Essay Blog on Forgiveness and Eternity:

On the Nature and Essence of Forgiveness and Eternity

The three monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam along with countless other faith traditions and philosophies have sought to address the grand concept of eternity and its central meaning within existence. The task of explaining eternity presents an arduous challenge since its essence is infinitely great for a mere mortal harboring a mind of limited proportions to fully comprehend and appreciate. The eclectic global religions who seemingly borrowing elements from ancient polytheistic mythologies have devised their own narrative accounts of an individual’s ultimate fate upon death usually involving reward or punishment primarily on the basis of karma. Strict adherents of a particular faith would be inclined to defend their religious dogma of an indefinite heaven or hell for those who apparently deserve it. Nevertheless none seem to fully realize what eternity would encompass even if such individuals claim out of sheer vain on the basis of their faith.

The Abrahamic monotheisms possess differing yet similar accounts of reward and punishment upon the death of an individual’s physical body. The idea of heaven is an eternal state of paradise and happiness where those who lead a good and benevolent life are destined for while the idea of hell is a place of eternal torment, agony, misery, and misfortune for the wicked ones who lived a life of sin and evil. Those who are rewarded a place in heaven are eternally blessed while those who are punished in the flames of hell are eternally damned for all of eternity until the end of time. But is it so? Does the human mind really envision an eternity of inflicting everlasting punishment and anguish for those who seemingly deserve it on the basis of their actions they have committed during the course of their limited lifetime? Or as the old and familiar saying goes, does time heal all wounds? Such a thought provoking question begs a serious philosophical discussion.

All of the billions of human beings that have ever been here on Earth, lived only for a limited time. With the exception of some living a little more than a century, no human has ever lived long enough for even an insignificant fraction of a percentage of the four and a half billion year duration of the planet’s existence. Furthermore no single human being ever in all of history has lived or endured a “perfect” life free of guilt and wrongdoing. Every single one of us are guilty of some form of transgression or “sin” as the monotheistic religions would describe in one way or another. The idea that some actions though finite in proportion may warrant an eternity in damnation is one that should be questionable and dealt with by simple common sense.

There are perhaps an endless variety of wrongdoings that the human mind can conjecture. Such wrongs or transgressions can be placed on a spectrum that characterizes the intensity of the offense. They can range anywhere from a simple impolite word to smacking someone across the cheek to robbery to actual murder and even to the most heinous crime which is none other than perhaps genocide. But regardless of the severity of the criminal action, no such ‘evil’ is of infinite proportion. There are undoubtedly crimes that are grotesquely abominable but even the most monstrous and heinous ones are all limited in scope and magnitude. As a knee-jerk reaction to such horrific crimes, it is psychologically common to respond in a way of extreme anger and vetting that often desires and wishes vengeance upon the wrongdoer with expressions that involve the inherent absurdity of eternal damnation.  

The ancient ideologies have beheld a variety of differing principles regarding appropriate punishment towards any individual wrongdoers. The most commonly well-known concept is the law of retaliation or the more familiar phrase “an eye for an eye”. Such a rule was enacted by the ancient Code of Hammurabi which is known to predate the Hebrew bible. The idea was later passed onward for generations to come as its emergence was noted in several biblical verses. Simply put the principle of an “eye for an eye” essentially states that the punishment must fit in proportion and magnitude towards the particular crime. Even if such an ethical precept is assumed to be true, the doctrine itself would effectively and conceptually nullify the biblical rule of eternal damnation. For someone to deserve an eternity of torment, anguish, and punishment would require the individual to commit an offense of infinite proportion for which there is no such thing.

Everyone of us has committed an offense. Perfection is not confined within any particular individual. Every particular wrongdoing we commit is limited and therefore cannot be extended to a perpetual psychological state of forever hating someone. An interesting point to conjecture is that each of our wrongdoings can be idealistically represented by mathematics and to estimate how long each offense could take in principle to actually be forgiven.

For that very reason, it is thereby here assuming that all things are equal in proportions, where I have conceptually concocted a somewhat humorous and simple mathematical equation that can estimate the approximate duration of time it would theoretically take to forgive a crime, specifically one that involves the wrongdoing of homicide. The equation is preceded by a formal theorem that I have mentally self-conceived. The theorem which is known as the Forgiveness Theorem harbors two central axioms.

The Forgiveness Theorem:

1. No crime or wrongdoing is infinite in scope and proportion. All crimes and wrongdoings are finite in magnitude.

2. Given enough time any crime committed or even imagined is theoretically capable of being forgiven by anyone.

The equation therefore is as follows:

Time duration for Forgiveness  =  Number of Victims  x  Number of Years to forgive per victim.

Let us assume for the sake of argument that some stranger murdered someone I knew and loved whether it be a relative or a friend. How many years will it take me to forgive? Honestly speaking for virtually any average person, it will be probably take at most a hundred years to forgive another for murdering one particular person. In that case, one should theoretically ‘forgive’ the transgressor after a mere century. For two victims it would take two centuries, for ten a thousand years, and so on. Yet the average person can often be heard replying “I’ll never ever forgive the person who killed my family member! I hope that person will burn in hell for all of eternity!” But will the victim’s relative really out of sheer vengeance or desire wish an ‘eternity’ of torment upon the wrongdoer for just a single crime of murder? It could be that perhaps when someone insists “I’ll never ever forgive” is really just another way of greatly exaggerating their true intentions of saying that “I will not forgive you for a very very long time”. Desiring and wishing an eternity of endless torture, pain, misery and agony upon someone else is infinitely worse than the crime that the individual inflicted upon in the first place.

Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945)

To further explore this conceptual equation formula, let’s consider a thought experiment by applying it to perhaps the most vile, vicious, heinous, and despicable human being to ever walk the Earth. That person who easily comes to mind is that insane shithead and disgusting animal from Austria who is none other than the all-powerful fuhrer of Nazi Germany or the Third Reich, Adolf Hitler! The existence of Hitler, who in his finite lifetime initiated the second World War and was the central force behind one of the largest and horrific genocides in modern history that is the Holocaust poses an extreme scenario behind this conundrum of eternity and justice. Without question his crimes were beyond reprehensible and appalling to human imagination and would easily nominate him for the supreme douchebag of the universe who is most deserving of an everlasting eternity of divine punishment! But even Hitler’s crimes which involved millions of deaths in the Holocaust as well as millions more in World War II, are finite in proportion. Statistics indicate that anywhere from 50 million to perhaps 85 million people perished during the Second World War including the victims of the Holocaust. Assuming that for each and every single life lost it will take a century to forgive, the hypothetical ‘forgiveness equation’ would calculate an approximate average of about 5 to 8 ½ billion years to forgive. Though several billion years is an unfathomably long period of time, it is never close enough in the slightest amount to what the full extent of ‘eternity’ would entail. The average person would often express his or her utmost hatred towards Hitler and his minions by saying something like: “Hitler and the Nazis were evil scumbags who will never be forgiven! I hope they all burn in hell and get tortured by Satan and his demons forever and ever and ever for the rest of eternity!!” The central problem behind this banal pattern of thinking lies within the context of eternity. Since it is impossible for a mere mind to grasp the concept of eternity in its entirety, no mortal could ever possibly imagine an eternity of endless torture.

If one would possibly object to the obvious fact that eternity itself carries forth a paradox then consider the following imaginative scenario involving Hitler himself. After being cast into the realm of hellfire that will leave him with a punishment of terrible agony, torture and pain, he is left there for an unimaginably long period of time.

One hundred billion years later! I mean that in the literal sense of the term! A period of 100 billion (100,000,000,000) years, which is several times the current age of the universe (13.7 billion years) passes by. Imagine enduring that length of time. One surely would be incapable of grasping what it will be like to experience such a prodigiously lengthy duration of time to flow by unless one single-handedly experiences it first-hand. At this point the Sun has long since burned out tens of billions of years earlier. The Earth assuming it still exists is now nothing but a cold deserted and barren wasteland. The Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies have merged together long ago. The distant galaxies beyond the Milky Way and local group have expanded way beyond the cosmic horizon and are no longer visible within the scope of the observable universe. The descendants of mankind if they are still on the radar have most likely colonized the entire observable universe several times over.

Two individuals walk past the chamber of hellfire and witness Hitler burning there. It has been a hundred billion years since the last time they saw him.

Individual A says: “Hey look it’s Hitler! That despicable bastard! Do you remember what he did a hundred billion years ago?!! That is World War 2 and the Holocaust?!!”

Individual B (Looking confused): “Eh... wait what? World War 2? The holo...what? I don’t remember any of that or such a thing at all. In fact I’ve forgotten anything from even a billion years ago, never mind a hundred! Can you please remind me again why is he still being tortured?”

Individual A: “Oh yeah I don’t remember either but who cares let’s still torture him baby! Right on!”

Individual B:  “Um...sure ok...even though I don’t see any purpose at this point on.”

Individual A: “There is most certainly no purpose from now on, but he still must burn for eternity! Just keep him there to fry and suffer!”

Individual B: “Ok but...I fail to see any point to his continued suffering.”

Individual A: “Just keep on burning and torturing him goddamn it! It’s that simple!”

The scenario described would clearly be problematic on so many levels. First of all, is it remotely possible that these two random individuals will remember anything from billions of years ago? Common sense can easily indicate that it is highly unlikely that even Hitler’s name will be faintly recognized to say the least. Although one could still in principle argue that some crimes can never in fact be redeemed regardless of the amount of time endured, it is far more probable that crimes or wrongdoings will rather be forgotten instead of merely being forgiven eventually after the passing of enough time. As the old metaphorical saying goes, “Time heals all wounds” or are there exceptions to the age old phrase? Anyone with the slightest amount of basic reasoning can perceive the situation involving the reaction of the two random individuals especially the first one to be inherently fallacious. A hundred billion years is an incomprehensibly long period of time that a mind cannot fully understand unless one literally experiences it. No one by definition has the authority to describe enduring an extraordinary period of eons on the magnitude unless one has genuinely experienced it flow by.

Strict religious fundamentalists would be enthusiastic to defend the idea of an eternal hell often adhering to their sacred texts and would passively search for biblical verses in defense of their extreme sadistic views. But it is highly unlikely that even the most ardent religious fanatic would sincerely believe in a vicious idea of an eternity of everlasting damnation. If one would still object then let’s consider an extension to the original scenario itself.

Eventually another 100 billion years passes by! This essentially adds up to a total of 200 billion years of torture and torment for Hitler! At this point the problem is clearly self-evident. Isn’t 200 billion years of suffering for Hitler excessive and enough? Nothing lasts forever. Eventually everything must come to an end including an individual’s suffering and torment. The same two individuals reappear and their upcoming response is one of hysteria and interesting.

Individual A: “Well look what we have here! It’s um...yea Hitler! That worthless son of a bitch deserves what he’s receiving for the way he treated his victims in World War 2 and the Holocaust!”

Individual B: “Dude what in bejesus name is World War 2 and the Holocaust?! When the heck did such a thing even happen? How do you even remember such a thing?! I don’t remember any of those at all! Yo man this shit ain’t cool anymore! Yo ding dong yo!”

Individual A: “I...but...I....hey I actually....think you’re right....buddy pal...this shit definitely ain’t cool at all. Yo ding dong yo!”

Individual B: “I think we should just forgive him and let him off. All of his victims whoever they were have long since forgiven him and they’re up there in heaven now hoping to reconcile. I think God himself would forgive him.”

Individual A: “Yea I agree. Let’s just forgive him baby!”

The two individuals walk to the chamber where Hitler is. They release him and all three hug each other.

Individual A: “Listen whoever you are Hitler, we forgive you. Whatever you did it was a shit long time ago! We forgive you now.”

Individual B: “I’m sure everyone else who suffered from you has long since forgiven you.”

Hitler: “I’ve finally repented many billions of years ago. I have been awaiting for this moment to reconcile to heaven and all of the victims who suffered at my inhumanity.”

The two individuals and Hitler go back to heaven and all of the victims of World War 2 and the Holocaust from billions of years ago have reconciled and are thus forgiven. God finally granted Hitler amnesty for his sins committed eons ago.

So there we have it. If an unimaginable monster and disgusting evil individual like Hitler does not deserve eternity in torment then who does? The most assured answer is that no one deserves to be punished and tortured endlessly regardless of the crimes committed. Nobody deserves an eternity of everlasting torment for a finite lifetime of wrongdoings. Not you, not me, not that jerk who you hate, not Hitler, and not even the Devil/Satan. An eternity of punishment is infinitely immoral and unjust. 

No actually if 200 billion years of torture isn’t enough for Hitler how about 500 trillion years? What about 700 quadrillion? If not how about 100 quintillion? Why not wait until the final supermassive black hole evaporates in a googol (10^100) years from now?

Take a minute and sit back and try to grasp exactly what “eternity” even means. Don’t try it! I repeat do not even try it! Do not even try to try to pretend to understand “eternity”! Imagine billions of years followed by hundreds of trillions and quadrillions and quintillions of years passing by and nowhere are you near eternity! Multiply that by a googol years and even by a googolplex (10^googol) and nowhere are you near eternity! The concept of eternity is patently absurd and serves as an embarrassing and humiliating theme for monotheistic religions to even attempt to address to its followers! 

Consider the list of victims to see how long it could theoretically take to forgive a list of some of the worst crimes ever committed in the history of humanity. The simple idea is that all crimes regardless of the severity or heinousness are limited and therefore forgivable after enough time passes by.

Below is a Table chart of some of the worst crimes and the approximate time duration for forgiveness:

Name of Crime/Perpetrator	Number of Victims	Time to forgive (100 years/victim)	Time to forgive (1,000 years/victim)
Suicide bombings	~50-100	5,000 – 10,000 years	50,000 – 100,000 years
Oklahoma City Bombing (Timothy McVeigh)	168	16,800 years	168,000 years
9/11 attacks (Osama Bin Laden)	~3,000	300,000 years	3 million years
Saddam Hussein’s Regime crimes	~100,000 – 300,000?	10 – 30 million years	100 – 300 million years
Idi Amin’s Regime crimes	~300,000 – 500,000	30 – 50 million years	300 – 500 million years
The Holocaust (Hitler and the Nazis)	~11-17 million	1.1-1.7 billion years	11-17 billion years
Genghis Khan’s Mongol Conquests	~45 million	4.5 billion years	45 billion years
Stalin’s Communist Regime	~30 to 60 million	3 – 6 billion years	30 – 60 billion years

One of the early Christian theologians, Origen of Alexandria expressed belief in a doctrine known as Apocatastasis in which he himself devised. The theological principle stresses that eventually after enough time, all sinners and wrongdoers including the devil and his fallen angels will be restored to grace and be reconciled with all others in heaven. The torment and fires of hell are not eternal but rather corrective in punishment much analogous to the process of purifying gold. Other Christian thinkers including St. Gregory of Nyssa and Clement of Alexandria expressed similar beliefs in universal reconciliation.

In order for anyone to sincerely believe that a place like hell even if it exists is truly and literally everlasting with no shred of hope of redemption for any crime or wrongdoing of finite proportion, one must believe that no matter for how long whether it be until every star burns out in the universe in a 100 trillion years or until the last supermassive black hole evaporates via hawking radiation (after a googol or 10¹⁰⁰ years), or even until the literal absolute end of space and time after endless eons, that the transgressor will never be pardoned even after having repented and asked for forgiveness trillions of times over where his or her victims have long since forgiven the transgressor. My personal take is that only a non-existent being of infinite psychopathy and lunacy could possibly believe and firmly hold unto such an absurd nonsense.