Having confessed he feels~Patrick Kavanaugh
That he should go down on his knees and pray
For forgiveness for his pride, for having
Dared to view his soul from the outside.
Lie at the heart of the emotion, time
Has its own work to do. We must not anticipate
Or awaken for a moment. God cannot catch us
Unless we stay in the unconscious room
Of our hearts. We must be nothing,
Nothing that God may make us something.
We must not touch the immortal material
We must not daydream to-morrow’s judgement–
God must be allowed to surprise us.
We have sinned, sinned like Lucifer
By this anticipation. Let us lie down again
Deep in anonymous humility and God
May find us worthy material for His hand.
Continuing a theme that was introduced in an earlier open thread, the role of confession, acknowledging fault. Where is weakness to be found? In the transfer or in the admitting of guilt?
This is, I think, one of the key issues in any relationship.
I remember as a teenager coming home a fair bit after curfew (which was already generous and somewhat flexible). My parents were up. Waiting for me. This was before cell phones, so there was no way to check in or check up on. They did what parents do in these situations, they were mad at me.
I was fine, I was with friends, safe friends, not the sort of friends who would get into trouble and bring me with there with them. They knew that. So what was the big deal? My immediate reaction was to be defensive. Then, as the argument began to take shape something hit me. I was tired. It really was late. What was I trying to prove. So, I caved. I apologized. Very straightforward about it. Said they were right, I was wrong. I remember their expressions, expecting to have to convince me, set me straight. I said I was sorry, sincerely so. As I was, because they were good people with reasonable expectations.
There and then I realized the power of a sincere apology to deflate volatile situations. Now, I'll keep my fight up when I know I'm right, so it's not passivity. It's honesty of a sort. Confidence even... maybe. To admit when you've made a mistake is dangerous, it can be used against you in a court of relationship, so its daring too.
Is it another one of those psychological tricks? Maybe. At least it helps move the situation on to other, usually more interesting topics.
49 comments:
People do not seem to realize that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character. Emerson
A sincere and true apology is always the right thing to do. However, apologizing inappropriately isn't. I once overheard two clerks in a store, one of whom was apologizing over and over again to the other for some perceived slight. The apology was not being accepted, and it was pretty clear from the conversation that the apologizer really wasn't the one who should have been apologizing. It was a no-win situation for her, although she was being quite contrite. It would have been better for her to apologize once then walk away and wash her hands of the other person. With true forgiveness, of course.
Lem- can you change the blog color scheme? Light blue type on white background sucks for my middle aged and older eyes.
A guilty conscience needs to confess. A work of art is a confession.
Albert Camus
We have sinned, sinned like Lucifer...
That sounds like something Billy Sunday would have said!
Jesus died for somebody's sins
but not mine.
--Patti Smith
Often people use the "I'm sorry" phrase in that knee-jerk reaction to hopefully avoid or lessen the possible punishment. And just as often, people realize it for what it is, a phrase with little true contrition behind it. It's become overused, just like using "I lovusin. Ice cream. Dogs. Cats. Baseball. Fast cars. So if you say "I love you", what is the true impact of that phrase? Sometimes not much because of how diluted the meaning has become.
I've found that when I truly do believe I have screwed up royally, asking "Will you please forgive me for... " conveys a much deeper sense of my regret and honest desire to make amends.
But that's just me.
Beautiful thoughts, PaddyO. We need a spiritual leader. Well, maybe not Crack. He just needs some spirits.
Ugh. Stupid phone autocorrect...
"I lovusin. ??? What the heck?
Should be "I love..."
Karen, "I'm sorry" is almost as ubiquitous as, "No problem."
Yes, that is probably true, ndspinelli, because what both are really thinking is -
I'm sorry ... now shut-up, go away, and leave me alone.
No problem ... but when you're asleep I'm going to carve your heart out.
What I've learned from confession, both in the box and from saying the secular I'm sorry is this: a simple "I am sorry" isn't enough. It needs to be for a specific event, to acknowledge that hurt was caused and to understand that hurt.
The usual "If that offended you, I apologize" isn't enough; isn't a real confession that wrong was done. It blames the person who was hurt for feeling hurt.
You know what is harder than confession, forgiveness.
I mean when someone wrongs you severely that you can go forgive them and move on. It is of course not about the wrong doer (just because you forgive them does not mean you should trust them again), it is about you taking control of the situation and not reliving the harm again and again.
On the first anniversary of 9-11 I ran across an intriguing article in Jewish World Review on the subject of forgiving the terrorists.
The whole article is worth reading and it illustrates, among other things, how the Jewsish take on forgiveness differs from the Christian.
It relates a story about a great rabbi who is assaulted by three other Jews while traveling by train because he doesn't want to play cards with them. When the train arrives and the rabbi is greeted with adulation by the crowd, the three Jews beg his forgiveness, but the rabbi refuses--to everyone's surprise. Later his son asks why. The rabbi explains:
"Do you really think I don't want to forgive these poor Jews before the High Holy days? If it were only in my power to do so, don't you know that I would have forgiven them when they stood before me at the railroad station? Of course I, Rabbi Kagan, forgive them for what they did to me. When they learned who I was, they were mortified and filled with shame for what they had done. But the man they beat up was the one they presumed to be a simple, unassuming poor person with no crowd of well- wishers waiting to greet him. He was the victim and only he is the one capable of granting them forgiveness. Let them go find that person. I am incapable of releasing them from their guilt."
I still think about that story now and then.
creely23, I do not think Jewish and Christian forgiveness is that much different. But I find that rabbi's reasoning to be sound.
‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ Matthew 25:40
That rabbi is a wise man.
People often apologize when they want something. Or when they want to hide something. Or make themselves look good even when they don't really mean it.
A sincere apology is a different matter.
But how often does that really happen?
ELB: I can't speak with any authority to Jewish forgiveness, but in my readings on forgiveness, it seemes there is a difference.
Christians forgive, or believe they should, unconditionally.
Jews forgive with conditions, such as wrong-doer repents or makes good or, apparently as in the story above, the wrong-doer has wronged one directly.
The article I mentioned also contains an account of a dying Nazi SS officer requesting forgiveness from Simon Weisenthal, the famous Nazi hunter. Weisenthal remained silent, then turned and walked away.
I make no claim that one form of forgivness is better than the other.
There is no universal issue of agreement among Jews on any issue, other than them rejecting Jesus as the Messiah (because if you accept Jesus as the Messiah, you are then a Christian).
The rabbi's forgiveness position was actually pretty well thought out. He was right, the man they slighted was not the rabbi, it was the man they though he was. He was not the one to forgive them (and in a way it is a lesson to them more important than forgiveness).
As for Holocaust survivors...whether or not they want to forgive is up to them. I would suggest forgiving (but not forgetting) helps the victim more than the perpetrator. Forgiveness is not, however, some magical incantation.
ELB: You seem to be moving the goalposts.
I do not think Jewish and Christian forgiveness is that much different.
...
There is no universal issue of agreement among Jews on any issue, other than them rejecting Jesus as the Messiah...
If Jews do not agree on anything, how would their forgiveness not be much different from Christian.
I'm not a Jew, but again, in my reading the Jewish take on forgiveness is always different from Christian -- that yes, it is good to forgive, but for Jews there is always some calculation, they do not seem to forgive unconditionally.
I'd love to hear from any Jews on this.
creeley, I do not think they are that much different. While the Christian standard is to forgive, in practice it tends to vary. But I will leave this one to others. I just thought the Rabbi's comment was interesting.
Confession: I voted for Ralph Nader for president in 2000. Should I apologize? If so, to whom? Should I pray for forgiveness? Why or why not?
Maybe I should apologize to all of you for making this confession.
quote
A further illustration of the difference between ritual concerns and substantive ones comes from occasions of accident in which the carelessness of one individual is seen as causing injury or death to another. Here there may be no way at all to compensate the offended, and no punishment may be prescribed. All that the offend[er] can do is say he is sorry. And this expression itself may be relatively little open to gradation. The fact - at least in our society - is that a very limited set of ritual enactments are available for contrite offenders. Whether one runs over another's sentence, time, dog, or body, one is more or less reduced to saying some variant of ``I'm sorry.'' The variation in degree of anguish expressed by the apologizer seems a poor reflection of the variation in loss possible to the offended. In any case, while the original infraction may be quite substantive in its consequence, the remedial work, however vociferous, is in these cases still largely expressive. And there is a logic to this. After an offense has occurred, the job of the offender is to show that it was not a fair expression of his attitude, or, when it evidently was, to show that he has changed his attitude to the rule that was violated. In the latter case, his job is to show that whatever happened before, he now has a right relationship - a pious attitude - to the rule in question, _and this is a matter of indicating a relationship, not compensating a loss_
- Goffman, _Relations in Public_ ``Remedial Interchanges'' p.117-118
Where's my apology for "Hello Larry"?
Regarding apologies. I've become more hardened over the years. I now issue a since apology for some minor faux-pas and if its accepted fine. If not, I usually say something like this:
"I apologized but you don't want to accept it. So unless you want to settle this with fists,** this conversation is over."
** usually only said to women, small children, and those with one leg.
"Should I apologize?"
Come on, man, think!
I think you should apologize to Ralph Nader, all that encouragement through votes did not help the man's mental health.
I'll send Ralph a hand-written email first thing in the morning. Asking his forgiveness. :)
The Christian form of forgiveness as a divine, unconditional imperative doesn't exist, as far as I can tell, in any other religion or philosophy.
Buddhism recommends forgiveness, but as a kind of spiritual hygiene. This is the way the mind works, this is the way suffering, karma and the wheel of rebirth work, so it's better to forgive.
But Jesus forgave on the cross, with nails in his hands and feet. That's something else. That's a different model.
As Marianne Wilson once wrote, "If Jesus had yelled from the cross, 'I hate all you guys,' it would been a completely different story."
But did Jesus forgive unconditionally on the Cross? He said of those who crucified him: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” That sounds future tense to me, which could imply some conditions. And he didn't issue the forgiveness himself.
He did, though, directly himself forgive the two criminals hanging next to him: “Today you will be with me in paradise.”
Sounds as if he made distinctions the Jewish way.
Lydia, Jesus only forgave one of the criminals.
One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”
But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.”
Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
Luke 23: 39-43
Did he forgive just the one or both? I am reading this as just the one.
He forgave the one who asked for forgiveness. One has to ask forgiveness.
One can forgive without being asked. The wrongdoer doesn't always feel he/she did wrong, yet the one who was wronged feels he/she did. One feels anger, then moves past it and forgives. In fact to forgive the un-contrite takes far more effort.
And beyond that to forgive the un-contrite helps the wronged party to move on, while the wrongdoer now shifts into victimhood status, continuing claims of innocence and shirking of responsibility for the wrong doing, which in turn makes it easier to continue the pattern of doing wrong, denial and shirking of responsibility.
Vicious cycle. The forgiver has moved on to a better place, learning not to expect much from such people.
Evi, I just checked the Greek, which differentiates between a singular and a plural "you". You're right, Jesus is forgiving just one "you", not both of them.
God's forgiveness is always there for us to accept, as is his love. But we have to accept it. If we choose to reject that forgiveness, then we choose to live in darkness.
And beyond that to forgive the un-contrite helps the wronged party to move on, while the wrongdoer now shifts into victimhood status, continuing claims of innocence and shirking of responsibility for the wrong doing, which in turn makes it easier to continue the pattern of doing wrong, denial and shirking of responsibility.
The story of Anna Karenina in a nutshell.
Is not forgiving someone who hasn't ask you to --- whether because they don't think they've done anything wrong (and hey, maybe they haven't), or because they willfully did something to harm you and they don't regret it --- abrogating to oneself a prerogative that belongs properly only to God?
Is not forgiving someone who hasn't ask you to --- whether because they don't think they've done anything wrong (and hey, maybe they haven't), or because they willfully did something to harm you and they don't regret it --- abrogating to oneself a prerogative that belongs properly only to God?
I don't think so:
"This is My Commandment: love one another as I love you." John 15:12.
Humans are allowed to bestow forgivness, even if not asked, are they not? Is it not divine to forgive? Shouldn't we be emulating the Divine? It doesn't mean we should consider ourselves Divine though. Isn't it an imperative to strive toward deviness? To raise ourselves up out of the lowly human condition?
Divine Justice: Striving for Higher Ground
Something I read last night that helped me put a few things in perspective.
Oh and before Crack sees the source of this blogpost, no I'm not into the metaphysical new agey thing. This blogpost did however, resonate.
The blog really needs an ignore button
Pretend there is one and scroll past.
I'm no authority, but can vouch for the fact that Jews require or at least encourage some form of repentance on the part of the wrongdoer for forgiveness to be meaningful. It's supposed to be a more social thing, and they even make an entire holiday out of asking forgiveness both of God and their fellow man. The fellow man part does require, of course, making personal amends to that person. Creeley is right. So this is another regard in which Jews and Christians have much to teach each other (as unconditional forgiveness can be just as powerful), and I find that symbiosis rather admirable.
Beautiful post, Paddy O.
"I voted for Ralph Nader for president in 2000".
Couldn't figure out the butterfly ballot?
In 2000, Clermont county Ohio still hadn't advanced to paper ballots. We used pottery shards.
I'm no authority, but can vouch for the fact that Jews require or at least encourage some form of repentance on the part of the wrongdoer for forgiveness to be meaningful.
R&B: Thanks. That's the nut of what I was trying to say and that's what I notice every time I encounter Jews talking about forgiveness. It's not the same as Christian forgiveness.
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