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Haleh Liza Gafori

in Love and Forgiveness for a More Just World

A poem by Haleh Liza Gafori that criticizes the language of the so-called War on Teror.

What Love Knows

Jean-Luc Marion

in Love and Forgiveness for a More Just World

Conceiving of love phenomenologically as an “erotic reduction,” Marion argues that love, far from being a passion, is a point of view, a gift that always comes first and operates a profound ... More

Conceiving of love phenomenologically as an “erotic reduction,” Marion argues that love, far from being a passion, is a point of view, a gift that always comes first and operates a profound displacement in our experience. Similarly, the act of forgiveness is the simple (but by no means easy) act of giving again, of not insisting on reciprocity, of maintaining the gift as gift.Less

Revenge, Forgiveness, and Love

Regina M. Schwartz

in Love and Forgiveness for a More Just World

Schwartz argues that Shakespeare’s plays suggest forgiveness as an alternative to revenge (which is incapable of redressing wrongs) that is tied to recognition and the (re)discovery of love.

Looking Evil in the Eye/I: The Interminable Work of Forgiveness

Orna Ophir

in Love and Forgiveness for a More Just World

Picking up on the work of Melanie Klein and her followers, Ophir urges us to understand both love and forgiveness as life-long processes that can break the vicious cycle of violence and ... More

Picking up on the work of Melanie Klein and her followers, Ophir urges us to understand both love and forgiveness as life-long processes that can break the vicious cycle of violence and counter-violence, provided we confront evil not so much in its manifest and external forms but above all the evil in ourselves.Less

Beyond Right and Wrong: An Exploration of Justice and Forgiveness

Albert Mason

in Love and Forgiveness for a More Just World

Mason develops a comprehensive psychoanalytical notion of forgiveness that sees it not only as fundamental to the relationship of the analyst to the patient but of the relationships all of us ... More

Mason develops a comprehensive psychoanalytical notion of forgiveness that sees it not only as fundamental to the relationship of the analyst to the patient but of the relationships all of us entertain with others and with ourselves, a conception that culminates in the claim that forgiveness is a “vital need.”Less

To Forgive: The Unforgivable and the Imprescriptible

Jacques Derrida

in Love and Forgiveness for a More Just World

Derrida’s reflections are centrally concerned with questioning the (im)morality of forgiveness, the fear that forgiving may lead to forgetting, the reciprocity of forgiveness asked for and ... More

Derrida’s reflections are centrally concerned with questioning the (im)morality of forgiveness, the fear that forgiving may lead to forgetting, the reciprocity of forgiveness asked for and forgiveness granted, and he seeks to find a way to think together forgiveness and reparation, the law and punishment.Less

Revision

Jill Stauffer

in Ethical Loneliness: The Injustice of Not Being Heard

Shows how revision—living the meaning of the past in the present moment in different ways—is possible and why it relies not only the will of one person but on a large number of human beings taking ... More

Shows how revision—living the meaning of the past in the present moment in different ways—is possible and why it relies not only the will of one person but on a large number of human beings taking responsibility for the building and repair of worlds and selves. Thus it helps to show that responsibility for recovery from violence must be widely shared rather than remaining a narrow legal concern.Less

Slavoj Žižek in Ramallah: Back to the Trauma Zone

Merav Yudilovith

in What Does a Jew Want?: On Binationalism and Other Specters

This chapter focuses on the world premiere of Udi Aloni's film, Forgiveness, in Ramallah. The screening of Forgiveness was attended by intellectuals as well as Palestinian artists and filmmakers such ... More

This chapter focuses on the world premiere of Udi Aloni's film, Forgiveness, in Ramallah. The screening of Forgiveness was attended by intellectuals as well as Palestinian artists and filmmakers such as Mahmoud Darwish and Slavoj Žižek. Two hours before the event, the second Lebanon war began as Israel entered Lebanon. In the film's commentary notes, Aloni wrote: “People flee from traumatic zones in an attempt to find a new life, only to find out that they are going back to the terror time and again.” This chapter describes the tension that foregrounds the Ramallah premiere of Forgiveness, along with some remarks by Aloni and Žižek about the film.Less

“I will tremble the underground”: On the Film Forgiveness

Slavoj Žižek

in What Does a Jew Want?: On Binationalism and Other Specters

This chapter examines Udi Aloni's film Forgiveness and its critique of Zionism in an unconditional fidelity to the Jewish tradition. Aloni challenges the ruling liberal attitude by addressing ... More

This chapter examines Udi Aloni's film Forgiveness and its critique of Zionism in an unconditional fidelity to the Jewish tradition. Aloni challenges the ruling liberal attitude by addressing different levels of ideology, art, and thought and achieves poetic power by creating new myths. Today, what we call the normal state of things has become indistinguishable from the state of emergency. The West is more and more often evoking some figure of fear and then promising protection from it. In such a scenario, the chapter suggests that the rhetoric of fear and emergency attempts to eclipse the act of thinking. It also discusses three major themes in Forgiveness: martyrdom, murder, and reconciliation. Finally, it considers the mechanisms of rules in the context of the underground.Less

Forgiveness and Reconciliation in Jus Post Bellum

Andrew Rigby

in Just War Theory: A Reappraisal

Until recently, just war theory has rarely, if ever, engaged with questions about what practices might be required to build the just peace for which a just war should have been waged. Most of the ... More

Until recently, just war theory has rarely, if ever, engaged with questions about what practices might be required to build the just peace for which a just war should have been waged. Most of the literature on post-conflict social reconstruction has not been concerned with issues of whether there was any justification to the conflicts in question. This chapter brings these debates together by arguing that a just and durable post-conflict peace requires a variety of processes to heal the scars of war sufficiently to open up the possibilities of future peaceful and just co-existence between former enemies. Operating with the non-ideal concept of a peace which is “just enough”, this chapter discusses examples – drawn from numerous conflicts and the aftermath of the 1994 Rwandan genocide in particular – of “memory” or “forgiveness” work as some ways in which former enemies have “dealt with the past” in pursuit of some form of reconciliation. Although context-sensitivity is crucial, some general guidelines can be drawn from such analyses which could provide a peacebuilding framework for jus post bellum.Less

Sin, Shame and Atonement: A Challenge for Secular Redemption

Christopher D. Marshall

in Criminology and Public Theology: On Hope, Mercy and Restoration

In expounding on wrongdoing, both criminological theory and theological reflection have been controlled by the language of guilt and punishment. Both have largely failed to factor in the role of ... More

In expounding on wrongdoing, both criminological theory and theological reflection have been controlled by the language of guilt and punishment. Both have largely failed to factor in the role of entrenched shame in understanding and responding to human transgression, and both often display an impoverished understanding of what is involved in atoning for sin and defeating its ongoing thrall in the lives of individuals. This chapter maps out the complex ways shame functions in human experience, then considers the place of shame and honour in the biblical world. It proposes that the unique saving power ascribed to the life, death and resurrection of Christ in the New Testament, known in theological shorthand as the Atonement, includes its capacity to expose, absorb and disrupt the tyranny of shame in human experience. It suggests the gospel’s offer of spiritual regeneration provides both a paradigm for and a challenge to secular attempts to secure rehabilitation and relational renewal through the criminal justice system.Less

The Ins and Outs of Signals of Forgiveness in Restorative Justice

Joanna Shapland

in Criminology and Public Theology: On Hope, Mercy and Restoration

Forgiveness has at least two parties involved: the person who has harmed and the person who has been harmed. In restorative justice it is the dyadic interaction between the harmed and the harmer, ... More

Forgiveness has at least two parties involved: the person who has harmed and the person who has been harmed. In restorative justice it is the dyadic interaction between the harmed and the harmer, facilitated by the mediator/facilitator which is central: the communication in terms of questions and judgements about the past, willingness to interact in the present and intent for the future. Yet there is a potential army of others waiting in the wings and potentially 'hearing' that communication: supporters and those close to both harmer and harmed, the community or communities into which the harmer (and the harmed) need to re-find their place, and powerful voices (such as the media) on what is seen to be the moral order of those communities. It has been said that a criminal offence causes ripples of concern and potentially fear spreading out from the offence into the community. Can and should forgiveness be seen similarly - and what effects may this ‘forgiveness ripple’ have on the person harmed, the person who has harmed and the community?Less

Non-Sovereign Forgiveness Mercy among Equals in The Laws of Candy

Bernadette Meyler

in Theaters of Pardoning

This chapter examines The Laws of Candy, composed either partially or principally by playwright John Ford, who resided for a long time in the Middle Temple, one of the Inns of Court that formed ... More

This chapter examines The Laws of Candy, composed either partially or principally by playwright John Ford, who resided for a long time in the Middle Temple, one of the Inns of Court that formed England’s early law schools. While on first blush The Laws of Candy seems merely to displace sovereignty from a King onto a legislative body, this chapter argues that it rejects sovereignty and a vision of pardoning attached to sovereignty in its entirety. Instead, the play presents the possibility of reconstructing a state faced with potential dissolution through a series of non-sovereign offers of forgiveness. The priority here is placed on law over sovereignty. The chapter also examines how this emphasis relates back to a possible intertext for the play, Plato’s Laws, which was widely read and cited by lawyers, including in Henry Finch’s Nomotexnia, and in compilations of ancient materials, such as Polyanthea and Polyanthea Nova.Less

Foodways

Anna Servaes

in "Franco-American Identity, Community, and La Guiannée"

This chapter considers food along the Guiannée’s journey on New Year’s Eve. Traditionally, food was offered during the carnival time to nourish the community, including the indigent, during the ... More

This chapter considers food along the Guiannée’s journey on New Year’s Eve. Traditionally, food was offered during the carnival time to nourish the community, including the indigent, during the winter months when no crops were available. The prepared meals and other foods are offered in exchange for the performance. In the Midwest, the main communal meal is a chicken bouillon, a chicken soup. Offering and sharing food during the carnival season renews the solidarity among the members through forgiveness of past conflicts. Sharing meals also contributes to the collective imagination and cultural transmission through the stories or information recalled at these communal meals.Less

The Morality of Law: The Case against Deportation of Settled Immigrants

Doris Marie Provine

in Closing the Rights Gap: From Human Rights to Social Transformation

There is no internationally recognized right to reside in the nation of one’s choice, but there are strong arguments for accepting the fact of non-citizen residence as grounds for some of the rights ... More

There is no internationally recognized right to reside in the nation of one’s choice, but there are strong arguments for accepting the fact of non-citizen residence as grounds for some of the rights citizens enjoy under domestic law. International human rights treaties suggest a way forward. These instruments spell out basic economic and social rights associated with human dignity, including the right to own property, to earn a living, and to quiet enjoyment of family life. The task is to persuade decision makers to extend these rights, through domestic law, to settled non-citizens on human rights grounds. This type of transformation is underway in the United States and some other nations, precipitated by conscious raising, publicity, political pressure, and lawsuits.Less

Forgiveness and the Rat Man: Kierkegaard, ‘Narrative Unity’ and ‘Wholeheartedness’ Revisited

John Lippitt

in Narrative, Identity and the Kierkegaardian Self

As Kierkegaardian narrativists such as John J. Davenport have revised and expanded upon their positions, the gap between them and narratosceptics has narrowed significantly. Despite this narrowing, ... More

As Kierkegaardian narrativists such as John J. Davenport have revised and expanded upon their positions, the gap between them and narratosceptics has narrowed significantly. Despite this narrowing, Davenport’s continued emphasis on the Frankfurtian term ‘wholeheartedness’ (and its purported superiority to ‘ambivalence’) remains problematic. This is brought into view via a consideration of J. David Velleman’s critique of Harry G. Frankfurt in the light of Freud’s ‘Rat Man’ case. The Rat Man’s problem is not his ambivalence, but the self-misinterpretation that constitutes his reaction to it – something troublingly close to Frankfurt’s proposed cure for ambivalence itself. Very often, however, psychotherapy’s purpose is not to take a client from ambivalence to wholeheartedness, but from feeling unmanageably to manageably torn (a more liveable kind of ambivalence). This is demonstrated via a discussion of forgiveness, of both others and oneself, noting the importance of a variety of forgiveness that continues to incorporate blame or self-reproach.Less

Imbabazi, Kwicuza and Christian Testimonials of Forgiveness

Madelaine Hron

in Rwanda Since 1994: Stories of Change

This chapter explores thorny issues related to reconciliation and forgiveness in post-genocide, post-gacaca Rwanda. Specifically, it deliberates Christian notions of forgiveness along with Rwandan ... More

This chapter explores thorny issues related to reconciliation and forgiveness in post-genocide, post-gacaca Rwanda. Specifically, it deliberates Christian notions of forgiveness along with Rwandan understandings of kwicuza (remorse) and imbabazi (pardon), and juxtaposes theological conceptualizations of forgiveness with psychosocial research on reconciliation in post-conflict areas. The chapter highlights noteworthy forgiveness projects in Rwanda, including those by the NGOs Twungubumwe Collectif and Just.Equipping. Most of this chapter however, delves into the representation of forgiveness in Christian testimonial accounts that are readily available in the West. Specifically, the chapter examines Led by Faith by controversial AiMA Anglican Bishop John Rucyahana; Immaculée Ilibagiza's "Catholic" bestseller Left To Tell and Frida Gashumba's more evangelical but also more realistic Frida: Chosen to Die, Destined to Live.Less