Forgiveness

Courtney Lewis B. Smedes once said “ To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.” Throughout all our lives we have been betrayed by someone. I believe that God forgives our sins, but also that He will not do so unless we forgive the sins of others. I have found that forgiveness is hard, yet it is possible. Forgiveness has indeed shaped me to be the young lady I am today. Simon Wiesenthal’s question “What would [you] have done” if one had the opportunity to forgive a Nazi soldier forces humanity to understand and apply our moral repertoire. My moral repertoire I mean the set of moral beliefs that informs our understanding of forgiveness and the criteria by which we evaluate it. Karl the Nazi Soldier, who initiates our inquiry into forgiveness, represents multiple identities. He is at once a rational human being, a member and supporter of the Nazi military, a murderer, and actor and representative of the State. Because of the simultaneously occurrence and fluidity of these identities conflation is an easy mistake in constructing exactly who we are forgiving. To forgive Karl the individual is very different than forgiving the Nazis or the State as represented by Karl. Even Lawrence Lager in the Symposium writes “It seems to me that in refusing to extend forgiveness to the culprit, Wiesenthal unconsciously acknowledges the indissoluble bond fusing the criminal to his crime” (The Sunflower 178). The conflation of what Karl represents is a large part of what make Wiesenthal’s question so vexing because the rules of forgiveness alter depending on the actor. Karl the individual is due certain considerations simply because of his humanity while the Nazis and the State as represented by Karl are entangled in political considerations. Forever labeling Karl as a murderer forgoes his still present humanity. This is not to say that forgiving Karl the individual isn’t political, or that we shouldn’t acknowledge the enormity of his crime.