The New Science of Forgiveness

On this Yom Kippur, literally a day of wiping: a day of wiping away our sins, we confess communally for every human sin that anyone may commit. And shortly we will read that Aaron, the Kohen Gadol, the High Priest, had an obligation each Yom Kippur to atone for himself, his household, and for all the Israelite nation. In the ancient sacrificial service, which was the way our ancestors drew near to God, each time a person brought any offering – even of grain or wine or oil, they placed their hands on or above the offering and confessed. This was the most important part of the offering, the confession. Our sage Maimonides taught us about atonement, which truly means at-ONE-ment. Maimonides said in his work, Mishneh Torah, that the first stage of repentance is acknowledging something we’ve done and discontinuing it. The second stage is confessing it with an attitude of regret, and evaluating its negative impact on you and others. And finally, resolving not to do it anymore. This afternoon we will read the Holiness code from Leviticus, which tells us not to take revenge or bear a grudge. We are, then, asked to forgive each other. Friedrich Nietsche said, “it is much more agreeable to offend and later ask forgiveness than to be offended and grant forgiveness.” And yet, this is what God asks us to do – to forgive each other, as Moses told us repeatedly – for our own benefit.

Rabbi Zalman Schacter Shalomi of blessed memory, tells a wonderful story. When he would do a wedding, he would ask the family to assemble and then he performed a forgiveness ritual, because in every family it’s nearly impossible that there be no hurts, resentments, disappointments, or grudges from the past. So too, on this day, we have an opportunity to enter the New Year without the baggage and weight of past slights and injuries. At one of Rabbi Zalman’s weddings, there was a little girl who wanted to know how to do forgiveness. He said to her: “can you imagine that you have a beautiful shiny white dress on and here comes this big clump of mud and dirties it? You would want to clean it off, wouldn‘t you? Oh, yes!” She said. “Could you imagine then, instead of the mud being on the outside on your dress, the mud is on your heart? I sure want to get rid of that,” she said. He suggested that she close her eyes and draw down some golden light and let it flow over the mud on her heart until it was all washed away. This sounds so easy, and we all know it is not. Even those we have forgiven intellectually, we may not have totally forgiven emotionally – that when we think of that person, there is still some negativity there, in thinking about them. And to be honest, sometimes it feels good to be the injured party – to feel that we are right, and know the other person was wrong. It helps us to maintain our good opinion of ourselves.

Did you know that there is a new science of forgiveness? It’s what a psychologist friend of mine used to call Grandma research – research proving something your grandmother could have told you. Doctors and researchers are now studying forgiveness. And here is what they have found. Charlotte van Oyen Wilvliet found that not forgiving resulted in higher blood pressure and heart rate; the subjects sweated more and experienced more stress. Another researcher found more cortisol in subjects’ saliva. McCullogh and Rachal found negative indicators for physical, mental and spiritual health. Toussaint found higher instances of hostility and type A behavior, while Worthington & Scherer, in a review of the scientific literature, found that not forgiving compromised the immune system at many levels, disrupting the production of important hormones, interfering with the way cells fight of infections, bacteria, and even periodontal disease. Dr. Karen Swartz at Johns Hopkins University Hospital urged people to forgive. She said, “do it for yourself.”

Because God is One and we are part of that Universal Oneness, we can’t do anything truly good or bad that does not affect ourselves, others, the world: the whole. Think, if you will, of all the figurative mud that we, all the people on this earth, are carrying around from year to year; how much of a burden for ourselves and the world that we manufacture and maintain unnecessarily. Caroline Myss, a spiritual teacher, has spoken about the experience of a hurt an insult, or a slight. She said that someone taught her that in the moment of the hurt, in the person who was hurt, the insult brought up that same ugliness in the recipient. In other words, we experience in ourselves the capability of inflicting the same damage or even more damage to someone else, and we hate that in ourselves. Therefore, one reason to forgive, among many, is to do it out of a desire never to want to do that very thing to anyone else and never to hate, as we will hear this afternoon, (Levit. 19) “Do not hate your brother in your heart.”

Another interesting fact concerning forgiveness research is that Worthington and Wade found that forgiveness takes time. The amount of time a person spent trying to forgive was highly related to the degree of forgiveness that person experienced. So it’s something we have to work at. In one sense, it is learned behavior and there are many levels of forgiveness. We may forgive someone and find that there is residual hatred or pain or anger there. We can look back to Moses Rabbenu, our teacher, and of course to God, who told us that forgiveness is good for us. Indeed, it is holy work. It allows us to live more in the present, that sacred spiritual moment of Now; to live a happier life; and if the researchers are correct, a healthier life, body, mind, and soul. In the 13 attributes of God, which the Divine Presence spoke to Moses as a gift, during their most intimate encounter in Exodus, God said, I am gracious, and compassionate, slow to anger, forgiving and cleansing. We were given these attributes that we might imitate them and become just a little more like God, who forgives us continually. Let us, for the sake of life itself, dedicate ourselves to forgiving, being in this way, most like God, and bringing goodness to ourselves and others.
Given on Yom Kippur 2016