The Virtue of Forgiveness

In Guernica this week, Susie Enfield offers a profound meditation on "Living with the Enemy" (http://www.guernicamag.com/features/1853/linfield_7_1_10/), comparing the post-World War II relationship between Germans and Jews with the current coexistence of the Hutus and Tutsis. In the middle of the article, she quotes Jean Amery, the Holocaust survivor/philosopher who proposed a doctrine of "undying resentment" for the Jews and crushing self-mortifying degradation for the Germans. Amery recognized that being wronged, being tortured, is something which we may forgive (though he would not understand why in some cases) but cannot forget. Reconciliation only comes when both sides admit, with force and repentance, that the act should never have happened. Right now, as I said to the Thinker over ice cream this afternoon, this is a state which the entire country could not get to right now. But I digress…

Amery's ideas are interesting, worth considering to a degree, but above all they scare and challenge me. Very rarely in my life has an outside party ever truly hurt me or brought me to the brink of trembling negative emotion. The last time was in the fall of 2008, about a week before I took the English Literature GRE. At that time, I had feelings for my then-and-now friend the White Lady, and being completely inexperienced, mishandled them so badly that I received a strongly worded e-mail from her outlining in no uncertain terms how much I screwed up. My parents and friends were amazed that I put all the blame on myself and, as they saw it, forgave her. Under Amery's terms, however, this was me being on the German side, stating that something regrettable had occurred which demanded my repentance. This is a pattern which has continued throughout my life, where I am more than willing to take the blame in conflicts…

But I can be incredibly angry and unforgiving and selfish about much smaller matters. One very close acquaintance of mine has, in all the time we've known each other, done many things which get on my nerves, but I am unwilling to say anything about his actions. I shall never have a chance to forgive him because I do not give him the opportunity to make an apologetic statement or gesture, to be forgiven, and this may be stubborn sinfulness on my part…which is nothing compared to me reading this over and realizing that I may not truly know how to forgive. I either beg for forgiveness myself or remain a stone-faced, impassive rock in a tempest of bitter feelings.

God tells us we have to practice self-denial and subservience to our fellow man, but in this I know I am failing because I do not keep a good heart through the practice.

I hope all who read this and think I have done them a serious wrong may forgive me.