I Beg Your Pardon!
Rabbi Nosson Slifkin
I Beg Your Pardon!
Rabbi Nosson Slifkin
There's a joke going around at the moment about a guy walking down the street who accidentally bumps into Bill Clinton.
"Pardon me," says the guy.
"Sure," says Clinton. "But it'll cost you."
The pardons granted to Marc Rich and other criminals are controversial mainly because of the suspicious motivations involved. Was there a payoff in terms of votes, gifts, or plain money? And how good is Clinton's status as a moral authority?
But there is a more fundamental issue to be considered here, which is whether the concept of a pardon is acceptable at all. Can a crime be erased by anyone?
It is a basic tenet of Judaism that one can always repent for a sin, no matter how grave. As long as one confesses the crime to God, feels remorse, and sincerely resolves not to commit the sin again, one can attain full atonement. If the sin was committed against people, then one must ask forgiveness from the victim first. Provided these stages are performed correctly, forgiveness is guaranteed.
The Talmud even states that when proper repentance has been done, the offenses become like merits; they will spur us on to improve ourselves all the more. And it states that even a fully righteous person does not reach the level of the repentant. Repentance is always possible, and, if performed sincerely, is always effective. True repentance really can erase a sin.
Now for the "but." The Talmud also states that anyone who says that God overlooks things, will have his life "overlooked." This sounds rather harsh! It also seems to contradict everything that we have stated about the value of repentance. Whatever happened to burying the hatchet and letting bygones be bygones?
The answer is that God is not some old man with white beard granting candy floss to do-gooders and zapping lightning bolts at sinners. He is not the god pictured in Far Side cartoons, watching mankind on a bank of monitors and pressing "smite" buttons on his computer. Rather, God has created a certain spiritual structure that operates according to our actions. Reward and punishment are not His arbitrary whims; they are the results of metaphysical processes that our actions launch.
Reward for the righteous is not candy-floss – not even its spiritual equivalent. As far as we can understand it, it is a relationship with God which takes place through the medium of various pan-dimensional spiritual worlds. These worlds are created through our good deeds, and damaged by our sins. Reward and punishment are not handed out by God. They are a supra-physical reality created by our own actions, words, and thoughts.
When the doctor tells you to stay away from cigarettes or you may contract disease, he's not threatening you — he's warning you. When God says that if we sin, we will suffer, He's not threatening us — He's warning us. He's warning us about the harm that our sins will necessarily cause. It's damage that cannot be easily undone.
It is obvious that when one commits a crime against another person, atonement cannot be attained until one makes amends with that person. Stealing cannot be forgiven until one has returned the stolen item. The same is true with crimes against God. When we commit sins, they set a certain negative spiritual process into effect. This cannot simply be waved away, which is why the Talmud emphasizes that God does not overlook things. There is no simple pardon that can wave away the effects of a crime.
This is not to say that one cannot repent. Repentance is always possible, but it works by setting a new metaphysical process into motion that overrides the harmful effects of the sin. It rebuilds the relationship that was damaged.
It's not as though the sin can simply be waved away. All actions, good or evil, have consequences. Sometimes they are visible, sometimes they are invisible. But they always exist.
It's only once we understand that all our actions have consequences that we will start taking responsibility for them. To be sure, we can repent for our crimes, and if we do this properly, we can achieve total forgiveness. But they cannot simply be waved away - not even for money.
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Rabbi Nosson Slifkin lectures on Judaism and the natural sciences at Ohr Somayach Institutions, the Jerusalem Biblical Zoo, and other zoos and natural history museums worldwide. His website is http://www.zootorah.com.
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