Revising the judgment of blame

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An alternative view on the relationship between forgiveness, excusing and moral scepticism

MA Thesis Philosophy

Student Marloes Boere 10004587 Supervisor Thomas Nys

Date 14 December 2016 Program Philosophy Master

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Introduction

After the election of US president Donald Trump, a huge „to-blame-or-not-to-blame‟ discussion arose regarding the role of the white middle class in America. White voters voted 58% for Trump while non-white voters voted 21% for Trump. Both The New York Times and The Washington Post published articles in which they called for sympathy with Trump voters (Stop Shaming Trump Supporters, 2016); (What is this election missing? Empathy for Trump voters., 2016). In contrast, Kali Holloway argued in an opinion piece called „Stop asking me to empathize with the white working class‟ (2016) that such a call for empathy shows that the suffering of white people is considered more important than the suffering of non-white people. The tension between the two groups of voters is not only a problem on a societal level: personal relationships suffer as well. The Dutch Newspaper NRC Handelsblad tells the story of Amanda Wade, a woman who decided to skip Thanksgiving with her family because her father voted for Donald Trump. I quote: “Maar ik kan niet accepteren dat mijn vader op een man stemde die het aanranden van vrouwen normaal vond. Hij heeft twee dochters. Hoe kon hij dat doen?” (Valk, 2016) It becomes apparent in this example that the difference in political viewpoints between Amanda and her father is more than disagreement about who should be president; Amanda Wade, as a woman, sees her father as sexist, because he voted for Trump. What is more, she blames him for that. Inversly, some Trump voters also feel victimised by their Clinton voting families, so the Associated Press has reported (Italie, 2016). Anne O'Connor‟s Trump supporting father cancelled the family‟s Thanksgiving plans, because he feels attacked by his family: “He got into a 'discussion' on Facebook with a friend who will be at Thanksgiving and he also read something my oldest daughter wrote against our family members who supported Trump,” O'Connor explained. In her opinion piece, Kali Holloway asks white Clinton voters to talk to their Trump voting family members during Thanksgiving dinner. This will become a bit difficult however if those family members are not at the same table.

Holloway argues that we need to hold someone accountable for the racism in America. However, what is creating the division between the two groups of voters is more than just them holding each other accountable; it is about one party seeing the other as morally blameworthy and considering themselves as the victims. As a daughter, Amanda Wade feels personally attacked by her father‟s sexism. Such blaming leads to resentment,

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5 which consequently leads to the situation in which some people feel their family members are not worth having Thanksgiving dinner with.

Holding people accountable and putting consequences to certain actions seems like a sensible thing to do. However, it is questionable whether blaming each other is either constructive or justified. Also, there is no party who benefits from increased tension, neither on a societal nor on a family level. A little forgiveness could therefore be useful in these times of division and polarisation. In saying this however, the question arises whether is possible to forgive someone for something he does not regret. In the case of Amanda Wade, for instance, one can wonder if she can or should forgive her father for his sexist – as she sees it – behaviour in order to be able to spend Thanksgiving at his place, even if her father continues to support Trump. In addition, Wade‟s quote seems to suggest that having two daughters makes her father even more blameworthy for his sexism, at least from her point of view. Wade might reason as follows: „He has two daughters so he should know better than to be sexist‟. Thus, even if Wade wanted to forgive her father, for example because she considers it a good thing to spend Thanksgiving with her family, it might be hard, if not impossible for her to do so as long as she continues to believe he is blameworthy for his sexism. There seems to be a paradox in Wade‟s dilemma. Philosophers have called it the paradox of forgiveness: forgiveness is only possible if there is something to forgive, that means, if someone did something immoral and is culpable for it. However, if it is clear that someone is indeed blameworthy, it is justified to blame them for their actions. It seems reasonable that justified blame should have consequences. It is exactly these consequences that forgiveness seems to undermine.

Some people have suggested that the way to resolving this paradox is to move past blame. For instance, in a Huffington Post article, the interviewee, Arlie Russell Hochschild, suggests the following attitude: “I‟ve seen myself and my “side” as a victim, and now let‟s see how they might feel that way, too.” In 1997, a supporting point was made by the philosopher Michael Zimmerman in his article „Moral Responsibility and Ignorance‟. Especially with regard to people who act from racist and/or sexist ideas, it is hard to justify blaming them since racist and sexist ideas are ignorant worldviews, Zimmerman argues. As such, you cannot directly be culpable for your ignorance. His conclusion is therefore:

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“I would think that it frequently (but by no means necessarily) happens that people who manifest these vices [racism, sexism, and the like] are oblivious to the wrongness involved in their doing so. Insofar as this is so, the foregoing argument applies, and the result is that responsibility for these vices and the vicious behaviour in which they issue is incurred less frequently, perhaps far less frequently, than is commonly supposed. This is an unwelcome conclusion to many.” (1997, p. 425)

Indeed, the conclusion that sexists and racists are blameworthy far less often than currently agreed upon, is unwelcome to many. Zimmerman‟s argument might therefore be dismissed as a reductio ad absurdum: the conclusion of not blaming sexists and racists is so radical and counterintuitive, we should reject the argument. This is a problem for philosophers who support a more sceptical view towards the justification of blame. In real life, we often blame and therefore, the reasoning goes that more sceptical positions towards blaming do not have any practical basis.

In this thesis I would like to argue that sceptical positions towards justified blame do have a practical basis, namely in forgiveness. Forgiveness is a practice in which people often become more sceptical towards blame. I will argue that forgivers often arrive at this scepticism through recognizing the ignorance of the forgiven. This form of scepticism corresponds with the argument made by Zimmerman. Other philosophers who defended this viewpoint and made great contributions to this debate are Gideon Rosen and Neil Levy, who I will also discuss in this thesis. My argument challenges the philosophical consensus that for forgiveness there first must be a justified judgment of blame. In this paper I will explain that by challenging this traditional view on forgiveness we will also find a solution to the paradox.

In the first chapter I will discuss the paradox of forgiveness as it is traditionally presented. I will discuss whether we can solve this paradox while still holding on to the idea that forgiveness must be uncompromising, that is, holding on to the idea that the wrongdoer is blameworthy. I will show this is not the case and that the paradox of uncompromising forgiveness is in fact not a paradox but a contradiction.

In the second chapter I will present an alternative account of forgiveness: a form of compromising forgiveness. In this chapter I will show that often when we forgive we indeed withdraw our initial judgment of blame. I will also argue that this is a proper way of forgiving.

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7 In the last and third chapter I will show that uncompromising forgiveness is indeed always appropriate, justified and desired. In making these arguments, my project shines new light on the relation between blame and forgiveness. It is my hope that it will offer a more genuine account of forgiveness which promotes empathy and mutual understanding.

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Chapter 1. Forgiveness: a paradox or a contradiction?

The first half of this chapter will be mostly descriptive, as I will introduce the concept of forgiveness. In 1.4 I will argue against some solutions of the forgiveness paradox. 1.1 What is the standard view of forgiveness?

Bishop Butler‟s well-known sermons Upon Resentment and Forgiveness of Injuries are generally understood as a noteworthy representation of the standard view of forgiveness (Butler, 1896). Since Butler‟s sermons, many philosophers have regarded forgiveness as a process of overcoming resentment (Hughes, 2015); (Garcia, 2011); (Minas, 1975). In this section I examine Butler‟s view on resentment and forgiveness.

Butler defines forgiveness as the forswearing of resentment it is important to understand his view on resentment.

According to Butler, there are two kinds of resentment: the hasty kind and the deliberate kind (Butler, 1896, p. 138). The first has the form of sudden anger. You could call this an instinctive „fight‟ response. The second kind of resentment is more settled, it is a response to an injustice. It is not just instinctive; it is based on a judgment about the wrongdoer. This second kind of resentment contains the desire that the wrongdoer will be punished. Such a deliberate kind of anger is not a reaction to suffering, according to Butler, but a reaction to injustice. The injured does not get angry at the person who is accidently present at the moment of the injury, but at the person who has been injurious in a moral sense. In other words, the injured gets angry at the person who is to blame, in a moral sense, for the injury (Butler, 1896, pp. 140-142).

Butler observes that people tend to get angrier at a wrongdoer when the injury is actually inflicted, as opposed to when the injury was attempted but prevented. The reason for this difference is not that the suffering is raising resentment, but because the harm will feel greater when the injured feels and experiences it, rather when they just reflect upon it. Consequently the resentment will be stronger (Butler, 1896, p. 146).

Since resentment arises when people are faced with injustice, its end should be to prevent or remedy injustice, Butler claims. Resentment should therefore not be considered a bad thing (Butler, 1896, p. 140). Only excessive or abusive resentment should be seen as faulty. Unfortunately, most of the resentment is excessive, because most people tend to review an injury to themselves as much more serious than it might

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9 have been in reality. If people feel offended, their anger makes them see things less clearly and they will be more likely to see the injustice done to them as greater injustice than it really was.

In addition, according to Butler‟s analysis, if resentment is not used as a means to an end, it immediately becomes abusive (Butler, 1896, p. 157). Every natural appetite may be gratified in particular instances, without being subservient to its particular chief end as long as the gratification of it does not contradict its end (Butler, 1896, p. 156). For example, the chief end of hunger is to be healthy. However there can be situations in which it is fine to satisfy your hunger with something that does not necessarily make you healthy, as long as it does not compromise your health. With resentment, this is never the case, because the gratification of resentment consists in producing misery. Resentment is given to us to prevent or remedy misery occasioned by injury. Therefore, if resentment is not conducive to the end for which it was given us, it must necessarily contradict this end (Butler, 1896, p. 156). Resentment should therefore only be used as a remedy or prevention of evil. If resentment leads someone to take revenge, it will only constitute more evil. Resentment is thus only justified as means to an end; however, in itself, it remains a painful means to an end.

Since resentment can easily become abusive or excessive, Butler argues it is virtuous to be forgiving. Furthermore, Butler concludes that a forgiving spirit is absolutely necessary since „If ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Farther will likewise forgive you‟ (Butler, 1896, p. 167). Considering your own need for forgiveness is also very helpful when forgiving others. According to Butler, forgiveness requires some reflection on the injury done to you and being able to see it was less of an offence than you had first thought. Forgiveness also requires reflection in the sense of being conscious of your own sins and consequently, being able to grand your wrongdoers forgiveness, from the realization you yourself need forgiveness as well (Butler, 1896, p. 166).

According to Couto in „The Reactive Attitudes Account of Forgiveness and the Problem of Repeated Offences‟, Butler‟s view can be labelled as „the reactive attitudes account of forgiveness‟ and can be stated as follows: “To forgive a wrongdoer for his wrongdoing: to overcome the negative reactive attitudes towards the wrongdoer that this wrongdoing warrants, while still holding the wrongdoer responsible for his wrongdoing” (Couto, forthcoming).

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This reactive attitudes account of forgiveness is the most popular account in philosophy and there is a fair amount of consensus that this is actually what forgiveness is (Murphy, 2005) (Hughes, 2015). However, there are still some important differences among philosophers that support this reactive attitudes account. I will specify two of them: 1) how reactive attitudes are labelled and defined and 2) what reasons count as valid and good reasons to forgive.

There are of course many instances in which someone can get rid of his reactive attitudes towards his wrongdoer, but not all of them would count as forgiving. Thus, before discussing the different positions about the reactive attitudes forgiveness ought to overcome and what valid reasons for forgiving can be, I would like to specify the concept of forgiveness a bit further by clarifying what forgiveness is not.

1.2 What is (generally) not seen as forgiveness?

In order to gain further clarity about forgiveness, it is important to see what forgiveness is not. In everyday life, forgiveness is often confused with other concepts, most importantly forgetting, excusing and justifying. In this section I will discuss, respectively, the difference between forgiveness and forgetting, excusing, justifying, condoning and letting go of resentment after the wrongdoer is punished. At the end of this section, it will have become clear what the moral difference is between these concepts and forgiveness.

Let us start with „forgetting‟. It is conceivable that someone who is wronged forgets about his anger or resentment just because of the passing of time. It might even be the case that he gets bored with this resentment. Forgetting something or getting bored is entirely passive (Hughes, What is Involved in Forgiving?, 1997, p. 333). Pamela Hieronymi, a philosopher who wrote on forgiveness in her article „Articulating an uncompromising account of forgiveness‟, rightly stated that: “Ridding oneself of resentment by taking a specially-designed pill, for example, would not count as forgiveness. Genuine forgiveness must involve some revision in judgment or change in view” (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 530) Forgiveness is thus something active and cannot be achieved by a passive process like forgetting. This revision in judgment is crucial. With forgetting, no judgment gets revised, it just disappears, which is why forgiveness cannot be achieved through forgetting.

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11 In most philosophical theories on forgiveness, there is a strict difference between excusing and forgiving (Boleyn-Fitzgerald, 2002, p. 484). Further on in my thesis I will argue that this strict distinction should be revised, but first I will explain why they are generally seen as two separate concepts.

Consider the following example. Suppose Mahogany has an appointment with Jonathan at their favourite café at 11 am. Mahogany is 30 minutes late. Jonathan is irritated and tells her she should have been on time. She replies: „Yes, I‟m sorry I am late, but I couldn‟t help it because all the public transport broke down‟. In this case, Mahogany admits that she has done something wrong, but she rejects any responsibility for it (Gamlund, 2011, p. 107). If Jonathan accepts this explanation, it means he has excused her and his irritation will probably vanish. This is different than forgiving because Mahogany was not responsible for the wrongdoing and Jonathan recognizes this. What happened is that Jonathan discovered there was nothing to forgive.

Imagine the situation above, but now Mahogany is late because on her way to the café she had to help a woman who had a heart attack on the streets. In this case, Mahogany has done nothing wrong by being too late. Although being late at an appointment is usually considered wrong or at least impolite, given these specific circumstances, it was the right thing to do. Mahogany is therefore justified in what she did. In this case, Jonathan has nothing legitimately to resent, and thus nothing to forgive (Murphy, 2005, p. 13).

Imagine again a third scenario in which Jonathan is waiting for Mahogany at the café. Mahogany arrives 30 minutes late, but Jonathan decides to remain quiet about it. It could be that he stays quiet because he is a bit scared of Mahogany, or maybe because he does not want to ruin the mood. Jonathan is fully aware of Mahogany‟s wrongdoing and disapproves of it, but he refrains from any retributive response to it (Kolnai, 1973, p. 95). This is different form forgiving for a couple of reasons. First, it might be the case that Jonathan still feels resentful inside. While he tries to hide it, he is actually very angry at Mahogany. He has thus not forgiven her. Resentment however is not even the most significant distinction between forgiving and condoning. With condoning, the victim acts as if the wrongdoer did nothing wrong. He does not only refrain from retributive responses, as forgivers often do, but he does nothing to acknowledge the wrong even while he is aware of it. This is very different from forgiving, because in the case of forgiving, the victim still acknowledges a wrongful act as wrong. In forgiving, the forgiver

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has a certain reason to separate the sin from the sinner – while still considering the sinner responsible for the sin – and is thus able, as St Augustine's famous dictum goes, to "Hate the sin, but love the sinner" (Kolnai, 1973, p. 97). This is not true for condoning, because condonation accepts the sin as well as the sinner.

Finally, let us take a look at the difference between forgiveness and punishment. It is easy to imagine that a victim no longer resents her wrongdoer after he has been punished. This should not be confused with forgiveness. A resentful person often wishes for the wrongdoer to be punished; if this wish is granted the resentment can disappear. In this case, the victim feels that the wrongdoer got what he deserved, therefore her resentment disappears not because she has forgiven him, but because her vindictive feelings where satisfied (Novitz, 1998, p. 307). Thus, if a victim overcomes resentment after her wrongdoer got, what she regards as, the right amount of punishment, this should not be mistaken for forgiveness.

When it is established what forgiveness is not, only a small bandwidth for what forgiveness is remains. As Hieronymi states, genuine forgiveness must leave the judgment of blame intact (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 530). In other words, the person that has to be forgiven must be and stay blameworthy; otherwise there is nothing to forgive. This gives rise to the paradox of forgiveness. If the offender is justifiably guilty, it seems feelings of resentment are justifiable and, consequently, honouring these feelings of resentment is also justified. However, forgiveness erases these justified feelings. This paradox could be resolved, for instance, if there are particular reasons that leave the judgment of blame intact, but at the same time justify the suspension of the consequences of this judgment. Different philosophers have given an attempt to formulate such reasons, which I will discuss in 1.4. However, the emotions that arise from a judgment of blame are characterised differently by different philosophers. I will discuss these characterisations first, in 1.3.

1.3 What are the emotions that forgiveness overcomes?

As mentioned, Couto has defined the general view of forgiveness as follows: „To forgive a wrongdoer for his wrongdoing: to overcome the negative reactive attitudes towards the wrongdoer that this wrongdoing warrants, while still holding the wrongdoer responsible for his wrongdoing‟.

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13 In this section I will discuss the different characterisations of the negative reactive attitudes that forgiveness overcomes. For the sake of clarity I will decide at the end of this section how to further refer to negative reactive attitudes warranted by wrongdoing. As I have explained, Butler regards „deliberate resentment‟ as a response to injustice. It is this deliberate resentment that forgiveness overcomes. The other kind of resentment, „hasty resentment‟, is not really related to forgiveness, because it is more of a „fight‟ response. For example, I can feel resentment towards my computer when it does not work properly, but this is just a „hasty‟ kind of resentment that does not have anything to do with injustice. I am not wronged in the moral sense if my computer does not work;1

therefore there is no need for forgiveness. Although Butler‟s view on forgiveness is often summarised as „the overcoming of resentment‟, this is only correct if resentment refers to deliberate resentment, since this is the resentment that is warranted by wrongdoing as opposed to all injury, whether it be moral or not.

In addition, Butler stresses that a desire for revenge is characteristic for resentment. Jeffrie Murphy stresses this as well in this book Getting even: forgiveness and its limits (2005), although he labels the negative reactive attitudes that wrongdoing warrants as „vindictive passions‟, of which resentment is one (Murphy, 2005, p. 16). According to Murphy, resentment is the passion that defends someone‟s self-respect. In his line of reasoning, morality is not just something to believe, it is something to care about. This caring includes concern about those who are the proper objects of moral attention, including oneself (Murphy, 2005, p. 19).

Pamela Hieronymi formulates a similar view to Murphy in „Articulating an Uncompromising Forgiveness‟ (2001). Hieronymi sees resentment as a form of protest. When a victim resents his wrongdoer, he is angry at his wrongdoer, according to Hieronymi. However, in contrast with Butler, Hieronymi states that if a victim resents his wrongdoer, this does not necessarily mean he wants his wrongdoer to suffer. It might even be the case that the victim feels a lot of compassion towards the wrongdoer and therefore feels bad about the pain and havoc the misdeed is bringing into the life of the wrongdoer (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 541). Such compassion for the suffering of the wrongdoer is very well compatible with resenting him, according to Hieronymi. Compassion for and anger against are not exclusive of each other. So while Hieronymi

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does believe that resentment is an important expression of self-respect, as Butler and Murphy do, her account differs from theirs with respect to her claim that vindictiveness is not at all a necessary part of resentment.

Let us take a closer look at the kind of protest that the victim holds against his wrongdoer. According to Hieronymi, resentment is a protest against a past action that persists as a present threat. She argues, for example, that if, someone does a certain action X that wrongs Koos, with this action X, the wrongdoer in fact makes the claim it is acceptable to treat Koos wrongfully. For example, if someone steals something from Koos, this person claims it is acceptable to steal from him; if someone lies to Koos, this person claims it is acceptable to withhold the truth from him. The object of protest that resentment is, is precisely this claim of acceptability. This claim persists as a present threat, because the person who made the claim was authored to make moral claims. This is why we rarely feel resentment towards the mentally disabled or towards children: they are not authored to make moral claims. Note that, according to Hieronymi, resentment is actually never directly felt towards someone. The resentment someone feels after he is wronged is not aimed at the wrongdoer, but towards the claim that he has made (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 547).

In my opinion, Hieronymi‟s definition of resentment is problematic because „protest against a current threat‟ is mostly forward-looking, aimed at the prevention of future wrongdoings. Such a definition cannot be accurate however, because it contradicts the typical backward-looking aspect of resentment, which is that resentment seeks justice for past events (Hallich, 2013, p. 1010). Justice seeking that is backward-looking is not necessarily aimed at preventing wrongs in the future, but at restoring justice. I will further elaborate on this in section 1.4.3b.

Although Hieronymi does imagine a general account of forgiveness to be addressing the wide range of "feeling hurt" in response to a wrong, her account is restricted to resentment (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 529). According to Norvin Richards in „Forgiveness‟ (1988), it is problematic to understand forgiveness merely as the overcoming of resentment, since the negative reactive attitudes warranted by wrongdoing do not necessarily consist of resentment (Richards, 1988, pp. 77-78). For example, if one is wronged, instead of resentment, one could also feel contemptuous of the wrongdoer, saddened by human vices or disappointed about having to give up one‟s good opinion of

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15 the wrongdoer (Kekes, 2009, p. 491). According to Richards, the abandonment of all such emotions should count as forgiveness.

I am inclined to say that all negative emotions that follow from blaming someone for the wrong he has done to you are resentful emotions. For example, if a father finds out his son has stolen from him, it would not strike us as odd if he would state that he does not feel angry, but merely disappointed. It could also very well be that he does not feel the urge to punish his son. However, if the father feels disappointment towards his son, as a consequence, something in their relationship changes: he might experience more distance from his son, or he might look at him with less respect. In any case, for the father, some displeasure has blemished his relationship with his son. I therefore consider it accurate to say the father has started resenting his son. For this reason, I believe „resentment‟ is a very suitable umbrella term for all „negative reactive attitudes‟ that are warranted by wrongdoing. This means that resentment can express itself in feelings of disappointment, sadness, anger, hurt or vindictiveness. It does not mean that all anger is resentful, but merely that all anger that is warranted by wrongdoing is resentful anger. In using such a broad interpretation of resentment, there is no problem in defining forgiveness as the overcoming of resentment. Thus, in the remainder of this thesis, I will define forgiveness as such. In the next section, I will discuss possible reasons to forgive. 1.4 Possible reasons to forgive

In philosophy, the standard view of forgiveness holds that forgiveness is only possible if there is something to forgive, that is, if an offender is blameworthy for his wrongdoing (Hallich, 2013, p. 999). This standard view of forgiveness is also called „uncompromising forgiveness‟ (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 531). Forgiveness is uncompromising if the forgiver does not compromise his initial judgment of blame. However, unlike forgetting, forgiving is tied to reasons. This means that the forgiver should have some sort of reasonably formed judgment from which it follows that forgiveness of the offender is appropriate. According to Oliver Hallich in „Can the Paradox of Forgiveness Be Dissolved?‟ any uncompromising account of forgiveness faces a difficult challenge, since such an account of forgiveness gives rise to a paradox (Hallich, 2013, p. 999). As mentioned above, forgiveness is tied to reasons. If an offender is culpable for his wrongdoing however, it seems justified and appropriate to resent him for it. From this it follows that if someone is culpable for his wrongdoing, there is no reason to forgive him.

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According to Hallich, there are different options for solving this paradox. First, one can argue there are moral reasons that render it mandatory for someone to forgive the offender. Second, there might be prudential reasons for forgiveness. Third, there may be moral reasons that pertain to the character of the forgiver and that favour forgiveness without making it morally mandatory.

1.4.1 Reasons that generate a moral duty to forgive

Let me start by discussing the first option. As Hallich suggests, there are four reasons that might generate a duty to forgive: (i) the time factor, (ii) the distinction between act and agent, (iii) the wrongdoer‟s repentance, and (iv) a change of identity on the part of the wrongdoer. I will discuss all four reasons below.

The first possible reason is that if a certain amount of time has passed after the wrongdoing took place, it is appropriate to forgive. Hallich refutes this argument. He acknowledges it is true that the passing of time can alter the state of affairs. This altering might make forgiveness morally obligatory. The passing of time itself, however, does not generate such a duty (Hallich, 2013, pp. 1002-1003). I agree with Hallich on this point, because the mere fact that time has passed does not change the judgements on which the initial blame is based. Therefore, this cannot be a valid reason.

The second possible reason is that forgiveness is morally demanded, because the wrongdoer should never be identified with the act of wrongdoing. In line with this, the Augustinian proverb goes that we should “hate the sin but love the sinner”. According to Hallich, it is inconsistent to ascribe responsibility to a person for a certain act X, while at the same time claiming that the moral judgment of event X should not affect the moral judgment of the agent. I agree with this. If it is true that people are responsible for their actions, they should be judged according to these actions (Hallich, 2013, pp. 1004-1005). This argument in favour of forgiveness is not only refuted by Hallich, but also by John Kekes in „Blame versus Forgiveness‟ (2009). Kekes refutes this argument on the grounds that if someone is blameworthy for his sin, it is not possible to separate the sinner from the sin. People who typically lie are liars, or should be considered liars, and therefore deserve to be resented (Kekes, 2009, p. 494). I will discuss Kekes‟ position in more detail below.

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17 The third possible reason in favour of forgiveness is that we ought to forgive, because the wrongdoer has apologized for the wrongful act. This is a view commonly held among philosophers as well as in popular consciousness.

Both Kekes and Hallich point out that even though repentance can change an offender, it does not erase the wrongful act he committed. To put it otherwise: “The remorseful rapist does not, because he is remorseful, ceases to be the person who committed the rape” (Hallich, 2013, p. 1005). I agree that an apology in itself can never be a valid moral reason to forgive. However, I recognize that repentance has an important role in forgiving an offender. Further along in this thesis I will discuss the role of apology and repentance more extensively.

The fourth reason in favour of forgiveness that Hallich discusses is a change of identity on the part of the wrongdoer. Consider the case in which the wrongdoer changed so much that he can no longer be considered the same person as the one who committed the wrongful act. Take for example an abusive father who neglected and assaulted his child. One day he breaks down, because he realizes that he can no longer live his life the way he did and he starts to reorganise his life. For example, he goes on a retreat and he starts with intensive therapy. After two years, he has become, what you would call, „a different man‟. He no longer suffers from uncontrollable anger and has turned into a loving and caring person for the people around him. We could say that his identity is no longer the same as when he committed the wrongful acts towards his child. If we presuppose that such a change of identity is possible, it is indeed so that the victim, the child in this case, should not feel resentment against the person who wronged him (or more correctly: whose past identity wronged him). For the child, it is probably hard to feel resentment against the man who is now his father, since he does not recognize his wrongdoer in this new person. Thus, the person who committed the wrongful act ceased to exist. Therefore, the victim does not forgive his wrongdoer; he only regards the person who once committed the wrongful act as a different person.

It thus seems that all four reasons that can lead to a duty to forgive are invalid. However, Hallich argues that there are prudential reasons for forgiveness and moral reasons that pertain to the character of the forgiver and that favour forgiveness without making it morally mandatory (Hallich, 2013, pp. 1008-1012).

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1.4.2 Prudential reasons for forgiveness

Prudential reasons to forgive can be reasons that are non-moral, but have other benefits for the victim. A prudential reason can be, for example, that the victim suffers from a lot of stress due to the negative feelings that result from resentment and therefore decides to forgive the offender. Forgiving can help the victim to feel better. Hallich suggest that we can therefore interpret the question “Ought I to forgive?” in a non-moral sense (Hallich, 2013, p. 1008).

I see an important difficulty with this solution. It is possible for a victim to act, whether for moral or for prudential considerations, as if he has forgiven his wrongdoer. This does not mean he has forgiven his wrongdoer. Forgiving is different from acting as if someone is forgiven: whether a victim has forgiven his wrongdoer depends on the internal process of the victim. In both the prudential and the non-obligatory moral case, the motivation to forgive comes purely from the interest of the victim. Someone can have the desire to get rid of his feelings of resentment, because they increase his levels of stress and anxiety or because they have a negative effect on his moral character. Forgiveness stops feelings of resentment. However, the fact that we want to get rid of feelings of resentment does not make them stop. Feelings are not under our direct volitional control and can therefore not be stopped simply because we are bothered by them or because we become morally better persons by not having them. Suppose for example my partner is angry at her mother, because her mother threw her favourite sweater away. I want to comfort my partner and tell her that she should forgive her mother because that will make her feel better. While this is of course true, this is a useless advice, since my partner cannot force herself to forgive her mother. She believes that her mother is blameworthy for the act of throwing away her sweater and she, like most persons, cannot force herself into not believing this. What is more, even if she could do that, my partner would change her beliefs for the wrong kind of reasons (Darwall, 2006, pp. 14-15). She would change her belief for pragmatic reasons instead of changing them based on her judgment of what is true.

For the sake of Hallich‟s argument though, let us imagine someone who is indeed able to stop his feelings of resentment, only for the reason that he believes it will decrease his levels of stress and that it will have a positive effect on his moral character. I would argue that this way of decreasing feelings of resentment does not count as forgiving. Likewise it would not count as forgiveness if someone would take a specially-designed pill that

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19 makes him get rid of his resentment. Genuine forgiveness must involve some revision in the initial judgment or change in view (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 530). If someone could find a way to manipulate himself out of his feelings of resentment it would not count as forgiveness. Resentment has a justification, which is a judgment of blame. Therefore, true forgiveness holds that the victim changes his relation to this judgment of blame. Hieronymi‟s account of forgiveness gives an analysis of how the victim‟s judgment about the wrongdoer changes. She gives valid reasons why we should feel differently about the wrongdoer after he has apologized, namely because his past actions no longer form a current threat. Although I believe that Hieronymi‟s theory has some serious flaws, I do consider it admirable that she provides a thorough analysis of how the attitude of the victim towards his wrongdoer has changed. I will discuss Hieronymi‟s account more thoroughly below.

1.4.3 Reasons that make it morally admirable to forgive

Finally, Hallich proposes moral reasons that pertain to the character of the forgiver and that favour forgiveness without making it morally mandatory. In this context, saying that someone „ought‟ to forgive in a certain situation does not mean there is a moral duty to forgive, but rather that if one does not forgive in this particular situation, one exhibits a negative character trait (Hallich, 2013, p. 1012).

Hallich argues there can be certain circumstances in which it is admirable to forgive, that is, when in these circumstances, the forgiver exhibits an effort of will (p. 1013). As an example he illustrates the situation of a mother whose daughter has been raped and murdered. The perpetrator, after being imprisoned, becomes repentant. On his deathbed, he asks the mother for forgiveness. After careful reflection and against inner resistances, the mother decides to forgive the wrongdoer. In doing so, the mother “gives testimony of her ability to control her passions and her willingness not to let them dominate her life” (p. 1014). According to Hallich, this example shows there is a solution to the paradox: even though there is no moral duty to forgive, there are situations in which it is morally admirable to forgive.

However, what Hallich does not seem to realise, is that this apparent solution is actually a new way of describing the paradox. While it does seem morally praiseworthy that the mother forgives the perpetrator, Hallich fails to make clear why she does so. If the mother has a reason to justifiably blame the perpetrator, what makes her change her view? Does she forgive him because he got the punishment he deserved? If that would be

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the case, she would not actually be forgiving him, as I explained in section 1.2.5. Does the mother forgive him because of the time factor? Not only is it impossible for the time factor to generate a duty to forgive, I also cannot see how it generates a reason to forgive. If she forgives him, because she does not want feelings of resentment to control her life, this would be a prudential reason, which is, as I have said in section 1.4.2, a wrong kind of reason. Thus, there seems to be no reason for the mother to forgive the perpetrator. The only thing that Hallich shows with his apparent „solution‟, is that forgiveness seems to be praiseworthy in some situations. However, this was already clear. There would not have been a paradox in the first place, if forgiveness would not have appeared praiseworthy. The hiatus in Hallich‟s argument is due to the lack of discussion of what kind of reasons should override justified and reasonable blame. An effort of will in itself does not lead to a change of view, just as the changing of time in itself does not lead to a change of view. There must be something about the circumstances which makes it morally admirable to forgive and which also generates a reason that causes a change in view. There are philosophers who did try to articulate the change of view that forgiveness is. Contrary to Hallich, they might have truly solved the paradox. I will discuss their solutions below.

1.4.3a Forgiveness out of compassion

A philosopher who argues that forgiveness can never be just an effort of will is David Novitz. He argues that forgiveness can never be a simple action, because we can never just decide to stop feeling resentful. He thus sees forgiveness as a task (Novitz, 1998, p. 308). According to Novitz, to forgive is to practise seeing things from the point of view of the offender. This makes forgiveness a sign of compassion and understanding. As Novitz argues, there is an important truth in the saying „to understand all is to forgive all‟ (p. 309). Really understanding the point of view of the offender makes a change of view possible and it is this change in view that constitutes forgiveness. In my view, this is also not a sufficient solution to the paradox, as Hieronymi has explained adequately. Hieronymi argues that understanding or empathy cannot be the sole reasons to forgive someone. As she claims, it is even the case that understanding the wrongdoer is necessary for resentment. She explains that if one says he understands an action, at a minimum, he marks this action as intelligible. This entails that he can ascribe reasons for this action, as opposed to seeing it as a spasm. In order to be offended, someone must both understand and protest the reasons that motivated the action that offended him,

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21 since it does not make sense to be offended by a spasm. An empathic understanding of the point of view of the offender should not erase the anger of the offended, unless the offended forgets his own point of view. If someone forgets or overrides his own point of view and therefore gets rid of his resentment, he does not forgive the offender, but suffers from a low self-esteem.

However, Hieronymi does acknowledge that empathic understanding can lead to compassion, which, in turn, can lead to a kind of „readiness-to-forgive‟. Compassion itself does not lead to a change of judgement that leads to uncompromising forgiveness, but it can make a person willing to revise his judgement. This means that although she disagrees with Novitz, they both recognize the importance of compassion. In the next section, I will discuss forgiveness after the wrongdoer has apologized.

1.4.3b Forgiveness after an apology

A revision of judgment may happen after a wrongdoer has apologized. Hieronymi argues that an apology from the wrongdoer is a valid reason for forgiveness. Her analysis is admirable, because she clearly explains, in contrast with theories from other philosophers regarding this issue, what happens with the attitude that the victim has towards her wrongdoer. I will explain her argument first, and then I will discuss its problems. As I have already explained in section 1.3, Hieronymi has a specific understanding of resentment, namely that resentment is a form of protest. According to this definition of resentment, the reason a victim feels resentment towards a wrongdoer is that the wrongful act poses a current threat towards the victim. According to Hieronymi, when someone‟s act wrongs you, they implicitly claim that you deserve to be wronged. It is this implicit claim the victim protests against, that is, any victim that has any self-worth. Their protest would then take the form of resentment. When a wrongdoer apologizes, he recognizes that his behaviour was unacceptable. This means that his past wrongful actions are no longer a threat to the victim. The victim can therefore let go of his resentment and forgive the offender. Hieronymi mentions that continued resentment after an apology of the wrongdoer is a sign of smallness of character (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 548).

If Hieronymi is right in claiming that an apology should lead to forgiveness, it follows that the only reason we feel resentment is to protest against a current threat. To me, this definition of resentment is problematic, because it is not clear why this form of protest arises only if the wrongdoer is blameworthy. One can also protest an action without

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seeing the actor as blameworthy for this action. I will give an example of this below. The essential point of resentment, that Hieronymi seems to disregard in her understanding of resentment, is that it is based on blameworthiness, which in turn is based on moral responsibility. While Hieronymi emphasizes the importance of an uncompromising account of forgiveness, one in which the forgiver holds on to a judgment of guilt, Hieronymi, with her definition of resentment, unwillingly disconnects resentment from blameworthiness. To be more specific, for an account of forgiveness to be uncompromising, one of the conditions it should satisfy is the judgment that “the wrongdoer is a legitimate member of the moral community who can be expected not to do such things. As such, she is someone to be held responsible and she is worth being upset by.” (Hieronymi, 2001, p. 530). If Hieronymi‟s account wants to satisfy this condition, it must be the case that while forgiveness does not compromise this judgment, forgiveness should eliminate a feeling that arises from such a judgment, otherwise it is not clear why such a judgment is needed. Therefore, it must be the case that the resentment that forgiveness overcomes only applies to cases in which the wrongdoer is indeed such a legitimate member of the moral community. However, when Hieronymi defines resentment as „protest against a threat that is formed by a past action‟, resentment seems to become no longer exclusive for cases in which the wrongdoer is blameworthy. Consider the following example: a 4-year old child lies to his parents. Lying is not morally permissible, and through the lying the child poses a threat towards the parents, because the child believes it is acceptable to withhold the truth from them. Therefore, the parents will most likely protest against this and take some form of didactic action. It appears to be the case that this form of protest fits Hieronymi‟s definition of resentment. However, if the parents are reasonable adults, they will not hold the child morally responsible for his actions because of his age. It thus seems that Hieronymi‟s account of forgiveness can also apply in cases of non-culpable wrongdoing. So here Hieronymi‟s theory gives rise to a new contradiction: while the analysis she gives for forgiveness leaves the blameworthiness of wrongdoer intact, her account can also apply to cases in which the wrongdoer is not blameworthy.

Hieronymi will probably reply to my objection something like the following. Consider again the example of the child lying to his parents. While the child indeed makes the claim it is acceptable to withhold the truth from her parents, we can speculate about the character of this claim. In alignment with Hieronymi‟s analysis of resentment, the claim of the lying is a threat to her parents, as I already mentioned: if their child continues to

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23 believe it is acceptable to lie, it will undermine the authority of the parents. However, it might be the case that we should not take this claim too seriously, Hieronymi might argue, since it is not a valid moral claim. After all, the child cannot be morally responsible for what she does. The appropriate protest of the parents against this claim therefore has a different character than the kind of protest against a valid moral claim. The parents do protest against a claim made by a past action that poses a current threat, however, this protest should not be considered as resentment. It is therefore possible to „rescue‟ Hieronymi‟s account by defining resentment as a form of protest against a moral claim that is made by someone with moral authority.

Yet another problem with Hieronymi‟s definition of resentment still remains. If resentment should be considered as a kind of protest, we cannot clarify other emotions that arise when someone is a victim of culpable wrongdoing. There are many cases in which there is no need for protest and victims have an attitude against their wrongdoer that I would characterize as resentful. Take for example cases in which the offender moves to another country or dies. In those cases it is not clear why the victim should stop feeling resentful against their offender. There are many emotions in play when victims ascribe blame to their wrongdoer and I think protest clarifies only a part of these feelings. Consider Tim, for example, whose only daughter is murdered by Carl. Now in such cases it is hard to imagine that the resentment that Tim feels consists of protest alone. Moreover, it seems very likely that Tim feels very resentful (in forms of hatred, vindictiveness and anger) against Carl, while there does not seem to be much reason for protest in Hieronymi‟s interpretation of protest, in the sense that Carl‟s action poses a current threat. Indeed it is the case that Carl made the claim that it is acceptable to murder Tim‟s daughter, but I do not see how this claim forms a current threat. First, this claim is not a threat because Carl can obviously not murder Tim‟s daughter a second time, since Tim no longer has a daughter. Second, Carl is probably imprisoned. Third, this claim is not really a threat, because the moral wrongness of the murdering of daughters is not up for debate. It is very unlikely that because of Carl‟s behaviour someone will think it is acceptable to treat Tim‟s family members this way or that Tim will lose respect. Rather, I believe that the feelings of resentment that Tim feels include to some extent the desire that Carl suffers, as a form of punishment.

I think that in essence, Hieronymi‟s definition of resentment is problematic, because she disregards the backward-looking aspect of resentment. I am of the opinion that

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resentment consists of „justice-seeking-emotions‟ (Hallich, 2013, p. 1010). This means that resentment is focussed on past deeds and based on the assumption that the offender is to be held responsible for what he did. Protest against a current threat however is more forward looking. It aims the prevention of future wrongdoings. When reacting to instances of wrongdoing, we can aim at minimizing future wrongs without holding the wrongdoer personally responsible. We can protest without really feeling resentful and we can feel resentful without the need for protest.

Thus, it seems to me that a current threat is neither necessary, as we saw in the example of Tim and Carl, nor sufficient, as the example of the 4-year old showed, to feel resentment. As a result, Hieronymi‟s account cannot give a moral reason to forgive after an apology.

From the analyses above it follows that the paradox of forgiveness is still unresolved. I believe that there are two solutions to this problem. One solution is proposed by Kekes and entails that in order to resolve the paradox we should recognize and admit that seeing forgiveness as a moral good is actually a contradiction. Kekes holds that “when blaming wrongdoers is reasonable, there is no reason to forgive them; and when blaming them is unreasonable, there is nothing to forgive” (Blame versus Forgiveness, 2009, p. 488). For this reason Kekes rejects the idea that forgiveness is a moral good.

I would like to propose a second solution, which is to redefine the definition of forgiveness and to let go of the condition that forgiveness should be uncompromising. Philosopher Patrick Boleyn-Fitzgerald has already argued for a broader interpretation of forgiveness, arguing for revision of the common presupposition that forgiveness should not compromise the moral blameworthiness of the wrongdoer. I would like to go one step futher and argue that in fact, genuine forgiveness needs to be compromising. I will outline this vision in chapter 2.

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Chapter 2. An alternative account for forgiveness

In the previous chapter I have taken for granted that forgiveness needs to be uncompromising. This means that forgiveness is only possible in cases of responsible wrongdoings. Genuine forgiveness should, in order to be uncompromising, leave the blameworthiness of the offender intact. The reason I took the uncompromising aspect of forgiveness for granted, is that it is commonly agreed upon among many contemporary philosophers, such as Pamela Hieronymi (2001), David Novitz (1998), Paul Hughes (2015), Aurel Kolnai (1973), Oliver Hallich (2013), John Kekes (2009), Chesire Calhoun (1992) and Norvin Richards (1988).

We have seen however that this account leads to a contradiction: if blame is reasonable and justified there seems no reason to forgive. In this chapter I will question further conditions for an uncompromising account of forgiveness and I will present an alternative: a compromising account. First, I want to question the need for an uncompromising account by constructing some arguments that Patrick Boleyn-Fitzgerald presented in his article „What Should “Forgiveness” Mean?‟ (2002).

2.1 What should forgiveness mean?

Generally, when a philosophical theory is developed to describe a certain concept, there could be two possible purposes. First, the philosophical theory could be aimed at describing a concept such that the description grasps the meaning of that concept in popular use. In this case, the philosophical theory has a descriptive aim. Second, it could be that the philosophical theory does not really grasp the meaning in popular use of a certain concept, but that it describes what the meaning of the concept should be. In that case, the philosophical theory has a normative aim.

So there can be two reasons to render it necessary for a philosophical theory of forgiveness to describe genuine forgiveness as uncompromising. I would like to discuss both of these possibilities below.

The first possible reason is that a proper philosophical account of forgiveness should describe forgiveness as uncompromising, because forgiveness is indeed uncompromising in common use. I would like to argue that this is not true. An example to support this claim is that Murphy corrected Jesus and claimed that the saying „Forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing‟ actually should be „Excuse them, for they do not know what they are doing (Luke 23:34)‟, since Jesus gives a reason, namely ignorance, that his

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perpetrators were not really culpable for what they did (Boleyn-Fitzgerald, 2002, p. 487). According to Murphy, Jesus did not use the concept of forgiveness properly. Of course, as Boleyn-Fitzgerald noticed, Luke 23:34 could also be an indication that the meaning of the popular use of forgiveness does not correspond with the philosophical meaning of forgiveness. We can find more indications of the inconsistency between the meaning in popular use of forgiveness and the philosophical meaning of forgiveness in a dictionary. For example, Dictionary.com presents the following definition for „to excuse‟: “verb (used with object), excused, excusing. 1. to regard or judge with forgiveness or indulgence; pardon or forgive; overlook (a fault, error, etc.)”2_{similar to the Cambridge} dictionary: “excuse  verb  to forgive someone”.3_{Both dictionary definitions claim that}

forgiving is similar to excusing, which is in opposition to the general philosophical theories, as I have shown in section 1.2. Contemporary philosophers insist on defining forgiveness as uncompromising, but we see that the common use of forgiveness is not necessarily uncompromising, since excusing is compromising, and it is used interchangeably with forgiveness. I will give more examples in this chapter that support this claim. I think it is thus not very likely that contemporary philosophers aim to describe the current practice of forgiveness when defining forgiveness as uncompromising, for if that were the case, they are doing a very poor job. I therefore want to consider a second possible reason for defining forgiveness as uncompromising: making a normative claim.

It is possible that the popular use of forgiveness is, indeed, not necessarily uncompromising, but that it should be. One argument in favour of this would be to say that uncompromising forgiveness offers a clear distinction between different concepts such as forgiving, excusing, forgetting, condoning etc. This clarity can benefit discussions and debates about forgiveness.

However, if philosophy is concerned with the normative claims that an account of forgiveness makes, it should also be concerned with other practical implications that an account of (uncompromising) forgiveness has on society. It seems implausible that philosophy should only be concerned with normative claims that aim at clarifying concepts and not with other normative claims. Therefore, philosophy should also be concerned with the question of whether understanding forgiveness as uncompromising

2_{http://www.dictionary.com/browse/excuse?s=t}_{, visited August 27, 2016.}

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27 has any tragic consequences in society in comparison to understanding forgiveness as not necessarily uncompromising (Boleyn-Fitzgerald, 2002, p. 489).

In order to see what the consequences of uncompromising forgiveness are, we should investigate what kind of forgiveness an uncompromising understanding of forgiveness would constitute in reality. According to Boleyn-Fitzgerald, an uncompromising account of forgiveness makes agents less likely to forgive. Even if they forgive, uncompromising forgiveness encourages agents to “overcome anger in ways that are arrogant, insulting, or unjust, and encourages a fetishistic concern for the causes of our virtue” (p. 450). First I would like to explain why an uncompromising account of forgiveness makes agents less likely to forgive. Consider the following example: Anne is angry with her friend Kjettil, because he has stolen 20 euros from her. Anne has an understanding of forgiveness the way contemporary philosophy describes, namely as uncompromising. Anne asks herself: „Should I forgive Kjettil?‟ Anne is not sure if she is able to forgive Kjettil. She knows that for uncompromising forgiveness, the offence that Kjettil made should neither be excusable nor justifiable. So she asks herself: „Was Kjettil justified?‟ and „Did he have an excuse?‟ Since Anne is angry, it is very likely that she will answer these questions with „no‟. Since she already resents him, she already believes he is blameworthy. So when Anne asks whether Kjettil was excused, she sees very easily how he could have handled differently. She could be thinking for instance „He could have just asked me to lend him the money‟. Thus, when asking herself whether Kjettil was excused or justified, Anne will probably resent Kjettil more, because she reminds herself why Kjettil did not have an excuse and why he was not justified. When Anne asks herself whether she can forgive Kjettil (in the uncompromising way), she will probably become less likely to forgive him, as Boylen-Fitzgerald points out: “rehearsing the reasons to be angry often prolongs and intensifies anger” (2002, p. 492). This intensified anger can potentially cause permanent damage to Anne and Kjettil‟s relation, and it can even be bad for Anne‟s health.

Even if Anne wants to forgive Kjettil after she has decided that Kjettil was neither justified nor excused when he committed the injury, this uncompromising forgiveness can have some negative consequences. Imagine that Kjettil apologises to Anne. His apologies seem sincere and since Anne has read Hieronymi, she believes that forgiving after a sincere apology is morally admirable. If Anne, in this scenario, would forgive Kjettil, it would be a very arrogant way of forgiving. Since Anne established that Kjettil was fully culpable for his wrongdoing, nothing seems to indicate that he deserves to be

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forgiven. Although it is morally admirable to forgive Kjettil, it is not something that is owed to him; it will just be a sign of the good moral character of Anne. Letting go of her anger will be quite difficult, since Anne reminded herself why she was right in feeling angry. If Anne somehow still manages to let go of her anger, she will probably forgive out of some sort of self-righteousness, still seeing Kjettil as having a lower moral status. In my view, believing that someone has a lower moral status than you is also a form of resentment. This kind of resentment can still stand in the way of a harmonious, respectful relationship between Anne en Kjettil, and I consider this to be a negative moral consequence. For this reason, I believe that uncompromising forgiveness does not work. If the victim still sees the perpetrator as fully culpable for the wrong, it might be the case that her anger goes away, but I cannot see how her resentment will have disappeared completely. I imagine there will still be some sort of resentment because Anne sees Kjettil as having lower moral status or believes that he owes her his gratitude in exchange for her forgiveness. In chapter one, I have argued that uncompromising forgiveness leads to a contradiction. In the case of Anne and Kjettil, we see that if someone holds on to uncompromising forgiveness anyhow, it becomes a very arrogant form of forgiveness, which never really works, since there will still be some resentment. I therefore do not think that an uncompromising account of forgiveness has attractive moral consequences.

One might argue that forgiveness does not need to dissolve all anger because one can never know if negative feelings will come back (Norlock, p. 12). Of course, with every form of forgiveness, it is the case that old memories, regrets, and new interpretations of old wrongs can intrude and bring back resentment. However, my point here is that an account of uncompromising forgiveness makes it very likely that not all the resentment has disappeared because of its arrogant character. If there are alternative accounts that increase the likelihood of the complete disappearance of resentment, then those accounts would have an advantage over the uncompromising account. In this section I have argued that an uncompromising account of forgiveness does not give an accurate description of popular use, nor does it give a proper normative account of what forgiveness should mean. Uncompromising forgiveness also leads to a contradiction, as I have shown in chapter one. There do not seem to be very good reasons left to hold on to an uncompromising account of forgiveness. Therefore I propose to

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29 redefine the philosophical meaning of forgiveness and develop a compromising account of forgiveness.

2.2 Forgiving as excusing because of ignorance

In the documentary „What Our Fathers Did: A Nazi Legacy‟, the Jewish human rights laywer Philippe Sands interviews Niklas Frank, son of Nazi war criminal Hans Frank, about the actions of Frank‟s father. Consider the following quote of Niklas Frank: “I could not forgive him. He was brought up as a catholic and he studied law in the Weimar Democracy. So, he knew by heart what is right and what is wrong. And he went on and on till the gallows. Because I think he was too much of a coward. He knew that he was committing crimes and he never had the bravery to say: „Okay mister Hitler, that‟s it‟.” (Frank, 2015)

In my opinion, this quote captures quite accurately what someone needs to be able to genuinely forgive. In the above example Frank expresses that he could not forgive his father, because he believes that his father knew what was right and wrong. In Niklas Frank‟s view, Hans Frank was completely aware of what he was doing and could have spoken up to his superiors. Therefore, he is completely blameworthy. In contrast to what the idea of „uncompromising forgiveness‟ proclaims, this blameworthiness makes the actions of Hans Frank unforgivable, according to Niklas Frank. In order to forgive his father, Niklas Frank needs a reason to compromise the blameworthiness of his father. Something that would compromise this blameworthiness would for instance be a kind of not-knowing. Since Niklas Frank cannot find such a reason, he is unable to forgive his father.

So we see that Niklas Frank wants to forgive in a compromising way. In 2.1 I have argued that in common use, forgiveness is often seen as compromising and as exchangeable with excusing. My account of forgiveness is not incompatible with this, in fact, it claims that forgiving is a form of excusing. In that sense, my account is a descriptive one. It also also has some normative aspects. I hope to create an account of forgiveness that has positive consequences if everyone would accept it, one that encourages people to forgive in a self-respecting, loving and humble way. I recognize that in common use there are cases in which forgiveness is seen as uncompromising. As I have argued, I believe understanding forgiveness as uncompromising tends to be discouraging towards forgiveness and can lead to an arrogant form of forgiveness. Since I wish to create an account that encourages

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genuine forgiveness, I will exclude uncompromising forgiveness from my understanding of forgiveness. By defining forgiveness solely as compromising forgiveness, my normative aims override my descriptive ones. In chapter 1 I have also argued why an uncompromising account of forgiveness leads to a contradiction, which is a problem in itself. A compromising account would not have this problem.

Now consider a fictive example in which someone is able to forgive. Lissa is a candidate for an important promotion that is coming up at her work. She really wants this promotion and has worked very hard over the last couple of years to show her boss what she is capable of, in order to increase her chances of getting promoted. However, there is another colleague, Sarah, who is also aiming for the same promotion and, as Lissa knows, is a very suited candidate. Unfortunately for Lissa, Sarah gets the promotion. One week later, Lissa finds out that Sarah has been spreading bad rumours about her and that she even manipulated Lissa‟s work to make it look bad. Lissa is devastated and feels deeply enraged. Because she does not see any growth opportunities at her current job and because she does not want to work with Sarah any longer, she decides to resign. One year later, Lissa receives a message from Sarah. Sarah tells her that she is very sorry about what she did. She wants to apologise and, if Lissa is open to it, she wants to explain herself. While Lissa still resents Sarah, she does agree to a meeting. During their meeting Sarah tells Lissa she feels really sorry about what she did. She explains that she was blinded by her desire to get the promotion. She felt entitled to the promotion and this led her to the belief it was acceptable to sabotage the process. When Lissa hears this, she is able relax a little more. They talk further and Sarah explains how she struggled with the need to achieve. She shares how she has done a lot of introspection in the past year, and that she has found out she has always tried to boost her self-worth with her achievements. When Lissa arrives home she realises that she no longer feels any resentment towards Sarah: she has forgiven her.

So what has happened exactly? When Sarah told Lissa how blinded she was by her need to achieve, Lissa realised that Sarah might not be fully culpable for her wrongdoing. Although Sarah knew what she did was wrong, her obsessive need for success made her believe that, all things considered, sabotaging Lissa‟s work was acceptable. Now that Lissa realises this, she can no longer believe it was reasonable to expect that Sarah would not have manipulated the process. Lissa has come to see that Sarah, at the time they worked together, was unable to reflect on her behaviour and her motives. In realising

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31 this, it becomes difficult for Lissa to still hold Sarah culpable. This is, what I believe, true forgiveness: seeing that what you thought were reasonable moral expectations might have been not reasonable. Saying this does of course in no way justify Sarah‟s behaviour; it might not even be excused. I would say that Lissa realised that Sarah might have been excused and therefore that her judgment of blame was not justified. For Lissa to be able to forgive Sarah, it is not necessary to establishes that Sarah is innocent, Lissa can just realise she does not know if Sarah is blameworthy, because she cannot know whether her moral expectations of Sarah were reasonable. So instead of asking whether Sarah was justified, Lissa starts to question her own justifications for her judgment of blame. Since she realises her judgments were not as justified as she had always believed them to be, Lissa draws back her judgment that Sarah is blameworthy. Compromising forgiveness consists in going from judging the wrongdoer to not judging the wrongdoer. Of course, the wrongfulness of the action can still be judged. Compromising forgiveness can very well propagate to “hate the sin but love the sinner”.

One might wonder then what exactly makes the action wrong if the wrongdoer is excused. I believe that my account of forgiveness does not require holding on to a certain moral theory about what makes something a morally wrong action. From a consequentialist point of view, Sarah‟s action is wrong because it has negative consequences, namely that someone suited for the promotion did not get it. Yet one does not have to be a consequentialist to accept my theory. It could also be that someone believes that the intentions of the person are crucial for determining whether his action is wrong. In the case of Sarah, we can say her intentions where wrong because they were selfish and ignorant of Lissa‟s interests. However, although this makes the action wrong, it can still excuse Sarah as a person, because at the time of the incident Sarah was unable to recognize her intentions as inherently selfish. If she would have recognized her intentions as such, she might not have committed the wrongful act. Therefore, we can say that someone having wrong intentions can cause that person to act wrongfully, but that does not mean this person is also culpable for these intentions.

In the previous example, it seems Lissa needed an apology from Sarah before she was able to forgive her. An apology is not necessary for forgiveness, however. We can also conceive of a situation in which Lissa goes through an experience which makes her realize her judgment of blame was not justified. This experience does not even need to involve Sarah. For example, if Lissa were to engage in a lot of introspection which leads

Revising the judgment of blame

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1. Forgiveness: a paradox or a contradiction?

Chapter 2. An alternative account for forgiveness