Father Dominic Emmanuel

A young man once asked his grandfather about an injustice that had left him enraged. The grandfather admitted that he, too, had felt such rage. “I feel as if I have two wolves fighting in my heart”, he told him. “One wolf is the vengeful, angry, violent one. The other wolf is the loving, compassionate one”.
The grandfather continued, “I, too, at times, have felt great hate for those who have taken so much from my life with no sorrow for what they do. But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die”. When he finished talking, the grandson asked him, “Which wolf will win the fight in your heart?” “The one I feed”, replied the grandfather.
Perhaps it was due to two wolves fighting in the heart of Peter, one of the disciples of Jesus, that he asked Jesus, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times” (Math 18:21-22).
One of the major struggles we often face in our lives is to do with people who need our forgiveness or those from whom we seek forgiveness. Sometimes we find it as difficult to forgive someone as others might find to forgive us for our wrongdoing. Nurturing a grudge against someone, we feel, gives us psychological satisfaction.
A few years ago when Gladys Staines, whose husband Graham and two young sons were burnt to death, appeared before the cameras after the incident and declared that she forgave the murderers, it left everyone stunned. Almost five years later when she decided to go back to her country, one of the leading newspapers carried an Internet survey which asked its readers, “Is the example that Gladys Staines set in India worth emulating?” A substantial 59.23 per cent of readers responded with a firm “No”.
The readers’ answers were born out of their (and our) own human, often extremely painful, experiences, where forgiving someone for such monstrous acts rarely surfaces as an option. Thus one is not surprised when one hears from the family members of the victims of violence that they want the culprit to be punished. As far as law is concerned that is what should, of course, be done.
But whether the law punishes the culprit or not, what happens to the one who suffers the loss and starts building hatred towards the other in one’s heart. And what about those times when issues are more personal than legal? For instance, when we are betrayed by a friend or when a trusted person stabs us in the back or someone whom we have never harmed goes and does terrible things against us. Such incidents, besides leaving us wounded, make us angry, hurt and bitter. We may keep looking for an occasion to pay back the person in the same coin — and this, if we do not take care, can eat us up from within.
King Yudhishthira was asked by Draupadi, referring to the answer of Prahlad to his grandson Vali, “If forgiveness or might was meritorious?” In a rather long response Yudhishthira answered, “O beautiful one, one should forgive under every injury. It has been said that the continuation of species is due to man being forgiving. He, indeed, is a wise and excellent person who has conquered his wrath and shows forgiveness even when insulted, oppressed and angered by a strong person… forgiveness is the might of the mighty; forgiveness is sacrifice; forgiveness is quiet of mind”.
No wonder then that when his disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, Jesus made it a point to make the prayer powerful but also added something to the prayer that would bring great healing: “…And forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us…” and hastened to add, “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Math 6: 12 & 14-15).
Jesus is doing his best to show the importance and, indeed, the usefulness of forgiving others, like the grandfather telling his grandson that “hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die”. Would we really not be creators of an incredible society when we would be able to forgive one another from our heart? And would that not be an ideal recipe worth adopting in the daily menu of life?

— Father Dominic Emmanuel, a founder-member of Parliament of Religions, is currently the director of communication of the Delhi Catholic Church. He was awarded the National Communal Harmony Award 2008 by the Government of India.