Forgiveness, sacrifice are core virtues
IN another two days, Christians will commemorate the death of Jesus. Good Friday, as it is called, likely occurred on Friday, April 3 in the year 33CE. Good Friday celebrates the virtue of forgiveness and the sacrifice of oneself for the sake of others, in keeping with Jesus’ last act. He died by crucifixion, and on the cross he prayed: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.”
He possessed the heart to forgive the conspirators who had plotted to get him executed in this most excruciatingly painful manner. It is a tough lesson that we should apply in our dealings with others as forgiveness is a virtue preached by all religions.
There should be no boundaries limiting forgiveness, no matter how unjustly and cruelly you may have been treated by someone. In his famous Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told the large crowd: “Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you.” He followed his teachings to the end.
Right after his wise counselling on forgiveness, Jesus gave the reason for it: “This is what God does. He gives his best – the sun to warm and the rain to nourish – to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that.”
This teaching on God’s allencompassing lovingness resonates deeply with the values of Indian and Chinese civilisations. The Bhagavad Gita, a popular Hindu scripture, says of God: “The same am I to all beings; to me there is none hateful or dear.” The Gita stresses that what really counts is a person’s depth of unity with God and cultivation of a godly character, and not which religion he strongly adheres to (“In whatever way people approach me, even so, do I go to them.” “Even those devotees who, endowed with faith, worship other gods, worship me alone”).
The Tao Te Ching, the principal scripture of Taoism, conveys these important verses on the need to avoid withholding goodness from people that you consider bad: “Heaven and Earth are impartial.” “The good I am good to them, the not good I am also good to them. This is the goodness of nature.” Another verse says: “To all beings, Tao is the hidden secret. It is a treasure to the good and a refuge to the bad. Noble words can bring respect. Noble deeds can bring advancement. But what of the bad person? How could it be that Tao is denied to him?”
‘Forgiveness good for health’
On one occasion, Jesus was asked how many times should a person who hurt you be forgiven. Seven? He replied: “Seven! Hardly. Try seventy times seven.” Earlier, Jesus had made another point: “There is nothing done or said that cannot be forgiven.”
Forgiveness greatly benefits the person who forgives. Clinical and academic psychologists have over many years discovered that forgiving a person who has wronged you is good for your health.
Harbouring bitterness, continually feeling angry, thinking the worst or plotting revenge will raise your blood pressure, damage your heart and
cause bouts of depression, especially if you are no longer young. Instead, wish the offender well and move on.
Do not harbour a grudge, for that is like clutching a durian fruit with your bare hands. You are the one who gets hurt most.
Eight years ago, a Hari Raya Aidilfitri greeting by Tenaga Nasional Berhad conveyed this beautiful sentiment: “Nothing warms the heart quite like forgiveness. Bridging every kind of difference, it restores the bonds between us with ease, assuring all is as it should be. Blissful and blessed.”
Moderation advocates Tawfik Ismail and Anas Zubedy exemplify this sentiment when they called on the people to uphold the virtue of forgiveness and always show mercy when reacting to offences.
In the Hindu scripture Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna teaches: “Vigour, forgiveness, fortitude, purity, absence of hatred, absence of pride – these belong to the one born for a divine state.”
Jesus also taught self-forgiveness, albeit, in a subtle inferential manner. Forgiving yourself for a mistake you have made, some negligence or hurt that you caused someone, is just as important to avoid damaging your health through constant emotional distress when your mind replays the error.
One day, a religious scholar asked Jesus which command in God’s Law is the most important. Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your passion, your prayer and intelligence. This is the first and most important. And the second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’”
‘Love your neighbour’
Note that Jesus likened the attitude of loving your neighbour and yourself to the first command. The scholar pursued his line of questioning and asked Jesus to define the concept of
neighbour. Jesus then told the story of a good Samaritan, an outcaste, who stopped on the highway to help a Jew who had been robbed and injured. He bandaged a person that Samaritans would consider an enemy for disdaining them. Furthermore, he took the victim to an inn and paid for his stay in advance.
You cannot love yourself as fully as you should love your neighbour unless you also forgive yourself for committing transgressions.
In preaching forgiveness, Jesus also made it a point to say: “If you forgive people their trespasses, God will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive people their trespasses, neither will God forgive your trespasses.”
Forgiveness by God is conditional upon you forgiving others. But how can you know that God has granted you forgiveness? You know it when you feel a sense of peace, and peace comes only after you have also forgiven yourself as well.
Does this mean that wrongdoers should be let off? No. To forgive is to show mercy, but mercy does not negate justice. To understand justice, the Sanskrit term karma is helpful. Karma means action and effect, in short, consequence. Every action bears a consequence of equal magnitude.
If humans damage the climate, the consequence is global warming. This consequence is inescapable. Consequences apply to physical and moral actions as both fall under the
ambit of nature. If you steal, you will also lose a valuable some day. If you break a law, the police will come for you and you will either be fined, jailed, or both.
However, you can mitigate the effects of wrongdoing by atoning for it through payment of a compensation or fulfilment of an indemnity condition. If a retail chain store sells a product deemed offensive by the public, it should not just apologise but should go further by immediately donating several thousand ringgit worth of needed supplies for distribution to the destitute.
“There should be no boundaries limiting forgiveness, no matter how unjustly and cruelly you may have been treated by someone. Live for the whole and not just for self, family, race, religion, nation or just for humanity without consideration for wildlife and the planet.
Self-sacrificing for others
Back to the cross. Christians believe that Jesus died as an act of vicarious or substitutionary atonement. This means that he died so that others may live.
Jesus’ self-sacrifice was truly an act of infinite compassion. He had gone to a garden at the foot of a mountain, accompanied by his closest 12 disciples only. It was a rural location suitable for private prayer. But a traitor in the group had disclosed his location to the conspirators. After Jesus had prayed, Roman soldiers and a big-armed mob sent by the chief priests, captains of the temple, and elders came to arrest him. One disciple drew his sword and attacked the servant of the high priest.
However, Jesus stopped the disciple from resisting his arrest. Jesus ordered him: “Put back your sword.”
He was then arrested, brought to trial before the Roman governor and sentenced to death. What if Jesus had allowed his loyal disciples to fight? The likelihood is that all would be killed as they were facing Roman soldiers and a large mob armed with swords and clubs. Jesus would still be arrested.
Furthermore, if any Roman soldier had been killed, the families of these disciples would also be thrown into prison.
Surprisingly as it may seem, the willingness to sacrifice one’s own life to save others is a natural impulse. We know this from testimonies by wildlife observers who have filmed animals offering themselves to be eaten by predators so that their young have a chance to escape.
One sacrifice that made international headlines 10 years ago was the capsizing of the South Korean ferry Sewol. Park Ji-young, the youngest crew member at age 22, gave her life jacket to a passenger. She died while struggling to make sure passengers on the upper floors of the ferry wore life jackets and found their way out. A month later, Ji-young and two other crew members who also gave their lives for passengers were designated martyrs by the South Korean government.
In our own country two months ago, 41-year-old Gillian Donald in Kota Kinabalu dashed into a burning house and rescued seven trapped persons. The hero died from over-inhalation of smoke that suffocated him.
In dying for others, Jesus and these martyrs fulfilled the highest moral potential of life. This is the great ethical message of Good Friday: Live for the whole and not just for self, family, race, religion, nation or just for humanity without consideration for wildlife and the planet.