By Simon Eder
The philosopher Derrida once said “There is only forgiveness, if there is any, where there is the unforgivable”.(1) The broad strain of Jewish tradition, treading the narrow tightrope between both justice on the one hand and mercy on the other would tend to disagree. Simon Wiesenthal’s famous book, The Sunflower is an important case in point. It details the confession of a former Nazi officer who, on his death bed begs for Weisenthal’s forgiveness for the hundreds of Jewish families who were murdered on his command. The famous Nazi hunter refuses on the basis that if any forgiving is to be done it is the victims who have the power to grant it. To do otherwise would be to usurp the divine prerogative and that is not in Weisenthal’s power.
Perhaps the refusal to forgive can be the righteous thing to do, even the morally appropriate course of action. Archbishop Tutu recounts an example from the South African Truth Commission in which a black woman came to testify. Her husband had been tortured and then killed by the police. As she said, “A commission or a government cannot forgive. Only I eventually could do it. And I am not ready to forgive.”(2)
Perhaps the refusal to forgive can be the righteous thing to do, even the morally appropriate course of action.
The philosopher Derrida once said “There is only forgiveness, if there is any, where there is the unforgivable”.(1) The broad strain of Jewish tradition, treading the narrow tightrope between both justice on the one hand and mercy on the other would tend to disagree. Simon Wiesenthal’s famous book, The Sunflower is an important case in point. It details the confession of a former Nazi officer who, on his death bed begs for Weisenthal’s forgiveness for the hundreds of Jewish families who were murdered on his command. The famous Nazi hunter refuses on the basis that if any forgiving is to be done it is the victims who have the power to grant it. To do otherwise would be to usurp the divine prerogative and that is not in Weisenthal’s power.
Perhaps the refusal to forgive can be the righteous thing to do, even the morally appropriate course of action. Archbishop Tutu recounts an example from the South African Truth Commission in which a black woman came to testify. Her husband had been tortured and then killed by the police. As she said, “A commission or a government cannot forgive. Only I eventually could do it. And I am not ready to forgive.”(2)
In an enigmatic piece of aggadah, Rabbi Elazar, son of Rabbi Shimon is initially not granted forgiveness following his insult to a stranger:
He happened upon an exceedingly ugly person, who said to him: Greetings to you, my rabbi, but Rabbi Elazar did not return his greeting. Instead, Rabbi Elazar said to him: Worthless [reika] person, how ugly is that man. Are all the people of your city as ugly as you? The man said to him: I do not know, but you should go and say to the Craftsman Who made me: How ugly is the vessel you made. When Rabbi Elazar realized that he had sinned and insulted this man merely on account of his appearance, he descended from his donkey and prostrated himself before him, and he said to the man: I have sinned against you; forgive me. The man said to him: I will not forgive you until you go to the Craftsman Who made me and say: How ugly is the vessel you made?(3)
Maimonides in his Code stipulates that for sins committed to our fellow we are obligated to seek forgiveness directly. The above episode however indicates that perhaps all sins are ultimately an offence before the Divine. It also powerfully goes to the heart of the ambiguity that lies surrounding questions of forgiveness – namely what is being asked of when one seeks forgiveness? Whom is being asked? Something or someone?
So Judaism certainly calls into question a notion of unconditional forgiveness that is perhaps the preserve of the confessional box.
Turning the other cheek
The parting of ways in Jewish and Christian attitudes to forgiveness need not be so stark however. Rabbi Jacobs corrects the distinction often made that in the notion of ‘turning the other cheek’(4) from The Sermon on the Mount lies the difference between Judaism and Christianity.(5) Indeed as he points out responding to injury without revenge, welcoming further suffering has its echoes in a Talmudic Passage:
Our Rabbis taught: Those who are insulted but do not insult, hear themselves reviled without answering, act through love and rejoice in suffering of them Scripture says: “But they who love Him are as the sun when he goeth forth in his might” (Judges 5:31)(6)
Only forgiveness has the power to release us from the treadmill of the past.
It is also a theme that is developed by the Safed mystic, Moses Cordovero in his Palm Tree of Deborah. There he expounds that God does not withhold His goodness, even for those who use the power He gives to them to provoke Him. Implied therefore in this ideal of imitating God is that ‘’this is a virtue that man should make his own, namely to be patient and allow himself to be insulted and yet not refuse to bestow of his goodness to the recipients.’’(7)
In a similar vein, Jewish lore has is that the saintly Chafetz Chaim, when thieves burgled his impoverished home, chased after the robbers through town declaring that, “whatever you have taken is a gift from me!” His motivation of course was that no one should suffer guilt or punishment on his account.
Whilst not all approaches are as extreme, we may certainly reclaim the notion that ‘turning the other cheek’ is nonetheless a Jewish one.
Reclaiming the Future
The central paradigm for forgiveness in Judaism when someone has been wronged by another draws on the story of Abimelech’s taking Sarah, Abraham’s wife and then returning her to him (Genesis 20) to declare that monetary compensation is not enough. The attacker must beg forgiveness. But when he does so the victim should grant it readily, in the way that Abraham was prepared to forgive the far from salutary figure that was Abimelech.
It is from this episode that we understand the tradition’s powerful psychological insight that even once justice has been done for no lingering resentment to persist the moral obligation to seek forgiveness is still necessary. We also learn that placing the importance to readily grant forgiveness is perhaps the best antidote to the condition so many of us endure and exemplified by Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner, whose only release comes from rehearsing the tragedy that has consumed him. There is also added emphasis that we do embrace forgiveness, less bitterness ensue, given the notion as Maimonides sets out that if after three attempts a perpetrator (the second and third attempt involving a group to accompany them) is not granted forgiveness it is then the victim who is deemed sinful for refusing a pardon.
The tradition certainly recognises therefore that past hurt should never rob us of our future and become the narrative of our lives.(8) Only forgiveness has the power to release us from the treadmill of the past.
Forgiving the person and not the deed
The philosopher Hannah Arendt makes an important distinction between the need to forgive the person who has wounded us whilst continuing to condemn what the person has done. It is holding these two seemingly contradictory values in equilibrium, the balancing act between justice and mercy that is the major trust of a Jewish approach. To acknowledge our common humanity, susceptible to the inevitability of transgression that the human condition entails is perhaps the best impetus to seek and grant forgiveness. As Richard Holloway has put it “we may only reclaim the future of humanity by forgiving its offenders.”(9) This should of course not detract from the moral imperative to identify any wrong doings as bad and the resolution to ensure that they do not occur again.
During this season of selichot, and the power that it entails, we may enable the sometimes clogged river of our lives to flow again. In so doing the wounds of the past may be healed and the shattered relationships between individuals and even nations may be mended.
1.Derrida, Cosmopolitanism and Forgiveness, p.36
2.Derrida, Cosmopolitanism and Forgiveness, p.43
3.Taanit 20b
4.Matthew 5:39
5.Jacobs, The Jewish Religion; A Companion, p.171
6.Shabbat 88b
7.Palm Tree of Deborah 1:1
8.Holloway, On Forgiveness, p. x
9.Holloway, On Forgiveness, p. 44
Simon Eder is Editorial Director of Jewish Quest. He writes regularly for the site and has written for the Judaism column of the Jewish Chronicle. He is a founder of the Jewish Community in Dubai and due to feature in a documentary later this year about its founding. He studied Theology at The University of Cambridge.