The Boundaries of Forgiveness
Matthew 18:21-22
Then Peter came and said to him, "Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?" 18:22 Jesus said to him, "Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times."
If we take this text out of context, it may look as if forgiveness does not have limits, and Christians must forgive everything to anybody anytime and anywhere.
However, we have to place the text into context, even if the context in this case is not completely a conventional one, but regards the very religious tradition the Apostles had, which is the Jewish tradition. According to their tradition, forgiveness and repentance are mandatory.
Mandatory, but not unconditional. Forgiveness may be mandatorily offered only to somebody who deeply regrets his or her wrongdoings, confesses his sins, repents, makes proper amendments, and asks for forgiveness, saying a genuinely meant sorry.
It is in the old tradition that on the Day of the New Year, called Rosh Hashanah, every year, the Angels open the Book of Life in Heaven, and a decision is made by God as to who will live in the next year and who will not. However, the decision stays open for the next ten days, and it is sealed only on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.
The Ten Days of Awe leading up to Yom Kippur are a solemn period of self-reflection. During this time, members of Jewish communities strive to correct their behavior and seek forgiveness for sins committed against both God and fellow human beings, offering public and private confessions, petitions, and prayers.
At the end of Yom Kippur, one hopes that they have been forgiven by God, and their names are inscribed in the Book of Life. Of course, repentance, amendments, and seeking and giving forgiveness are better done every day, because we do not know whether we will be alive tomorrow or not.
It must be seen that there are two levels of sins: those committed against man, and those committed against God.
In both cases, the procedure is the same: 1) One must deeply regret what he did wrong. It is like an aching pain in the heart. 2) One must take a sacred oath that he will not commit the same sin again. 3) One must seek amendments for what he did. 4) One must ask forgiveness from the very persons he wronged, saying a heartfelt sorry—if it is a human, from a human; if it is God, from God.
A great example is the case of Zacchaeus, found in the New Testament. His name ironically means innocent or pure. Definitely, before his meeting with Jesus, he was considered a great sinner.
As a tax collector, he was despised as a traitor (working for the Roman Empire, not for his Jewish community), and as being corrupt, arrogant, and even violent in extorting and racketeering.
The Roman Empire levied inhuman taxes on their subjects in the land of Judea, but usually they hired locals to be their tax collectors in a system where they were third-party contractors. The Romans estimated the taxes of a town, and they gave the tax-collecting rights to the contractor who paid the amount in advance to the Romans, or who paid the most for it in an auction.
After that, the appointed tax collector was able to collect as much in taxes as he was able to squeeze out of the population. The Romans aided the tax-collecting procedures with soldiers and wealth investigators. The tax collectors especially attacked widows and orphans who did not have male relatives and were defenseless. Most of the time, Zacchaeus and those like him, by force, confiscated the houses, land, and other properties of the people if they were not able to pay the insane tax allocations and assessments.
He was feared and hated, despised and cursed, and the people in general had great contempt for him. He was on his way to enter the deepest Hell in the Afterlife.
However, he met Jesus, who invited him to dinner—actually, he invited the sinner to repent. And it changed the life and path of Zacchaeus, as it is written in the Gospel of Luke: Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, half of my goods I give to the poor. If I have wrongfully exacted anything of anyone, I restore four times as much." Jesus said to him, "Today, salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost."
The forgiveness he received met the conditions. Zacchaeus regretted deeply what he did to the people. He repented and wanted to turn back to God. He took the oath not to fall into this sin again. He made amendments by giving away half of all his possessions, and by reimbursing four times the people he wronged.
Without meeting the conditions—aka having genuine regret, repentance, improving behavior, seeking and making amendments, saying a heartfelt sorry, and asking for forgiveness—even Jesus would not have had the power to make Zacchaeus clean from sins and save him from Hell.
Thus, forgiveness is conditional. However, according to tradition, when someone who trespassed against us is seeking to reach forgiveness, and he meets all the requested conditions, then forgiving him is obligatory without an excuse, even on seventy times seven occasions.
If we want to enter Heaven, but we maintain someone’s fault against us by not forgiving him when he meets all the requirements, by doing so we commit sin, and not forgiving someone’s fault will eventually prevent us from entering Heaven.
This rule is so significant that it can be found even in the Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.” "14 For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you don't forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."
That is why, practically, Jesus answered Peter in that way: it does not matter how many times your brother is looking for your forgiveness, you must forgive him countless times.
However, it happens very often that some of the requirements are impossible to meet. Then forgiveness is impossible. Either because people committed deadly sins or making amendments is impossible—like when lives are lost, irreversible injuries happen, or the consequences of someone’s actions make the life of whole communities miserable—those people will be dealt with by divine judgment here on Earth and in the Afterlife. This is called divine justice, where the good are rewarded, but the wicked are punished.
As disciples of Jesus, we must seek reconciliation and forgiveness, whenever it is possible, because we do not wish for the perdition of the wicked, but want them to repent and to amend their lives, as it is written in the Book of Ezekiel, chapter 18: “Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul who sins, he shall die.”
“BUT, if the wicked turn from all his sins that he has committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. None of his transgressions that he has committed shall be remembered against him: in his righteousness that he has done he shall live. Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked? says the Lord God; and not rather that he should return from his way, and live?”
Thus, we have to ceaselessly pray for the wicked that they should change their path, which leads to perdition, to the path which leads to life and God.
May The Lord’s Name Be Blessed. AMEN
