Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- The Ethics of Religious Belief: A Recent History
- PART ONE METAPHYSICS: GOD AND CREATURES
- PART TWO EPISTEMOLOGY: GOD AND THE ETHICS OF BELIEF
- PART THREE SOCIAL-POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY: GOD, ETHICS, AND BELIEF
- 8 The Epistemic Authority of Testimony and the Ethics of Belief
- 9 Kant on the Rational Instability of Atheism
- 10 Does Forgiveness Undermine Justice?
- 11 Can Good Christians Be Good Liberals?
- Index
10 - Does Forgiveness Undermine Justice?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- The Ethics of Religious Belief: A Recent History
- PART ONE METAPHYSICS: GOD AND CREATURES
- PART TWO EPISTEMOLOGY: GOD AND THE ETHICS OF BELIEF
- PART THREE SOCIAL-POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY: GOD, ETHICS, AND BELIEF
- 8 The Epistemic Authority of Testimony and the Ethics of Belief
- 9 Kant on the Rational Instability of Atheism
- 10 Does Forgiveness Undermine Justice?
- 11 Can Good Christians Be Good Liberals?
- Index
Summary
Prominent in the ethic of christianity is the declaration that God forgives and justifies the sinner who has faith, and the injunction that we are likewise to forgive those who have sinned against us. The issue I wish to consider in this essay is whether these teachings concerning forgiveness and justification undercut the moral order that Christianity itself affirms.
Jesus often declared to persons in his entourage that their sins were forgiven; his hearers took him to be speaking on behalf of God in doing so. The story of the healing of the paralytic is a good example. The episode is recorded in all four gospels. Here is how Mark tells the story.
When some people carrying a paralyzed man could not bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him; and after having dug through it, they let down the mat on which the paralytic lay. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, “Why does this fellow speak in this way? It is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
(Mark 2:4–7)And just as often as he pronounced God's forgiveness of some sinner, Jesus enjoined his followers to forgive those who had wronged them.
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- God and the Ethics of BeliefNew Essays in Philosophy of Religion, pp. 219 - 247Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005
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