Paul Tillich and Forgetting

I recently finished reading a collection of sermons and meditations by Paul Tillich found in a little book entitled, The Eternal Now. The preface to the book immediately caught my attention in its description of Tillich. Highly attuned to his times, Tillich was convinced that, "the core religious issue of the modern age is raised not, as it had been in past eras, by death or guilt but by all that threatens to make life meaningless" – understandably so, considering his service in the first world war. This makes Tillich particularly relevant for today as well. With the advent of video technology, instant communication, and the overabundance of information about the world, Christianity is stretched to its limits in attempts to explain reality; meaninglessness and the absurd are faith’s biggest opponents. Thus, Tillich’s incredible insight and delicate touch on difficult topics is refreshing. In this collection he discusses, among other things, loneliness and solitude; inequality; and the nature of language and man. If you get a chance, you should pick it up (Note: Some of his implied theology is problematic; most flagrant is a latent universalism that runs throughout).

The first collection of sermons centers on humanity and the complexities of being human, discerning the fears and desires of men with rare clarity. Within this section there is a particular mediation/sermon entitled, Forgetting and Being Forgotten, that offers an incredible description of repentance and forgiveness. Tillich, in a typical german manner, expounds extensively on the word, Forget, and its many derivates. In parsing out Paul's statement, "One thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead", he determines there are at least three types of forgetting. He begins by pointing out that Paul never, in the literal sense, forgets his past – namely, his life as a Pharisee and his persecution of the church. And he is right. Directly before Paul’s statement about forgetting, Paul has written in great detail about his past (phil. 3:1-10). In other letters, such as 1 Timothy, we find more indications that he never truly ‘forgot’ his past. Thus, forgetting here must mean something else.

Tillich explains by expounding on three types of forgetting. First, there is natural forgetting: the unconscious process by which our brains let go of superfluous information (e.x. Last week's weather, the shirt color of a friend seen two days ago). Clearly, this is not what Paul means; his forgetting is active and not passive in nature; his forgetting requires effort, while natural forgetting is an unconscious process, like breathing.

Next, there is repression: the cutting off and suppression of unpleasant and painful memories. Never completely successful, repression has subtle, debilitating effects, marking in crippling ways, and failing to function at the most inopportune times. Paul cannot mean this type of forgetting either. The gospel offers freedom. There is no freedom in repression; one remains chained to the past. How can the experience of the 'up' in the upward call of Christ occur in someone chained to the past? There must be another type of forgetting. Therefore, he proposes a third type; I quote in length:

Then there is a forgetting, to which Paul witnesses, that liberates us not from the memory of past guilt but from the pain it brings. The grand old name for this kind of forgetting is repentance. Today, repentance is assoicated with a half-painful, half-voluptuous emotional concentration on one's guilt, and not with a liberating forgetfulness. But originally it meant a 'turning around', leaving behind the wrong way and turning towards the right. It means pushing the consciousness and pain of guilt into the past, not by repressing it, but by acknowledging it and receiving the word of acceptance in spite of it. If we are able to repent, we are able to forget, not because the forgotten act was unimportant and not because we repress what we cannot endure, but because we have acknowledged our guilt and can now live with it. For it is eternally forgotten. This was how Paul forgot what lay behind him, although it always remained with him.

Here lies one of the most beautiful descriptions of the new life promised to us by Jesus. In spite of our acknowledgement -an active and outward remembrance of our sinful past -, God receives us. This Yes finds its origin in the cross of Christ. And because of this Yes - a yes to our historical being, to our unerasable past - we are able to say yes to ourselves, able to forget the guilt and shame of the past. It is eternally pushed aside by the Christ’s death and resurrection. Hence, another Christian paradox: The believer’s sins are held peacefully as completely forgotten and remembered.

(PS: Thanks TK, if you ever see this, for the book)