Political Economist

(3) R.M. Brown

R.M Brown is a Professor of Theology and Ethics at the Pacific School of Religion. As a lifetime theologian and ethical philosopher, he may resolve the questions Simon had to face.

He starts his essay from the memory of a commemoration ceremony he attended in Warsaw in 1979. Even though he admits that the slogan, “never forget, never forgive” should be maintained as a maxim in most human atrocities, he also offers Nelson Mandela’s and Tomas Borge’s sublime attitudes toward their perpetrators as good examples for the possibility of opposite reasoning; in their cases, even though they are not so common, forgiveness sometimes does much more than the simple punishment can.

Based on this preliminary sketch, Professor Brown says that if he were Simon, he “would have urged the dying SS man to address his plea directly to God, and throw himself on the possibility of Divine Mercy.”(123)

This main argument on Simon’s dilemma is based on his own reflections on Elie Wiesel’s theological and ethical questions. According to Professor Brown, Elie Wiesel raised two serious questions in his novel: “Where is God in all these atrocities?” and “what is there left for us to do?”(123-24)

Brown confesses that he could not find any proper answers to these questions. Thus, the only thing he can do is to urge to follow and respect God’s rules without doubting the omnipresence of God. “And if we do so, perhaps, just perhaps, a world will begin to emerge in which we do not have to ask unanswerable questions any longer.”(124)

With respect to Professor Brown’s responses, I wonder whether it was possible for Simon to urge Karl to pray for forgiveness to his God, not to Simon, in that situation. Maybe Karl, the dying SS man, already prayed for absolution to his God. But it might not be sufficient for him to feel that he could die in peace. That was perhaps the reason why he made up his mind to confess his crimes in the face of a Jew, Simon. If that is the case, Professor Brown’s ‘humble opinion’ may not be useful answers or even advice for Simon.

(4) Robert Coles

Robert Coles is a professor of both Psychiatry and Medical Humanities and Social Ethics at Harvard University. As a scholar who has studied ordinary men’s and women’s vulnerable and fragile mentalities, he does not hesitate to recognize Simon’s consistent moral attitude toward the dying SS man.

But if he were in Simon’s shoes, he says, he “would pray for the Lord’s forgiveness” of the dying SS man, even though “he would have turned his eyes away in a tearful rage.”

The reason for this forgiveness is not because he believes that everyone is alike as a “sinner” under God, but because he knows the absolute finiteness of human beings.

This seems to me that we, as ordinary human beings with limitations, don’t have any absolute rights or authority to decide to forgive or not to forgive somebody instead of God.

At any rate, even after he uttered he would have forgiven Karl, he added that he had no “conviction of righteousness.” Robert Coles’ stumbling attitude reminds me of Simon’s silence. In the end, Robert Coles himself may not know how to deal with the dilemma.

(5) The Dalai Lama

The Dalai Lama is one of the most prestigious spiritual leaders of Buddhism not only in his own country, Tibet, but also around the world. After the Chinese government’s invasion and occupation of Tibet, he escaped to India in 1959. Since then he has continued to preach to Tibet people nonviolent and peaceful independence movement.

As a Buddhist spiritual leader, he asserts that we “should forgive persons who have committed crimes against oneself and humankind.”(129) According to him, however, this forgiveness has nothing to do with forgetting those atrocities. Instead, it is necessary not to forget in order to prevent such atrocities from reoccurring. Thus, his opinion to Simon’s dilemma is to forgive, but never forget.