I really like my random quote of the day today. It's from Hannah Arendt (who is most notable in my field for being the author of the Eichman in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil).
It goes:
"Forgiveness is the key to action and freedom."
Take a breath and quickly move past the "uh... duh" knee-jerk response you just had. I know it, I thought it too. I thought, "what a great sentiment, of course forgiveness is the key to action and freedom! Nice to see someone is publicizing the notion." And then I proceeded to move on.
But then I didn't move on. No, I stopped to ponder my "ya, and birds fly and the sky's blue" reaction to the simple statement.
If you break it down, "forgiveness" becomes more than a checked off box on the list of life. What is forgiveness? How do you show forgiveness? How do you receive forgiveness? Is it in the possession of the forgiver to give or can it be earned by the one who needs it? More than all of this, how important really is it to forgive and be forgiven?
If you check with the many sects religious faith you'll probably find out that it is God's gift, Him alone can show it and give it, and you must show Him love and repentance to get it. It is the all-important feature of the Christian faith as it is literally the "key" to heavens gate.
But we're not going to go with that cop-out. No, we're pondering forgiveness in Hannah Arendt's world, where "men, not Man, live on the earth and inhabit the world." (A central thought from her work, The Human Condition." This makes the idea a whole bucket-load of complicated because it comes down to the interactions of two individuals. Two people who may have completely different opinions about right and wrong, circumstances and events, and what forgiveness is and is not.
If it is the "key" to action and the "key" to freedom, then it must be pretty important. It must have some practical use. It must be understandable. (It must have a guide book, down-loadable free from Google docs.)
No such luck. (Maybe I'm spelling it wrong?)
No, I'm sure you'll find no such guide-book exists. (But it's Google. Everything exists on Google.)
I think you'll find this is not that easy to... (See?! Here, I found a definition for forgiveness: "compassionate feelings that support a willingness to forgive.")
OK, well what does it mean to forgive? Does it explain that? (OK, wait, wait! How about this one: "Forgiveness is typically defined as the process of concluding resentment, indignation or anger as a result of a perceived offense, difference or mistake, and/or ceasing to demand punishment or restitution." Sounds basic enough.)
Uh, well actually that's not bad. But it's not quite setting the parameters for forgiveness. For example, should the other individual see themselves as needing to be forgiven, or is that not a requirement? Or, can one truly forgive just by "ceasing to demand punishment" or do they have to no longer feel anger as well. And where in all this does the saying "forgive but never forget" fit?
A really great test case would be Arendt's work on Adolf Eichmann. He did not feel he needed to be forgiven because he did not perceive his own actions to be in offense. Could the Jewish public holding him to account for his crimes have forgiven him without delivering corporal punishment when he did not seek their forgiveness? Is it possible to come to terms as an individual regardless of the 'other'?
(Hold on, the Google instant just froze... how do you spell Eichmann?)
[headdesk].
My personal response to these questions would be that I hope people can learn to forgive with or without the showing of repentance of the perpetrator or opposing 'other' because I too believe forgiveness to be the key to freedom. Only after you forgive as an individual can you move on to the next stage of your journey in life and let go of the past. One must be able to forgive in order to function in life or they would be dragged down by all the little gremlins that scratch and scrape at the edges. Grudges and acts of vengeance are the roadblocks, the weight on our shoulders that can grow too heavy to bear if we're not careful.
I also understand that there is a part of the individual that needs to receive forgiveness from time to time. This is where things get a whole lot more complicated. Requiring forgiveness means having to somehow earn that forgiveness from another individual. One who may not see the world as you do. One who may not see forgiveness as so very important in life. Yet without this forgiveness you might develop your own weights that prevent you from moving forward, taking action, and being free. In this more than ever can the inter-play of the human condition be seen.
I say, don't blanket the words of Hannah Arendt with a generalized "well everyone knows that already but show me someone who's successfully lived it."Don't worry, I won't retort with obvious examples from Gandhi to Martin Luther King, Jr. What I will do is urge you to quit looking to other examples and find it in your own life. Where has forgiveness helped, or its lack of presence hindered, your journey of life, your freedom?
