentment—to discount the wrong, the wrongdoer, or oneself—were the only ways to overcome it, then forgiveness would be impossible. In order to understand an overcoming of resentment as a case of forgiveness, it needs to be distinguished from compromise. Here, then, lies a task for philosophy: to provide an articulate account of the way in which the overcoming of resentment can count as forgiveness. With that task completed, discussion can turn to how forgiveness is accomplished and when it is justified.

Moral Sentiments.

Butler, Bishop Joseph. Sermons. Boston: Hilliard and Brown, 1827.

Grover, Trudy. Forgiveness and Revenge. London: Routledge, 2002.

Hieronymi, Pamela. "Articulating an Uncompromising Forgiveness." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 62 (2001): 529–555.

Murphy, Jeffrie G., and Jean Hampton. Forgiveness and Mercy. Cambridge Studies in Philosophy and Law. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

This is the complete article, containing 524 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page).