In this paper I examine the relationship between promise and gesture, in order to understand how they co-participate in the configuration of our life-histories. I start by noticing the role played by promise in establishing a dialogical pact of trust, through which an experiential cohesion is maintained through time. Reflecting on the variable conditions of mutual trust, I focus on crisis-situations when we cannot keep the promises we make to others and to ourselves. Relying on the thesis of an “ (...) class='Hi'>original forgiveness”, I argue that our promises operate beyond the initial intention that animates them and even beyond their failure. I then show that failed promises reveal a broader state of self-fragmentation, engaging the other as a mediator between segments of experience that remain otherwise difficult to bring together and to reconcile by oneself. I close by highlighting the role played by gestures in cultivating this mediation. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Many Buddhist teachers in North America teach forgiveness: an attitude of non-anger not conditional on wrongdoers repairing their wrongs. Classical Buddhist texts and premodern Buddhist cultures also taught forgiveness: the act of reconciling after wrongdoers repaired wrongs. This article describes traditional Buddhist forgiveness processes, analyses how new processes to forgive arose in North America, and outlines the current state of Buddhist forgiveness teachings there. It shows that the predominant way North American Buddhists now teach (...) class='Hi'>forgiveness is new. It developed in the 1970–1990 period and incorporates non-Buddhist discourses. In addition to clarifying what forgiveness has long been in Buddhism and how, in North America, changes to that occurred, the article notes the frequent absence, among academic scholars and Buddhists alike, of awareness concerning (a) the replacement of longstanding Buddhist teachings on forgiveness by new teachings; (b) the predominantly non-Buddhist sources of the new teachings; and (c) the impact on victims, wrongdoers, relationships, and communities of the new teachings. The article contributes to scholarship on Buddhist ethics, forgiveness in Buddhism, and the development and hybridisation of Buddhism in North America. (shrink)

In this book, David Konstan argues that the modern concept of interpersonal forgiveness, in the full sense of the term, did not exist in ancient Greece and Rome. Even more startlingly, it is not fully present in the Hebrew Bible, nor in the New Testament or in the early Jewish and Christian commentaries on the Holy Scriptures. It would still be centuries - many centuries - before the idea of interpersonal forgiveness, with its accompanying ideas of apology, remorse, (...) and a change of heart on the part of the wrongdoer, would emerge. For all its vast importance today in religion, law, politics and psychotherapy, interpersonal forgiveness is a creation of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when the Christian concept of divine forgiveness was fully secularized. Forgiveness was God's province and it took a revolution in thought to bring it to earth and make it a human trait. (shrink)

McCullough et al. argue that humans possess evolved computational systems for implementing retaliatory behavior that both deters aggression and promotes subsequent reconciliation. However, they do not apply this analysis to the sphere of intergroup relations. We believe their model can be usefully extended to this domain and discuss why this would be possible, pertinent, and productive.

For the past thirty-five years or so forgiveness has been of great interest to philosophers, and the recent spate of new books and scholarly essays on the topic is evidence that this interest continues unabated. David Konstan’s Before Forgiveness: The Origins of a Moral Idea is among the recent contributions to this literature. Konstan argues that none of the various ways in which people in the classical Greek and Roman world managed angry emotional states such as resentment constitute (...) the modern phenomenon of forgiveness. And although forgiveness is prominent in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles, the main sense of that term refers to God’s forgiveness of human sin, and not to the contemporary notion of human interpersonal forgiveness, which typically refers to a moral transformation of the victim of wrong that involves, centrally, overcoming or forswearing resentment caused by and directed toward a wrongdoer, and doing so for moral reasons. This latter component refers to behaviors enga .. (shrink)

The theme of this book is the complex moral psychology of forgiving and remembering in both personal and political contexts. It offers an original account of the moral psychology of interpersonal forgiveness and explores its role in transitional societies. The book also examines the symbolic moral significance of memorialization in these societies and reflects on its relationship to forgiveness.

Forgiveness as a positive response to wrongdoing is a widespread phenomenon that plays a role in the moral lives of most persons. Surprisingly, Kant has very little to say on the matter. Although Kant dedicates considerable space to discussing punishment, wrongdoing and grace, he addresses the issues of human forgiveness directly only in some short passages in the Lectures on Ethics and in one passage of the Metaphysics of Morals. As noted by Sussman, the TL passage, however, betrays (...) some ambivalence. Kant establishes a duty of virtue to be forgiving (TL, 6:460), yet he immediately warns against its excess: meek toleration of recurrent wrongs could manifest a lack of self-respect and a violation of a duty to oneself (TL, 6:461). Sussman claims that this ambivalence ultimately arises from the fact that forgiveness sits uncomfortably in Kant’s moral thought. First, forgiveness has an ‘ineluctably elective aspect’ that makes it, to a certain extent, arbitrary and dependent on particular features of the forgiver’s psychology and, as such, in tension with Kant’s central claims that human beings are autonomous agents capable of determining their own moral status. Second, according to Sussman, Kant’s moral retributivism, i.e. ‘the particular moral position that every moral wrong against another deserves punishment of the wrongdoer’ seems to be in tension with the possibility of a ‘truly redemptive forgiveness’. Moreover, forgiveness also seems to be in tension with a passage of the Religion in which Kant argues that the moral guilt from our original evil disposition cannot be understood as a debt or liability that can be compensated, erased, transferred or otherwise wiped out by others (Rel, 6:72). Thus, to the extent that forgiveness might be thought to involve the forgoing of moral guilt, it seems incompatible with Kant’s views on culpability and punishment. This chapter seeks to clarify Kant’s views on forgiveness in order to show that, although not often appreciated, personal forgiveness plays an important role in the lives of ordinary human agents as understood by Kant. In particular, I aim to show there is a conception of forgiveness available to Kant that is not incompatible with Kant’s views of punishment and culpability. In Section 1, I argue that, for Kant, far from being merely ‘elective,’ forgiveness is, under certain conditions, morally required. I provide a brief summary of an interpretation of Kant’s theory of forgiveness that I have defended in recently published work , in order to argue that Kant’s duty to be forgiving should be understood as an imperfect duty of virtue which is conditional on repentance. Kant is not ambivalent about this duty because he maintains that when the relevant conditions are not met, we have a perfect duty to ourselves not to forgive unrepentant wrongdoers. The TL passage thus identifies two different duties. In Section 2, I show that forgiveness, as conceptualised by Kant, does not require the forgoing of punishment or the overcoming of moral guilt and that this could, in fact, be seen as an attractive feature of Kant’s position. I end by offering a very brief assessment of Kant’s views. (shrink)

This article introduces a concept that I refer to as racialized forgiveness. Cases that exemplify certain conditions that I take as paradigmatic of the problem of racialized forgiveness include instances in which: who is forgiven or not is determined by the race of the offender; praise and criticisms of forgiveness are determined by the race of the victim; and praise and criticisms of forgiveness are, at least implicitly, racially self-serving. I argue that this practice is morally (...) objectionable because of its psychological origins, moral failures, and negative effects. Accordingly, in order to dodge these pitfalls, we need to practice forgiveness differently. (shrink)

I argue that the effectiveness of forgiveness in the healing of relationships is dependent on both the givers and recipients of forgiveness understanding that once it has been granted, forgiveness is not normally able to be retracted. When we forgive, we make a firm commitment not to return to our former state of moral resentment against the offender, replacing it by good-will. This commitment can be broken only where the forgiving party makes some significant cognitive adjustment to (...) her appraisal of either the offender or the offence, believing that her original forgiveness was granted in error. I reject the view that forgiveness can lapse or be withdrawn on the basis of a return of hurt or disappointed feelings, arguing that these do not amount to a restoration of the resentment that is extinguished when forgiveness is granted. I contend that a person who ‘forgives’ and later takes back that ‘forgiveness’ because certain negative feelings have returned either did not genuinely forgive in the first place or shows that she has not fully grasped the nature of forgiveness. (shrink)

Philosopher Vladimir Jankélévitch has only recently begun to receive his due from the English-speaking world, thanks in part to discussions of his thought by Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Lévinas, and Paul Ricoeur. His international readers have long valued his unique, interdisciplinary approach to philosophy’s greatest questions and his highly readable writing style. Originally published in 1967, Le Pardon, or Forgiveness, is one of Jankélévitch’s most influential works. In it, he characterizes the ultimate ethical act of forgiving as behaving toward the (...) perpetrator as if he or she had never committed the action, rather than merely forgetting or rationalizing it—a controversial notion when considering events as heinous as the Holocaust. Like so many of Jankélévitch’s works, Forgiveness transcends standard treatments of moral problems, not simply generating a treatise on one subject but incorporating discussions of topics such as free will, giving, creativity, and temporality. Translator Andrew Kelley masterfully captures Jankélévitch’s melodic prose and, in a substantive introduction, reviews his life and intellectual contributions. Forgiveness is an essential part of that legacy, and this indispensable English translation provides key tools for understanding one of the great Western philosophers of the twentieth century. (shrink)

Philosophical interest in forgiveness has seen a resurgence. This interest reflects, at least in part, a large body of new work in psychology, several newsworthy cases of institutional apology and forgiveness, and intense and increased attention to the practices surrounding responsibility, blame, and praise. In this book, some of the world's leading philosophers present twelve entirely new essays on forgiveness. Some contributors have been writing about forgiveness for decades. Others have taken the opportunity here to develop (...) their thinking about forgiveness they broached in other work. For some contributors, this is their first time writing on forgiveness. While all the contributions address core questions about the nature and norms of forgiveness, they also collectively break new ground by raising entirely new questions, offering original proposals and arguments, and making connections to the topics of free will, moral responsibility, collective wrongdoing, apology, religion, and our emotions. (shrink)

This article explores and offers a qualified defence of the claim that the entitlement to forgive a wrongdoer belongs to the victim of the wrong. A summary account of forgiveness is given, followed by arguments in favor of the victim's prerogative to forgive. Primary, or direct victims are then distinguished from secondary and tertiary ones, which point to a plurality of prerogatives to forgive. In cases of conflicts between these prerogatives it is emphasized that special care should be taken (...) to protect the primary victim's entitlement, without giving an absolute and exclusive status to the latter prerogative. Grounds for limiting the primary victim's prerogative regarding forgiveness include (a) cases where harm to secondary and/or tertiary victims are greater than the harm resulting from the original wrong committed against the primary victim, (b) the social dimensions of the elements of forgiveness, and (c) the need for self-forgiveness when a repentant wrongdoer is not forgiven by any of the victims. The practical significance of these arguments are illustrated by considering the criticism that the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission have forgiven perpetrators in ways that inappropriately pre-empted the primary victims' entitlement to forgive. S. Afr. J. Philos. Vol.21(2) 2002: 97-111. (shrink)

Philosopher Vladimir Jankélévitch has only recently begun to receive his due from the English-speaking world, thanks in part to discussions of his thought by Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Lévinas, and Paul Ricoeur. His international readers have long valued his unique, interdisciplinary approach to philosophy’s greatest questions and his highly readable writing style. Originally published in 1967, _Le Pardon,_ or _Forgiveness,_ is one of Jankélévitch’s most influential works. In it, he characterizes the ultimate ethical act of forgiving as behaving toward the perpetrator (...) as if he or she had never committed the action, rather than merely forgetting or rationalizing it—a controversial notion when considering events as heinous as the Holocaust. Like so many of Jankélévitch’s works, _Forgiveness_ transcends standard treatments of moral problems, not simply generating a treatise on one subject but incorporating discussions of topics such as free will, giving, creativity, and temporality. Translator Andrew Kelley masterfully captures Jankélévitch’s melodic prose and, in a substantive introduction, reviews his life and intellectual contributions. _Forgiveness_ is an essential part of that legacy, and this indispensable English translation provides key tools for understanding one of the great Western philosophers of the twentieth century. (shrink)

Philosopher Vladimir Jankélévitch has only recently begun to receive his due from the English-speaking world, thanks in part to discussions of his thought by Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Lévinas, and Paul Ricoeur. His international readers have long valued his unique, interdisciplinary approach to philosophy’s greatest questions and his highly readable writing style. Originally published in 1967, _Le Pardon,_ or _Forgiveness,_ is one of Jankélévitch’s most influential works. In it, he characterizes the ultimate ethical act of forgiving as behaving toward the perpetrator (...) as if he or she had never committed the action, rather than merely forgetting or rationalizing it—a controversial notion when considering events as heinous as the Holocaust. Like so many of Jankélévitch’s works, _Forgiveness_ transcends standard treatments of moral problems, not simply generating a treatise on one subject but incorporating discussions of topics such as free will, giving, creativity, and temporality. Translator Andrew Kelley masterfully captures Jankélévitch’s melodic prose and, in a substantive introduction, reviews his life and intellectual contributions. _Forgiveness_ is an essential part of that legacy, and this indispensable English translation provides key tools for understanding one of the great Western philosophers of the twentieth century. (shrink)

Along with the question of what kind of debt reduction we should grant to the third world, one must also ask the question of why such a reduction is needed, and what is the ethical justification for it. This question belongs in a specific context: that of the jubilee year. In Leviticus 25, it is said that every fifty years on the day of atonement the ram's horn is sounded and liberty is proclaimed “throughout the land to all its inhabitants; (...) it shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his family”. The jubilee year is a year of freedom, a time of redistribution and new beginnings, of a return to the original relations among people, which also implies the forgiveness of the debts incurred by history's `losers'.This radical redistribution looks like a utopian dream, but it is nothing of the sort. It is thought of as a real historical possibility, about which a reasonable debate can take place. The Belgian bishops have pointed out that this historical possibility also involves recognizing the sacred historical significance of the life of Jesus Christ. According to Luke's gospel , itself referring to Isaiah 61:1-3, he conceived his life's task as that of effectively accomplishing the jubilee year. The tone is even more radical in a verse from Isaiah 58, 6 where there is talk of “freeing the oppressed”.Jesus's action was more than simply the proclamation of good news; his action also had real consequences for those concerned: it was good news for the poor, light for the blind, freedom for the imprisoned, and justice for those who are repressed. Jesus showed that social relations could no longer be the way they had been, and that imitating Him meant that the faithful had to become apologists for the poor, which means they had to work towards a new history in which “the contorted relations between people are set aright, poverty is overcome and all the debts of the destitute are forgiven”.In this article I would like to examine certain aspects of this ethical mission and show that this radical demand for debt forgiveness is not an exception in Christian ethics. To this end, I will reflect on various key concepts in Christian ethical thought: social justice, solidarity and the universal right to use earthly goods. (shrink)

Most philosophers who discuss the value of forgiveness concentrate on its moral value. This paper focuses on the prudential value of forgiveness, which has been surprisingly neglected by moral philosophers. I suggest that this may be because part of the concept of forgiveness involves the forgiver being motivated by moral rather than prudential considerations. But this does not justify neglecting the prudential value of forgiveness, which is important even though forgivers should not be prudentially motivated. (...) class='Hi'>Forgiveness helps satisfy interests arising from the need for co-operation in such areas as epistemic life, where humans are interdependent. Forgiveness can restore epistemic relationships, and this has the prudential value of helping agents navigate their way through their environment. While the prudential value of forgiveness may be supplementary to its moral value, it would be a mistake to ignore this area of the debate. Exploring the prudential value of forgiveness enriches our understanding of the role that this practice plays in human life, and may contribute to explaining the origin of forgiveness. (shrink)

The French studies scholar Patrick Coleman made the important observation that over the course of the eighteenth century, the social meanings of anger became increasingly democratized. The work of Jean-Jacques Rousseau is an outstanding example of this change. In Man or Citizen, Karen Pagani expands, in original and fascinating ways, the study of anger in Rousseau’s autobiographical, literary, and philosophical works. Pagani is especially interested in how and to what degree anger—and various reconciliatory responses to anger, such as (...) class='Hi'>forgiveness—functions as a defining aspect of one’s identity, both as a private individual and as a public citizen. Rousseau himself was, as Pagani puts it, “unabashed” in his own anger and indignation—toward society on one hand (corrupter of our naturally good and authentic selves) and, on the other, toward certain individuals who had somehow wronged him (his famous philosophical disputes with Voltaire and Diderot, for example). In Rousseau’s work, Pagani finds that the extent to which an individual processes, expresses, and eventually resolves or satisfies anger is very much of moral and political concern. She argues that for Rousseau, anger is not only inevitable but also indispensable, and that the incapacity to experience it renders one amoral, while the ability to experience it is a key element of good citizenship. (shrink)

In general parlance the term sin has lost its existential meaning. Originally a Jewish-Christian term within a purely religious context, referring to a wrongdoing with regard to God, sin has slowly become reduced to guilt in the course of the secularization process. Guilt refers to a wrongdoing, especially with regard to fellow human beings. It also refers to errors of judgement with what can be tragic consequences. These errors can occur whenever human beings are called upon to act, including the (...) hospital environment. A Christian hospital has to address the issue of how to deal not only with guilt-ridden misdemeanors, but also with wrongdoing unto God, which overshadows every instance of guilt-ridden human behavior. Here, as in every parish, the Church Service is the place to acknowledge sin, confess sin, and forgive sin, beyond the boundaries of the parish itself. Article translated by Sarah L. Kirkby, B.A. Hons. (shrink)

This dialogue between Paul Ricoeur and Sorin Antohi took place in Budapest on March 10, 2003 at Pasts, Inc., Center for Historical Studies, which is affiliated with Central European University (CEU). Ricoeur was the honorary president of Pasts, Inc., and its spiritus rector. On March 8, he had given a lecture on "History, Memory, and Forgetting" in the context of an international conference entitled "Haunting Memories? History in Europe after Authoritarianism," and organized by Pasts Inc. and the Körber Foundation. On (...) March 9, Ricoeur had received the first Honoris Causa doctorate ever granted by CEU. Ricoeur had already visited Hungary in 1933. At the time, he was participating in a Boy Scouts European jamboree at Gödöllö (where he also saw Horthy on his white horse). After WWII, he went back to Hungary to meet with Lukács. Mona Antohi has transcribed and edited the recording of the dialogue. The two interlocutors have then made some minor revisions. The original text, in French, is available on the website of Pasts, Inc. (www.ceu.hu/pasts). This English version, translated and annotated by Gil Anidjar, will be included in Sorin Antohi's book, Talking History. Making Sense of Pasts, forthcoming in 2006 from CEU Press. His own Romanian translation of the dialogue was published in the Iasi-based journal, Xenopoliana (3-4, 2004), as was the Hungarian translation by Réka Toth, which appeared in the Budapest-based journal, 2000 (November-December 2003). (shrink)

René Girard’s breakthrough consists in uncovering the mechanism of violence, namely the mimesis and rivalry it permits. Yet, mimetic violence still leaves the very origin of evil and murder unquestioned. Here Lévinas plays a decisive role: the call to murder only becomes possible as one of the versions of the call of the face, the call of the other. This is what Girard should have taken up in order to clarify his final allusions to a “good mimesis”—this other, properly Christic, (...) possibility of the call of the face. (shrink)

Despite increasing popularity and intensive worldwide use, few studies have assessed the validity and factorial structure of the Heartland Forgiveness Scale. However, scientific literature showed that the original factorial structure of the HFS was not fully replicated and—in addition—the Italian translation is still lacking. To fill this gap, this study aims to extend evidence about the original HFS factorial validity by analyzing the Italian version. The final sample was composed of 523 randomly enrolled participants [139 males, 384 (...) females ] aged from 18 to 82 years who completed the Italian version of the HFS. The confirmatory factor analysis showed good fit indices for the original hierarchical factor solution and a significant decrease in model fit was found for all of the competing models. Also, the Italian version of the HFS revealed good reliability and very good psychometrical properties. Findings suggest that the Italian version of the HFS can be considered a reliable and good psychometrically based instrument for the assessment of dispositional forgiveness of the Self, Other, and Situation. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that we can learn much about wild justice and the evolutionary origins of social morality – behaving fairly – by studying social play behavior in group-living animals, and that interdisciplinary cooperation will help immensely. In our efforts to learn more about the evolution of morality we need to broaden our comparative research to include animals other than non-human primates. If one is a good Darwinian, it is premature to claim that only humans can be empathic (...) and moral beings. By asking the question What is it like to be another animal? we can discover rules of engagement that guide animals in their social encounters. When I study dogs, for example, I try to be a dogocentrist and practice dogomorphism. My major arguments center on the following big questions: Can animals be moral beings or do they merely act as if they are? What are the evolutionary roots of cooperation, fairness, trust, forgiveness, and morality? What do animals do when they engage in social play? How do animals negotiate agreements to cooperate, to forgive, to behave fairly, to develop trust? Can animals forgive? Why cooperate and play fairly? Why did play evolve as it has? Does being fair mean being more fit – do individual variations in play influence an individual''s reproductive fitness, are more virtuous individuals more fit than less virtuous individuals? What is the taxonomic distribution of cognitive skills and emotional capacities necessary for individuals to be able to behave fairly, to empathize, to behave morally? Can we use information about moral behavior in animals to help us understand ourselves? I conclude that there is strong selection for cooperative fair play in which individuals establish and maintain a social contract to play because there are mutual benefits when individuals adopt this strategy and group stability may be also be fostered. Numerous mechanisms have evolved to facilitate the initiation and maintenance of social play to keep others engaged, so that agreeing to play fairly and the resulting benefits of doing so can be readily achieved. I also claim that the ability to make accurate predictions about what an individual is likely to do in a given social situation is a useful litmus test for explaining what might be happening in an individual''s brain during social encounters, and that intentional or representational explanations are often important for making these predictions. (shrink)

Mr. Darcy spoke with affectionate praise of his sister's proficiency.I never spoke to you without rather wishing to give you pain than not.Pride and Prejudice has been read in many ways. I argue that this well-known love story not only foregrounds the battle of the sexes but also places center stage the pros and cons of different types of family systems and reciprocal altruism. Humans have long evolved to become homo familiaris. In its Latin origin, the word family does not (...) necessarily refer to blood relations or kinship. Rather, the ancient Romans used familia to refer to "household property—the fields, house, money and slaves owned by a man. The Latin word famulus means 'servant.'"2In Family and Friends in... (shrink)

When, why, and how does interpersonal forgiveness occur? These questions guided recent research that compared the relative abilities of empathy versus motivated reasoning models to account for the influence of relationship closeness on interpersonal forgiveness. Consistent support was provided for the Model of Motivated Interpersonal Forgiveness. This model hypothesizes that following relationship transgressions, relationship closeness leads to a desire to maintain a relationship. Desire to maintain a relationship leads to motivated reasoning. And motivated reasoning fosters interpersonal (...) class='Hi'>forgiveness. The goal of the present research was to examine two concerns that emerged from the initial support for the Model of Motivated Interpersonal Forgiveness. First, were the measures of motivated reasoning and interpersonal forgiveness conflated, thus reducing the potential for empathy to account for interpersonal forgiveness? Second, did the analytic estimation used reduce the power to detect the mediational role of empathy? The present research examined these questions. When motivated reasoning was measured by thought listings (in addition to the original questionnaire items) and when the analytic estimation provided greater power, the Model of Motivated Interpersonal Forgiveness was replicated. (shrink)

Given the current climate of political division and global conflict it is not surprising that there has been an increasing interest in how we ought to respond to perceived wrongdoing, both personal and political. In this volume, top scholars from around the world contribute all new original essays on the ethics of forgiveness, revenge, and punishment. -/- This book draws on both historical and contemporary debates in order to answer important questions about the nature of forgiveness, the (...) power of apology, the relationship between punishment and revenge, the path to reconciliation, the morality of blame, and the role of forgiveness in political conflict. -/- Chapter 16 is available open access . (shrink)

A new examination of Aristotle's Poetics has confirmed my conviction that a number of old and new puzzles can be solved by the same analytical method which in recent years has been successfully applied to a good many of his writings, giving us a better insight into the growth and successive elaboration of his thought. The importance of the Poetics seems to me to justify any attempt to discover the original train of thought and to distinguish it from later (...) additions . Readers will be aware of the enormous number of books and papers dealing with the problems of this work and will forgive me for referring to a selection only. (shrink)

In the general introduction to the first part of his Philosophie de la Volonté, Le volontaire et l’involontaire Paul Ricoeur writes that the phenomenological or ‘pure description […] of the Voluntary and the Involuntary’ is ‘constituted by bracketing’ two things: first the fault, which is essentially a perversion of the pure nature or the essence of human willing; and second ‘Transcendence which hides within it the ultimate origin of subjectivity’. Evil, the condition of brokenness or the reality of the fault, (...) asks for an empirical description of concrete myths and symbols. He will remove this first bracketing in the second part of his Philosophy of the Will and in the long ‘series of detours’ of his hermeneutical writings. The second bracketing, however, will turn out to be much more difficult to remove. It demands a ‘poetics’, which would threaten Ricoeur’s effort to separate his Christian faith from his ‘autonomous’ philosophizing. In this article I argue that Ricoeur eventually did present his poetics, though only in the epilogue to his penultimate book on ‘Difficult Forgiveness’. The article indicates why this epilogue might fulfil the promise of a poetics, explains why this could only be done in an epilogue and gives at least one possible reason why Ricoeur could write at the end of his oeuvre, what he could not at its beginning. (shrink)

© 2014 International Journal of Philosophy and Theology. In the general introduction to the first part of his Philosophie de la Volonté, Le volontaire et l’involontaire Paul Ricoeur writes that the phenomenological or ‘pure description […] of the Voluntary and the Involuntary’ is ‘constituted by bracketing’ two things: first the fault, which is essentially a perversion of the pure nature or the essence of human willing; and second ‘Transcendence which hides within it the ultimate origin of subjectivity’. Evil, the condition (...) of brokenness or the reality of the fault, asks for an empirical description of concrete myths and symbols. He will remove this first bracketing in the second part of his Philosophy of the Will and in the long ‘series of detours’ of his hermeneutical writings. The second bracketing, however, will turn out to be much more difficult to remove. It demands a ‘poetics’, which would threaten Ricoeur’s effort to separate his Christian faith from his ‘autonomous’ philosophizing. In this article I argue that Ricoeur eventually did present his poetics, though only in the epilogue to his penultimate book on ‘Difficult Forgiveness’. The article indicates why this epilogue might fulfil the promise of a poetics, explains why this could only be done in an epilogue and gives at least one possible reason why Ricoeur could write at the end of his oeuvre, what he could not at its beginning. (shrink)

A new examination of Aristotle's Poetics has confirmed my conviction that a number of old and new puzzles can be solved by the same analytical method which in recent years has been successfully applied to a good many of his writings, giving us a better insight into the growth and successive elaboration of his thought. The importance of the Poetics seems to me to justify any attempt to discover the original train of thought and to distinguish it from later (...) additions. Readers will be aware of the enormous number of books and papers dealing with the problems of this work and will forgive me for referring to a selection only. (shrink)

L'étude de l'élaboration historique du dogme du péché originel est propre à dissiper l'illusion qu'il descendrait le cours du temps : il le remonte en réalité. On l'observe en particulier dans la genèse de ce concept chez Augustin, en réponse à la doctrine manichéenne du mal: la rédemption du Christ reflue vers les origines de l'humanité pour dévoiler notre responsabilité de la faute sous le pardon divin qui la recouvre. Ce dogme fournit une clef de lecture de l'histoire, il montre (...) la présence active de l'amour et du pardon aux origines du temps, pour dénoncer et réprimer la violence des hommes ; il conteste l'inertie du temps par la profusion du pardon, il exprime un sens de l'existence, il enseigne une intelligence de la temporalité.Le cas du péché originel illustre le fonctionnement du dogme en général dans la culture, bien au-delà de la sphère de l'Église, son rôle à la fois révélateur, contestant et régulateur. Encore faut-il savoir interpréter les dogmes, à la façon des mythes fondateurs, c'est-à-dire en tant qu'ils relèvent d'une logique symbolique, d'un langage narratif. La contemporanéité du Concile de Trente et du style baroque illustre également l'inscription du dogme dans la culture: le foisonnement des ornementations périphériques ne doit pas détourner le regard du centre de l'architecture, qui est la figure du Christ.The study of the historical development of the dogma of original sin is enough to dissipate the illusion that it descended tbrough time : as a matter of fact it reascended. In particular we see this in the birth of the concept, in Augustine’s answer to the Manichaean doctrine of evil: the redemption of Christ flows back towards the origins of humanity to unveil our responsability for the fault, which is covered over by the divine pardon. This dogma gives a key for reading bistory. It shows the active presence of love and forgiveness from the beginning of time, which denounces and represses the violence of men. It contests the inertia of time by the profusion of forgiveness, it expresses a sense to existence, and it teaches an understanding of temporality.The case of original sin illustrates the functioning in culture of dogma in general, well beyond the spbere of the Cburch, and its role both as revealer, contestant, and regulator. But it is still necessary to know how to interpret dogmas, in the fashion of foundation myths, that is to, say in so far as they are based on a symbolic logic of a narrative language. Tbe contemporaneousness of the Concil of Trent and the baroque style equally show the inscription of dogma in culture: the multiplication of peripberal ornaments ougbt not to turn our look away from the center of the architecture, which is the figure of Christ. (shrink)

Fyodor Dostoevsky is renowned as one of the greatest psychologists in world literature, but what we know about the origins and the workings of the human mind has changed drasti­cally since the late nineteenth century. If Dostoevsky was such a sensitive reader of the human condition, do his insights hold up to modern research? To judge just by the issue of the psychology of confession, the answer appears to be: yes. The work of Michael Tomasel­lo indicates that the human conscience (...) evolved in order to make people obey group norms. From this I draw the proposition that confession should be best directed to the group as a whole, and not to an individual. Judging by Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment and an assortment of characters in The Brothers Karamazov, this appears to be exactly how confes­sion works in Dostoevsky’s novels: sin is against all, so forgiveness must be from all. (shrink)

This article investigates the social accounts employed by 11 highly paid professionals and managers for neutralizing the moral stigma of losing their job due to resume fraud. This ethnographic study, based on 66 hours of interviews, explores the retrospective sense making used by resume fraudsters to justify, personally pardon and excuse behaviour seen as morally problematic by others. In this study the resume fraudsters sampled were selected because they all found high-paying jobs after their public humiliation, and each one morally (...) disengages. They put their transgressions behind them, not by seeing the light of day or asking for forgiveness, but by pointing to the ubiquity of information distortion in their companies, the victimless nature of their so-called transgression, and, most interesting, a portrayal of themselves and their act of resume fraud as the very type of risk taking required to instil capitalism with a passion and a will to succeed. The article closes with a discussion of how moral disengagement enlarges the zone of indifference in populations and reinforces cultures in which the pursuit of amorality thrives. (shrink)

In this radical reinterpretation of Rousseau, Jeremiah Alberg reveals the neglected theological dimension of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s philosophy. Alberg shows how only Christianity can bring the coherence of Rousseau’s system to light, arguing that the philosopher's system of thought is founded on theological scandal and on his inability to accept forgiveness through Christianity. This book explores Rousseau’s major works in a novel way, advancing his system of thought as an alternative to Christianity.

Understood historically, culturally, politically, geographically, or philosophically, the idea of Europe and notion of European identity conjure up as much controversy as consensus. The mapping of the relation between ideas of Europe and their philosophical articulation and contestation has never benefited from clear boundaries, and if it is to retain its relevance to the challenges now facing the world, it must become an evolving conceptual landscape of critical reflection. The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Europe provides an outstanding reference work (...) for the exploration of Europe in its manifold conceptions, narratives, institutions, and values. Comprising twenty-seven chapters by a group of international contributors, the Handbook is divided into three parts: • Europe of the Philosophers • Concepts and Controversies • Debates and Horizons Essential reading for students and researchers in philosophy, politics and European studies the Handbook will also be of interest to those in related disciplines such as sociology, religion, and European history and history of ideas. Darian Meacham is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Maastricht University, The Netherlands. He is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology and the co-editor of Thinking After Europe: Jan Patočka and Politics (2016) Nicolas de Warren is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Jewish Studies at Pennsylvania State University, USA. He is the author of Husserl and the Promise of Time (2010), A Momentary Breathlessness in the Sadness of Time (2018), and Original Forgiveness (2020). (shrink)

It is natural to wonder how mercy is related to justice. I focus in this essay on a more limited question: how should we relate mercy and retributive justice? My suggestion is that attending to our situation as moral agents can help us solve this conundrum. I offer a pessimistic reading of our situation. Because of original sin and related forms of bad moral luck, we have limited control over our attitudes and actions. This has a surprisingly hopeful upshot, (...) since our unfortunate condition makes it appropriate to respond to one another mercifully. I suggest that this response can take two forms. Without collapsing justice into mercy, it is right to make our approach to justice and punishment more merciful and to recognize the fittingness of “erring” on the side of mercy when we are uncertain how to apportion blame. (shrink)

The story of the devil’s fall poses at least three separate philosophical puzzles, only two of which Anselm addressed. The first (Puzzle A) wonders how this angel could have committed a sin in the first place since he was created with a good will and good desires. A second puzzle (Puzzle B) consists of trying to explain why the devil cannot ever be forgiven for that first sin. According to Christian teaching, the devil is unable to “repent” (i.e., express sorrow (...) for) that first sin and thereby acquire forgiveness for it. Humans, by contrast, are portrayed as repeatedly sinning, repenting, and being forgiven. It is a mystery why no mechanism similar to that humans use for forgiveness is available to the devil. The final puzzle (Puzzle C) is slightly different. It wonders why the devil was never given a second chance. In daily life, most of us are given (and grant to others) second chances all the time. Given that the consequences of choosing incorrectly were in this case so disastrous and permanent, it seems inconceivable that a good God would permit one of His angels merely one chance to choose and thereby determine his eternal fate. And yet, despite this inconceivability, this is precisely the way the story is presented. Anselm addressed Puzzles A and B but never explicitly raised Puzzle C. I propose he failed to raise it because he conflated it with Puzzle B. In this paper, I first explain how he solved Puzzles A and B. I then go on to argue that Puzzle C does indeed constitute a separate puzzle that should not be conflated with Puzzle B. I then argue that the best (and perhaps only) way in which Anselm could solve Puzzle C is to appeal to a type of free will that conflicts with his solution to Puzzle A. As a result, I argue that there may be a latent contradiction in Anselm’s treatment of the devil’s sin unless an alternate solution to Puzzle C can be found. (shrink)

The origin and prevalence of transposable elements may best be understood as resulting from “selfish” evolutionary processes at the within-genome level, with relevant populations being all members of the same TE family or all potentially mobile DNAs in a species. But the maintenance of families of TEs as evolutionary drivers, if taken as a consequence of selection, might be better understood as a consequence of selection at the level of species or higher, with the relevant populations being species or ecosystems (...) varying in their possession of TEs. In 2015, Brunet and Doolittle made the case for legitimizing claims for an evolutionary role for TEs by recasting such claims as being about species selection. Here I further develop this “how possibly” argument. I note that with a forgivingly broad construal of evolution by natural selection we might come to appreciate many aspects of Life on earth as its products, and TEs as—possibly—contributors to the success of Life by selection at several levels of a biological hierarchy. Thinking broadly makes this proposition a testable Darwinian one. (shrink)

R. G. Collingwood’s philosophical analysis of religious atonement as a dialectical process of mortal repentance and divine forgiveness is explained and criticized. Collingwood’s Christian concept of atonement, in which Christ \ the Atonement the Incarnation), is subject in turn to another kind of dialectic, in which some of Collingwood’s leading ideas are first surveyed, and then tested against objections in a philosophical evaluation of their virtues and defects, strengths and weaknesses. Collingwood’s efforts to synthesize objective and subjective aspects of (...) atonement, and his proposal to solve the soteriological problem as to why God becomes flesh, as a dogma of some Christian belief systems, is finally exposed in adversarial exposition as inadequately supported by one of his main arguments, designated here as Collingwood’s Dilemma. The dilemma is that sin is either forgiven or unforgiven by God. If God forgives sin, then God’s justice is lax, whereas if God does not forgive sin, then, also contrary to divine nature, God lacks perfect loving compassion. The dilemma is supposed to drive philosophy toward a concept of atonement in which the sacrifice of Christ is required in order to absolve God of the lax judgment objection. God forgives sin only when the price of sin is paid, in this case, by the suffering and crucifixion of God’s avatar. The dilemma can be resolved in another way than Collingwood considers, undermining his motivation for synthesizing objective and subjective facets of the concept of atonement for the sake of avoiding inconsistency. Collingwood is philosophically important because he asks all the right questions about religious atonement, and points toward reasonable answers, even if he does not always deliver original philosophically satisfactory solutions. (shrink)